RapidComposer

music prototyping

User Guide

© 2024 by MusicDevelopments
http://www.musicdevelopments.com

October 2024

RapidComposer User Guide

 Table of Contents

Glossary 6
Introduction 7
Getting started 10
System requirements........................................................................10
Windows........................................................................................10
macOS...........................................................................................10
Installation........................................................................................11
Installation on Windows.................................................................11
Installation on macOS....................................................................13
Software activation...........................................................................14
Upgrading from version 4.................................................................14
The basics 15
Basic concept & functionality............................................................15
Working with phrases.......................................................................17
Adding phrases to the composition................................................17
Filling a track with phrases............................................................19
Transposing phrases......................................................................23
Resizing phrases............................................................................26
Using the lock for phrases..............................................................27
Using the magnet for phrases........................................................28
Harmonization................................................................................36
Other phrase operations................................................................40
Working with MIDI continuous controllers (CC’s)...............................42
Curves or events............................................................................42
Adding CC’s to a track....................................................................43
Adding CC’s to a phrase.................................................................43
Adding CC’s to a note....................................................................44
Editing tools...................................................................................44
Working with chords.........................................................................47
Editing chords on the master track................................................47
Using the Chord Selector...............................................................48
Using the ‘Circle Of Fifths’ chart....................................................50
Using the ‘Tonnetz’........................................................................51
Using the MIDI keyboard for chord selection..................................52
Using the computer keyboard for typing chord names..................53
Editing guitar chords......................................................................54
Generating a chord progression.....................................................56
Working with tracks..........................................................................60
The track instrument......................................................................61
Variations.......................................................................................61

RapidComposer User Guide i

 Sound effects.................................................................................61
Adding a new track........................................................................62
Rearranging tracks.........................................................................63
Removing a track...........................................................................63
Mute and solo................................................................................64
Track templates.............................................................................64
Guitar tracks..................................................................................64
AI suggestions...................................................................................68
Prerequisites..................................................................................68
Settings..........................................................................................68
How it works..................................................................................69
Getting AI suggestions...................................................................70
Browsers...........................................................................................73
Structure inspector...........................................................................75
Drag and drop...................................................................................76
Dragging and dropping phrases.....................................................76
Dragging and dropping rhythm......................................................77
Dragging and dropping chord progressions...................................79
Dragging MIDI to RapidComposer..................................................80
Dragging MIDI from RapidComposer to DAW (or to Explorer/Finder)
.......................................................................................................82
Articulations......................................................................................84
Phrase Editor 85
Explanation for the notation used.....................................................86
Phrase generator reference 88
Arpeggiator....................................................................................89
Bass Generator..............................................................................91
Chord Generator............................................................................92
Dyads Run......................................................................................93
Fingerpicking Generator.................................................................95
Generic Generator.........................................................................96
Markov Melody Generator..............................................................98
Melody Generator........................................................................100
Melody Generator v2....................................................................103
MIDI Transformer (full edition only)..............................................103
Modern Chord Pattern Generator.................................................106
Motive Generator.........................................................................107
Ostinato Generator......................................................................108
Percussion Generator...................................................................110
Phrase Container..........................................................................111
Phrase Morpher............................................................................113
Piano Chord Pattern Generator....................................................114

RapidComposer User Guide ii

 Piano Run Generator....................................................................116
Random Melody Generator..........................................................118
Rest..............................................................................................120
Rhythm Mapper...........................................................................120
Strings Staccato Generator..........................................................122
Strum Pattern Generator..............................................................124
Rhythm generator reference 126
Rhythm Processing......................................................................126
Rhythm Lab..................................................................................127
Modern Rhythm...........................................................................130
Modern Random Rhythm.............................................................131
Schillinger's Interference.............................................................132
Subdivision...................................................................................133
Polyrhythm...................................................................................134
Euclidean Rhythm........................................................................135
Smooth Rhythm...........................................................................136
Retro Rhythm...............................................................................137
Generic Rhythm (obsolete, replaced by Rhythm Lab)..................138
Probabilistic Rhythm (obsolete, replaced by Rhythm Lab)...........139
Simple Divisions (obsolete, replaced by Rhythm Lab)..................140
Toggle Divisions (obsolete, replaced by Rhythm Lab)..................142
Manual Editing.............................................................................142
Variations 145
Applying variations to the entire track.........................................145
Applying variations to a phrase....................................................146
Variations included......................................................................147
Melody Editor 151
Overview.........................................................................................151
Workflow......................................................................................151
User interface..............................................................................151
Creating melodies...........................................................................160
Melody generation.......................................................................160
Melody mutation..........................................................................168
Melody editing.............................................................................168
MIDI Mutator 169
Overview.........................................................................................169
Workflow......................................................................................169
User interface..............................................................................169
Piano roll options.........................................................................171
The editing toolbar.......................................................................172
The timeline.................................................................................173
The chords track..........................................................................173

RapidComposer User Guide iii

 The workspace.............................................................................174
Working with MIDI files...................................................................174
Changing the rhythm...................................................................175
Changing the timing....................................................................177
Changing the accents..................................................................177
Changing the chords....................................................................177
Changing the shape/notes...........................................................178
Chord Rules Editor 182
MIDI Import 184
1. Selecting the file to import.......................................................185
2. Select tracks to import.............................................................186
3. Set scale detection options......................................................186
4. Set chord detection options and check chords.........................186
5. Set other options......................................................................187
6. Press the “Import” button!.......................................................187
Chord voicings 188
Voicing editor on the master track...............................................188
Voicing for a master track chord..................................................189
Universal voicing..........................................................................191
Idea Tool (full edition) 192
Overview......................................................................................192
Entering Idea Tool mode..............................................................192
Workflow......................................................................................193
Master track options....................................................................193
Track options...............................................................................194
Generating tracks........................................................................197
Possibilities of the Idea Tool.........................................................198
Phrase Morphing (full edition) 199
Settings 214
MIDI................................................................................................214
Audio.............................................................................................. 215
Plug-ins...........................................................................................216
Soundfonts......................................................................................216
Another way of adding soundfonts...............................................217
Preview...........................................................................................217
Chord preview options.................................................................217
Chord preview instrument............................................................218
Bass preview instrument..............................................................218
Scale preview instrument............................................................218
Rhythm preview instrument.........................................................218
Locations........................................................................................218
Compositions...............................................................................218

RapidComposer User Guide iv

 Custom phrases...........................................................................219
Custom rhythm patterns..............................................................219
Track templates...........................................................................219
Windows portable use..................................................................219
Miscellaneous.................................................................................220
Editing..........................................................................................220
Rhythm Editing............................................................................222
Chords..........................................................................................223
Inspectors And Browsers..............................................................224
New Composition.........................................................................225
New Track....................................................................................225
MIDI Export..................................................................................229
MIDI Recording.............................................................................229
Plug-in Hosting.............................................................................229
RapidComposer VST/VST3/AU......................................................230
Analysis........................................................................................231
History.........................................................................................231
Help.............................................................................................232
Experimental Features.................................................................232
User Interface.................................................................................233
Keyboard Shortcuts........................................................................233
Troubleshooting 234
Skip loading the most recently edited composition......................234
Skip audio initialization................................................................235
Force using ‘software’ rendering..................................................235
Force using non-retina screen (macOS only)...............................235
Reset window position and UI color scheme................................235
Loading a composition without plug-ins.......................................236
Support 237
Checking for updates......................................................................237
Reporting bugs...............................................................................237

RapidComposer User Guide v

Glossary
DAW: Digital Audio Workstation, the host application where VST and Audio Unit
plugins are loaded.

Inversion: horizontal or vertical mirroring of notes. Play the motive upside down
or right to left. The latter is also called ‘retrograde’.

MIDI CC: MIDI continuous controllers.

Phrase: a group of musical notes, the basic building block of a composition in

RapidComposer. Phrases typically include chord and/or scale relative notes, so
they can be used with any chords and scales (smart phrases).

Phrase Generator: a phrase with notes created by an algorithm. Access phrase

generators’ settings in the phrase inspector.

Motive: A motive is the smallest possible musical idea, no more than five or six
notes at the most. A composer will use a motive to build larger structures by
repeating, modifying and combining it with other motives. Motives are denoted
as A, B, C, D, E, F, G and H in the Melody Editor. We use the term ‘motive’ only in
connection with melody.

RapidComposer User Guide 6

Introduction
RapidComposer is a unique, non-destructive, phrase-based music prototyping
software, with VST, VST3 instrument/effect and SoundFont support. You can read
more about the features, view screenshots and tutorials (including tutorial videos)
at www.musicdevelopments.com.

If you ever used a DAW, you won’t have any difficulties using RapidComposer.
However, the software does assume that you have a basic knowledge of music
theory, but even if you don’t, RapidComposer is very helpful in assisting you in
regards to which chords fit together, and how scale intervals relate to chords.

This guide provides an introduction to RapidComposer and takes you through the
basic workflow. You are advised to use the pop-up help windows (also known as
tooltips) which contain more details. If you hover the mouse on any user interface
element, a tooltip window appears after a few seconds.

RapidComposer features:
• Advanced tools for phrase editing, phrase generation, phrase morphing,
phrase grouping, motif development, chord progression editing
• Master track with chords (note names or universal notation) which all
phrases automatically conform to
• Chord suggestions, chord progression generation with optional borrowed
chords, chord progression rules editing, chord voicing editing and assigning
to tracks and phrases
• Guitar chord fingerings displayed on the master track, offered by a smart
algorithm, editing guitar chord notes, guitar chord preview
• Easy chord entry from Chord Selector, Circle Of Fifths chart, MIDI keyboard,
or computer keyboard. Chord Selector offers 'Chord List', 'Scale Degrees',
'Palette', 'Chord Builder', ‘Tonnetz’ and 'Circle Of Fifths'.
• AI suggestions for chords, chord rules, progressions, phrases (OpenAI API
key required)
• Included rhythm generators: Rhythm Lab, Schillinger's Interference, Poly-
rhythm, Subdivision, Euclidean Rhythm, Smooth Rhythm, Bass Rhythm. Old
rhythm generators included for compatibility: Generic Rhythm, Probabilistic
Rhythm, Simple Intervals, Toggle Intervals
• Included phrase generators: Arpeggiator, Bass Generator, Chord Generator,
Dyads Run, Generator, Fingerpicking Generator, Generic Generator, Melody
Generator, Melody Generator v2, Modern Chord Pattern Generator, Ostinato

RapidComposer User Guide 7

 Generator, Phrase Container, Piano Chord Pattern Generator, Piano Run
Generator, Random Melody Generator, Strings Staccato Generator, Strum
Pattern Generator. Only in the full edition: MIDI Transformer, Motive
Generator, Percussion Generator, Phrase Morpher
• Included variations: Add Chord Notes, Add Interval, Adjust Note Lengths,
Apply Rhythm, Audio Gain, Delay Notes, Double Note, Double Phrase,
Expression, Extract Rhythm, Humanize, Join Notes, Limit Note Range, MIDI
Echo, Make Monophonic, Mirror Horizontally, Mirror Vertically, Permute
Chord Notes, Quantize, Remove Note, Remove Short Notes, Rests, Rotate
Notes, Simplify Phrase, Spread Out Chord Notes, Staccato-Legato,
Strumming, Swap Chord Notes, Swing, Transpose, Triple Phrase, Velocity,
Velocity Generator
• Melody generation, melody auto-harmonization using 2 methods,
• Piano roll with scale and chord notes shading, and smart arranging of
overlapped notes in two styles.
• In-place non-destructive phrase-level and note-level editing
• “DAW view” that enables working in multiple tracks at once, like in a DAW
• “Guitar tab view” that displays notes on strings and frets (editable) with
MusicXML export
• “Song view” to display the composition line by line
• Editing percussion tracks using drum maps
• Sophisticated MIDI CC editing and recording, CC function generator, CC
envelope browser
• Articulations can be assigned to phrases or even individual notes (full edition
only)
• Extensive scale, chord, chord progression databases.
• Rhythm drag-and-drop between phrases or from rhythm browser, applying a
rhythm pattern on a phrase,
• Instrument browser of all MIDI, VST, VST3 and SF2 presets in one place
• Integrated Idea Tool that can generate a multi-track composition, offering 3
different workflows (full edition only)
• Unlimited undo (simple list or version tree with branches)
• Fully customizable user interface (all colors and font size) with preset
themes
• Fully customizable keyboard shortcuts (MIDI keys can be used as shortcuts)
• MIDI drag-and-drop tracks or composition to DAWs
• Virtual instruments (VST v2.4 and VST3 plug-ins) support
• Sound effects (VST v2.4 and VST3 plug-ins) support
• SoundFont (.SF2) support
• Simple activation. No internet connection is required for activation or
operation

RapidComposer User Guide 8

RapidComposer is available for Windows and macOS and comes as 64-bit
standalone application, VST3 and AU (synth and MIDI FX, on macOS) plug-in
versions.

