In this position, please add a common chord.
It is the most commonly used chord. Like these.
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As a personal observation, I’d (respectfully) suggest that the ‘MOD’ page is not a logical place to have such a function. The various options on this page are essentially scale focussed, not chord focussed, and the chords suggested in the various options have some logic (e.g. as in Neo-Riemannian) with the context of a scale and a transition to another scale.
The diagram you show (from Band-in-a-Box) has no relationship to anything to do with modulation at all; you select a key in the main BIAB window and the pane merely allows you to select any chord from the diatonic harmonisation thereof, and offers you nothing to assist with the selection of a modulation path. How would you know which chords to choose for modulation, unless you already happened to be familiar with (say) PLR notions? That’s what the MOD page does for you - it proposes pathways , not just gives a list (which is all the BIAB page is) for you to choose from.
That said, If you would like to see a chord builder as just a list of chords related to some scale to select one to add to a progression, then I’d suggest the better place to have it would be on the ‘CHORD’ page. However from an entirely personal perspective, I’m happy with the chord search box which allows me to type ‘C’ and get a comprehensive list of chords to drag and drop. I acknowledge that others might prefer a ‘point and click’ approach, but they are real estate heavy and it’s hard to see how the BIAB structure would fit in to the current design.
My approach here might be picking a scale (which can be non-diatonic) and dropping section B into section C, then moving to the CHORD page. Now I can see in the pattern all the harmonised chords (as in the BIAB window) at the bottom, and all the possible variations of the root chords along the top. In BIAB, you would click on, say Dm (The second chord on the top row) and get a window to choose from. as under
In Scaler, I just type Dm into the search box and it gives me a list of chords.
just the same as BIAB. There is surely no FUNCTIONAL difference here, it is all about GUI choices, and that is one for the devs in the final analysis.;
Finally, I would note that for those not familiar with Band-in-a-Box, it is (AFAIK) restricted to diatonic scales (assuming that is defined as TTSTTTS or a rotation thereof), as shown in the chord builder diagram in the post. This doesn’t affect the chord selection per se in isolation in 12 TET, but BIAB is obviously less flexible that Scaler in this regard - it therefore can’t generate melodies for a Superlocrian bb3 scale as far as I can see in my version.
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Scaler’s Chords page is good. I didn’t use it before, but now I use it all the time.
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Developing @yorkeman’s theme I would suggest that there are two logical places to add some of the functionality that @swingmix is suggesting from BIAB. These are the Main page and the CHORD page.
The Dominant 7ths could be included as a variation on the Main page, say here
whilst slash chords may be option on the CHORD page (I found some slash chords on the VOICING options on the Main page, but I had to look for them).
Having chosen a slah chord, clicking on the SUGGEST button produced alot more.
I also note that it is possible to create slash chords on the Chord page manually using the keyboard, but one has to know what one is doing.
I think the issue is that @swingmix is at the start of is composing career and has only limited music theory and looks to the software to suggest the answer. @yorkeman and others have more theory, therefore don’t need the prompts that BIAB gives to novice composers.
IMHO it all depends on the development roadmap that the team are following for Scaler. It may be helpful to have more structured suggestions in the application but as I have said before I believe that this may kill creativity and may be expensive to implement…
IMHO at the end of the day it is better to spend a bit of time looking for new chords and using your ears to find them than to be reliant on the software suggesting them: because if they are “the common chords” then they are used in everyone’s composition and could make one’s composition common and not unique.
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I think of scaler as an instrument, not an an almanac. Too much inference of one negates the other, that said it’s important that we note user requests and suggestions and ‘prioritise’ them amongst our own features we think are important.
I do love using the CHORD page for this, and the circle of fifths and its associated chord suggestions have become a larger part of how I ( and many artists ) use Scaler. I think this area needs to be expanded as it, alongside the suggested chords, is an effective way to write original harmony or recreate existing harmony.
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Thanks everyone for the replies.
The reason why I am writing this request.
Mainly, every time I use SCALER, I have to write these common chords myself.
If possible, I would like SCALER to make a common chord interface.
This will save a lot of time, thanks a lot.
I hope these chords will be added to the same page in the new version in the future. thank you