Capo Voicings

Jega777

Hi Peter, many thanks for he update to Stagetraxx 3 and first off great job all round you've given us a great app here.
I wondered now you've added the ability for the chords to self transpose with the key change (a superb feature thank you) would it be at all possible to add capo voicing so the chords also changed if you instructed which fret you were placing the capo onto?

Many thanks Jeff.

peter

I'm afraid I don't play guitar and have no idea how the calculation would look like for this. Do you know of any app that does this?

Jega777

Hi many thanks for the swift response, 'OnSong' does the capo transposition, but they don't transpose the tracks just the chords.
I Use Onsong for my band work for this reason (where a track doesn't need to be attached) and Stagetraxx for any 'track related' playback such as solo or duo work, but I much prefer your interface and for use with tracks Stagetraxx 3 is the best out there, in my opinion.
It was purely a suggestion which would just make life very eas, for me, if it could be done and now the chord transposition is in place I though maybe a similar formula may work for capo if maybe for example on the track menu near the pitch and speed controls you could just do a Capo control which you could manually change to off / capo1 / capo 2/ etc and the chords would change in sequence to your selected capo position.
However, having said all that and putting my idea to you, it may not be as simple as that to work into the app and I am no expert in that field, so it is just a suggestion and in the meantime I can re edit the chords to the capo position and it will work, but it was just me being lazy really and if the app did it for me it would save a little time re scripting the chord names.
But many thanks for this app, it really is the best in my opinion and your customer service and relations is definitely the best by far, many thanks for listening to our ideas and incorporating many of them and always responding to us.
Best wishes Jeff.

peter

Just to be clear. What does capo position 1 mean? Are chords transposed by one semitone up?

Jega777

Attached a capo chart which will explain it much better and more simply than I can with an explanation many thanks and I really appreciate you looking into this to see if it’s possible.
thanks Jeff.

Jega777

Original chord would be no capo and then capo one is capo placed on fret 1 of the guitar etc....

peter

OK, so Capo x means transpose down by x semitones. Well that it easy to do but the question is how to integrate it into the UI. This is a rather special feature for guitar players. All other instruments don't need it. So I would not want it taking up space in the main UI.

Jega777

Hi many thanks for the reply.
Could it be placed near the pitch and speed sliders in the song menu and auto set to off or 0 then it wouldn’t effect any other instrumentation and only stringed instruments such as guitar/mandolin/ banjo/ ukulele will be able to manually set it as with pitch/ speed control to use it?
And it would only affect that particular song that it’s manually selected in as you wouldn’t need it on for every song as with pitch and speed controls.
but the placement in the app and whether you feel it is worth adding is completely up to you, I really appreciate you taking the time to look into it and I respect wherever you decide, I just feel it is a feature I would use and could be handy for anyone else playing stringed instruments.
many thanks Jeff.

peter

Yes, that is a reasonable place for this feature. I will add this to my todo list for version 3.3. I can't do this earlier because it needs changes in the database structure which I limit to the bigger updates.

Beejaywh

peter Peter, this will be really good in two ways. Firstly, I love the transpose feature but as someone who has already manually inserted chords into a previously transposed track. Now they are out due to the blanket transpose on or off. By having a capo function effectively allows me to alter the transpose on individual tracks. Probably not well explained but basically it will help me so I look forward to it.

perhaps more appealing is that this will help musicians other than guitarists ie brass and woodwind players. E.g. some saxes are tuned so that if the song is in Bb they will play in C, +2 semitones, (soprano and tenor saxes) or if a song is in Eb an alto or baratone sax will play in C, -3 semitones, so it will allow them to easily transpose by using the capo function. Other instruments are tuned to F too. This will be really good where you are using the network function.

So please do incorporate this in the next update as it will open many doors for much more than guitarists using a capo.

Jega777

That’s awesome thank you so much and you are a star many thanks Jeff.

ROrsten

I realize this is an old thread but I am wondering if the Capo function has been added. I am brand new to the app and I am loving it.
I have come from the Linksoft Songbook world. Also a good product with good support but Stage Traxx has some features that I am loving.

For clarity on the Capo issue, using Linksoft lets say I am playing a song in the Key of Bb, a somewhat awkward key in guitar. If I put a Capo on the first fret I can play the song using my open A shape which is very comfortable on guitar. So in Songbook the Song is in Bb and the song is shared to all of the musicians in my band (keys and bass), they all see the chords in the root Bb. Each songbook user has a user ID to identify who is using the app. My user name is Rod. The text at the start of the song we use to identify the Capo is - {Capo-Rod: 1}. This transposes the chords on my tablet only to show the song in A. It does not change the pitch of the song, only the chords on my display are in A, the rest of the band sees a Bb.

I was very impressed when the Songbook app had this feature. I realize not everyone is a guitar player but remember we are the noisiest and most annoying!!

I am just learning the app and starting to change the formatting of my songs to switch over. Perhaps the Capo feature is there already as this thread is 5 years old.

