It is a polyrhythmic visualization. This is a visual representation of what happens when two independent pulse streams work together in one cycle. Clicking around the interface with your mouse will allow you to change it, alternatively you could also use your computer keyboard to make changes more quickly.
The tool is divided into three main sections. On the left is the control dock. The center contains the clock face. On the right are the tap section and grid. These provides mathematical, auditory and visual means of grasping the rhythm.
How to Use the Tool
Starting at the left dock sets initial settings for your journey. Using the ratio buttons selects from most commonly used ratios such as five against seven or two against three. Alternatively, use the inner and outer count fields to enter your own specific numbers to create a combination. Pressing the exchange ring roles button switches the place of the two voices so you can hear the effect of the faster pulse moving to the outside ring instead.
Sliders below the ratio controls forms the timing of what you hear. The convergence rate slider determines the number of full cycles per minute. The higher the number, the faster the rate; lower numbers gives you longer to observe the pattern. Inner phase slider moves the inner voice forwards or back by slot positions. It is useful for disrupting the alignment and observing the pulses drift apart then re-align at the seam.
The audible orbit section let you isolate the voices. This section allows you to pick out the voices separately. Coupled voices lets you hear both voices together. Inner Voice Only shows you just the small divisions and Outer Voice Only plays just the larger pulses. There’s also a Normalize Pulse Weights button which sets everything back to a neutral accent. The Convergence Bell Volume is another control that lets you hear how loudly the voices converge when aligned. Overall there’s an Observatory Level slider that sets volume of the whole instrument.
That’s where the visual interaction occurs: on the central clock face. The inner voice is represented by diamond shapes; the outer voice is represented by those round dots. To play with the pulses on the clock, simply click on one. It will cycle through levels of whisper, accent, and normal. A whisper is subtle and quieter than an accent, which in turn is louder and more pronounced. Alternatively, you can click right on a pulse for an instant playback of its tone without starting the complete cycle.
Click set orbits in motion to run the animation and audio once and have it repeat the cycle in a continuous loop. This will play all the way through once and stop. That lets you really listen to just the single pass through… The alignment on that one go-round.
The status text below the clock tell you what’s happening with the system. The pulse lattice below the clock break the cycle down into its tiniest common grid of parts. A cell is one slice of time. Outer attacks are shown as round dots; inner attacks with diamonds. If both voices happen at the exact same moment, they are marked by stars. You can click on any cell in the grid and hear just that instant in time. This way you can identify precisely where the overlaps happen within the math of it all.
There’s also a tap lab where you can practice your timing (on the right-hand side). Click the tap button after you’ve started the orbits and listen for when the two voices is aligned. If you’re early or late, it’ll move a needle across a gauge. It’s one of those things that trains your ear to find the seam even if you don’t rely on the visual clues. There isn’t any score-keeping in the system, so you can practice as much as you like with no pressure.
You can also use the keyboard for quick navigation without a mouse. To jump to one of the four preset ratios simply press the corresponding number keys (2-5). This is much quicker than clicking each button every time you want to change the pattern. Also, the tap function is activated by pressing the space bar when not in focus within an input box. Using this, you can tap along with your finger on the home row to check your timing.
In addition to the clock face, there are also options for navigating the pulses with your arrow keys. After selecting a pulse on the ring, you can then move to the next pulse in line by pressing right and left. To adjust the weight of this particular pulse, press the space bar or enter key to cycle it through. This is useful when you wish to emphasize some but not all of the beats instead of having to click around the interface.
The return to alignment button in the dock will reset the phase slider to zero which moves both voices back to their common starting point. Experiment with some extreme phase shifts and you will notice that this alters the lattice. If you drag the inner phase slider to either end of the range, it can produce a pattern where the voices seem like they might never line up at the midpoint of the cycle. When do they actualy coincide? And where? Listen out for it; sometimes it is astonishing how much a difference of just a couple of slots between the inner and outer voices affects such a simple three against four pattern.
If you find yourself overwhelmed by rhythm try hitting the normalize button to set all your accents back to the same strength. You will then be able to hear the bare bones of the ratio after experimenting with hard and soft pulses. Settling everything back to the same value allows you to try another combination. This way, you know that what you’re hearing isn’t what’s left from the last accents, but rather the underlying structure of the polyrhythm.
If you’d prefer to go full-screen and just focus on the visualization, there’s a fullscreen option for that too. Just hit the fullscreen button up in the top-right of the widget to expand it to take over your whole screen. It’s especially nice when you’re showing off the visualizer to someone or on smaller screens. The grid and clock face will get a lot bigger and be easier to see as it adjusts itself to fit the available space.
If you ever find yourself stuck, there’s also a quick reference guide in the help panel. There’s also a how to play button that will give you a summary of all your shortcuts and controls. You can leave this up as long as you want and refer back to it as you experiment. If you forget how something is mapped to the keyboard or what a certain button does, this is a good place to check.
Begin with a basic pulse train such as 2:3 and give it a slow rate of convergence. Listen for the convergence bell and watch for the pulses to align. When you’re feeling confident go ahead and change the rate or phase and see if you can break the pattern. Feel free to click around and discover what sounds interesting to you, there’s not a wrong way to explore the rhythms.