RapidComposer User Guide 9

Getting started
System requirements
Windows
• Windows 8/10/11 (64-bit) with at least 1GB RAM
• Intel/AMD processor (1.4 GHz minimum)
• ASIO driver is recommended for low-latency audio
• VST3 host required if using RapidComposer as a plug-in

macOS
• macOS 10.13-14 (latest update)
• Apple Silicon or Intel Core Duo
• 1GB RAM
• VST3 or AU host required if using RapidComposer as a plug-in

RapidComposer as a standalone application can host VST/VST3

instruments/effects and soundfonts. It is also possible to use a virtual MIDI cable
to forward MIDI events to your favourite DAW, which will host the instruments. On
macOS a virtual MIDI output is offered for this purpose. In this case you use “MIDI”
instruments for the tracks rather than soundfont or VST/VST3 plug-ins.

RapidComposer as a plug-in sends and receives MIDI events to/from the plug-in
host. It can output audio, so soundfonts can be used in the plug-in which is useful
for chords preview, for example. In order to use the plug-in you need to route the
plug-in output to a virtual instrument track. You will find more details for how to
accomplish this in the user guide of your DAW.

RapidComposer User Guide 10

Installation
The installation should be guided and straight-forward. You only have to follow the
steps described in the installation program.

Installation on Windows
During the installation, neither DLL files nor services are installed in the Windows
system directories.

The setup file automatically installs RapidComposer into the Program Files
directory.

The VST3 plug-in is installed in

C:\Program Files\Common Files\VST3

The data and settings files are stored in your public documents folder:
C:\Users\Public\Documents\RapidComposerV5

After a successful installation it might be required to add the corresponding plug-

in search path to your host software. Please refer to your DAWs manual to find out
how to do that.

Portable Use (Windows Only)

It is possible to run RapidComposer from a pen-drive.

Preparations

You need to move the installed application from “Program Files” directory to
your pen drive, e.g. to D:\RC. Installation installs data files to C:\Users\
Public\Documents\RapidComposerV5 directory. Move RapidComposerV5 to
the program folder, e.g. to D:\RC so that D:\RC\RapidComposerV5 will contain
Articulations, Chords, Settings, SoundFonts, etc.

Usage

RapidComposer User Guide 11

When RapidComposer is started from D:\RC, it will look for data files in
RapidComposerV5 in the same directory. If it cannot locate it, the usual location
will be used in C:\Users\Public\Documents\.

Settings

For portable use the locations of the Custom Phrases, Rhythm Patterns, Track
Templates can be made to point to directories on the pen-drive. For this use
relative paths, like “.”, “..”, or path names beginning with “\”. The reference path
(“.”) is the RapidComposerV5 directory.

Uninstallation
Uninstalling the application can be done either by selecting “Uninstall
RapidComposer” in the Windows Start Menu (inside the RapidComposer folder), or
from the Windows Control Panel. Since the system is not changed in any way
during the installation, you can also remove the folders without uninstalling the
software.

RapidComposer User Guide 12

Installation on macOS
Open the .dmg file, and click on “RapidComposer Installer”. The installer will
install the following files:

Standalone application:
Applications/RapidComposerV5.app

VST3 plug-in:
/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST3/RapidComposerV5.vst3

Audio unit (synth) plug-in:

/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/Components/RapidComposerV5.component

Audio unit (MIDI FX) plug-in:

/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/Components/RapidComposerMFXV5.component

The data and settings files are stored in

~/Documents/RapidComposerV5

Important: you should allow RapidComposer to access your Documents folder,

where it saves settings, chords, scales, progressions, etc. If RapidComposer
cannot write into ~/Documents/RapidComposerV5, you cannot save new scales,
chords, progressions, and you will need to type your license key every time.
RapidComposer will ask your permission to access the Documents folder. You can
set the permission manually:

1. On your Mac, choose Apple menu >> System Preferences >> click Security
& Privacy >> click Privacy.
2. Select Files and Folders.
3. Please select the checkbox below the RapidComposer application to access
files and folders in the Documents folder.

RapidComposer User Guide 13

Software activation
When first running RapidComposer, you will be asked to type the license key that
you received with your order. No internet connection is required for
activation or operation.

Upgrading from version 4

Some notes if you have installed RapidComposer version 4 in the past:

Version 5 and 4 can coexist on the same computer. Installing version 5 will not
overwrite any version 4 files. All installed files include “V5” in the name.

v5 is able to import v4 composition files but since instruments handling was

totally reworked, virtual instrument plug-ins will not be loaded from a v4
composition.

RapidComposer User Guide 14

The basics

Basic concept & functionality

RapidComposer is used to produce compositions quickly using MIDI phrases. It is
not meant to mix or master music. Once a composition have been finished, it can
be exported as a MIDI, WAV, or AIFF file. These files can then be imported into a
DAW for mixing and mastering. RapidComposer can also be used as a VST3/AU
plugin inside your favorite DAW, for synching up audio and virtual instrument
tracks (and vocals) with your RapidComposer compositions. Additionally, you can
drag-and-drop entire Compositions or separate tracks to your DAW as MIDI files.

Before you start using RapidComposer, it is important to understand exactly what

a Composition consists of. A Composition is a collection of one or more Tracks,
each which contains an Instrument (SoundFont, VST, VST3 or MIDI) controlled by
Phrases or Phrase Generators. Tracks are common to the whole composition,
and, like DAWs, combine to produce a musical arrangement with harmony and
melody.

The basic unit of composition is a Phrase, which is a sequence of notes and/or

chords (i.e. notes in parallel). Most commonly, phrases are created and
extensively manipulated by using rhythm and phrase generators. There are many
rhythm and phrase generators in RC, more in the Rhythm Generator Reference
or Phrase Generator Reference chapters.

As an important concept, phrases include chord-relative and/or scale-relative

notes. Absolute notes (used in DAWs) are also allowed, as well as bass note
relative notes. These special notes make the phrase automatically adhere to the
master track chords and scales.

You can also create a phrase manually (in Note Editing Mode or in the Phrase
Editor, by entering with mouse or recording from a MIDI keyboard). Furthermore,
you are able to save custom phrases with RC. Generators and the Phrase Browser
are covered in detail in other chapters. Commonly, you will start with a Generator
and tweak it, as this is the fastest way to get ideas going in RC.

RapidComposer User Guide 15

There are three types of tracks utilized in RapidComposer:

• Standard Tracks (MIDI) – Contain notes/chords/phrases for a particular

Instrument. These track types are the bread and butter of RapidComposer.

• Audio Tracks – Audio track implementation is basic with limited

functionality (no timestretch/tempo-matching). WAV, AIFF, FLAC, mp3 and
OGG (almost any sample format and sampling rate) can be imported and
dropped directly on an audio track or on the empty area to add a new audio
track. Audio to MIDI conversion is possible, by selecting the audio clips and
clicking on 'Convert selected audio to MIDI' in the phrase inspector.

• Folder Tracks – contain other tracks. You can drag regular tracks over a
folder track to be included. Alternatively you can use “Add To Folder Track”
or “Remove From Folder Track” in the track inspector.

RapidComposer User Guide 16

Working with phrases
Adding phrases to the composition
As a preparation, click on New Composition:

Press Ctrl-N/Cmd-N
OR

Press the 'Files' button:

Click on 'New Composition':

Open the Phrase Browser:

1. Dragging from the Phrase Browser

Drag and drop a phrase from the browser:

RapidComposer User Guide 17

2. Double-clicking in the track
The quickest way to add the selected phrase from the browser is for a double-
click. After you added a phrase, you can use paste (Ctrl-V/Cmd-V) to insert
additional phrases.

3. From the phrase inspector

For completeness you can find all phrase operations in the phrase inspector. The
top item inserts the selected phrase to the time pointer:

RapidComposer User Guide 18

4. Dropping MIDI files on tracks
It is possible to drop MIDI files inside the track or on the track header. The MIDI
file is inserted as a new phrase (named after the file) with absolute notes. You can
convert the notes to chord or scale relative in the phrase inspector. Optionally,
holding down Ctrl during dragging the MIDI file will convert the inserted MIDI
notes to chord-relative form. This assumes chords can be successfully analyzed in
the file, so this may or may not work optimally.

5. Copy and paste from Phrase Editor or Melody Editor

If you created a new phrase in the Phrase Editor or in the Melody Editor, you can
add it in the clipboard by clicking on “Add To Clipboard”. Use Ctrl-V/Cmd-V to
insert it in the composition.

Filling a track with phrases

Sometimes it is convenient to fill a track with phrases. You can do this with drag-
and-drop and with keyboard shortcuts (see Settings / Keyboard Shortcuts / Track).

1. With drag-and-drop
If you drop a phrase on the track header, the phrase is copied to the track
multiple times. When you release the mouse button you have some options:
holding down Shift will create ghost phrases, holding down Ctrl will activate the
magnets for voice leading.

Examples: Drop without Shift and Ctrl:

RapidComposer User Guide 19

Drop with Shift held down:

Drop with Ctrl held down:

RapidComposer User Guide 20

Drop with Shift and Ctrl held down:

2. Using keyboard shortcuts

By default the ‘F’ key is assigned for filling a track with the current selection in the
phrase browser. Shift and Ctrl behaves the same way as when dropping the
phrase (Shift-F: create ghosts, Ctrl-F: use magnet, Ctrl-Shift-F: create ghosts and
use magnet).

3. Making a ‘chords’ track

There are special shortcuts for setting up a chords track that will automatically
follow the chords on the master track, with or without voice leading. The shortcuts
are:

H: fill track with master track chords:

RapidComposer User Guide 21

Shift-H: fill track with master track chords with ‘Join’ option (Join variation is
added to the track):

Ctrl-Shift-H: fill track with master track chords with ‘Join’ and ‘Magnet’ options:

RapidComposer User Guide 22

Transposing phrases
Dragging the phrases vertically with the mouse will transpose them. Transposition
can also be set in the phrases inspector using a slider. There are 3 types of
transposition (to be set in the Phrase Transpose menu above the composition),
which are presented using a simple 1-3-5-3 phrase.

RapidComposer User Guide 23

Phrase Transpose: ‘Phrase’
Note that the phrase shape remains the same:

RapidComposer User Guide 24

Phrase Transpose: ‘Note’
Bottom notes jump up by an octave, the phrase shape changes:

RapidComposer User Guide 25

Phrase Transpose: ‘Octave’
All notes move by octaves, the phrase shape is preserved:

Resizing phrases
Dragging the left or right edge will resize the phrase. There are several options for
resizing:

• Shift-drag to scale
• Ctrl-drag to repeat/crop
• Dragging the edge without Shift/Ctrl means scaling for normal phrases and
setting generator length for phrase generators

It is possible to use several resizing operations one after the other like first scaling
then repeating the scaled notes.

RapidComposer User Guide 26

Using the lock for phrases
The ‘lock’ option is useful for voice leading long phrases which include chord and
scale changes in the middle of a phrase. When there are chord changes, the most
optimal inversion is used for chords. For scale changes, the closest note is used
on the new scale so that the phrase shape is preserved.

Without ‘lock’ enabled:

RapidComposer User Guide 27

With ‘lock’ enabled:

Using the magnet for phrases

Phrase magnets are useful for voice leading.

The small magnet icon at the top left corner of each phrase can help you to
automatically transpose the phrase relative to the previous phrase or an
envelope. You cannot move a phrase when the magnet is active. When several
phrases are connected, you can move the first phrase and all other phrases will
follow it.

The magnet has three states:

disabled, you can freely move the phrase around

RapidComposer User Guide 28

 it may point to the previous phrase which means the phrase will be
adjusted to the previous phrase

it may point upwards which make the phrase follow the phrase envelope

Right clicking on the magnet will offer 5 ways of automatically transposing

phrases:

RapidComposer User Guide 29

Minimize Note Distance
The phrase is transposed so that the distance between the first note of the phrase
and last note of the previous phrase is minimized. This works best for monophonic
phrases when there is exactly one 'first' note and one 'last' note.

RapidComposer User Guide 30

Approach Average Note Height
The phrase is transposed so that the distance between the the average of the
lowest and highest notes is minimized. This works well for both monophonic and
polyphonic phrases.

RapidComposer User Guide 31

Highest Note Follows Envelope
The phrases are transposed so that the highest note is not lower than the
envelope

The envelope is evaluated at the phrase starting position:

RapidComposer User Guide 32

RapidComposer User Guide 33
Average Note Height Follows Envelope
The phrases are transposed so that the average of the highest and lowest note is
on the envelope:

The shorter the phrases are the smoother they will follow the envelope. Here we
created a very simple phrase lasting for 2 beats that consists of only scale notes
(set the Note Mapping option to “Scale Notes [+semitones]”):

RapidComposer User Guide 34

RapidComposer User Guide 35
Each Note Follows The Envelope Within Key
Notes are transposed independently to the nearest scale step on the envelope:

Harmonization

You can auto-harmonize a melody line in RapidComposer. Harmonization works by

finding suitable chords for a melody, that are placed on the master track after
analysing the melody notes. Two algorithms are offered by RapidComposer.

Step 1: Insert the melody phrase in a track

The melody phrase can contain absolute or relative notes, and the source can be
anything (imported from MIDI file, recorded, generated, manually edited, etc). For
best results the melody should be monophonic and should include absolute notes.

