Description by Ron Klein
Written by the developer, not by AppBrain. Click to read.
BarBeatCue Satellite makes an iPad or an iPhone a player's stand on stage. It shows what that player reads — a chord chart, the lyrics, the chords above the words, the part as printed or engraved, the giant bar and beat, or the band leader's remote — and follows the song bar by bar, on the Mac's clock, over your own WiFi.
IT WORKS WITH BARBEATCUE ON THE MAC
BarBeatCue Satellite is the companion of BarBeatCue, the live-performance rig for the Mac (barbeatcue.live). The Mac plays the setlist — the stems, the click, one song into the next — and every iPad and iPhone on the same WiFi follows it. Without a Mac running BarBeatCue it plays a short built-in Demo song, so you can see it work. On stage it needs no internet, no account and nothing to sign in to. The app is free and has nothing to buy.
WHAT A PLAYER SEES
• Chord chart — the song's bars four to a row (two on an iPhone), the bar playing framed, the rest dimmed.
• Lyrics — a prompter: the line being sung lit, the lines around it dimmed, scrolling with the song.
• Chords and lyrics — the chords above the syllables they fall on.
• Score — a PDF part as printed, its pages turned in playing order through repeats and jumps; or a MusicXML part engraved at the width of the screen and scrolling with the song, the bar playing shaded. A song played in another key is re-spelled on the fly.
• Giant bar and beat — the song, the part, the bar and the beat, readable from across the stage.
• Remote — play, stop, songs, parts, vamps and the click, for the band leader, once the iPad has proved the rig's passphrase to the Mac. The passphrase never travels over the WiFi.
A slim band along the top always says the song and the next one, the part, the bar and beat, the tempo and the time left.
ON THE BAR LINE, TOGETHER
The song is sent once; each screen draws itself from its own clock, kept with the Mac's. When the song jumps to the chorus, every chart, prompter and score jumps with it, on the bar line. A vamp, a key change or a song chained into the next lands on every screen on the same downbeat.
WHO SEES WHAT IS SET ON THE MAC
The Mac's Band list holds the players — a name, an instrument, what they read — and saves them with the show. Open the app, pick the rig, pick who you are, and your part is there. A song, or a moment in a song, can switch a player to another display. The Mac's Screens pane shows what every player sees.
YOUR OWN LOOK
A face of your own (a Real Book hand among them), colours, a black background for a dark stage or paper for daylight, Nashville numbers or a capo for the chords. A pinch makes the prompter or the chart larger, and the size is kept on the Mac with the show.
MANUAL MODE
Leave the song for a moment — turn pages, scroll ahead — while the top band keeps the band's place. One tap on Follow brings you back.
YOUR MARKS ON YOUR PART
With the Apple Pencil, mark the printed part: a pen in three colours and stamps from the music font — breaths, dynamics, accents, bowings. Each mark is held by its bar, back in its place on every page turn, upright or on its side, at any zoom. Only the player who drew it sees it.
WHAT IT NEEDS
• A Mac with BarBeatCue, on the same WiFi network as the iPads and iPhones. A router of your own on the stage is best; a venue's guest WiFi often keeps devices apart.
• Local network access for this app, asked on the first launch.
• iPadOS or iOS 17 or later.
BarBeatCue Satellite collects nothing. What it receives from the Mac stays on your device.