I am super impressed and will be coming over as a customer regardless of the Capo functionality being available. Hats off to you for an amazing app. Wish it was available on Android but I do have an ipad kicking around.

Best regards

peter

Sorry, the Capo feature is not yet there. I have indeed removed the todo list entry again as I was not sure why it is such a big deal to have a user interface element allowing you to select "Capo 1" instead of selecting "Transpose -1" which is the more generic notation for the same thing in my opinion.

Beejaywh

But we do still have the transpose feature in semitones (capo by another name) so if you’d want to put the capo on the 2nd fret then you take it up two semitones in the transpose chords area so it’s well worth purchasing and using the app.

I can see why you would use it as when we put a capo onto the neck we guitarists think of the shape we are playing rather than the voicing so with a capo onto the 2nd fret we’d think and refer to, for instance, a D shape as D even though the voicing is an E. Moving the capo to the fifth fret we’d still refer to the shape as a D even though it’s playing a G.

So to get the ‘transpose’ to work as a capo we’d actually transpose down in semitones so it would display a D

Makes perfect sense to me lol

Jega777

Hi, The area in the transpose chords section of the song menu is as good as a capo position editor. This was the compromise that Peter included after our initial discussion and it works fine. select "Apply pitch the chords" and then use the slider to select a minus number and that corresponds to the fret capo position and the chords displayed on screen will be the position you play :-) (so -1 = capo on fret 1, -2 = capo on fret 2, etc...) I use this feature when I want to capo a song and it works fine and saves the position once changed, so you only have to find the position once - I then just mark not he lyric screen my capo position and happy days :-)

ROrsten

Thanks for the replies.
The transpose will change the song keys very well but it also changes the key of the backing track, that makes it unusable by a guitar player who wants to open style chords in different keys which is a very common requirement for country music. I started playing mostly rock and always thought capos were just a crutch however when I started playing for professional country artists I quickly learned that I needed a capo to achieve the open chord sounds in various keys.
On our Songbook app (which I am moving from) we can live share (similar to the function you have) a song between the guitar, bass and keys. If one of the guitar players elect to play with a capo and different chord shapes. Only his Ipad displays the chords in the alternate key. the rest of the band follows the song in the original key. So really all the capo settings do is change the chords of the song on that players display.
I appreciate that you are considering adding some capo function in the future so I thought I would just add some clarification. I hope it helps. If it would be of further help for me to send you some video clip examples or further clarifications just let me know. I would be happy to help out. You have done some amazing work and the functionality I am finding in your product far outweigh the few "nice to have" features I am missing.

Jega777

This is already in place I have attached the pic to highlight it - the Pitch and speed circled in green will change the musical pitch of the track, but below, circled in red, is to transpose the chords so -1 is capo fret 1 , -2 is capo fret 2 and so on…. This doesn’t change the track pitch only the written chords to a capo’d position in relation to the minus number = the capo fret. I use it all the time and it works fine. I’m a country music musician also and so I understand the necessity to be able to capo certain songs to get the open positions and this will be work 👍🏻🤠 hope it helps and happy playing 👍🏻🤠

ROrsten

Jega777 Thanks so much for taking the time the clarify this! I totally missed this! This solves my concerns for playing solo.

For playing with a band (Yes I run tracks with full bands for some songs, guilty!):
One more button to select if you want to keep these changes local to one player or broadcast them over when hosting a session and we would be 100% there. Possibly I am also missing this too??

I am loving this app!!

Jega777

To have the different pads display the different capo positions in a joined session, you just need to share the song files to the pads and then use local lyrics setting and it will display the setting you choose in a session as you want it displayed even if you are not the host - again I use this all the time where I capo for synth but my lead man doesn’t so I just share that song to his iPad with airdrop and remove the capo position on his iPad of that song. Then when you join a session and share the host screen it picks up you “local lyrics” and only displays your choice - but it has to be the same file name etc so make sure you airdrop the exact file you use and then you can activate local lyrics and the songs you have in the pad will be different to the host pad but the host pad will still control the song in all other aspects.
It really is a superb app and Peter has put all of this in place.
I’m sure if you look into it you will find it already does exactly what you are looking to do. 👍🏻🤠

Details to use own lyrics at the bottom of this page in the manual 👍🏻👍🏻
https://stagetraxx.com/user-guide/network-sessions/

ROrsten

Jega777 Thanks!! You have done some amazing work with the app. That solution certainly works if you are always playing with the same bandmates and can spend the time to get the lyrics configured for each player to host locally.
For me I will play with a host of bands, sometimes with little notice. I would love to be able to tell the players to just purchase the app and for them to have the ability to follow the setlist and songs right out of the gate.
The host of a session (myself usually) could set a capo position, see the adjusted chords but transmit the song in the original chords. For people joining the session displaying the original chords would be perfect. Their systems do not need to be configurable.

Thanks again for your help with this!