BARBARA the Metronome

With BARBARA you can quickly create and play sequences of bars, and the bars can have different time signatures. You can put rests between bars, and you can use alternative metronome sounds for selected bars. You can specify how many times, or minutes, each bar is played.

BARBARA has many pages of buttons with which you can create sequences of bars. The buttons are marked with familiar musical symbols. BARBARA is a programmable metronome as its operation is based on the sequences of bars that are created with the buttons.

Although BARBARA can be made to play bars with different time signatures, musicians most often need the basic metronomic functionalities. For these purposes BARBARA has a Quick Start button with which you can quickly start making some traditional rhythms or a monotonous metronome sound. You can set the tempo and activate the metronome by tapping an empty area of the main screen.

With tempo buttons you can set or change the tempo of the metronome in any position in a sequence of bars. When tempo is programmed in a sequence, you can make BARBARA play a certain bar for a certain number of minutes.

BARBARA can be made to tick certain sections of music with a different metronome sound. One way to utilise this feature is to create a sequence in which the primary metronome sound is played for some minutes, and after that a few bars are played with the alternative metronome sound. When this kind of sequence is repeated, there is a warm-up routine in which the musician can move to a different warm-up exercise when she or he hears the alternative metronome sound. Especially some drum teachers recommend a set of exercises in which each exercise lasts a few minutes.

There are several ways how BARBARA can repeat sequences of bars. You can even create a repeated sequence that is inside a longer sequence that is also repeated.

When sequences of bars are repeated, it is possible to increase or decrease the tempo for each new repetition.

BARBARA will store the sequences of bars that you create. You can name your sequences and play them later. The metronome app contains many demo sequences that will help you to learn how the metronome can be used.