August 2, 2018
Alive Drumming has released it’s Apple iOS app, Song Rhythm Tracks. It is now available in the Apple App Store at
If you are interested in reviewing this app please email reviews@alive-drumming.org
April 19, 2018
We have hand-picked some of our favourite F.A.Q.s about Alive Drumming and Song Rhythm Tracks.
They do, don’t they! And for a number of reasons:
All this takes a lot of careful preparation and curation, huge storage, and sophisticated algorithms. We feel this cannot be achieved on mobile devices themselves which is why our solution involves our cloud services working with the mobile App.
Song Forms for a number of songs are here
Alive Drumming’s Song Rhythm Tracks are supplied without reverb (aka “dry”). We are endeavouring to make our iOS app Apple inter-app audio (IAA) compliant. When it is, you will be able to use other, 3rd party app’s to add reverb to the audio. See this youtube video for some of them in action.
Alive Drumming aims to cover all regions, countries, languages, and cultures, embracing a wide diversity of rhythms is what we are all about. If we haven’t adopted yours yet, we almost certainly aim to in the future. If you want yours to be supported now, why not contact us at marketing@alive-dumming.org
We support all the popular, essential song forms by name – 12 bar blues, 16 bar tunes, 32-bar A1A2 and 32-bar AABA, and about 30 other less common also by name. The list is increasing! We also support selecting these same song forms using stick notation instead of names. This simply specifies section lengths in bars, for example, ‘8|8/8|8’, where ‘bridge‘ sections are preceded by a ‘/’ instead of ‘|’. Additionally, we support users defining their own forms via stick notation, including repeats, and concatenation of up to four (4) parts. This allows for a truly huge flexibility, enough to describe any song’s form. See this user guide for more information, Song Rhythm Tracks.
The app currently supports about 60 different distinct rhythm categories, which includes about 250 distinct rhythms. Of these, most are available with differing instrumentation such as ‘rim’ shots or, say, wooden blocks, and many at multiple tempos. In all over 3,700 different rhythm track recordings are available that can be applied to a song form. The app makes the selection of one of these 3,700+ recordings easy by providing filtering on a musical meter (say 4/4 or 3/4 time) and feel (even or straight, 8th or 16th notes).
Here is a tiny sample of the styles represented:
For a full list of all rhythms and sub-rhythms see the page catalog-rhythmic-styles.
Alive Drumming grants license to remix its tracks. That is, you can take the Song Rhythm Tracks audio, mix it with your own content, and sell that mix as your own work without paying a fee to Alive Drumming.
Alive Drumming prohibits resale or redistribution of its un-mixed, original Song Rhythm Tracks. You cannot sell or give away these tracks unless you mix them into a new creative piece of work.
Alive Drumming appreciates artistic attribution but does not require attribution in your remixed works. You do not need to attribute Alive Drumming for the rhythm track in your remixed original work but if you wish to please add, “rhythm track supplied by Alive Drumming (c)” and include a reference to this website.
The tracks are available via Apple iOS mobile App and will later be available via an Android mobile app.
The huge permutations of song forms and rhythms available means the traditional audio file distribution channels of iTunes and Amazon do not fit this new medium of Song Rhythm Tracks.
In particular, Amazon and iTunes do not accommodate the additional assistance that is required for musician’s to select the appropriate track.
Alive Drumming has no plans to market these tracks on legacy media such as Audio CDs or DAT tape.
All Musicians! New Musicians; Experienced Musicians; Great Musicians;
Really, any musician including Pianists, Guitarists, Horn Players, Singers and even Drummers.
The tracks can be used for practice, performance and cutting a release.
To learn more about their benefit in practice, using the Song Rhythm Tracks app, see the news articles,
“When to work on your rhythm?”
“How to practice, then how to jam”
“Why songform with rhythm tracks?”
If we don’t already include a particular rhythm, we would like to work with a drummer to include it. This involves making high-quality audio recordings of the drumming at multiple tempos including multiple shots and fills used in turnarounds. The audio recording will be analysed to identify where the various aspects occur and the preference level of each occurrence. This is the basis for Alive Drumming to incorporate additional rhythms into their Song Rhythm Tracks. If you are a drummer and have a rhythm you’d like to be represented please email feedback@alive-drumming.org
Alive Drumming takes personal privacy very seriously. We are committed to proactively protecting the privacy of our customers by not storing any personal information unless it is absolutely required, and should that be the case, it will always be protected by strong encryption. We will never sell or otherwise disclose any personal, private or confidential information we hold on others.
Song form is based on the concept that every song has been composed around a musical form or structure. Popular song often chooses simple forms as a basis for a song but forms can be more complex as well.
A good reference on song form (structure) is the Wikipedia article, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_structure
Alive Drumming wants to provide you with the easiest and most reliable methods to describe song form.
Song Form may be selected using both (i) traditional names such as ’16-bar Tune’, or (ii) the ‘stick notation’ equivalent of ‘4|4|4|4’ if that is what you prefer.
