Talea: Drum & Groove

Concert percussion, five new idioms, nineteen time signatures — and polymeter. FIVE CONCERT IDIOMS March, Bolero, Tarantella, Swell and Tutti join the ten drum-kit styles. They are written against the pulse of the bar like everything else, so a March in 6/8 becomes a quickstep on its own and a Tutti in 7/8 needs no special case. Swell is the one to hear first. It is the only style whose subject is the turn map itself: cymbal and timpani rolls that crescendo INTO where the form turns, and quiet bars that are nearly empty on purpose. CONCERT AND ORCHESTRAL KITS The same fourteen voices, re-voiced. Concert is a band or pit — concert toms, a crisp field snare, tambourine, splash and suspended cymbals. Orchestral is symphonic — timpani in place of the toms, tam-tam, triangle, and a soft-mallet bass drum. Picking a concert idiom moves the kit for you, and says so. They rename and renumber themselves on the way out, so the file says what you heard: a tambourine leaves as GM 54 Tambourine, not as GM 42 Closed hat. NINETEEN TIME SIGNATURES 2/4 3/4 4/4 5/4 6/4 7/4 3/8 2/2 3/2 · 6/8 9/8 12/8 15/8 · 5/8 7/8 8/8 10/8 11/8 13/8, in three families. 2/2 is not 4/4 with a different label: its pulse is the half note, so the same groove puts its hats on quarters instead of eighths. POLYMETER, FROM ANACRU Import a file from Anacru and its cycle rides over your bar, going in and out of phase with it — five quarters against 4/4 realigns every five bars, and Talea tells you so in bars rather than in numbers. You choose which layer rides, what it plays, and whether it sounds every pulse or only the accents. ALSO • Type an exact tempo in the field beside the slider, instead of dragging for it. Still one purchase. Still no account, no ads, no subscription, and nothing leaves your device.