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 identifying these same song forms using stick notation. 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 user-defined song forms using stick notation, repeats, and concatenation of up to four (4) parts. This allows for a truly huge flexibility when coupled with the facility to add an introduction and ending section. See this user guide for more information, SongForm Rhythm Tracks.
Arranging
Each track you arrange includes repeats of the song form preceded by an ‘intro’ section and followed by an ‘ending’ section. User-defined song forms allow for a much more complex structure, making possible any section based arrangement. In addition, the user-defined song form includes the ability to add whole-bar ‘stops’ to the arrangement where the drumming stops for a bar. This is achieved by the Alive Drumming smart servers selecting a recording of a ‘stop’ by the drummer and incorporating it into the arrangement. This ‘stop’ will be in the idiom of the style being performed. Also a more advanced feature is to add a ‘push’ at any bar-beat-subdivision position in the user-defined song form, where the drummer adds an additional drum hit slightly ahead of the position to push the rhythm along. This is not required to achieve a wonderfully natural rhythm but where song arrangements benefit from a special emphasis.
Song Rhythm Tracks, SongForm, SongForm Requests
Alive Drumming 