Rayzoon Technologies LLC

[funktional]

Could you please explain the core bar concept a bit?

peace
burak

[J van E]

I do think the definition 'Core bar' isn't a real good choice... It makes things more complicated than it should have been.

But first let me explain what a Core bar is: a part (in the Song sheet) can contain several bars. You decide how much bars a part will contain (1 or 4 or whatever). Besides that you can let a part repeat itself, and again you decide how often that will happen.

Let's take a 4 bar part that is repeated 3 times as an example:

1 2 3 4 > Core bars
1 2 3 4 > Repetition
1 2 3 4 > Repetition

Here you see a part containing 4 bars, being repeated 3 times. The FIRST play-through you will be hearing (and seeing) the Core bars (there are foru of them). The second and third play-through you will be hearing repetitions of those 4 Core bars. Together they form a Part (which also includes a Style and Drummer).

While you are listening to the first play-through, you will see the words Core bar in the bar editor, telling you that what you hear and see is the Core bar. During the repetitions those words will have disappeared.

The IMPORTANCE of this Core bar is that EVERY change in the Core bar will affect it's repetitions! So a change in the second Core bar, will effect the second bar of the repetitions. However, every change in a repetition will NOT affect the other repetitions nor the Core bar itself.

Let's make a change to the Core bar 2 as an example: let's make it red:

1 2 3 4 > Core bars
1 2 3 4 > Repetition
1 2 3 4 > Repetition

The change is used in all repetitions! Now let's make a change in a repetition: let's make a bold italic:

1 2 3 4 > Core bars
1 2 3 4 > Repetition
1 2 3 4 > Repetition

Notice how this change is NOT affecting other bars?

You may stop reading here, unless you want to know what I find confusing...

Now, to get back to the possible confusion: a Core bar can consist of MORE bars...! In fact ALL bars of the part of the first play-through) are Core bars! A lot of people (including me) initially think the first BAR of a part is a Core bar and ALL other bars will be made up by JS2 automatically. But this is not so. If you want to manually create a part with 4 bars (that can be repeated as much as you want to), you will have to edit ALL 4 bars that all called 'Core bar'. Those 4 Core bars make up the first play-through of the part. And HERE is where I think things could have been more easier...:

Maybe it would have been better (hope this wont get confusing!) to forget about the Core bars and simply call it the Part...!!!

I honestly think it isn't necessary to call the 'first play-through' the 'core bar' while you could simply call it THE part itself. You set up a part of 4 bars and you can repeat that part. Simple as that. But maybe I am missing something obvious...

1 2 3 4 > Part
1 2 3 4 > Repetition
1 2 3 4 > Repetition

Looks simple and logic to me: now everyone understands you have to fill all those first 4 bars in order to create a valid part! All in all the idea of the Songsheet in JS2 is pretty simple, but introducing the term Core bar makes it more complicated than it should be. If you rename Core bar to Part, explaining the use of this, as I did above, would be a LOT easier. The Core bars ARE the Part, and you can assign a style and drummer to that Part and let THAT repeat as often as you want to.

Hope someone still knows what I mean... I do think this would have been an easier way. Unless, as I said, I am missing something obvious...

EDIT:
(I just had some more ideas, to make my theory even clearer, but maybe only Ralph should read this). To make it even more simple and less confusing, it might be (or have been) a nice idea to change the order in the song sheet to this:

Part name - Bars - Style - Drummer ----- Rep - R - T

So you set up a part and THEN you decide on the repetitions.

And more important: I do believe Rep should be ZERO when you want the part to be played once...! Because, coming to think of it, the first play-through if a part isn't a repetition at all!!! So in 'my songsheet' Rep should have to be set to 3 if you wanted the initial part to be repeated 3 times, which would result in the part being played 4 times! And if you don't want the part to be repeated Rep should be 0. This also makes the important difference between the original 'Core bars' and its repetition more cleare.

Hope you don't mind me thinking along: I know I am a bit late with it all...

[funktional]

You really gave me a clear explanation of the core bar.I really thank you for this and for the other helpful posts of yours.

peace
burak