The Play Screen
The Play Screen: Drums Vol.1
Specific functions within the Play Screen
Playing a track
To play a track, tap the play button once.
Tip: You can also begin playback from anywhere in the track by simply tapping a coloured chord block.
Pausing a track
When a track is playing, the play button turns into a pause button. To pause a track that is playing, tap the pause button once.
Rewinding a track
To rewind a track back to the beginning, tap the rewind button. Alternatively, swipe the coloured chord blocks left or right to move your track to the desired point.
Accessing sections of your track quickly using the scrub bar
To get to a particular section of your track more quickly, rather than swiping the coloured chord blocks (left or right), rub your finger along the scrub bar in either direction. The scrub bar is the plain grey area to the right of the time counter.
Accessing the Edit screen to make changes to (edit) your track
To access the Edit screen, tap the Edit button once.
Accessing the Mixer screen to mix your track
To access the Mixer screen, tap the Mixer button once.
Adding a count-in to your track
To activate a 1 or 2 bar count-in before your track starts, tap the ‘1,2,3’ button. Tap it once for a 1 bar count-in (green light). Tap it twice for a 2 bar count-in (orange light). Tap again to deactivate the count-in altogether (no light).
Recording your track
You will need to record your track in SessionBand if you want to create an audio file to export into another application such as GarageBand.
There are two separate means of recording tracks in SessionBand: either by ‘live‘ recording (where all real-time adjustments are recorded) or by ‘automatic‘ recording which records the last saved version of your track. In both cases, recordings are made to .WAV format, but are compressed to m4a files if and when they are emailed. (For more information on recording and sharing recordings, refer to the ‘Sharing and exporting your saved tracks’ section of the Action Menu guidance).
To create a ‘live’ recording of your music, simply tap the record button (‘REC’) followed by the play button. During ‘live’ recordings you can toggle between the Play, Mixer and Edit screens to make real-time changes. All changes will be recorded including volume, tempo, loop markers and auto-transpose.
A ‘live’ recording stops if you either: a/reach the end of a track; b/tap the record button a second time or c/tap the rewind button while in recording.
On completion of a ‘live’ recording, you will be prompted to ‘Save’ your recorded track by giving it an ‘Author’ and a ‘Title’ name.
Sharing/exporting your track
There are a number of different ways to share/export your tracks. (Please refer to the Action Menu section ‘Sharing and exporting your saved tracks’).
Saving your track
To save your track at any time, tap the Action Menu button followed by the ‘Save’ button. Give the track an ‘Author’ and ‘Title’ and the track is saved. (Please refer to the Action Menu section ‘Sharing and exporting your saved tracks’ below).
Changing the tempo (speed) of your track
To change the tempo of your track, tap the BPM (Beats Per Minute) button. It displays the current BPM of your track and will light up when selected. Slide this button to adjust the tempo either by speeding it up (slide to the right) or slowing it down (slide to the left). The Reset button will reset the track to its original (native) tempo. Tap the BPM button again to finish and go back to the normal Play screen.
Naming different sections of your track
To add a name or description to a particular section of your track (e.g. verse, chorus, bridge etc), tap the grey area below the bar number but above the coloured chord block and enter your text. Note: there is a maximum of 10 characters per description.
Tip: Naming different sections of your track makes building a complete linear track much easier when using the Track Builder function. See the ‘Building a track quickly using ‘Track Builder’ guidance within the Edit screen section.
Adding/deleting loop markers to your track
To repeatedly play a particular section of your track, tap to the right of a bar line to set a ‘start’ loop marker, and tap to the left of a bar line to set an ‘end’ marker. Tap an existing loop marker to remove it.
Tip: Remove the ‘end’ loop marker which appears at the end of your track (by default) if you want your track to only play once.
Time counter explained
The time counter displays the time duration of your track in minutes, seconds and hundredths of a second.
Accessing information about the artists who feature in this app
To access information about the artists who feature on this app, tap the Biographies button once.
Accessing the Action Menu
To access the Action Menu, tap the Action button once. (Refer to detailed information on all the features accessible from the Action Menu).
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