maxWerk - Copyright 2000-2007 Amanda Pehlke
Published by RedMoon Music -
1.12 Improv
To round out this introductory description of features, we'll describe one more specialty track whose settings become part of a Werk file and whose output is recorded in midifiles. maxWerk's Improv player looks for inspiration to your choices from source menus, where you can select up to four existing Basic Loops and/or Melody Phrases. These sources may be important motifs in your Werk, or they may be ones dedicated to Improv. Improv can combine them with default new generated phrases or fills. For each new musical idea, it picks sections of different step lengths beginning from the starts of its source patterns, and assembles these into a new phrase. It then applies
Once enabled, by default Improv pops up wherever it pleases in the stereo field. Improv has a resolution of sixteenth notes, and you can impose a start delay in 32nd note increments. Several more play options similar to those of other tracks make Improv an interesting companion while you try out chord progressions or simply noodle.
With Automute active, maxWerk can trigger a section of Improv bars and silence them for you at selected points for recording to a midifile. The setting for in/out bar numbers is in the performance- oriented Automute window. However, there is no telling exactly what Improv's note patterns will be. Alternatively, you can start up and discontinue Improv manually during recording; on being dismissed, it holds its last note a little before dropping out gracefully. Get more insight as to how Improv works and its other parameters by reading about the similar, but relatively more predictable and obedient Melody track, under "More Melodizing" in Part II of this Guide.
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