Dear prof. Keller and staff

I found your software really great. I really appreciate the effort to make a
free software. I'm  just a poor jazz student (for hobby) and you software seems
to suite all my needs.

There is just a thing I wonder. I didn't find any function that allows some
"pre-counting" before the song start to be played. I mean the classic four stick
hits, that give the tempo signature before the song start. Sorry, but I don't
speak English very well and maybe It's just
because of a linguistic misunderstanding.

Thank you very much,

This world really need altruist people as you.

Giorgio Arcara

PhD student


REPLY from the moderator:

Giorgio,

We call that feature a "count in". It is not available yet, is on
the wish list. I suspect we will get to it within the next few
months. Thanks for the kind words.

Bob

--- In impro-visor@yahoogroups.com, chandru bachhav <asaramzz@...> wrote:
>
   
> what about if you add some north indian and south indian styles in it.
>  
> i will send you some hindi songs so you can know the indian rythems
better!!!
>

Thanks, but I think it would be better if YOU were to add the styles.
We provide a user interface for constructing and editing styles,
and also a modest import-from-midi facility. Since you know the
styles, you can work on constructing them to perfection.

I have my hands full with the core software, but I would like to
encourage our user to community to contribute more items in textual
form, including:
     leadsheets
     solos
     transcriptions
     styles
     vocabulary items, such as licks

Regards,

Bob Keller

Hi there,

I have old macs, running java 1.42; is there an earlier version of
improvisor that I can use? If so, can someone post the URL, or even
email the file to me?

Cheers,

Mike

bytes4u.ca


REPLY from moderator:

I'm sorry, but there is no version for Java versions earlier than 1.5.

Bob

--- In impro-visor@yahoogroups.com, "t0emaz" <toemaz@...> wrote:
>
> > I'm looking forward to hearing what you can contribute.
>
> Hi Bob,
>
> We could contribute musicXML import & export by including the
> proxymusic library: https://proxymusic.dev.java.net/
>
> That way, one could import lead sheets from Finale, Sibelius, <a
> href="http://musescore.org">Musescore</a> and many more. Also, you
> could get musicXML files from http://wikifonia.org , legally and for
free.
>
> Sounds like a good extra feature, not?
>

Hi Toemaz

Yes please! I would very much like the MusicXML import and export
feature! Hope you'll be able to manage that. Then I could use Impro-
visor together with other another great software for (aspiring) jazz
musicians, THoTH. THoTH is a music learning software made by "retired"
Berklee prof and jazz guitarist Steve Carter. It's partly a database
of useful info and learning material on standard tunes to assist in
the learning of improvisation and comping and partly a tool for analyzing chord
scale relationships, what scale goes with what... The
demo is fully functional, but limited.
http://www.frogstoryrecords.com/

--
Cheers

I'm probably missing something, but:

- I create a very basic blues in F
- I create a motif in the first bar (F7)
   c+8 f+8 bb16 cb16 bb16 ab16 bb4 ab8 f8
- I save this as a lick, and it appears in My.voc as
   (lick (notes c+8 f+8 bb16 cb16 bb16 ab16 bb4 ab8 f8) (sequence F7 |)
(name blues))

This lick never appears as advice, not even in the bar in which it was
created. In fact, I see a number of licks in My.voc that would fit a
bar of F7, but there is nothing under the advice links tab.

Does anyone have any ideas about what's happening here?

--- In impro-visor@yahoogroups.com, "jkharrop" <john@...> wrote:
>
> I'm probably missing something, but:
>
> - I create a very basic blues in F
> - I create a motif in the first bar (F7)
>   c+8 f+8 bb16 cb16 bb16 ab16 bb4 ab8 f8
> - I save this as a lick, and it appears in My.voc as
>   (lick (notes c+8 f+8 bb16 cb16 bb16 ab16 bb4 ab8 f8) (sequence F7 |)
> (name blues))
>
> This lick never appears as advice, not even in the bar in which it was
> created. In fact, I see a number of licks in My.voc that would fit a
> bar of F7, but there is nothing under the advice links tab.
>
> Does anyone have any ideas about what's happening here?
>

I just tried it and it worked for me. When you say there is *nothing*
under the advice licks tab, you mean it's empty? For me, there are
lots of F7 licks there. After saving the lick, I found it by entering
starting note c on the leadsheet. Then the lick appears about half-way
down the menu:

/\/\/\ [F7] blues (c8 f8 bb-16 b-16 bb-a6 ab-16 bb-4 ab-8 f-8)

The only thing I can think of that might be causing this is if you
have a chord in bar 2, such as a Bb7, then it looks for F7->Bb7 licks
explicitly, and does not look for F7 licks alone.