RapidComposer User Guide 36

Step 2: Make sure the scale is set correctly on the master track
The harmonization will use the master track scale as the base scale, so it should
match the melody scale. Not just the scale but also the time signature has to be
set, if you'd like to insert chords on bars.

Step 3: Open the phrase inspector, Harmonize tab

Right-click (secondary click) on the melody phrase. Click on the Harmonize tab to
display harmonization options:

RapidComposer User Guide 37

Step 4: Choose your preferred settings
There are two kinds of harmonization that RapidComposer offers, each with its
own settings. Below you will find the explanation of these settings.

Basic Functional

This is a simple harmonization that was used in the 18th century, usually it gives
very good results. For each melody note, one or two (rarely three) possible chords
can be used.

Specify how often you want the insert a new chord. Possibilities are
Chord On Bars, On Bars Or Strong Beats (Automatic), On Strong Beats,
Change: On Beats. The program won't insert a new chord when it is not
necessary.
Select if the supertonic, mediant and submediant chords can be used
Allow II,
in the harmonization, and in what extent. If you select 'No', only the
III, VI: primary chords (I, IV, V) will be used.
Allow
Select if the dominant 7th chord can be used in the harmonization,
Dominant
and in what extent.
7th:
When it is possible (the melody notes allow) you can force the
Start
harmonization to start with a chord. Possible choices are Any, I, V, I
With:
or V.
When it is possible (the melody notes allow) you can force the
End With: harmonization to end with a chord. Possible choices are Any, I, With
Perfect Cadence (I-V-I), With Imperfect Cadence (II-V-I).
There are several possibilities to use chord inversions, because the
root positions will rarely sound good. This is not required though,
because you can choose to transpose the phrases (manually or
Chord automatically by using phrase magnets) or enable the master track
Inversion magnet that also inverts chords for better voice leading. Options are:
s: None, Adjust Highest Chord Note To Melody, Minimize Chord
Note Distances, Minimize Bass Movement, Minimize Highest
Note Movement.
Add For your convenience a harmony track can be added which lets you
immediately listen to the results of the harmonization. When such a

RapidComposer User Guide 38

 track has already been added, it is updated after each harmonization.
'Harmony' Feel free to set a different instrument, or change the transposition for
Track: this track, because the track settings won't be reset. Only the phrases
inside this track are updated.

Based on Rules

This algorithm builds a valid chord progression on the melody notes. Please note if
the rules and settings are too restrictive, the program may not find a solution. A
pop-up message will notify you about it, and that you should relax the rules.

The chord progression rule contains the weights (probabilities) of

the 'next' possible chords and is editable in RapidComposer. Make
Rule Set:
sure you use the right tonality, that should be in accordance with
the master track scale.
Specify how often you want the insert a new chord. Possibilities are
Chord On Bars, On Bars Or Strong Beats (Automatic), On Strong
Change: Beats, On Beats. The program won't insert a new chord when it is
not necessary.
Select how the next chord is chosen using weights. Choices: Most
Expected (use the chord with the highest weight; there is no
randomness), Expected (select one randomly from the first two
Expectedne highest weights), Less Expected (ignore the highest weight,
ss: select one randomly from the 2nd and 3rd highest weights),
Unexpected (ignore the first 2 highest weights, select randomly
from rest), Random (select any of the possible 'next' chords
randomly, ignore weights).
Allow 6th Select if 6th and 7th chords can be used in the harmonization.
and 7th: Options: No, Only 6th, Only 7th, Both 6th and 7th
When it is possible (the melody notes allow) you can force the
Start With: harmonization to start with a chord. Possible choices are Any, I, V,
I or V.
When it is possible (the melody notes allow) you can force the
End With: harmonization to end with a chord. Possible choices are Any, I,
With Perfect Cadence (I-V-I), With Imperfect Cadence (II-V-I).

RapidComposer User Guide 39

 There are several possibilities to use chord inversions, because the
root positions will rarely sound good. This is not required though,
because you can choose to transpose the phrases (manually or
Chord automatically by using phrase magnets) or enable the master track
magnet that also inverts chords for better voice leading. Options
Inversions:
are: None, Adjust Highest Chord Note To Melody, Minimize
Chord Note Distances, Minimize Bass Movement, Minimize
Highest Note Movement.
For your convenience a harmony track can be added which lets you
Add immediately listen to the results of the harmonization. When such a
track has already been added, it is updated after each
'Harmony'
harmonization. Feel free to set a different instrument, or change
Track: the transposition for this track, because the track settings won't be
reset. Only the phrases inside this track are updated.

Step 5: Press 'Auto-Harmonize'.

After you pressed the 'Auto-Harmonize' button, the master track is filled with
chords, and the optional 'Harmony' track is filled with phrases. You can review the
results immediately. Feel free to press the 'Auto-Harmonize' button again to get
different chords (if the algorithm allows random decisions).

Other phrase operations

All the phrase operations can be found in the phrase inspector. Click on .
Many keyboard shortcuts are available for phrase editing under Settings/Keyboard
Shortcuts.

By using the mouse on the workspace:

Phrase Editing mode:

• Select phrase: click inside phrase

• Toggle phrase selection: Ctrl+click inside phrase
• Multiple phrase selection: Shift+click inside phrase
• Deselect all phrases/Mute phrase preview: click on workspace

RapidComposer User Guide 40

 • Add phrase from browser: double-click on workspace
• Copy phrase: Ctrl+drag phrase
• Ghost copy phrase: Ctrl+Shift+drag phrase
• Transpose+Move phrase: drag phrase
• Drag original phrase&rhythm: Alt/Option+drag phrase
• Drag phrase&rhythm with variations: Alt/Option+Shift+drag phrase
• Replace rhythm/phrase or apply rhythm/melody: Drop phrase&rhythm on
phrase

Note Editing mode:

• Select active phrase: click on a phrase note

• Add new note: [select phrase to add to] double-click
• Add 6 chord notes: [select phrase to add to] Ctrl+Alt/Option+drag
• Duplicate selected notes: Ctrl+drag notes
• [Rhythm] Add/remove event/toggle accent: Ctrl+click or right click

DAW view:

'DAW view' offers an optimized display for working in the composition globally as
in a DAW. Select and move phrases in multiple tracks, use the rubber-box
selection in multiple tracks, drop multi-track MIDI files, etc, like you would do in a
DAW.

RapidComposer User Guide 41

Working with MIDI continuous controllers
(CC’s)

Version 4.5 brought significant improvements for MIDI CC editing. Not just tracks
but also individual phrases and notes may have their own MIDI CC envelopes. This
means the CC’s are attached to the phrase or note, and when you move them,
the CC’s also move with them. In addition these controller data are saved in the
phrase library with the phrase and/or notes.

By “continuous controllers” we mean not just the standard MIDI control change
events, but also “pitch bend”, “channel aftertouch” and “key pressure”.

It may happen that at any given time a note, a phrase and a track also has CC
envelopes. In this case the note CC’s are the highest priority, so note CC’s
override phrase CC’s, which override track CC’s.

In RapidComposer all CC values are handled as precise floating point numbers,

and all 14-bit CC’s are supported. 7-bit CC values are between 0 and 127, 14-bit
CC values are between 0 and 16383. During editing a percentage is displayed but
it is possible to enter the MSB (most significant bits: the top 7 bits of the 14-bit
controller) and LSB (least significant bits: the bottom 7 bits) when needed.

Tip: you can create a special phrase having only a dummy note with 0 velocity to
create a “MIDI CC only” phrase that has several CC lanes and which can be
moved around in the composition.

Curves or events
CC’s can be edited as either curves or individual events. Curves provide smoother
distribution of MIDI CC events and offer 3 different automatic placement for MIDI
events based on the curve steepness: low-density, medium-density and high-
density. It is possible to place MIDI CC events on every 1/1024, 1/512, … to 1/32.
In the menu it is possible to convert between curve and event modes.

The menu for tracks (there is a similar menu in the Phrase Editor):

RapidComposer User Guide 42

Adding CC’s to a track
You can add new CC lanes to a track in the track inspector, “MIDI CC’s” tab.
Clicking on the “Add…” button displays a menu with all possible controllers.
Clicking on will display an envelope instead of setting a single value for the
track. If you select the envelope or slider will be displayed.

Adding CC’s to a phrase

It is possible to edit phrase and note CC’s in the Phrase Editor. First open the CC
editor by clicking on the small button in the left bottom corner. By default note
on velocity values are displayed. Click on the small ‘+’ button to add a controller.

RapidComposer User Guide 43

Adding CC’s to a note
First select the note, then click on the ‘+’ button. Clicking on a note will shade
other areas and a Note label is displayed as well, meaning that you are editing
note CC’s:

Editing tools
Editing tools can be set by clicking on one of the buttons, or in the menu
which appears when you right-click on the background:

RapidComposer User Guide 44

‘insert’ modes create new points by replacing existing points, ‘set’ modes only
adjust existing points but do not create new ones. “Note on velocity” is special:
you cannot create new events, so only ‘set’ mode is available.

• Arrow tool (selection, placement): for adjusting individual points. Right-click

on a point to set its value. Right-click on the background to set a curve to
exponential or exponential S-curve, or to straighten a curve.

Hold Ctrl to use 'Paint tool (create and move)' temporarily.

Hold Shift to disable 'snap' temporarily.
Hold Alt to snap values to 0, +/- 50%, +/- 100%.

• Paint tool: has several sub-tools:

◦ click to insert and move: create and set individual points/events
◦ freehand, insert: draw freehand to create points/events. The editor snap
value is used for placing the points.
◦ freehand set: draw to set existing points/events.
◦ line, insert: draw a line, by replacing points/events. In curve editing you
can set curvature by using the mouse-wheel or dragging the center point.
To use S-curve, right-click on the background when the Arrow tool is
active.
◦ line, set: draw a line, and set existing points/events.

Hold Ctrl to set 'insert mode' temporarily.

Hold Shift to disable 'snap' temporarily.
Hold Alt to snap values to 0, +/- 50%, +/- 100%.

• Eraser tool: delete points.

Ctrl-click to delete all points. You can Ctrl-click also on the Eraser
button too.

• Function generator: a powerful feature to set up controllers based on

functions:

RapidComposer User Guide 45

 ◦ The function generator uses exponential curves to approximate different
functions, so the least number of possible control points are used.

• Select all, copy, paste, remove selection: the usual editing operations
are available too

Undo and redo is available during editing. The MIDI CC editor has its own undo
and redo arrows in the right top corner:

RapidComposer User Guide 46

Working with chords
Editing chords on the master track
Clicking on a master track chord will display a few options above the chord, and
the Quick Suggestions pop-up below the chord:

RapidComposer User Guide 47

The buttons on the top allow you to select the chord using the Chord Selector,
Circle Of Fifths Chart, MIDI keyboard and computer keyboard (in this order).

The Quick Suggestions pop-up is fully configurable; you can select what you
want to display by clicking on the menu button in its top right corner. Clicking on
“More suggestions” will open a more detailed pop-up with suggestions for
multiple chords:

Using the Chord Selector

The Chord Selector is a flexible and universal way to

RapidComposer User Guide 48

 • select chords for the master track
• edit, generate and save chord progressions
• preview the edited phrase in the Phrase Editor
• preview the currently selected phrase in the Phrase Browser
• preview the selected phrase from the composition

using any chords. This is the 'target' that you select on the top half of the Chord
Selector.

The bottom part shows the methods for chord selection:

• Chord List
• Scale Degrees
• Parallels
• Palette
• Builder
• Tonnetz

RapidComposer User Guide 49

 • Circle Of Fifths

All methods share the same color and preview options that you can select in the
“Options” menu.

Using the ‘Circle Of Fifths’ chart

The “Circle Of Fifths Chart” is usable when the scale is one of the 'church' modes.
The same chord preview settings are used here, as in the Chord Selector. The
menu in the top right corner offers choices to set the master track scale when
clicking on a mode or chord.

RapidComposer User Guide 50

Using the ‘Tonnetz’
The “Tonnetz” (tone network in German) is a two-dimensional lattice diagram
showing the harmonic relationships between chords. A great amount of literature

RapidComposer User Guide 51

is available, if you search for “tonnetz” on the internet. You can start with
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonnetz.

In the diagram you can click in a triangle to select a major or minor chord, and
may toggle additional notes. Scale notes have a blue border, chord notes are
filled with green color. Each chord has a specific shape throughout the lattice.

The Tonnetz diagram can also be found on the master track. The master track
version does not show the scale, selected notes, chord, naming and zoom as in
the top line below. The scale, chord and chord naming is automatically taken from
the master track. You can use the mouse wheel to zoom in and out.

Using the MIDI keyboard for chord selection

Enter chords from your MIDI keyboard by holding down more than 2 keys. You can
toggle keys on the displayed keyboard with the mouse. If the held down keys

RapidComposer User Guide 52

cannot be located in the chord library, semitone offsets are displayed. E.g. when
you hold down C, C# and D, the chord name will become “C+1+2”. If that makes
a valid chord, you can add it to the chord library. There is an option to jump to the
next chord when you want to enter multiple chords from the MIDI keyboard.

Using the computer keyboard for typing chord names

You can type several chords separated by space to set multiple master track
chords at the same time:

RapidComposer User Guide 53

Editing guitar chords
As a new feature for guitar players, you can set up guitar chords on the master
track. A smart algorithm finds the most convenient fingering positions for any
chords, based on your constraints, but it is also possible to manually select the
notes to voice on a guitar neck. Any phrase or track that uses “Guitar” chord
voicing will use these guitar chord notes.

As the first step, click on the small guitar button on the master track:

Below the chords the guitar fingering is displayed. Usually there are multiple ways
of voicing a chord, that you can choose by clicking on the ‘left’ or ‘right’ arrows.
Clicking on the fingering lets you edit the chord notes.

The constraints used for offering the various chord fingerings can be set in the

RapidComposer User Guide 54

Master Track inspector:

Alternatively, the small ‘cogwheel’ button also opens the same settings window:

RapidComposer User Guide 55

Generating a chord progression
There are several ways to generate a chord progression, or just replace a few
chords on the master track.

Important: you need to set the proper chord progression rules for the
composition, depending on the scale used. The rules should match the scale used.
For a major scale, use rules for major scales, for a minor scale, use minor scale
rules.

With chord selection on the master track

This is the quickest way. The master track inspector settings are used. Select a
few chords to replace, and click on the ‘dice’ button:

If you want to edit or save the progression, click on the ‘pencil’.

In the master track inspector

Select chords on the master track, set up the options, and click on the “Generate
Progression…” button. Right-click on any chords to open the master track
inspector, if it is not open.

RapidComposer User Guide 56

Settings:

• Rule Set: specify which chord rules to use. It is important that the rules
should match the scale. The rule name is set automatically based on the
position of the first selected chord. You can assign separate rules to parts or
lines in the structure inspector.
• Number Of Chords: the number of chords to place on the master track. The
number is set based on the selected chord count every time you make a
chord selection.
• Diversity: select the unexpectedness of the progression between ‘expected’
and ‘unexpected’. For the ‘unexpected’ option chords with smaller weights
will be used more often.
• Keep harmonic rhythm: the existing chords will be replaced without
changing their length. This disables the ‘number of chords’ slider.
• Allow returning to the previous chord: allow patterns like I-V-I.
• Connect to next chord: take the next chord into consideration, according
to the rules.

In the timeline inspector

Everything connected to ‘time’ can be found in the timeline inspector. You can
select a range on the timeline which will be filled with chords (on the master
track):

RapidComposer User Guide 57

The settings are the same as above.

In the Chord Selector

Set the target to “For Chord Progression” and you are already in the chord
progression editor. The lightning button creates a new progression. Right-click on
it for more options:

RapidComposer User Guide 58

You can use ‘borrowed’ chords from other keys here. ‘Borrowed’ chords are not in
the rules, but they make the progression more interesting. As a useful option you
can tell the program which scale degrees may contain borrowed chords.

RapidComposer User Guide 59

Working with tracks
Right-click on a track to open the track inspector to set track properties and
execute actions associated with tracks:

A track can be MIDI, folder or audio track. MIDI tracks may be a percussion track
with a drum map assigned, or a guitar track that displays notes in a guitar tab. For
percussion tracks the percussion instruments assigned to MIDI notes are
displayed instead of the piano keyboard. Drum map files can be created in a text
editor (see existing .rcDRUM files).

RapidComposer User Guide 60

The track instrument
There are 4 types of instruments that can be used. Soundfonts, VST and VST3
instruments and MIDI instruments.

MIDI instruments do not generate audio, but they are useful for sending MIDI
events to external software and hardware synthesizers. You can set up
RapidComposer to send MIDI events to a DAW on a virtual MIDI cable (e.g. LoopBe
on Windows, or the RapidComposer Virtual MIDI Output on macOS). When you set
up RapidComposer this way, you need to select a “MIDI” instrument for the
tracks.

Soundfonts are very useful for composition because they are relatively small,
load quickly, and do not jeopardize the stability of the application by loading
foreign code into the application address space, like VST plug-ins. You can find
good quality soundfonts on the net, some of them are free. Add your soundfonts
under the Settings / Soundfonts list.

VST plug-ins are VST2.4 instruments. Before using the VST plug-ins, you need to
add them to the list under the Settings / Plug-ins tab. If you have an instrument
that comes as VST and VST3, use the newer VST3 format.

VST3 plug-ins use a newer SDK than VST. Most new plug-ins are made available
only as VST3. Before using the VST3 plug-ins, you need to add them to the list
under the Settings / Plug-ins tab, or scan the plug-ins which is a convenient way af
adding all usable instrument plug-ins.

Variations
You can add variations to the entire track (see the Variations chapter). Variations
are applied to all phrases in the track, from top to bottom order. Variation
parameters can be automated.

Sound effects

RapidComposer User Guide 61

When a track uses a virtual instrument it is possible to add sound effects to the
track instrument. You can do this in the FX tab. Please note: the sound effect
plugins belong to the instrument not the track. This means multiple tracks using
the same virtual instrument will use the same sound effects.

You can enable and disable the sound effect, or open its editor window by clicking
on the small ‘pencil’ button.

Adding a new track

When the track headers are in keyboard focus (with blue rectangle around) you
can simply press ‘+’ to add a new track. Another shortcut ‘*’ can be used to
duplicate a track.

The track menu above the tracks offers adding tracks:

RapidComposer User Guide 62

Right-clicking on the empty area below the tracks opens a popup menu:

Rearranging tracks
Rearranging tracks is done by drag and drop, or from the track inspector (Move
Up, Down). You can move a track into a folder track by dragging it over the folder
track. Similarly you can move a track out of a folder track.

Removing a track
To remove a track, press the ‘delete’ button when the track headers are in
keyboard focus. It is of course possible to remove a track in the track inspector.

RapidComposer User Guide 63

Mute and solo
A track can be muted by highlighting the small ‘m’ button ( ) in the track header.
A track can be made ‘solo’ (that is to make all other tracks muted) by highlighting
the small ‘s’ button ( ). There can be multiple solo tracks.

Track templates
As a convenience, tracks can be saved together with the instrument and all
phrases as track templates. The track templates are saved in the Track Templates
browser, from where you can drop track templates on an existing track to replace,
or on the empty area to add a new track.

Guitar tracks
Guitar tracks show all notes in a guitar tab format. In this example we added a
FingerPicking Generator to a track:

Open the track inspector, and select ‘Guitar’ track. For the first time a settings
window opens where the tuning and other guitar settings can be set:

RapidComposer User Guide 64

Clicking “OK” will run a smart algorithm which finds the most optimal string and
fret positions for playing back the notes on a guitar. The result:

You can export the guitar tab as MusicXML from the track inspector by clicking on
this button:

RapidComposer User Guide 65

Editing the guitar notes
It is possible to edit the guitar notes, however the suggested workflow is that you
finish editing in the normal MIDI track, then change the track type to ‘Guitar’
track.

If editing the guitar notes is necessary, you need to enable rendering all notes
before entering Note Editing mode.

This is required because the notes you see in Phrase Editing mode are the result
of variations, some notes may not even exist originally. (The same reason that
you can edit only the original phrase notes in Note Editing mode in normal MIDI
tracks.) Phrase generators become normal phrases, and all phrase and track

RapidComposer User Guide 66

variations are removed but their effect remains, that is the original notes are
replaced with the rendered notes.

Editing in the guitar tab:

• Move notes between strings: drag notes vertically. When a note is too
high or too low for a string, the note cannot be dragged over the string.
• Change fret positions (change pitch): use the mouse wheel
• Dragging a note horizontally will change its starting position
• It is possible to change the length of notes

Note: after editing the rest of the notes may be re-positioned, but the edited
notes keep their string/fret settings.

RapidComposer User Guide 67

AI suggestions
AI suggestions are available in several places in the program by clicking on the

button. Think of it as an assistant who knows everything about music

composition. There is a chat window where you can ask music composition-
related questions, and receive replies. The AI assistant will be able to suggest
chord replacements, chord progressions, chord rules, phrases, and even song
structure and tracks depending on the genre and/or mood you specified.

Note: this is not a guaranteed service and may stop working anytime.
We cannot guarantee that AI functions are always available, because they depend
on external servers and services that are outside of our control. If you experience
any problems with AI functions, please try again later or contact us for assistance.

You can hide the AI buttons if you don’t want to use AI suggestions in the settings.

Prerequisites
Before using AI functionality, you need to set a few settings under the Settings /
Miscellaneous tab.

Note: you need an OpenAI API key to use the AI suggestions in RapidComposer

When you register on https://platform.openai.com/signup, new registrations

receive free tokens (as of the time of writing this user guide, $5) that are more
than sufficient to try the AI functions in RapidComposer.

Note: an OpenAI API key is not the same as the ChatGPT subscription. It costs
much less, and you pay only for the actual usage, there is no monthly fee. For
intensive use you may create an expense of 2-3 US dollars per month.

Settings
Click on the Settings, then on the Miscellaneous tab, and scroll down to “AI
Functions”:

RapidComposer User Guide 68

1. Paste your API key into the “API key” field.
2. Select “Yes, with OpenAI”
3. Click on the “Select from available models” menu. If your API key works, a
menu will be displayed with the list of models. If there is a problem with the key,
you’ll see an error message.
4. Select a model to use. Some hints: gpt-3.5-turbo has the lowest costs, and it is
also the fastest model. It is great for general questions and chord replacements,
and chord progression suggestions. gpt-4-turbo (called gpt-4-1106-preview as of
the time of writing this) costs more, and is more capable than GPT 3.5, it is also
faster than gpt-4, which has the highest costs. Both gpt-4-turbo and gpt-4 are
suitable for creating phrases based on your description.

There are additional settings when you click on the button next to the model
menu. The crucial factor is the 'temperature' setting, indicating the level of
determinism (lower values) or creativity (higher values) in the responses.

It is not necessary to click on “Start AI services” at all. The connection to the

OpenAI server is set up automatically when an AI function is used.

How it works
RapidComposer sends requests to the OpenAI server in textual form, and waits for
the reply. Your API key is sent on an encrypted connection. When the reply
arrives, the program interprets the reply and extracts musical information from it
(chords, scales, progressions, phrases) that are displayed to the user, ready for
immediate usage (e.g. by drag and drop or one-click editing).

The program waits until the whole reply arrives which may take 5-20 seconds
depending on the model and request. The reply is not displayed word by word as
when chatting with ChatGPT.

RapidComposer User Guide 69

Getting AI suggestions
To get good replies you need to ask good questions. Be as specific as possible.
Generic requests may not give good results (e.g. “create a bass phrase”).

The button above the composition includes some built-in prompts. But first
right-click on the button to set basic properties, like genre or mood:

These settings are optional but strongly suggested to be used, to get usable
replies. Optionally you can provide a scale, to tell the model to return results only
for the specified scale.

Clicking on will display a few built-in prompts, and you can open the chat
window here as well:

RapidComposer User Guide 70

After getting suggestions, you can open the chat window and ask follow-up
questions, or even new ones. For cost-effective usage it is important to keep in
mind that AI chat has no memory, so if you ask a follow-up question, all previous
questions and replies are also sent to the model.

RapidComposer User Guide 71

AI buttons ( ) can be found in the Chord Selector to create a chord progression,
in the Phrase Editor and in the Chord Rules Editor. The latter helps creating chord
rules for the specified scale (exotic scales may not provide good results).

Keep in mind: explore and try different approaches; if the response doesn't meet
your expectations, consider rephrasing your question. AI outcomes may vary, so
it's beneficial to be specific when framing your queries.

RapidComposer User Guide 72

Browsers
Browsers are docked on the right side of the workspace. Click on the small
button at the top right corner to open the browsers:

Activate a browser by clicking on the tabs at the top. You can configure the
browsers to display full texts by right clicking on the button. The following
abbreviations are used: Phr=Phrases, Rhy=Rhythms, Scl=Scales, Chd=Chords,
Prg=Progressions, Ins=Instruments, Trk=Track Templates, Fil=Files.

The browsers offer various options for previewing, searching and filtering the
library contents. The explanations for the buttons in the top row:

: collapse all folders

: expand all folder
: direct link to selected phrases. Phrase selection in the composition will select
the same phrases in the library. Selecting a phrase in the library will overwrite the
selected phrases in the composition. This feature lets you replace all selected
phrases with a single click!
: preview (listen to a phrase, rhythm, chord...)

RapidComposer User Guide 73

 : reload custom phrases or rhythm patterns
: display selected phrase/rhythm/chord/etc
: search in library
: display certain groups (filter)
: browser group/sort/display/filter options for advanced users

You can drag phrases and rhythm patterns from the browser to the workspace.
Dropping MIDI files or folders containing MIDI files to the phrase or rhythm
browsers will convert the MIDI files to phrases. Dropping rhythm patterns to the
rhythm browser will save the pattern.

RapidComposer User Guide 74

Structure inspector
You can set up the hierarchic composition structure in the structure inspector.
Create, duplicate and delete new parts and lines, set lengths, colors, change the
order by dragging.
The structure inspector is available by clicking on :

It is important that in RapidComposer lower level units (parts, lines) inherit the
properties of higher level units, but they can override them too. The properties
include the scale, tempo and signature. In the above screenshot ‘Part 3’ overrides
the composition scale, and it will use C Major instead of E Major. ‘Part 2’ changes
the tempo to 130 BPM. This means all lines in ‘Part 2’ will use that tempo, but
lines can also override any properties they inherit from parts or the composition.

Right-click on any parts or lines will open the Master Track inspector where you
can set the name, length, scale, tempo and signature. Double-click on the name
will let you rename it. Double-click on an empty area will bring the currently
selected unit in focus in the composition.

RapidComposer User Guide 75

Drag and drop
Dragging and dropping phrases
Use the phrase browser to drag phrases to the workspace. Please note it is
simpler to double-click on the workspace to insert the currently selected phrase.

Dragging a phrase from the Phrase Browser

Drop the phrase on the workspace to insert it in the composition. Alternatively
you can use double-click, or press the '+' key (only when the workspace is in
keyboard focus).

RapidComposer User Guide 76

Dropping a phrase on an existing phrase
Drop a phrase on another one to replace it.

Dropping a phrase on a track

The track will be filled with the phrase. If you hold down Ctrl during dropping,
ghost copies will be used.

Inversions
Drag phrases vertically to make an inversion of the phrase. The way the phrase is
inverted depends on the “Phrase Transpose” setting over the workspace. Notes:
when moving up, the bottom notes of the phrase move up. This won't preserve
the phrase shape, but the harmony and rhythm will be the same. Phrase: when
moving up, all phrase notes move up to the next chord note. This preserves the
phrase shape. Octave: this setting allows the phrase to move by octaves only

Copying phrases/notes
Ctrl-drag phrases or notes

Ghost copying phrases

Ctrl-Shift-drag phrases to make a ghost copy. The “copy” will follow the changes
in the original phrase. You can choose to apply the variations on the original
phrase, or not.

Moving phrase between tracks

During a normal drag operation, you can drag the phrases to other tracks.

Dragging and dropping rhythm

It is possible to drag the rhythm part of phrases, or drop a rhythm pattern on
phrases.

RapidComposer User Guide 77

Dragging rhythm from phrases
Alt+drag phrase

Dragging rhythm from the Rhythm Browser

Drag phrase from the Rhythm Browser

Dropping rhythm to phrases

If the phrase is a generator its rhythm is replaced, unless you hold down Ctrl,
which means adding an “Apply Rhythm” variation.

For normal phrases an “Apply Rhythm” variation is added with the dropped
rhythm.

Dropping rhythm to the Rhythm Browser

Drop the dragged rhythm to save it in the Rhythm Browser

RapidComposer User Guide 78

Dropping rhythm to tracks
Dropping a rhythm pattern on a track will add it as a new phrase. This is very
useful for percussion tracks.

Dragging and dropping chord progressions

You can drag chord progressions from the browser or from the Chord Selector
(“Drag” button in progression editor)

Dropping a chord progression on the master track

By default chord lengths are preserved if there are lengths assigned to chords in
the progression. You can ignore the lengths by dropping the progression using the
Ctrl key.

Dropping a chord progression on the timeline selection

The chords are placed automatically in the selected timeline range. This many not
be possible if the selection is too short, so make sure the chords will fit into the
selection.

RapidComposer User Guide 79

Dragging MIDI to RapidComposer
You can drag and drop MIDI (either files or directly from DAWs) to any track or the
master track. Dragging should work from most DAWs that use the standard D&D
procedures. Only the first track is inserted from the MIDI files. You can import
multiple tracks under the MIDI Import tab.

Dragging MIDI to tracks (with real-time preview)

If you hold down the Ctrl key, the dragged MIDI is analyzed for chords, and its
relative form is dropped which automatically adhere to the master track chords. If
you do not hold down Ctrl during dragging, the original MIDI notes are placed in
the track. Some DAWs (like Reaper) do not make it possible to show a live
preview of the dragged phrase, because the file data is created only when
dropping the MIDI data. However it is still possible to drop MIDI from Reaper.

Dragging MIDI to the master track (with real-time preview)

The dragged MIDI file is analysed for chords which you can drop on the master
track. Monophonic files without harmony do not work.

RapidComposer User Guide 80

Dragging MIDI to rhythm drop targets
It is possible to drop a MIDI file on “rhythm drop targets”. In this case the rhythm
will be extracted from the first track of the MIDI data.

Dragging MIDI to the RC window

This will open the MIDI Import page for specifying further options

Dragging MIDI files and folders to the phrase browser

It is possible to batch convert MIDI files to phrases. You can drop multiple MIDI
files or folder to the phrase browser. Folders are parsed hierarchically. Use simple,
short MIDI files. Phrases are saved in the same folder structure.

Dragging MIDI files and folders to the rhythm browser

It is possible to batch convert MIDI files to rhythm patterns. You can drop multiple
MIDI files or folder to the rhythm browser. Folders are parsed hierarchically. Use
simple, short MIDI files. Rhythm patterns are saved in the same folder structure.

Dragging MIDI files and folders to the chord progression browser

It is possible to batch convert MIDI files to chord progressions. You can drop
multiple MIDI files or folder to the chord progression browser. Folders are parsed
hierarchically. It is best to use MIDI files with a single track. ‘Chords-only’ MIDI
files are smartly detected and a simpler, more reliable chord detection is used for
these file. Chord progressions are saved in the same folder structure.

RapidComposer User Guide 81

Dragging MIDI from RapidComposer to DAW (or to
Explorer/Finder)

Dragging the whole composition

Use Ctrl-drag on the file icon. Muted tracks will not be included. You can select a
section to drag by making a timeline selection.

Dragging a single track

Ctrl-drag the track name. You can select a section to drag by making a timeline
selection.

RapidComposer User Guide 82

Dragging selected phrases as MIDI
Ctrl-Alt-Shift+drag phrases

RapidComposer User Guide 83

Articulations
Articulations specify how individual notes are to be performed within a phrase or
passage.

Articulations are described in an editable text file with .rcCTRL extension in one
of these locations:
Windows: C:\Users\<user name>\Documents\RapidComposerV3\DB
OS X: ~\Documents\RapidComposerV3\DB

Each library or virtual instrument requires such an .rcCTRL file that defines the
possible articulations, arranged in groups.

An articulation can be a key-switch or a controller value change or both. It can be

assigned to a phrase, or individual phrase notes, or even a track can have its
default articulation.

E.g. if you open “Garritan Personal Orchestra 4.rcCTRL” you’ll see that there are
articulations with just key-switch or controller change or with both as in
group=“GPOSoloStrings”; articulation=“Legato”; keyswitch=“C-1”;
ctrl=68; ctrlval=127;

Explanation:
“group”: articulation group
“articulation”: articulation name
“keyswitch” (together with “keyvelocity”, optional): specify keyswitch note as
note name (C4=MIDI note 60) or MIDI note number (0-127)
“keyvelocity” (together with “keyswitch”, optional): specify note on velocity for
the key switch (0 is a note off event!)
“ctrl” (together with “ctrlval”, optional): MIDI controller number (0-127)
“ctrlval” (together with “ctrl”, optional): MIDI controller value (0-127)

The author will gladly help to create an articulations definition file, assuming there
is a specification.

RapidComposer User Guide 84

Phrase Editor
The Phrase Editor is for “designing” and testing phrases, using different scales
and chords. While the Note Editing mode lets you edit individual notes in phrases
in the main composition workspace, many times it is more convenient to focus on
a single phrase. To edit a phrase in the composition, double-click on it. When
creating a phrase from scratch, you can save it, or add it to the clipboard for
pasting in the composition.

The top toolbar:

RapidComposer User Guide 85

Please note: the Phrase Editor settings have no relation with the scales, chords or
tempo used in the composition! These are independent settings.

Explanation for the notation used

Because notes in RapidComposer hold extra qualities, we use a special notation
for marking a note chord-relative or scale-relative.

There are 4 types of notes in RapidComposer:

• Scale note relative: one of the scale notes, denoted with a roman numeral (e.g.
I=scale root, II=second scale note, etc…). The actual note depends on the
scale used.
• Chord note relative: one of the chord notes, denoted with #<number>. The
chord root is #1, the second chord note (typically a 3rd) is #2, the third chord
note (typically a 5th) is #3, etc. Negative numbers can be used, #-1 means
the top chord note transposed down by an octave. A special notation can
address chord notes from the highest note: #TOP means the highest note in
the chord, #TOP-1 is the second highest, etc.
• Bass note relative: the bass note of the chord, which is the chord root note, or
the slash note (if used). It is denoted by B
• Absolute note: the usual MIDI note from C-1 to G9.

Roman numerals are used for scale step offsets use, while Arabic numbers are
used semitone offsets.

These notations can be combined. Examples:

#1+II means the chord root note plus 2 scale steps
#3-1 means the third chord note (typically 5th but not always!) minus 1 semitones
B+IV means the bass note plus 4 scale steps

RapidComposer User Guide 86

Don’t worry, you need not enter these notations in RapidComposer, only
recognize if a note is chord or scale relative. The program selects the most logical
parameters when you transpose a note. During editing you set the Note Mapping
depending on what you want to achieve: making a phrase that uses mainly chord
notes, or a melody phrase with scale notes only.

Chord-relative notes are transposed differently than scale-relative notes. E.g. for
the notes #1, #2, #3 (for a C Major chord: C E, G), the first transposition upward is
#2, #3, #1+1 octave, so E, G, C+1 octave, as one would expect for a chord.
Scale-relative notes are transposed from scale step to scale step, so scale notes I,
II, III (for a C Major scale: C, D, E) will be transposed to II, III, IV (D, E, F).

RapidComposer User Guide 87

Phrase generator reference
In phrase generators the notes are created by specialized algorithms. Each phrase
generator has a specific purpose.

Clicking the Generator tab in the Phrase Inspector shows the editor for the
currently used phrase generator. Most phrase generators have a rhythm input,
which means they work on a rhythm pattern (in most cases a rhythm generator,
but you can use/edit your own rhythm patterns). When an input rhythm pattern is
used, you can set it up under the Rhythm tab in the Phrase Inspector.

The following phrase generators are included:

• Arpeggiator: creates arpeggios from many types of patterns

• Bass Generator: melody in a lower octave, resembling a bass guitar
performance
• Chord Generator: simple rhythms: quarter notes, half notes, whole notes,
etc.
• Dyads Run Generator: generates a MIDI run, commonly a “thirds run”
• Fingerpicking Generator: guitar-style patterns/arpeggios
• Generic Generator: piano-like patterns that can be easily manipulated
rhythmically, based on a series of variables
• Markov Melody Generator: experimental, generates melodies where the
next note depends on previous notes. You need to enable this phrase
generator under Settings / Miscellaneous / Experimental Features. Not
available in the LE version
• Melody Generator: generates melodies that intelligently fit over any chord
or key. Not available in the LE version
• Modern Chord Pattern Generator: creates chord patterns used in EDM
genre. Not available in the LE version
• Motive Generator: motive generated or edited under the Melody Generator
tab
• Ostinato Generator: generates ostinato patterns
• Percussion Generator: generates percussion patterns using multiple
percussion instruments
• Phrase Container: arranges phrases using the selected order in the track

RapidComposer User Guide 88

 • Phrase Morpher: intelligently connects 2 phrases or phrase generators by
analysing them and generating the missing notes between the two phrases.
Not available in the LE version
• Piano Chord Pattern Generator: creates a pattern for the left and right
hand
• Piano Run Generator: rhythmically rich arpeggios running up and down
chords
• Random Melody Generator: a simple but effective way of making
surprisingly good melodies.
• Random Note Generator: experimental, useful for triggering key-switches.
You need to enable this phrase generator under Settings / Miscellaneous /
Experimental Features.
• Rest: Use only in the Idea Tool to insert rests in the composition
• Rhythm Mapper: maps a different rhythm pattern to a phrase (available
only in the 'Convert Phrase To Generator' menu!)
• Strings Staccato Generator: creates beautiful staccato patterns, perfect
for orchestral and string quartet arrangements
• Strum Pattern Generator: creates realistic guitar strum patterns with lots
of options

Arpeggiator
Create simple or complex arpeggiated phrases with the Arpeggiator. As most
other generators, the arpeggiator uses the rhythm generator which lets you
create rhythmically complex, interesting arpeggiated phrases.

RapidComposer User Guide 89

Arpeggiator Settings

• Notes To Use: select usable notes. By default chord notes are used, but
any notes can be assigned for arpeggiation.
• Shape: there are lots of options for how the notes follow each other.
• Key Range: describes the number of chord notes to be used
• Retrigger: the arpeggiated pattern will be restarted at the 'retrigger'
duration (quarter notes). 0 means the pattern never restarts.

