Solo app

[Boudoir Guitar]

Anybody used this? Downloaded it yesterday.

I took some lessons from a Berkeley grad jazz head last year that were semi-helpful in some areas, but mostly were just a matter of "yeah, uh, you've got killer time-feel and phrasing buuuuut, you need to go spend a few months memorizing stuff you should have memorized years ago."

Want to use this to truly memorize notes of fretboard and to more firmly embed various chord shapes in my head in terms of which string is root, which is 3rd, which is 9th, etc.

 

[yeky83]

I downloaded it a long time ago and never used it... let me know if it works for you!

 

[Sascha Franck]

Interested in your findings, too. Usually, I don't give much about such apps as I think there's more efficient ways, but from one video I watched, this looks at least sort of interesting.

 

[mbenigni]

I don't actually know what we're talking about, and "solo" makes for a lousy Google search. Anybody have a link? Or is this an iOS/ Android sort of thing?

 

[Sascha Franck]

Anybody have a link? Or is this an iOS/ Android sort of thing?

sølo

www.solotrainer.app

 

[mbenigni]

Thank you!

 

[mbenigni]

I bought this last night and started using it right away. It's a great practice tool. I've barely scratched the surface, but just launching it, picking some settings at random, and setting it on repeat for 15 minutes or so made for an excellent warm up. This will def. be great for those nights when I know I need to practice but I have absolutely no sense of direction, and don't entirely feel like picking up the guitar in the first place. Gets you going in a structured way, and within a few minutes your hands and ears are in a place where you do want to play.

From a strictly technical standpoint, and compared with the rest of the iOS "economy", I can't help but feel like this app is a little overpriced at $15. It's almost entirely comprised of stock, old school iOS menu objects and public domain chord sequences. I feel like, at this price point, a few more bells and whistles could have been incorporated, e.g. a tuner, a metronome, the ability to have the app play back the chords indicated as you play notes over them. As is, it's a really bare-boned text-based app (with audio input note detection.)

Having said that, and speaking in more absolute terms, I like it, I think it will do me some good, and it costs what I'd spend on a few cups of coffee. You're really paying for the ideas here, and while none of those ideas are unique to this program, they are well-organized and presented. Good stuff.

 

[Eagle]

Nothing you can’t do on paper and I hate trying to look at a screen when I am trying to play. You need the theory down to attempt to use it. Nothing good will happen in your improvisation if you are in any way having to think about this while playing.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Nothing good will happen in your improvisation if you are in any way having to think about this while playing.

Well, I think random chords thrown at you are a cool practising tool, though (no idea whether the app does that) - but I think it's even better in case there's nothing written down. Two different pair of shoes of course. I often get confronted with both live, by playing tunes I never played before prima vista or by some folks just playing things their way without any sheets.
In case the app does both of these, I'd consider it useful.

 

[Eagle]

If someone throws chords at you without you knowing them in advance then you will need to identify them and play accordingly but this isn’t going to be good unless you have perfect pitch and are instantly familiar with appropriate scales and arpeggios.

 

[Eagle]

Having nothing written down is the best way if you know the changes . You can think about making melodies. When you write words you don’t think about grammar and spelling you just tell the story. But you still need the grammar and spelling to be correct. The best part about being a guitarist is you never finish learning. I spent the first 10 years frantically learning techniques and the next 30 learning what to do with it and I am no nearer to finishing than I was when I started.

 

[Sascha Franck]

If someone throws chords at you without you knowing them in advance then you will need to identify them and play accordingly but this isn’t going to be good unless you have perfect pitch and are instantly familiar with appropriate scales and arpeggios.

Well, it's part of my job. And no, I don't have perfect pitch but pretty good relative pitch.

 

[mbenigni]

Well, I think random chords thrown at you are a cool practising tool, though (no idea whether the app does that) - but I think it's even better in case there's nothing written down. Two different pair of shoes of course. I often get confronted with both live, by playing tunes I never played before prima vista or by some folks just playing things their way without any sheets.
In case the app does both of these, I'd consider it useful.

The app will throw a number of different chord sequences at you, or the chords from a library of standards that are included, and ask that you play the corresponding intervals. Which intervals can be configured, e.g. 1 3 5, 1 3 5 7, chord scale, etc. Many variations. There's a separate set of scale modes as well.

What @Eagle says is true, of course: there's little value in this if you don't have some theory and context going in. But the whole point is to get you playing these intervalic functions without relying as heavily on the scales and arpeggios that may have become habitual. There's a bunch of YouTube content describing ways to best approach the material; the app itself won't do anything to prevent you from falling back to lazy habits after a short while.