I would have called this an Idiom rather than a lick, then it would
be seen in either case, as Idioms are only indexed on one chord.

If this is not the problem, please email me your entire leadsheet
and I'll see what I can find.

Also, I assume you are using version 3.39. If not, please state the
version.

Thanks.

Bob Keller

--- In impro-visor@yahoogroups.com, "keller_91711" <keller@...> wrote:
>
> The only thing I can think of that might be causing this is if you
> have a chord in bar 2, such as a Bb7, then it looks for F7->Bb7
> licks explicitly, and does not look for F7 licks alone.
>
> I would have called this an Idiom rather than a lick, then it would
> be seen in either case, as Idioms are only indexed on one chord.
>
> If this is not the problem, please email me your entire leadsheet
> and I'll see what I can find.
>

Many thanks Bob,

It was as you suggested - the phrase worked just fine when redefined
as an idiom. Also, my second bar did indeed contain a Bb7, and by
extending my phrase into bar two it also worked as a lick.

This is an exceptional piece of software. The ability to set up your
own musical vocabulary sets it apart from everything else out there.

John

Hi all

I've just got hold of another expert system for jazz enthusiasts named
THoTH, or THoTH music learning software, developed by the jazz
guitarist and professor at Berklee for over 25 years, Steve Carter.

I find this program very useful to use together with Impro-Visor. It
has the pretty unique ability to analyze chord progressions and
produce chord-scale analysis. It's main intention is to help students
find out how a scale, mode, arpeggio or chord voicing can be use in a
progression.

The program comes with a chord progression analysis tool, in which
changes are entered much like in Impro-Visor.

http://www.elgitar.com/_detail/thoth_progression_analysis_tool.png

This is the outputted progression analysis

http://www.elgitar.com/_detail/thoth_progression_analysis_tool_output.
png

From there you could go back to Impro-Visor and start entering the
scales from the Advice dialog there:

http://www.elgitar.com/_media/impro-visor_thoth.png

In the Advice dialog, you'll be able to find some of the scales, but
not all of them.

How can that be remedied?

How can I add the missing scales to Impro-Visor Advice, that is, so to
be able to find them in and entering them from the Advice dialog?

Here's a web page with the images:
http://www.elgitar.com/thoth


Cheers

--- In impro-visor@yahoogroups.com, "Torkill Bruland" <atbruland@...>
wrote:

>
> In the Advice dialog, you'll be able to find some of the scales, but
> not all of them.
>
> How can that be remedied?
>
> How can I add the missing scales to Impro-Visor Advice, that is, so to
> be able to find them in and entering them from the Advice dialog?
>

Torkill,

You can add scales by editing the vocabulary file, My.voc, found in
the vocab directory, using a text editor. All scales are
expressed with C as the tonic. Just follow the pattern shown here. The
parentheses form must be copied exactly (the spacing is not important,
but nesting of parentheses is).

(scale
     (name C locrian)
     (spell c db eb f gb ab bb c)
     )

(scale
     (name C melodic minor)
     (spell c d eb f g a b c)
     )

To have a scale included in Advice for a chord, you would edit the
chord definition similarly, for example:

(chord
     (name CM69#11)
     (pronounce C major six nine sharp eleven)
     (key c)
     (family major)
     (spell c8 e8 g8 a8 d8 f#8)

     . . . omitted voicings and such ...
     (scales
         (C lydian)
         (G major)
         (C major pentatonic)
         (D major pentatonic)
         (G major pentatonic)
              ... add more scales here ...
         )
      )

Or if you send me the scales that you think are missing, and the
chords over which they are played, I'll edit them in and post a new
My.voc. I'd be interested in what they are.

