The Practice Grid indicates and controls the settings for conducting practice sessions in Scales View. Some of the settings are also used for exploring scale positions.
For Single Practice sessions, you can select settings in the grid for the animated demonstration. For Cycle Practice sessions, if you have chosen to vary any of these settings, they may be automatically updated between each step.
Several settings in Practice Options have an effect on how practice sessions are conducted.
Settings
Scale
Indicates the scale currently selected in the Scale Matrix, or displays (none) is no scale is selected.
Although this setting shows the same dropdown button when highlighted as the other settings, it cannot be updated from the Grid. For Cycle Practice sessions where you have chosen to vary the scale, this setting will be updated automatically between steps.
Position
Indicate the scale position you are currently viewing on the Fretboard. If no scale is selected in the Scale Matrix, or if there are no positions available for the selected scale, this setting displays (none).
When highlighted, the Position setting displays a dropdown button which you can press to view or change to alternative positions. Positions are indicated in the list with an item of the following format:
Fret 5, Bass <4>
This indicates that fret 5 is the lowest fretboard location in the scale position. For partial positions, an additional modifier (show here as Bass) will appear, if there is more than one scale position at the same fret.
In this case the description tells us that the position occurs on the bass (low-pitched, thicker) strings of the instrument, and there will be another scale position marked Fret 5, Treble, which occurs on the treble (high-pitched, thinner) strings.
The last number in angle brackets at the end of each item indicates the fret span of each position. You may wish to choose lower fret spans to find scale positions which are easier to play.
You can limit the fret spans of scale positions that ChordWizard uses with the Practice Options.
For Cycle Practice sessions where you have chosen to vary it, this setting will be updated automatically between steps.
Pattern (for Partial Positions)
Indicates the pattern (or sequence) to be used for playing the degrees in the partial scale position in practice sessions.
Normally this has the degrees appearing in ascending order, for example with a Major scale, the default pattern would be as follows (the small 1 at the end indicates the root note one octave up):
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ¹
However, to add interest and challenge to scale practice, many other patterns (48 in total) of these same degrees are available, as shown below.
3 4 1 2 7 ¹ 5 6
7 ¹ 5 6 3 4 1 2
2 1 4 3 6 5 ¹ 7
When highlighted, the Pattern setting displays a dropdown button which you can press to view or change to alternative patterns. For Cycle Practice sessions where you have chosen to vary it, this setting will be updated automatically between steps.
The names of the degrees appear differently for other scale types. You can choose to play only selected degrees from the scale by changing the Include setting.
Pattern (for Full Positions)
Indicates the pattern (or sequence) to be used for playing the full scale position in practice sessions. There are two components to the pattern for full positions.
The first indicates the direction of play, and is one of the following:
/ = lowest note up to the highest
\ = highest note down to the lowest
/\ = lowest to the highest and back
\/ = highest to the lowest and back
The second indicates the step pattern between the notes. Some examples are given below:
(+1) = Step up by 1 note each time
(+2, -1) = Step up by 2 notes, then down 1, then up 2 again, etc.
(+2, -2, +1) = Step up by 2 notes, down by 2, up by 1, then up by 2 again, etc.
These step patterns are repeated until the last note in the scale position is reached.
Include
Indicates which scale notes from the scale position will appear in the Pattern used for practice sessions.
Normally this is set to All Degrees, and includes every note in the position. However, you can choose to restrict this if you want to focus on particular elements of the scale.
The following shows the other choices, together with an example of how it would work with a Major scale. For other scale types, these degree names would be different:
Odd Alternates 1 3 5 7
Even Alternates 2 4 6 ¹
Triad+2nd 1 2 3 5
Triad+4th 1 3 4 5
Triad+6th 1 3 5 6
Triad+7th 1 3 5 7
When highlighted, the Include setting displays a dropdown button which you can press to view or change to alternative patterns. For Cycle Practice sessions where you have chosen to vary it, this setting will be updated automatically between steps.
Harmony
You can choose to play a chord during a practice session to provide a harmonic context for the scale.
The actual chord played is chosen automatically by ChordWizard according to the principles of relations. You can find out more about this in the Chord and Scale Relations topic in Tutorials View.
Before you start your practice session, the Harmony setting displays a dropdown button when highlighted, which you can use to select a Triad (Three-Note), Four Note, Five Note, or Six Note Chord to be played.
Which one you select depends on how rich you want the harmony to be. You can also choose to disable the harmony altogether.
During practice sessions, the name of the actual chord selected by ChordWizard is displayed in this area. You can change the voice and relative volume of the harmony chord in the Sound options.
Rhythm
Indicates which rhythm pattern is used to play the scale position in practice sessions. Normally it is set to a simple rhythm of four whole beat notes.
However, to add interest and challenge to scale practice, many other rhythms are available, consisting of combinations of whole beat notes, half beat notes, and half beat rests. These are displayed in standard musical notation.
When highlighted, the Rhythm setting displays a dropdown button which you can press to view or change to alternative rhythms. For Cycle Practice sessions where you have chosen to vary it, this setting will be updated automatically between steps.
Tempo
Indicates the tempo to be used for scale practice sessions, expressed in Beats per Minute (bpm).
Normally it is set to a comfortable 120 bpm, but when highlighted, the Tempo setting displays a dropdown button which you can press to change it.
All tempos from 30 bpm to 240 bpm are available, in 2 bpm increments. If you have magic fingers and need to play faster than 240 bpm, try setting the Rhythm pattern to use half beat steps.
For Cycle Practice sessions where you have chosen to vary it, this setting will be updated automatically between steps.
See Also
