I found a couple of practical sites that may be of interest to guitar players.
The first is a chord finder called chordbook.com.
I refer to this site often and used it to identify and designate all the “weird” chords that are listed under the songs tab on the Deep Is The Well Website. What’s different about this site – and why I really like – it is because it is very interactive and brain-dead simple to use. From a single screen page it shows you the neck of the guitar and allows you to create a fingering diagram of any conceivable chord by clicking and dragging the “dots” (representing your finger placement) to any fret or string. Hit the search icon and viola! It identifies the chord, instantly. From the same screen you can use a remarkably elegant table whereby you select the root chord and with a single click of the mouse, it shows you all the variations of major, minor, diminished, suspended, 5ths, 7ths, 9ths, 11ths, and 13ths. One more click and it shows you a diagram of all their inversions and voicings all the way up the neck.
The second site is a FREE App that I installed on my iPhone: The Gibson App.
There are two tools that I have used with some regularity: a chromatic tuner that in addition to standard EADGBE, gives you the choice of several alternate tunings. The traditional chromatic tuner which starts in “All Notes” mode, tracks whatever is played. Owners of the App can choose a tuning on the “Mode” page so the tuner will only track notes for that particular tuning. A simple tuner is also included which allows less advanced users to tune to Standard tuning Open G, Open D etc., by touching the key. For iPhone and Android users, the Gibson headstock inlay automatically changes color indicating if the string is sharp, flat or in tune. For iTouch users they can turn the “Play Notes” option on so they can hear the appropriate note. This tuner, although it will never replace in-line, rack mount or headstock tuners, is great in a pinch.
The other feature that I really like is the digital tap-tempo metronome with a pendulum and a dial-wheel. It allows you the option of a specific BPM or just tap the screen three times to automatically set the tempo. There are other features as well from Gibson, but these two really stand out!
