Whats the Best Chord Progression Hardware?

thank you for that. i am buying it and give it a try.

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my knowledge I limited and i defiantly decided at a young age that if alternatives worked for sonic youth then i never wanted to learn a damn thingā€¦but 20 years past and I wasnā€™t making tracks or breaking any ground so I dabbled just a little.

what opened things up massively for me was just to learn one scaleā€¦
on a keyboardā€¦
then that same scale on guitarā€¦
c minor is a great startā€¦
up and down the keysā€¦
and the fret boardā€¦
then just start to smash any 2 keys in that scaleā€¦(moog sub 37 taught me that as thats all you can play) see how they soundā€¦
then mess with combos of three keys see what works and what doesnā€™tā€¦
If you find sone thing you like you can always Google the chord nameā€¦

Itā€™s not rocket surgery and gives you a whole new appreciation of all musicā€¦just try one scaleā€¦first one is freeā€¦

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What kind of music do you want to make? How do you want your chords to sound? Poppy? Jazzy? Classical?

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Thats a real cool idea. I will try it.

Hmmm whatā€™s that old saying?

I thought using drum samples was cheating, so I got a real drum machine and sampled my own. I thought using a drum machine was cheating, so I got a real drum set and learned how to play and record it. I thought buying a drum set was cheating, so I learned how to stretch some pig skin over some hollow wood. I thought buying pig skin and hollowed wood was cheating so I bought a a pig pen and some treesā€¦

Iā€™m not sure where I draw the line and you bring up a good point. I donā€™t think arpeggiators are cheatingā€“theyā€™re a nice tool. I also donā€™t think sequences and NDLR (what little I saw of it) are cheatingā€¦I mean, if ā€œcheatingā€ is even such a thing in music composition. Iā€™m also definitely not at all opposed to writing something you canā€™t even physically playā€“thatā€™s what composers have been doing since, well, written music, I guess.

I think my issue arises when people donā€™t try and learn some concepts. An orchestral composer canā€™t possibly be expected to play all the violin partsā€¦but he should know the range of the violin, the basic and extended techniques a violinist might use, what keys are easier/trickier for violin, etc. I think thatā€™s how I look at ā€œchord progression hardwareā€ stuff too.

But Iā€™m also kind of grappling in the dark right now and thinking aloud. Iā€™m open :man_shrugging:

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Im trying dude. Ive just got the chord wheel. Testing it i checked out Pink Floyd Echoes on it(intro). And most of the notes do work with the chord wheel. Just a few transpositions thrown in for uniqueness. I think the appeal for these hardware devices is sometimes you just want to take it easy. Not laziness. Just want to chill out without much brain work. Especially if your time limited. Cheers.

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Iā€™ve heard that thereā€™s a secret chordā€¦

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I donā€™t really disagree with you here, and I grapple with this stuff myself. I was trained on piano and viola as a kid, so I do know how to play traditional instruments, read music, etc. That has definitely helped me with electronic composition, which I first got into as a teenager in the 80s. I began by absolutely using technology to ā€œcheatā€ (using my Alesis sequencer to step record patterns I couldnā€™t play in real time), but quickly learned that sequencing was more than just entering notesā€“itā€™s a genuine compositional tool.

On the other hand, I also struggle with where to draw a line. Using presets? Sometimes, but I try to deconstruct and modify them when I do so that I at least understand how they were created. Packaged samples? I donā€™t use samples much, although thatā€™s starting to change. The idea of using packaged loops is anathema to me, but ā€œborrowedā€ one-hits and multisamples maybe ok (I just ordered an MPC One in part because Iā€™m excited to autosample my analog synths to get more flexibility out of them).

In the end, I guess everyone just has to draw the line wherever they feel most comfortable. Iā€™m not a professional musician, so the stakes for me are pretty low. IMO what works for meā€“or for youā€“doesnā€™t necessarily need to apply to anyone else. I think everyone should have the opportunity to be creative and make music, so whatever tools help with that are great in my book. But I also have no problem with ultra purists who reject anything they see as a technological crutch or who want everyone to learn some theory. My two kids like to screw around with my electronic gear, but Iā€™ve also made sure theyā€™ve been exposed to learning traditional acoustic instruments. Let a thousand flowers bloom!

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Whatā€™s cool with the Pyramid is making a chord voicing with the harmonizer effect and then using the scale effect after. You can then sequence a progression and try different scales while it plays through the sequence.

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Yes, I did it too. Nice things to obtain and choose chords that will fit our work.
I realy dig the custom chords. I teach it specific chords series coming from different autors and then play my interpretation of their chords production. Two days ago it was Stravinsky. Real fun and result far away from my expectations.

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I think you could draw the line between programming music machine | playing music instrument | building music machine or instrument :slightly_smiling_face:
On topic, for me playing instrument is searching for melody or chord progression, and it is fun sometimes, other times i feel like a am not interested in what is i can come up with, and then i roll a dice letting machine suprisse me, and i will just make a choose .
As for chord progression, usually a like what is familiar to me, and is klishe in a way, if i want crazy, i never use chord progression, it is always just sound design and sample ma manipulation , fx, editing tracks, maybe melody.
This tool generating chords could be interesting, i think what ever method u use, just donā€™t be lazy, try real hard! And have fun while doing so :slightly_smiling_face: