While I have been learning cantible and capturing my playing of a melody
I had the idea of the metronome having additonal accents.
I perhaps next to the metronome beat balance knob there could be a little
button to add or customize the accents.
Click the button and a little window pops up with a line of dots which lights up a given colour for where you want the accents. Say in 4/4 time, first accent on the first beat, then the second (not so loud) accent in on the third beat (like a march rythym then) or anywhere you want. Or if playing something in 7/8, have an accent on 1-3-6-7 or 1-3-5-6.
Any thoughts on this, is this a worthy idea to anyone?
I 100% agree. Plus an option to have double time in the metronome compared to time sig of song would be helpful imo. In my case it helps me lock to a pocket.
Another cool way to get custom metronomes is to make some MIDI files and add them to a Media Playerās playlist. You can output to a simple pair of click tones or to an entire drum set that way! Set the sync to the transport and away you go! I just send the output to the headphones only.
I couldnāt have pulled off my multi-arpeggiator shows without that custom click in my in-ears!
This could work also. However sometimes I cant predict what Iām playing or noodling, therefore cant make a midi file beforehand ready to go. There is one song song i did years ago that worked out being every 4th bar was 5/4 in the chorus, no 16 beats to 4 bars it was 17 instead.
My idea was, Iāve decided I want this particular rythym then play around with a few
ideas to that rythym with out having any extra work like making a midi file for
custom accents. I think it would simplify the process (or the workflow people call it) of catching ideas when they happen. when there is the addition of the auto record feature, it makes this i beleive a brilliant tool I havenāt seen anywhere else.
I understand that. I wasnāt suggesting this try be a daw. While your practicing, it might be handy to have a metronome which can have added emphasis on any given beats, nothing more. If anything this could help a performance.
even if I agree with @The_Elf in principle, I find your approach interesting. However: especially the last aspect would be quite complex (the patterns would have to have a maximum selectable length of up to 17 - in practice probably more up to 32 beats, which is what is common in sequencers).
On the other hand, this is for me already performance and less DAW operation. However, I would rather do something like that with Ableton on a clip basis. Maybe MuLab 9 could be a VST solution in Cantabile in the medium term:
What I could also imagine would be the static approach that you initially described, with the ability to call ad hoc different patterns by binding. But then the question is whether this is not beyond the scope and should really be part of Cantabile.
One last impulse (and then Iāll shut up): if I want to do something more complex (also such odd patterns) is to āabuseā a percussion machine like Stylus or Nerve as a plug. This is usually very fast and you could also put such a plug in a rack and store the most used patterns as states - then they would be available on click. No idea if this fits into your workflow - just an idea.
The nicest thing about the Media Player MIDI files idea is that it can be a growing library that you can always insert into any performance, or even house it in a rack. It is completely flexible and is not ever limited by the programās built-in metronomic capabilities.
+1 for both ideas.
Iād find it useful to have accent controls on the metronome.
Iāve been in situations where Iāve had to practice something in 7/4 and having the accents would really help.