Thanks.

Bob

--- In impro-visor@yahoogroups.com, "Torkill Bruland" <atbruland@...>
wrote:
>
> Here's a web page with the images:
> http://www.elgitar.com/thoth
>
>

I've looked at the web page. In all cases but one in this example,
Impro-Visor does have the scales, but named differently. Scale naming,
like chord naming, is not completely standardized in jazz.

Lydian b7 is the same as Lydian dominant

Sym Dim is the same as Diminished

Mixo b9 b13 is the same as Harmonic minor, 5th mode

The latter scale is advised over dominant b9 and some variants. For example,
over C7b9, f harmonic minor is advised. It might be good to add the Mixo naming
though.

Sometimes the scale choice is subjective rather than compelled. I'm not sure how
THoTH deals with it, but I wouldn't be surprised if there weren't some author
bias introduced when a unique scale is suggested.

Thanks.

Regards,

Bob

Thanks Bob!

Impro-Visor really is an amazingly rich piece of software. I've been
trying out Impro-Visor off and on for a couple of years, Mostly for
accompaniment, transcription, and to be able to listen to the
melodies from lead sheets. I've been trying out programs like
Sibelius, Finale, Band-in-a-Box and Guitar Pro. But not until I
decided to give Impro-Visor a new try the other day, and delve deeper
into it, did I start to realize how powerful Impro-visor really is!

Seems I could not find any scales missing in there, even though I
tried hard to find one ;-)

I checked the "Cords to Scale" tool of this site
http://www.all-guitar-chords.com/chords-to-scale.php

For C7 i found it listed over 130 scales, despite that some of the
scale names mentioned in this thread and in the My.voc file, is not
mentioned in that list. But I've found none missing yet.

Could anyone list some more synonymous for scales used by jazz
musicians?

--
Cheers

Hi Bob

Thanks again for your patient replies. I'll delve deeper into this. I
did not fully realize that Impro-Visor already has all the things I
need to start practicing scales, arpeggios and cells over changes.

Guess cells are small melody line patterns taken from scales or chords,
and that can be moved up or down the scale or arpeggio?

--
Hava a nice day!

John,

I believe that Impro-Visor will prefer the specified voicings, unless
there is no voicing that works in the given range, in which case it
will use a generated voicing. At least, that was the intent.

You might be running into an issue where your voicings (possibly
transposed to the current chord context) do not fit within the
specified range. The range is specified in the style, and you can
change it using the Style Editor or a text editor. For example, in
file styles/Swing.sty, there are the attributes:

         (chord-high a)
         (chord-low d-)

The idea of generated voicings is that Impro-Visor will always find
some voicing that fits the range (except in the pathological case
where the range does not span an octave).

If this still does not work for you, let me know.

Thanks.

Bob

post all sweet finished pieces on new website created for hobbiests
and passionists of your kind.

there is a space on the site for solo work, original beats,
instrumental.....etc.

check it out.  post your audio, video, or links to your current
homepages.  promote yourself and your creations.

all my best & aloha.

stoked to learn more about impro-visor,

kat

Dear users of Impro-Visor,

I've just completed my thesis on a phenomenological approach towards
artificially creative jazz performing systems, that is, an approach
that tries to bring about as many features and traits of human
musicians as possible by analysis and decomposition of existing
artificial systems that do or do not exhibit these phenomena.

The thesis as such can be downloaded from

http://www.redsdesk.de/files/Ebert - A phenomenological approach to
artificial Jazz improvisation.pdf

Reason this might be particularly interesting for the Impro-Visor
community: the implementation of the suggested approach uses the
transcriptions of real performances that ship with Impro-Visor,
analyses them and builds virtual jazz players that can perform genuine
solos. Everything is implemented in python and licensed under the GNU
GPL and runs smoothly on *nix; compatibility with DOS is untested.
Grab a copy here:

http://www.redsdesk.de/files/phenjazz.tar.gz

I'd be happy to hear your feedback: maebert [at] uos [dot] de

PS. If the first link gives to a 404 error, copy & paste it with all
the whitespaces until .pdf or simply use
http://www.redsdesk.de/files/thesis.pdf instead.