RapidComposer User Guide 90

 • Fill Between Notes: it is an interesting effect when you fill the space
between arpeggiated notes with notes
• Velocity For Filled Notes: velocity used for the added 'filler' notes

Bass Generator
The bass generator is a simple way of creating bass phrases.

Bass Generator Settings

• Allowed Notes: specify notes which the Bass Generator can use. Default
setting: the Bass note, Bass+4 scale steps (typically 5 th), Bass+6 scale steps
(typically 7th), Bass+octave

RapidComposer User Guide 91

 • Global Movement: Phrase shape. Available settings are Up (default), Down,
Up-Down, Down-Up, Random, and Select Randomly.
• Note Movement: Specify how successive notes relate to each other.
Available settings are None (default), Alternating, Select Randomly.
• Transpose (Octaves): Available settings are None, -1, -2 (default), -3, -4
Octaves.

Chord Generator
The simplest phrase generator that fills all rhythm events with chord notes.
Optionally you can add bass notes to the phrase a few octaves below the root
note. The note selector allows usage of not just chord notes.

RapidComposer User Guide 92

Chord Generator Settings

• Notes To Use: select usable notes. By default chord notes are used, but
any notes can be used.

• Add Bass Note: add bass note using octave transposition. Values: -1, -2, -3,
-4 Octaves

Dyads Run
This generates a MIDI run, specifically by interval, commonly a “thirds run”,
similar to the bridge of “Let It Be”, but could also be any interval, with polyphony
option.

RapidComposer User Guide 93

Dyads Run Settings

• Motion: specify up or down motion

• Interval: specify interval for the 2 notes. Possible values: Third (default),
Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Octave
• Polyphony: when required, the polyphony can be increased by inserting
notes in octave distance from the original notes

RapidComposer User Guide 94

Fingerpicking Generator
Create interesting guitar fingerpicking patterns with this generator. Set up the
rhythm under the Rhythm tab.

Fingerpicking Generator Settings:

• Notes To Use: select usable notes. By default 5 chord notes are used. If the
chord is a 3-note chord, the 4th and 5th note will the 1st and 2nd note
transposed up by an octave.

• Dedicated Bass: Set the number of (bottom) chord notes reserved for the
bass pattern.

RapidComposer User Guide 95

 • Retrigger: the fingerpicking pattern can be restarted after a number of
quarter notes.
• Sustain Notes: Note lengths increased so that notes last until the next
note. Default setting is enabled, where the MIDI notes resemble
fingerpicking an acoustic guitar.

Generic Generator
The Generic Generator lets you specify the proportion of ‘chord’ and ’other’ notes,
the proportion of full polyphony/partial polyphony/monophonic notes, and note
repetition options. You can set up exactly which notes to use for ‘chord’ notes (by
default: chord notes), and for ‘other’ notes (by default: scale notes).

RapidComposer User Guide 96

Generic Generator Settings

• Chord/Other Notes: the proportion of ‘chord’ and ‘other’ notes. 100% Chord
Notes only use the notes from the ‘chord notes’ list.
• Partial Polyphony: the percentage of using partial polyphony (a few chord
notes but not all).
• Allowed Partial Polyphony: the possible number of chord notes to be
played together when partial polyphony is used.
• Repeat Last / Second Last: How often you’ll hear notes repeated

RapidComposer User Guide 97

 • ‘Chord’ Notes: list of notes to be used as ‘chord’ notes. Default: chord
notes.
• ‘Other’ Notes: list of notes to be used as ‘other’ notes. Default: scale notes

Markov Melody Generator

This phrase generator must be enabled among the Settings / Miscellaneous /
Experimental Features before first use. It is only for expert users because there
are MANY settings that you should set up. Markov Melody is a monophonic phrase
generator where each note depends on the previous two notes. You set weights
(probabilities) with the sliders for all the scenarios that may happen. In the “Next
Note” menu you can select from possible scale step offset for the next note
compared to the last or second last note (depending on the scenario).

RapidComposer User Guide 98

Markov Melody Generator Settings
• Higher Than Both, Between, Lower Than Both, etc (possible scenarios for
the next note): weight for this scenario

RapidComposer User Guide 99

 • Next Note: scale step offset for the next note compared to the last or
second last note (depending on the scenario)

Melody Generator
The Melody Generator is based on 'steps and leaps' and we at
MusicDevelopments feel it is a great and incredibly useful addition to the full
edition of the program. The Melody Generator is capable of creating melodies for
the master track chords, unlike the Motive Generator. It is the only phrase
generator that uses the actual master track scale and chords for creating the
melody. This means that transposition of Melody Generator is discouraged
because it may not sound as good as untransposed.

RapidComposer User Guide 100

There are lots and lots of parameters to choose from and tweak, and you can get
very usable results, in a very short amount of time!

Melody Generator Settings

• Mode: Available settings are “Downbeat is always a chord note” (default),
“Scale notes only (independent of harmony)”, “Downbeat and on-beat (1st &

RapidComposer User Guide 101

 3rd beat) is always a chord note”, “Chord notes only” and “Scale notes and
chord notes”. Depending on how these are set, you’ll hear more “chordal”
melodies, or more “scalar” melodies.
• Options: Allowed up and down motion, and some other settings are here.
• Penultimate note is a step above tonic: when set, the algorithm
attempts to place the note before the last note to be a scale step about
the chord root note
• Convert notes to 'chord note+scale steps' form: by default the
Melody Generator creates scale-relative notes, but you can convert
them to chord-relative
• Allow 2nd to be a melody note: you can allow the 2nd to be a
melody note even when using chord notes only. The 2nd very often
participates in melodies.
• Allow 7th to be a melody note: you can allow the 7th to be a melody
note even when using chord notes only.
• Don’t be afraid to experiment! Default settings are “Penultimate note
is a step above tonic (also depends on the chord!)”, and nearly all
“Allowed Up Motion” and “Allowed Down Motion” scale intervals are
checked (except Octave motion).

• Allowed motion: check which intervals are allowed for steps and leaps from
one note to the other
• First Note: Available settings are “Random chord note” (default), “Chord
root note”, “Random scale note in note range”, and various absolute notes.
• Last Note: Available settings are “Random chord note” (default), “Chord
root note”, “Random scale note in note range”, and various absolute notes.
• Climax: There are many settings here. The default Climax setting is “First
Note plus Major 3rd”. You can also choose “No Climax”, or various scale
interval movements. Experiment!
• After Leap: This is the behavior that Melody Generator uses after notes
“leap” (such as go up or down equal to or greater than a minor 3rd). The
default setting is “Any step or leap (allow 2 leaps in the same direction)”.
You can also choose “Step in the opposite direction”, “Step in any direction”,
“Step or smaller leap in opposite direction”, or “Leap in opposite direction”.
• Steps & Leaps: Move to the right to have your melody movement be more
“scalar” or step-wise, and move to the left to add more leaps to the melody.
• Note Repetition: Move to the right to increase the number of consecutive
repeated notes in the melody.

RapidComposer User Guide 102

 • Note Range: Default range is G2 to F4 (common tenor range).
• Random Movement: Specify the probability of an 'expected' movement.
When set to 100%: 7th will move up to the root, and 4th will move down to
the third (and other rules). Please note that sometimes the 'expected'
movement is not possible when other conditions do not allow it.

Tips
• Set the Movement slider all the way to the right (100% expected), and
increase the Note Repetition slider for more “melodic” results.

• Set the Steps slider for a majority of steps (with fewer % leaps) for additional
“melodic” results.

• Set the Climax to “No Climax” for melodies that don’t reach a “peak.” (a lot
of melodies don’t… they hang around in one place, unless the melody is
deliberately trying to draw attention to itself (then, a climax is
recommended).

Melody Generator v2
The Melody Generator v2 is similar to Melody Generator, it is also based on
'steps and leaps' with two differences:

• it ignores the master track scale, but creates a scale from the chords, e.g. it
uses the E minor scale for an Em chord

• you can specify scale tone usage: I (tonic), II (supertonic), III (mediant), IV
(subdominant), V (dominant), VI (submediant), VII (subtonic)

Otherwise all other settings are the same as for Melody Generator.

MIDI Transformer (full edition only)

You can create a new phrase of similar style from a dropped MIDI file. Just drop a
MIDI file in the inspector to be analyzed. This phrase generator creates absolute
notes because it forms new chords!

RapidComposer User Guide 103

It uses a Markov chain internally and works similarly to AI but here you have more
control over the output. MIDI Transformer works by selecting the ‘next’ note
based on your settings.

• Expectedness: The expectedness of the Markov chain. 0% means that the

chain will contain less likely decisions, 100% means that the chain will be
more deterministic, that is similar to the original note sequence. The 100%

RapidComposer User Guide 104

 setting has no randomness, always the best note is chosen from the
available options.
• Matching rhythm priority: Set if using the same rhythm (as in the original
sequence) has priority when selecting the next note
• Matching melody priority: Set if using the same melody (as in the original
sequence) has priority when selecting the next note
• Matching scale note priority: Set if using the same scale note (as in the
original sequence) has priority when selecting the next note
• Note range: Allowed note range to generate
• Scale option: Select the scale to use for the Markov chain, which works best
when used with a diatonic scale. It is possible to use a scale consisting of the
original notes, with the less used notes ignored (may not be a valid major or
minor scale). Alternatively you can look up a major or minor scale that fits
best for the notes, including harmonic, melodic major/minor and church
modes.
• Chord notes: Decide if chord notes preserve their semitone intervals as in
the original sequence, or the nearest scale note is used for them.
• Longest continuous chain: Longest continuous chain of notes from the
original sequence
• Biggest leap allowed: Biggest leap allowed between notes (in semitones)
• Repetitions allowed: Certain repetition can be enabled an disabled. For a
short sequence (few bars) disabling repetitions will limit the possibilities of
the algorithm, while it is better to disable repetitions for a longer input
sequence.
• Structure: The numbers indicate the length of each unit. The denominator is
4 if it is absent. E.g. A:2 or A2 means 2/4 length. Length can be omitted if
already present, e.g. A4 A A A
Note: repeating a few beats may result the pattern heading to higher or
lower direction.
• Velocity equalization: Make velocity changes smooth when combining
notes from different places

RapidComposer User Guide 105

Modern Chord Pattern Generator
Create EDM chords with this phrase generator! For best results use 'Modern
Rhythm' or 'Modern Random Rhythm' as the rhythm generator or you may edit
the rhythm manually.

RapidComposer User Guide 106

Modern Chord Pattern Generator Settings

• Chord Placement: choose which rhythm notes represents the chord notes.
'Auto' will place a chord to each 8th note, 'All' means that all rhythm notes
are chords
• Chord Notes: specify which chord notes to use for the full chord. Available
settings: Root, 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, Root-1 Octave, 3rd-1 Octave, 5th-1 Octave,
7th-1 Octave, 9th-1 Octave
• Chord Polyphony: Decide to use one chord note at a time, or all chords
notes
• Chord Note Length: the length of chords notes. Available settings: As In
Rhythm, Until Next Chord, Until Next Chord-16th Note, 16th Note
• Bass Placement: choose which rhythm notes represents the bass notes.
'Auto' will place a bass note to each 16th note, 'All' means that bass notes
are placed to all rhythm notes
• Bass Note: Select which note to use as bass. Available settings: Random,
Chord Root, 3rd, 5th
• Bass Note Octave: Bass note transposition
• Bass Note Length: the length of bass notes. Available settings: As In
Rhythm, Until Next Bass, Until Next Bass-16th Note, 16th Note

Motive Generator
Motive generator encapsulates all the settings of the Melody Editor. It is the only
phrase generator which has a dedicated page for editing, rather than a few
buttons and sliders. When you double-click on a ‘Motive Generator’, the Melody
Editor opens, instead of the Phrase Editor as it usually happens.

RapidComposer User Guide 107

Motive Generator Settings
A whole chapter is devoted to explain motive editing and generation under the
Melody Editor tab. Please look up the Melody Editor chapter.

Ostinato Generator
An ostinato is a recurring rhythmic or melodic pattern often found in both classical
compositions and popular songs. Ostinato plays an important part in improvised
music (rock and jazz), in which it is often referred to as a riff or a vamp. The
Ostinato Generator does not use an external rhythm pattern.

RapidComposer User Guide 108

RapidComposer User Guide 109
Ostinato Generator Settings

• Pattern: choose from many pattern presets

• Repeat Notes: it is possible to repeat notes maximum 4 times
• Pattern Length (Retrigger): pattern length in quarter notes. The pattern is
retriggered when this length is reached.
• Insert Chord Root Note Every: insert chord root note one octave below
every Nth event (not quarter note)
• Changed Note Count: the number of notes that are changed randomly in
'pattern length' duration. Downbeats and the first 3 notes are never
changed.
• Possible Intervals: specify allowed up and down motion intervals, in scale
steps. Available settings: +1 to +7, -1 to -7 scale steps

Percussion Generator
Create percussion patterns using multiple percussion instruments. Set the drum
map first, use a percussion soundfont/VST/VST3 instrument. You can re-generate
one percussion, or all (unlocked) percussion instruments. Clicking on the pencil
icon will open the rhythm generator options, where you can adjust the rhythm, or
set up the rhythm manually.

