WorldScales 4+

Kelfar Technologies

Designed for iPad

    • 4.5 • 11 Ratings
    • $4.99

iPad Screenshots

Description

Not all scales are created equal.
This app allows you to break out of the limitations of equal-tempered scales and gives you freedom to tune the built-in keyboard in whatever way you want. Loaded with many presets and samples you can explore ancient scales, byzantine music, oriental vibes or configure your own scales.

Have you ever wondered why we tune our instruments the way we do? They are usually tuned to an "equal-tempered scale", which divides the octave into equally spaced tones and semitones. This has become the most prevalent way of tuning the instruments in the west since the 18th Century. Today, musicians use this tuning system, and the scales based on it, without ever considering other ways. For example, in the Middle Ages European musicians generally used Pythagorean tuning, and today many traditional instruments in the Middle East and Asia are tuned according to regional systems and standards.

Included features:
● Ability to tune each key in the octave individually (+- 100 cents).
● 35 High quality sampled instruments: From grand piano, violin and organ to oriental oud and kanun, to voices of a choir singing Ison voices. Many samples are polyphonic and have multiple velocity layers.
● MIDI In. Connect your External MIDI keyboard and play microtonal music. Tuning the individual keys is normally only possible on $1000+ keyboard!
● Many presets introducing lesser known western, byzantine and oriental scales.
● Ability to save your own scales and tunings.
● Entering directly frequency ratios, frequencies or cents.
● Shows on the piano keys where the scale starts and what keys are included in the scale.
● Changing the root key of a scale: all tuned keys are shifted correctly.
● Audio effects: reverb and compressor.
● And more…

What’s New

Version 1.0.8

bug fix 1.0.8 / audio over Bluetooth. Now it works!

Ratings and Reviews

4.5 out of 5
11 Ratings

11 Ratings

MagellanTheRed ,

Learning Chants

While starting to learn chanting with a Greek Orthodox church, I found out about the WorldScales app. With it, I can set the correct pitches for the various scales, something that thousands of other musical apps cannot do.

I was delighted to see that not only can the user set pitch adjustments on each key, but it has the soft chromatic scale and Byzantine Mode 2 available directly from a menu. That was exactly what was needed for the music I was practicing.

I was a little bummed because running on a MacBook the user interface is not as convenient as it would be for a touch screen on an iPad. But then I was completely delighted to discover the WorldScales' MIDI feature in the settings, connect my keyboard via USB cable, and it just worked. That's an even better UI than a touch screen.

Arastoomi ,

Waiting

This app is very good and i haven't seen anyother app like it.
However I'm having problems lately , playing some keys makes the key turn color but it doesn't sound any sound.

Margo1325 ,

World Scales: Beginner-friendly and expert-versatile!

Kudos to this excellent application for its friendliness to beginners and versatility for those of us familiar with Near Eastern tunings, for example.

As a lover of Arab maqam and Persian dastgah traditions, as well as the Psaltic art of Byzantine music, I was impressed by the priority given to intuitive accessibilty and ease of use as well as the wealth of musical value that should appeal to the user newly exploring tunings and/or the variety of world musics.

One neat included tuning for Arab Rast is the Byzantine 53 Diatonic set, which approximates a moderately bright Maqam Rast if one starts from the Byzantine Νε (as in the Fourth Mode Plagal), or Maqam Huseyni (as in the First Mode and First Mode Plagal) if one starts from Πα. By the way, having these solmization syllables displayed on the keyboard in Greek characters is a great learning resource. The Byzantine theorist Chrysanthos of Madytos in 1832 gave al-Farabi's tuning of what was later termed a Rast tetrachord as an example of good Byzantine intonation. The Byzantine Diatonic 53 tuning included with this app is a nice middle point between the al-Farabi tuning and the later Byzantine tuning based on 36 or 72 steps per octave adopted by the Patriarchal Commitee on Music in 1881, and I found it a very nice Rast. The five accidentals are left in unaltered 12-tone equal temperament, but for Arab maqam music I might recommend setting them to Pythagorean flats (or the 53-tone equal temperament equivalents, which I think should be within about a cent of the Pythagorean values), with offsets relative to A at Db -16; Eb -12; Gb -18; Ab -14; and Bb -10. This expedites modulating from Maqam Rast on C (or Byzantine Νε as shown on the keyboard), the standard untransposed location on the Arab gamut, to other maqamat (the Arabic plural of maqam) on C, with Nahawand, Hijazkar, Nakriz, and Hijazkar Kurdi as attractive possibilities.

As an experienced tuning table user, I'll add that I was creating user-defined tunings within my first few minutes after downloading, and the design is praiseworthy in keeping the interface simple while offering precision to the nearest cent. But the real success was found in the hours of delighted playing that this led to. I especially enjoyed the 'oud and kanun samples.

This application is itself a work of art, in its intuitive design and sophisticated precision and above all its use of these to convey priceless musical beauty and value.

App Privacy

The developer, Kelfar Technologies, indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy.

Data Not Collected

The developer does not collect any data from this app.

Privacy practices may vary, for example, based on the features you use or your age. Learn More

Supports

  • Family Sharing

    Up to six family members can use this app with Family Sharing enabled.

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