I'm just an amateur muso, home user, and learn a lot by ear.
Your software has opened lots of improvisation ideas against
progressions for me that I wouldnt have thought of and helps get the
creative 'spark' going..

Thanks to you and your students.

I would rather join yahoo groups to get access to the software and
forum  rather than have to hand my email address over to a site to get
a download link or activation as so many do nowdays.

Hope the project continues to develop in the future.

regards

Peter

It seems that you incorporated and adapted JMusic into your own
software package. The adaptation features Swing elements as opposed to
the old awt elements. Did you reference the original JMusic package in
your code at all? Did you think it would be difficult to pull out some
of your modified JMusic classes to use in another project or are the
too heavily interweaved into Impro-Visor.

--- In impro-visor@yahoogroups.com, "stretchtiberius"
<stretchtiberius@...> wrote:
>
> It seems that you incorporated and adapted JMusic into your own
> software package. The adaptation features Swing elements as opposed to
> the old awt elements. Did you reference the original JMusic package in
> your code at all? Did you think it would be difficult to pull out some
> of your modified JMusic classes to use in another project or are the
> too heavily interweaved into Impro-Visor.
>

I think that it would be pretty difficult. When we used the GUI
elements of jMusic in 2004, extensive additions had to be made to
accomplish our objectives, as well as some changes that might have
been avoidable in hindsight. I think jMusic may have changed some too
since our adaptation.

You are welcome to try re-adapting the GUI classes. I would recommend
using the NetBeans development environment if you do, at least to
start, as that's how we did all of our GUI work. I should also mention
that we have a new version on-going that will be released sometime
this winter, as soon as various issues are resolved.

Regards,

Bob

--- In impro-visor@yahoogroups.com, "threedeejay" <threedeejay@...> wrote:

> Is there a way to record midi input exactly 'as is' without any
> quantization?

No, there is no mechanism for saving unquantized MIDI. Everything is
saved in leadsheet notation, which has a minimimum quantization of 120
slots per beat currently.

I'm sorry this does not meet your needs. Maybe it's something we can
look at in the future.

Regards,

Bob Keller

Hello and thanks for reply

Actually the issue I experienced is both slightly different than beat
quantization (IMHO) and also mostly nothing to worry about considering
the great overall usefulness and creative features of the software you
kindly shared.

Maybe I used a wrong description (probably due to the fact that
English is not my native language :) by using "quantization" word.

What I mean was when I for example choose a 4:4 time signature,
recorded music kind of fits in 4:4 time signature (as expected maybe),
and overall time wise relation between originally played notes change.
And to my ear this sounds different from a beat per minute
quantization instead as if there's a time signature quantization (like
4:4 or 4:8, etc). Maybe because the music I play does not have a fixed
tempo nor a metronome friendly one : ).

I was just wondering if it's possible to make Impro-visor ignore the
time signature when recording. And if not, then that's mostly nothing
to worry about and I can happily keep using improvisation features
which are being done amazingly.

PS: I can later send small samples of midi in case you may want to
hear the timing thing I mentioned

Best regards

Threedeejay

It appears that former Java/MIDI problems with MacOSx are resolved in
revision 10.5.5 of the latter. Impro-Visor 3.39 works "out of the box"
on an Intel Mac desktop machine under MacOSx 10.5.5. For a MacBook, I
found that I needed to set the tracker delay to something like 2. This
may vary from system to system.

Thanks.

Bob

--- In impro-visor@yahoogroups.com, "wastie345" <roy.wastie@...> wrote:
>
> Hi Thanks for making this great software available.
>        How do I enter slurred notes?
> Thanks Roy
>

Roy,

There is no provision for slurred notes currently.

In most jazz notation, slurs are not usually shown explicitly, it
being left to the interpretation. When slur marks are used (as in some
Aebersold play-alongs, for example) it is usually to indicate
phrasing, rather than actual slurring.

I'm sorry if you really need them in the notation.

Bob