RapidComposer User Guide 110

Phrase Container
The Phrase Container lays out phrases in a certain order. Typically you add the
phrases to be used in the list, of which the Phrase Container will select the
specified number of phrases, that it will lay down using the specified
arrangement.

RapidComposer User Guide 111

Phrase Container Settings

• Number Of Phrases: number of phrases to select randomly from the list

• Arrangement: order of phrases. The available settings depend on 'number
of phrases'.
• Possible Phrases: add the phrases that you want to include in the
container. When there are more phrases than the 'number of phrases'
setting, the necessary number of phrases are randomly selected from the
list

RapidComposer User Guide 112

Phrase Morpher
Phrase Morphing means that when you place a 'source' and 'target' phrase in the
composition, the phrases between the two will be composed automatically by
RapidComposer so that there is a smooth transition from the source phrase to the
target phrase. There are several options to control this transition. Usually there
are many possible transitions, if you don't like the one offered by the program,
pressing 'Regenerate' (the lightning button) will create a different transition.

RapidComposer User Guide 113

Phrase Morpher Settings

• Quantization: Horizontal note movement control. Specify if you allow notes

moving in time and if so how they are quantized. Notes moving in time will
change the rhythm, so if that is not what you want it is best to disable this
option. Available settings: Disable Note Movement In Time, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16,
1/32, 1/64, 1/128
• Vertical Movement: Vertical note movement control. Specify if you allow
notes moving vertically (becoming higher or lower notes) and if so how they
are handled. Moving notes can be snapped to scale notes or semitones.
Available settings: Disable Vertical Note Movement, Snap To Semitones,
Snap To Scale
• Pair Note Additions And Removals: When checked adding a target note
and removing a source note will happen at the same time as far as other
conditions allow. This results a smoother transition.
• Handle Chord Notes Together: When checked chord notes with no offset
will be added/removed together.
• Apply Automatic Transposition: Specify if transposition is applied to the
generated phrases. When checked the highest note of the source phrase will
approximate the highest note of the target phrase. This setting is ignored
when guitar chords are used.

Piano Chord Pattern Generator

The Piano Chord Pattern Generator makes separate patterns for the left and right
hands. The left hand (bass) patterns are taken from presets which have their own
rhythm. The right hand uses the rhythm generator output, and applies chord
patterns on the rhythm.

RapidComposer User Guide 114

Piano Chord Pattern Generator Settings

• Position: chord position. Available settings: Root is lowest (from C3), 3rd is
lowest, 5th is lowest, Root is lowest (from C4)
• Mode: the chord pattern to play (order of chord notes).

• Rootless: remove the root note from the pattern

RapidComposer User Guide 115

 • 7th, 9th, 11th, 13th: when to play these chord notes (assuming the chord
includes this note). Available settings: None, With Root, With Third, With
Fifth, Every Nth Event

• Bass: the bass pattern. Each bass pattern has its own rhythm.

• Bass Velocity: the velocity of bass notes

• Randomize!: you can randomize left and right hand patterns

Piano Run Generator

The Piano Run Generator offers a variable-note-length run through different
octaves, in any direction, to easily add intensity or energy to a Composition.

RapidComposer User Guide 116

Piano Run Generator Settings

• Technique: the “style” of the run. Available settings: Straddle, Straddle

Without Middle Note, 2-1 Breakup, 3-1 Breakup, Waterfall, Waterfall Using
Inversions

RapidComposer User Guide 117

 • Motion: Upwards, Downward, Up-Down, Down-Up, Up-Down-Up-Down,
Down-Up-Down-Up
• Up Motion Range: the number of events (not quarter notes or semitones!)
when moving up.
• Down Motion Range: the number of events (not quarter notes or
semitones!) when moving down.

Random Melody Generator

This is a much simpler melody generator than 'Melody Generator' with less
options. But still, it can make very good melodies.

RapidComposer User Guide 118

Random Melody Generator Settings

• Options:
• Wide Melody (Bigger Steps): allow bigger jumps for notes.
• Last Note Is I: the last note becomes the root note of tonic
• Force Chord Note For Notes Longer Than 2/4: longer notes will be
chord notes when this option is checked

RapidComposer User Guide 119

 • Harmony Note Probability: higher probability means more chord notes will
be used in the melody
• Note Range: melody notes will be generated in the note range. Default: G2-
F4
• Note Repetition Probability: higher probability means more notes
repeated.

Rest
This is an empty phrase used only in the Phrase Container and Idea Tool to add
rest between phrases.

Rhythm Mapper
You can convert any phrase to a 'Rhythm Mapper' which lets you use a different
rhythm pattern for the phrase. This is available only in the 'Convert Phrase To
Generator' menu in the Phrase Inspector so you won’t find Rhythm Mapper in the
phrase browser. Please note there exists a Rhythm Mapper variation with the
same functionality. The difference is that you can add the Rhythm Mapper
variation to phrases, which transform the phrase notes according to a rhythm
pattern. On the other hand, the Rhythm Mapper generator stores the source
phrase, and lets you use rhythm generators. Both are useful.

RapidComposer User Guide 120

Rhythm Mapper Generator Settings

Direct 1:1 Mapping

The rhythm events are mapped to phrase events. It is not the rhythm length that
counts but the number of events in the rhythm. First the algorithm locates
'events' in the original phrase. An event has a position and a length. Events are
when note(s) begin and last until the next note/event. Multiple notes (e.g. a
chord) may belong to a single event. Also all rhythm notes are considered as an
'event'. Then the rhythm events are applied to the phrase, by shortening phrase
notes if needed. Please note: a faster rhythm may change the phrase length. E.g.
when you have 4 quarter notes, and you apply a rhythm consisting of eighth
notes, the phrase becomes half the length. So the phrase length may change
when using “Direct 1:1 Mapping”.

Preserve Phrase Shape

RapidComposer User Guide 121

This functionality is the same as the Apply Rhythm variation. The phrase length
does not change, notes are sliced according to the rhythm.

Strings Staccato Generator

The Staccato Strings Generator is best utilized with a Staccato Strings
soundfont or VST/VST3 instrument plug-in. This Generator is absolutely perfect to
create classical runs/arpeggios, that stay true to string ensemble arrangements,
and the intervals they often use. The algorithm was painstakingly created through
extensive study of classical compositions. There is no source rhythm for this
generator.

If you love classical music and the beauty of staccato string arpeggios, this
generator might be the missing puzzle piece for your ideas.

RapidComposer User Guide 122

Strings Staccato Generator Settings

• Polyphony: How “thin” the Phrase can be (Polyphony 3), or how “full”
(Polyphony 8 or 9). Put simply: Polyphony 3 means 3 performers playing
complimentary arpeggios, and Polyphony 9 or 10 means more than 3
performers playing complimentary arpeggios in different octaves.
• Density: Default setting is Low+Medium+High. Other available settings are

RapidComposer User Guide 123

 Low, Low+Medium, Medium, Medium+High, and High.

Strum Pattern Generator

Create interesting and realistic guitar strum patterns with this generator! Use the
'Steel Guitar' preset from the included 'GeneralUser GS-RC' soundfont, or similar
virtual instrument.

RapidComposer User Guide 124

RapidComposer User Guide 125
Rhythm generator reference
Besides being able to edit rhythm manually, there are some interesting tools to
generate rhythm patterns using mathematical algorithms. The rhythm generators
are available only in the phrase generator Rhythm menu.

The following rhythm generators are included:

• Rhythm Lab (new in v5!)

• Modern Rhythm
• Modern Random Rhythm
• Schillinger's Interference
• Subdivision
• Polyrhythm
• Euclidean Rhythm
• Smooth Rhythm
• Bass Rhythm
• Generic Rhythm (obsolete, only for v4 compatibility)
• Probabilistic Rhythm (obsolete, only for v4 compatibility)
• Simple Intervals (obsolete, only for v4 compatibility)
• Toggle Intervals (obsolete, only for v4 compatibility)
• Manual Editing

Rhythm Processing
There are a few rhythm settings (collapsed by default) that are common to all
rhythm generators. You can see these controls under the rhythm generator UI,
suggesting that these process the rhythm after rhythm generation. Please notice
that note length is part of the rhythm in RapidComposer.

RapidComposer User Guide 126

 • Dotted Notes: Use dotted notes where possible. E.g. when selecting
“Dotted 1/4” when there are 2 quarter notes one after the other, the length
of the first note becomes 3/8 and the length of the second quarter note
becomes 1/8. Options are None, Dotted 1/2, Dotted 1/4, Dotted 1/8, Dotted
1/16, Double Dotted 1/2, Double Dotted 1/4, Double Dotted 1/8, Double
Dotted 1/16
• Note Length: options are Sustain Notes, Set Equal Length, Change By
Percentage, Change By Offset
• Rotate: shift notes left or right, using the snap setting
• Rests: you can insert silence in the middle of a rhythm pattern
• Accents: increase or decrease 1/4, 1/8 or 1/16 note accents
• Humanize: humanize note positions, lengths, and velocity

More detailed descriptions of the various rhythm generators are followed:

Rhythm Lab
This new rhythm generator replaces several older generators. It works by
selecting the necessary number of notes from probabilities edited by the user.

RapidComposer User Guide 127

Accents and timings (slight time offsets) can be set up too.

3 different rhythms can be combined using various operators. This allows creating
interesting patterns:

First select one of the rhythm buttons:

then which aspect of the rhythm you want to edit:

RapidComposer User Guide 128

Accents are actually note velocities, weights are the note probabilities. Timing can
offset the notes left or right to a maximum 16th note.
Some rhythm presets are available in the preset menu:

The operators can be selected between two rhythm buttons:

These operations will combine two rhythm patterns. First Rhythm #1 and #2 are
combined, then the result and Rhythm #3:

(Rhythm #1 OP1 Rhythm #2) OP2 Rhythm #3

The ‘Expectedness’ slider is a possibility to modify probabilities non-destructively.

It can make likely notes less likely and vice versa without changing the
probabilities. During dragging the slider, the final weights are displayed.

Set the number of notes to generate:

RapidComposer User Guide 129

Modern Rhythm
Modern Rhythm creates rhythm patterns used in modern EDM styles (trance,
dubstep, trip-hop, DnB…). The rhythm is based on groups of three 16th notes with
some 8th notes lead in. It is best to use with the Modern Chord Pattern
Generator.

Modern Rhythm Settings

• Divide 3-Note Groups: Specify how a group of 3 16th note should look like.
Possible options: No (16th+16th+16th), 1-2 (16th+8th), 2-1 (8th+16th),
Randomly (choose any previous settings), Randomly For Each (select a
random division for each group).
• Lead-in 8th Notes: You can use one or two (or none) 8th notes at the
beginning of the rhythm pattern

RapidComposer User Guide 130

 • Remove 16th Notes: Remove all 16th notes from the pattern
• Complexity: This setting will change 1 or 2 groups of 16th notes by re-
grouping. Possible options: Simple (no re-grouping), Medium (1 re-grouping),
Complex (2 re-grouping)

Modern Random Rhythm

Modern Random Rhythm is a rhythm generator for EDM (trance, dubstep, trip-
hop, DnB…) and other modern styles especially for chord patterns. It works by
joining preset rhythm patterns used in EDM songs randomly.

RapidComposer User Guide 131

Schillinger's Interference
Schillinger’s Interference (based on Joseph Schillinger's work) places pulses on
every Nth position creating an interference pattern. You can achieve a lot of nice
results using this rhythm type. Experimentation is the key!

Schillinger’s Interference Settings

• Duration: A pulse will be placed every Nth 'pulse width'. Set N with the
Duration sliders.
• Phase: You can offset the pattern. Valid phases are zero to Duration-1.
• Pulse Width: Available settings are 1/4, 1/8, 1/16, 1/32, 1/64. The basic
duration unit used by the generator. Set it to 1/16 to better see how it works.
• 1 Pulse, 2 Pulses, 3 Pulses: Specify what happens when there are 1, 2, or

RapidComposer User Guide 132

 3 pulses at a given beat.

Subdivision
Subdivision works by recursive slicing of a long note. It is especially useful for
creating percussion phrases but it can also create some very melodic and quirky
patterns, which can be perfect for “chiptune” music. You can achieve a lot of
great results in this style by increasing the Number of Subdivisions slider above
the default of 6 (13 to 16 is a great number), and also increasing the Full
Polyphony slider to above 50%. Subdivision is useful in a lot of other ways.

Subdivision Settings

• Subdivision: Available settings are Random Weighted (default), Random, or

Successive. Depending on how these are set, different algorithms are used.
• Number of Subdivisions: The number of slices, that is how many new notes

RapidComposer User Guide 133

 are created. How “busy” the Phrase can be (or how “simple”).

Polyrhythm
Polyrhythm allows a phrase to include notes that are off-beat or uncommonly-
placed. You can achieve a human-like performance quality using this rhythm
generator type. You can set a duration (e.g. 2/4) which is then divided into
'division' parts.

Polyrhythm Settings

• Division1, Division2, Division3: Sets the number of divisions. E.g. if you set
5, the specified duration will be divided into 5 equal length parts

RapidComposer User Guide 134

 • Beats To Divide: Sets the duration in quarter notes that you want to divide.