For full information on Alive Drumming’s Song Rhythm Tracks mobile app and it’s flexibility in identifying Song Forms see the page, Song Rhythm Tracks
You may describe any Song Form with “user-defined” Song Forms in the mobile app, and for popular tunes, searching for a user-contributed Song Form for that song, again within the mobile app. There are now tens of thousands of these being shared.
are a new type of backing track composed entirely of rhythmic backing (no melody or harmony) arranged to the musical form of the song — it’s “songform”. These tracks are complete performances like one gets from a professional drummer. They have a count-in, introduction section, choruses and characteristic endings, framed by fills showing where sections start and end. Even musical bridges and middle choruses have higher intensity where appropriate to the style. All this without a typical arranger’s interface thereby keeping it simple. One can select a track in under 30 seconds — under 15 seconds once one gets the hang of it.
The App’s player has tempo adjustment and a facility to sequence the tracks for your gig or jam session. It is for musicians of all abilities. New musicians use the App to provide an accompaniment to songs. They get a rhythm that is sympathetic so they learn to keep time, get into the groove and internalise the song’s musical structure – All this while enjoying engaging and inspiring rhythms. Gigging musicians catalogue their backing into setlists and use it to guide performance. Having quality rhythmic backing, with a setlist facility and a musician’s player, all in the one App is so convenient one finds oneself using this rhythmic backing more and more.
Song Rhythm Tracks are truly high-quality rhythmic backing that is convenient to select and play. You are not going to get tired of these backing tracks. You are not going to have to sequence anything. You will find that the player and setlist’s user-interface encourages continued use. You will get to appreciate the form of your songs more and you might include these tracks into your own single and album releases.
Whether you are learning a new tune, jamming, gigging or cutting your latest album, this Song Rhythm Tracks provides a solution.
Check out samples of the audio at Alive Drumming’s Samples page
Check out these articles from Alive Drumming that give further insights into the thinking behind the product –
“When to work on your rhythm?”
“How to practice, then how to jam”
“Why songform with rhythm tracks?”
Download the Song Rhythm Tracks App on the Apple App Store
Try Alive Drumming’s sampler apps to sample previously arranged tracks of popular tunes. It is then easy to use the app to adjust these to your practice and performance requirements. All the sampler apps are the same Song Rhythm Tracks app but with the included sample tracks.
April 14, 2018
These Song Rhythm Tracks do sound totally great, don’t they?
This is one of the most frequent things I hear. The great sound quality often comes as surprise, perhaps because of the widespread familiarity everybody has with ‘Midi Drum Machines‘, which don’t satisfy in the same way as Song Rhythm Tracks. Midi Drum Machines and Song Rhythm Tracks are two very different products; we summarize their differences below.
Here are the three top reasons why we believe these tracks are so great to jam to, to gig to, and to cut records to.
One – Great Recordings of Great Drummers – Song Rhythm Tracks are arranged from careful studio recordings of excellent drummers.
They are not constructed from midi files fitting together “samples” from single drum hits to form a mechanical style but rather multiple longer-form full recordings by top studio drummers, lasting from up to 8 bars at a time where you hear subtle drum rolls, variations in ride cymbal taps, complex fills and more. The rhythmic style comes from talented drummers that are very experienced in the particular style be it Reggae, Salsa, Bossa, Rumba, Tango, Rock, Country, Jazz, Pop, Celtic, Praise & Worship, Blues, and lots more!
Two – There is natural variety promoted over the repeats.
That is, a number of recordings of all aspects of playing, fills, post-fills, shots and more are taken and selectively chosen while sequencing and engineering the final audio. This provides the natural variety one gets with drummers. It helps prevent the drumming from becoming monotonous and repetitive.
Three – The arrangement is always spelling out aspects of the song’s form.
This might have a larger contribution than one might imagine. It is what real drummers do, but drumming software rarely does. The drumming is indicating
All this takes a lot of careful preparation, curation, huge storage, and sophisticated algorithms. We feel this cannot be achieved on mobile devices themselves which is why our solution involves cloud services working with the mobile App.
Continue ReadingApril 7, 2018
Afro-Cuban Salsa Sampler is the Song Rhythm Tracks sampler App from Alive Drumming providing the same great rhythm tracks arranger with over 20 included sample arrangement tracks of Afro-Cuban Salsa staples.
Afro-Cuban Salsa Sampler has the same facilities as the standard Song Rhythm Tracks App but comes pre-installed with over 20 Afro-Cuban Salsa arrangements and an allocation of 4 downloads for your own arrangements, with more are available via In-App Purchasing. What an opportunity to sample some arrangements of these great Afro-Cuban rhythms before using the App for your own arrangements! It’s the same Song Rhythm Tracks App with all the latest facilities.
Alive Drumming has reduced this App’s price to a minimal level for a limited time. This is a great opportunity to try out this heralded rhythm track arranger at no cost and get into creating your own arrangements of the world’s greatest Song Rhythm Tracks, using Alive Drumming’s vast library of artist’s authentic interpretations. Try the Afro-Cuban Salsa standards and arrange some more tracks for whatever tunes you are currently playing. There’s a vast selection of authentic rhythms from talented artists across many genres in addition to Afro-Cuban Salsa.
“La Gloria eres tu” – A single chorus of a user-defined form (as 4|8|8|8|12 bars) with no intro’ or ending sections and using a Bolero rhythm at 105 bpm
“Samba For Carmen” – 2 choruses of a user-defined form (as 16|16|8 bars) with an 8-bar intro’ and a 6-bar ending, using a Samba rhythm with both drums and percussion at 190 bpm