CNET's Donald Bell rounds up his Top 5 iPhone apps for guitarists.
Donald Bell
Donald Bell has spent more than five years as a CNET senior editor, reviewing everything from MP3 players to the first three generations of the Apple iPad. He currently devotes his time to producing How To content for CNET, as well as weekly episodes of CNET's Top 5 video series.
Guitar Toolkit packs a ton of guitar tools into a single app. For $9.99, you get a chromatic tuner, chord finder, scales, four-string and five-string bass guitar modes, and a metronome. If you're going to buy just one guitar app, this is it.
Pros: Tons of features, left-hand mode, alternate tunings, and one of the only apps to offer a chromatic tuner.
Cons: If you can live without the tuner and bass modes, less expensive apps such as ChordMaster and ScaleWizard cover many of the same features. Tuner cannot be used with first-gen iPod Touch and requires a microphone accessory for use with second-gen Touch.
ChordMaster does just one thing, but does it very well: demonstrates where to place your fingers for any guitar chord.
Pros: Intuitive interface, tons of chord parameters (major, minor, diminished, dominant) great graphics, authentic sounds and strumming. Info screen includes options for left-handed orientation.
Cons: Not all-encompassing like Guitar Toolkit. No options for alternate tunings. No full-screen fretboard view. No suggestions for chord progressions.
Strobe tuners are the holy grail of instrument tuning, offering accuracy within one tenth of a cent. Since a reliable standalone strobe tuner will set you back $75-$100, most guitarists make do with more affordable chromatic-style tuners.
Pros: Precise, professional tuning that can be applied to guitar, bass, brass, and woodwind instruments. Internal signal boost allows for direct input of guitar with a cable adapter. Noise filter helps to reduce affect of ambient noise on tuning accuracy. Concert A reference mode allows for piano tuning.
Cons: Requires a $13 instrument cable adapter for direct guitar input. Incompatible with first-generation iPod Touch, and second-gen Touch owners will need to purchase a microphone accessory or cable adapter.
FourTrack is a deceptively simple-looking multitrack recorder and mixing console. If you're a songwriter looking for a way to sketch multi-instrumental song ideas on the go, FourTrack acts as a fully baked portable recording studio.
Pros: Familiar interface for anyone who's worked with recording gear, real-time volume metering, track bouncing for limitless layering, and support for dock-connecting stereo microphones.
Cons: The app is relatively expensive, iPod Touch users will need to purchase a mic or headset, and recordings only transfer over Wi-Fi with no option to e-mail or upload to a Web host.
Like ChordMaster, ScaleWizard just tackles one aspect of the guitar (scales), but does a very thorough job.
Pros: Beautiful interface, tons of advanced parameters (arpeggios, modal scales, rare scales such as Semi Locrian b4). Landscape position offers full-screen fretboard view. Info screen includes options for left-handed orientation, alternate tunings, and automatic scale playback.
Cons: Not all-encompassing like Guitar Toolkit. Added background info or advice on scale choice would be helpful for novices.
