Guitarator » Software

New sound for Chord Designer & Chorderator

eddie — Thu, 15 May 2008 20:59:58 +0000

Apparently, there is some skill involved in creating musical samples. For my Chord Designer and Chorderator web-apps, I originally created the samples from scratch by manually playing every note on the guitar fretboard. Unfortunately, these didn't sound great when combined into arbitrary chords, since the timing and intonation were subtly off.

To fix this, I've completely redone the generated sounds. I think they sound a lot better now. You should also notice a difference in my ear training tools: the Interval Quiz and the Chord Recognition Quiz.

The Chorderator is my free online application that shows you how to play any chord you can think of, in any tuning. In standard tuning, you can also hear what the generated chord shapes sound like. (If you want to listen to chords in other tunings, including bass guitar and banjo [along with a ton more features], you can purchase my Guitarator Toolbox downloadable application.)

The Chord Designer is a sort-of "reverse Chorderator," which lets you place notes on a virtual fretboard to design a new chord, listen to it, and see what it's called.

Here are the gory technical details: The chord audio files are generated on the fly using a back-end python script. The script creates a MIDI file to feed to the TiMidity++ softsynth application which converts the audio to a WAV file, which is then fed to the LAME MP3 encoder to convert it to MP3 format. This is then played in your web browser using Jeroen Wijering's Flash Media Player. Phew!

I hope you enjoy the new sounds.

Guitarator Toolbox now available for purchase

eddie — Thu, 01 May 2008 04:00:17 +0000

The beta test period has been completed for the Guitarator Toolbox application software. For $17.99, you can download it today at store.guitarator.com.

The Guitarator Toolbox is an application for Microsoft Windows that allows you to look up any chord or scale you can dream up, find the proper fingerings in any tuning, and hear what they sound like.

Introducing the Guitarator Toolbox, Beta version

eddie — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 16:48:29 +0000

Note: The Beta trial is completed. You can now purchase Guitarator Toolbox final.

I'm seeking beta testers for my new Guitarator Toolbox application software. The Guitarator Toolbox is an application for Microsoft Windows that allows you to look up any chord or scale you can dream up, find the proper fingerings in any tuning, and hear what they sound like.

For a limited time, I am offering a free download of the Guitarator Toolbox. All you need to do is register. After the initial testing phase, the software will be available for sale.

Find out more