A deliberate practice app for guitar players who want to level up

Hello! I am the one behind this app. A friend who thinks I am not promoting it enough submitted it to HN (not complaining at all, thanks Aditya!).

I had also posted on the "What are you working on?" thread yesterday - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43531684.

Happy to answer any questions.

Thanks HN, for helping me force Vineet's hand into accepting that the app is worthy of being used by not-Vineet.

He demo'd Captrice last week, to a bunch of friends here in Bangalore. And I knew he was going straight to the "infinite bikeshed", based on his tepid answers to questions like "Wow this is cool! So... Launch, when?".

Plus, you made m'dude earn his "First Internet Dollar". To whomever did the "buy me a coffee" thing... you're awesome! There is a stark psychological "before/after" of earning your F.I.D. Now he can't ever go back.

As someone stuck in his own Infinite Bikeshed, I take heart from this event, and hope to follow in his footsteps sooner than later :)

Looks like a great app.

For those who can't read sheet music, can I suggest a guitar tabs?

The very first screenshot I see in the website is guitar tabs.

Not only that, everything I see is tabs - I don't see music notation anywhere and I'm looking through exercises right now.

I would suggest learning standard notation. Tabs are useful (since you often have a choice of what string to play any given note on, but which you choose matters both because different strings sound different, and because some strings will make the next note unreachable), but standard notation has benefits too. If you know both you have a chance of playing along with anyone else - most people will hand you standard notation when they want you to play background to solo, or play with in a group with you (this depends on what type of group - some groups will have tab some will not).

Yes, music notation is configured to be hidden as I felt it would take up extra space. But recently I myself felt the need for it when editing tabs that had triplets. Beams are not visible in tabs. Planning to add a button soon to toggle notation display.

That is great to hear. Notation is essential, especially for musicians coming to the guitar from another instrument.

This looks super cool, and very similar to a need I have, except I'm not learning the guitar.

I'm learning my first (serious) instrument and I've decided on the lyre, since it's similar to other string instruments (guitar, ukulele, traditional harp) but a bit easier.

Will you support other instruments for lessons, other than the guitar?

Guitar tab is uniquely suited for exercises because it directly shows which string and fret to play, which is important since the same note can be played in multiple positions on the fretboard, unlike an instrument like the piano where std notation does show you exactly what to play. It also clearly communicates guitar-specific techniques (bends, slides, hammer-ons, pull-offs) that are awkward to represent in traditional notation. For exercises specifically, tab shows you where your hand should be positioned on the neck, making it easier to develop proper technique and muscle memory.

BTW the original comment didn't make sense since the app does support tab, just wanted to make this point. Also not saying that learning std notation isn't valuable although many excellent players never learn it.

Now this is a good friend! Love to see it.

I am going through the alphatex documentation in more detail and chances are that any stringed instrument could already be supported. Checkout the tuning section - https://alphatab.net/docs/alphatex/metadata#tuning.

It might even work for piano as well, there's an example here - https://alphatab.net/docs/alphatex/notes/#multiple-voices

Awesome!

I'd think about considering a more common instrument because you'll have a bigger support network.

You can find guitar teachers literally anywhere, guitar tabs are all over the internet, and you probably have friends who can give you a few pointers if you get stuck. Ukelele and bass guitar aren't that far behind.

Good for you Aditya!

When I was in college, in 1996, several computer science professors told me I was playing with toys and no serious organization would use Linux as an operating system.

In 1997, I asked a math professor about a statistics program, and he said R would never be used for real work.

In 1998, I was told that sure, I could learn Python if I wanted, but I should learn Java, but if I insisted on a scripting language, I should stick with Perl.

I don't use tools because I think they're popular, I do what I enjoy.

Also you didn't ask me why it might be easier for me to learn the lyre, which has to do with physical limitations I have.

God tier app. Up the irons.

You can annotate position changes onto a traditional score too, in most cases without it getting too noisy, fwiw