General

These exercises are meant to help finger positioning and intonation. The general idea is that for each exercise, the app will show you a note on a musical staff. You play that note. Then the app will play that note and you can adjust your fingers to find the pitch. Then it will repeat this with a different note.

The different exercises train different aspects of your fingering. For example, the most basic exercise is First Position #1. Here the app will play all of the notes in the first position – this is great for a beginner cellist learning how to place their fingers. The other exercises will help with other aspects of fingering.

What to do

  1. Choose the exercise.
  2. Press Start.
  3. The system waits for timeToStart # of seconds.
  4. It shows a note on the staff.
  5. It waits waitTime # of seconds.
  6. The system plays that note for timeLength # of seconds.
  7. The system repeats 4-6 until you press Stop.
  8. Change the times by using the sliders.
  9. The text above the staff tells you which position/fingering you should be using.

Hearing the notes

In order to tune your note, the app sound should be loud enough to be heard over your cello. If you need to amplify it you could either use an external speaker or earphones (only one earphone). Note that while the earphone would be louder, you wouldn’t hear the beats between close pitches. – the beats happen when notes interfer in the air. With earphones, the app sound goes directly into your ear and the notes interact in your brain, not the air.

Tones

The tone is a sampled cello sound.

Tuning

This app uses equal temperament. If this is a major issue, let me know and I will add just intontation.