Euclidean Rhythm
The greatest common divisor of two numbers is used rhythmically giving the
number of beats and silences, generating almost all of the most important World
Music rhythms. The beats in the resulting rhythms are as equidistant as possible.

RapidComposer User Guide 135

Euclidean Rhythm Settings

• Steps: the length of the rhythm sequence in 'division' units

• Density: it is the number of notes spread evenly in the number of steps
• Offset: offset of the rhythm sequence
• Mirror: possibility to mirror the sequence
• Division: the note length used in the rhythm sequence

Smooth Rhythm
This generator creates a sequence where the neighboring note lengths are either
the same, twice or half of the previous note. That is a 1/8 note will be followed by
a 1/16, 1/8 or 1/4.

RapidComposer User Guide 136

Smooth Rhythm Settings

• Shortest Note Length: the length of the shortest possible note in the
sequence
• Longest Note Length: the length of the longest possible note in the
sequence
• Allow 1:2:1 Division: option to allow/disallow a 1:2:1 division of a 4 unit
long note

Retro Rhythm
Retro Rhythm places interesting rhythmic patterns one after the other. It suits
monophonic sounds (a bass guitar, and other instruments) best. If you play with
the sliders a bit, you can achieve a lot of great dance/trance/techno-style piano
patterns using this Rhythm type, with a Generic Generator.

RapidComposer User Guide 137

Retro Rhythm Settings

• Patterns: Select the possible patterns that are inserted to each quarter
note. Available settings are One Note On Beat, Two 16th Notes Before and
After Beat, Two 8th Notes Before and After Beat, Two 16th Notes Before and
a Note On Beat, and finally, Two 8th Notes Before and a Note On Beat.

• Note Length: Available settings are Short, Medium (default) and Long.

Generic Rhythm (obsolete, replaced by Rhythm Lab)

Some old rhythm generators are still available in RapidComposer for compatibility
reasons.

Generic Rhythm (especially inside a Generic Generator) is one of the most

useful ways to generate “piano-style” patterns. Don’t be fooled by the word
“generic”, as it is anything but.

RapidComposer User Guide 138

Generic Rhythm Settings

• Density: How “busy” the Phrase can be (or how “simple”)

• Note Placement: Available settings are 1/4, 1/8, 1/16 or 1/32.
• Musical Stress: Available settings are Strong, Strong-Middle, and Strong-
Medium-Weak.

Probabilistic Rhythm (obsolete, replaced by Rhythm Lab)

This generator will place notes based on probabilities. The bigger divisions have
higher probabilities, e.g. 1/1 will more likely contain a note than 1/4 and 1/4 will
more likely contain a note than 1/8, etc.

RapidComposer User Guide 139

Probabilistic Rhythm Settings

• Division: Available settings are 1/16, 1/8, 1/4, 2/4, 3/4, 4/4, 6/4, 8/4.
• Density: The number of notes to generate. How “busy” the Phrase can be
(or how “simple”)
• Randomness: Expected means a note is more probably placed on bigger
division than on a smaller one. E.g. note on a 1/4 will be placed with bigger
probability than a note on a 1/8 or 1/16. You can make more interesting,
more unexpected patterns when some randomness is used.
• Musical Stress: Accents to use in the rhythm pattern. Available settings are
Strong, Strong+Middle, and Strong+Middle+Weak.

Simple Divisions (obsolete, replaced by Rhythm Lab)

Simple Divisions are exactly that: simple rhythmic divisions. Sometimes you just
need something simple and fast, that gets the harmonic job done, with a basic
rhythm.

RapidComposer User Guide 140

Simple Divisions Settings

• Division: Available settings are Bar, 3/4, 2/4, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16, 1/32, 1/64, 1/4T,
1/4T Shuffle, 1/8T, 1/8T Shuffle, 1/16T, 1/16T Shuffle. Depending on how
these are set, you’ll see the notes below change to be more “busy” or more
“simple.”

• Weak Accent: accent or velocity to use for weak notes

• Strong Accent: accent or velocity to use for strong notes

• Strong Accent Every: a strong accented note can be placed on regular

positions. When 0, there will be only weak accented notes, when 1, only
strong accented notes are used.

RapidComposer User Guide 141

Toggle Divisions (obsolete, replaced by Rhythm Lab)
Toggle Divisions, like Simple Divisions, toggle when certain MIDI notes are
played and when and where they are not.

Toggle Interval Settings

• Toggle Every: toggles every 4/4, 3/4, 2/4, 1/4, 1/4T(triplet), 1/8, 1/8T, 1/16
notes.

Manual Editing
It is possible to edit rhythm patterns using Manual Editing. When you like the

RapidComposer User Guide 142

results of a rhythm generator but want to modify the rhythm slightly, select
Manual Editing.

Manual Editing Actions

• Create Note: Ctrl+click or left double-click

• Move Note: drag note horizontally
• Resize note: drag note at the right edge
• Split Note: Alt-click or left double-click at split position
• Delete Note: Ctrl+click or right double-click
• Delete All Notes: right click on the background
• Change Note Accent: right click on note. Note accents are:
strong/medium/weak.
• Change Note Velocity: Ctrl+right click on note

RapidComposer User Guide 143

Manual Editing Settings

• Snap&Grid: note snap and grid density: 1/4, 1/8, 1/16, 1/32, 1/8 Triplet,
1/16 Triplet.

RapidComposer User Guide 144

Variations
Variations are transformations with tweakable parameters that can be applied to
entire tracks, or specific phrases. Multiple instances of the same variation (with
different parameters) can be applied to a track or a phrase.

Important: variations are non-destructive, which means your original phrases

won't be changed. Think of them as transformations that can be disabled or
removed anytime.

Variations are applied top to bottom (order is important).

Variations are also a great way to get really interesting and unique ideas from the
Idea Tool.

You can mute any variations by removing the checkmark in the box next to the
Variation name.

Applying variations to the entire track

Right-click the track header to pull up the Track Inspector, and then click on the
Variations tab to access the variations from the Track Inspector window.

Click the “Add” button on the bottom left to add (and tweak) variations to the
entire track.

RapidComposer User Guide 145

Applying variations to a phrase
Right-click on a phrase to pull up the Phrase Inspector, and then click on the
Variations tab to access the variations from the Phrase Inspector window.

Click the “Add” button on the bottom left to add (and tweak) Variations to the
Phrase.

RapidComposer User Guide 146

Variations included
Here is a list of available variations in RapidComposer:

• Accents 4th/8th/16th: change accents of 4th, 8th, 16th notes

• Add Chord Notes: add chord notes above or below the original note with
the option of muting the original note
• Add Interval: Add specific intervals (1 or more) to monophonic or
polyphonic Phrases or Tracks. Easy way to harmonize a melody (add a Third,
and/or a 6th).
• Adjust Note Lengths: Similar to Staccato-Legato Variation, but more
specific note options.
• Adjust Note Lengths v2: a better version of “Adjust Note Length” with

RapidComposer User Guide 147

 more options (change by percentage, or change by offset)
• Apply Melody: adjusts phrase notes to follow a melody phrase
• Apply Rhythm: drag and drop a rhythm pattern to use for slicing the phrase
notes according to the pattern.
• Apply Shape: use only the rhythm with the shape of another (dropped)
phrase
• Audio Gain: a simple control for audio gain, usable in audio tracks only
• Delay Notes: Offset the beats/counts of notes by tiny increments (for a
more “human” feel). Similar to “Humanize.”
• Double Note: Opposite of “Remove Note” with same settings (see below)
• Double Phrase: Acts as a multiplier for the MIDI notes inside a phrase. If
you have 8 straight 8th notes, it creates 16 16th notes).
• Expression: Many slider variables available here. Works as MIDI velocity
(soft to loud notes). Each track has an Expression by default.
• Extract Notes: extracts important notes from a phrase, ignores all other
notes
• Extract Rhythm: Makes a monophonic phrase by replacing every note with
the given note
• Humanize: “Loosens” the timing of a phrase or track, for a more “human”
performance.
• Join Notes: No parameters - Glues two notes together when the first note
ends and the second one begins.
• Limit Note Range: Two sliders available, controlling the lowest note and
highest note. Currently only effects entire Tracks as a Track Variation (not
specific Phrases).
• Make Monophonic: removes polyphony from the phrase
• MIDI Echo: Adds an echo-effect by adding quieter MIDI notes to the main
notes of a Phrase.
• Make Monophonic: Similar to Extract Rhythm, but with different options.
• Mirror Horizontally: No parameters (reverses the MIDI notes, rhythmically
and/or melodically, inside a phrase)
• Mirror Vertically: No parameters (reverses the MIDI notes, melodically (not
rhythmically), inside a phrase)
• Permute Chord Notes: No parameters. Like Swap Chord Notes, it
rearranges the chord notes randomly.
• Quantize: Tightens timing or changes timing entirely. Has many note
alignments, including triplets, quintuplets, and more. Includes slider amount

RapidComposer User Guide 148

 for Quantize percentage.
• Remove Note: Available settings that are affected by the slider are Note at
Index, Event at Index, Before Time and After Time. Settings that the slider
has no effect on include All, Even Beats, Odd Beats, Random Note, Random
Time, Shortest Note, Longest Note, All Shortest Notes, All Longest Notes,
Notes on Whole Beats, Notes Between Beats.
• Remove Short Notes: Removes too short notes from the phrase with
minimum length specified
• Re-rhythmize Phrase: Makes rhythmic variations of the same phrase. Enter
the number of steps.
• Rests: Two sliders available, to generate rests in various places at at
various lengths.
• Rhythm Mapper: The “Preserve Phrase Shape” mode is the same as the
'Apply Rhythm' variation. With the “Direct 1:1 Mapping” each phrase event
is mapped to the corresponding rhythm event, so it is best to use a rhythm
with the same or similar note count as the phrase. A phrase generator with
the same name and functionality exists, use which is more convenient.
• Rotate Notes: An interesting effect to rotate phrase notes.
• Show/Hide Non-Existent Chord Notes: (rarely used) Hide or show 'non-
existent' chord notes in phrases. This affects notes that the chord does not
include, e.g. when a note uses the 4th chord note (7 th) but the master track
chord consists of only 3 notes. These notes are either ignored or lower chord
notes are transposed up.
• Simplify Phrase: Simplifies a phrase by removing less important notes.
• Slice Phrase: Slices the phrase on note or 1/4, 1/8, etc division boundary
and rearranges slices to get a new phrase.
• Spread Out Chord Notes: Makes phrases more “full” by spreading out the
intervals of a chord. Alternatively you can use a chord voicing, assigned to
the phrase.
• Staccato-Legato: Makes notes more “choppy” or more “smooth”.
• Strumming: Moves MIDI notes by a tiny amount, to simulate a guitar chord
strumming (works best on chord Phrases with longer-duration notes… or any
Phrase with 3 or more notes played simultaneously).
• Swap Chord Notes: Available settings are First-Second, First-Third, First-
Last, Second-Third, Second-Last, Third-Last. This Variation can do very
interesting transformations on Phrases: it rearranges the chord notes
depending on your setting.
• Swing: Applies a “shuffle” to straight Phrases. Great for making a phrase

RapidComposer User Guide 149

 more funky or “bouncy”. Very useful also, for generating “chiptune/8-bit
video-game” music phrases. Many settings. Common swing setting: Half
Beat (1/8 Note), w/ Swing slider set to 40.
• Transpose: Increase or decrease the pitch of the Phrase or Track.
• Triple Phrase: No parameters (acts as a multiplier just like Double Phrase. If
you have 4 quarter notes in a phrase, it creates 12 notes, which become 8th
note triplets).
• Velocity: Basic MIDI velocity adjustment (soft to loud).
• Velocity Generator: Many variables here that affect MIDI velocity and
performance.
• Velocity Range: Assign random MIDI velocities for downbeats/on-beats/off-
beats, 8th and 16th notes

RapidComposer User Guide 150

Melody Editor
Overview
Workflow

You design or generate a melody line for the selected scale, drag the melody to
the DAW, harmonize it to add chords, and finish the composition in the DAW. The
Melody Editor tab offers melody generation for a chord progression if you enable
the chords track. So two different workflows are supported:
• Create a catchy melody, then find chords for the melody later (chords track
disabled)
• Create melody for a given chord progression (chords track enabled)

Dropping a MIDI file on the workspace lets you work with existing melodies. The
MIDI file is imported as one big section. You can make smaller sections by splitting
the big section, regenerate parts of melody, make repetitions, etc.

User interface
There are three main pages in the user interface:
• Melody Editor: the main melody editing workspace where you create or
edit a melody
• Settings: miscellaneous and user interface settings, keyboard
shortcuts.
• Support: update checking, version history and feedback

The Melody Editor

The user interface consists of the tool bar at the top and the workspace where
you can edit the current melody notes.

RapidComposer User Guide 151

 : Play back the currently edited melody. At the end of the playback the cursor
returns to the last clicked position. Right-click to edit playback options

: Loop playback

: Generate melody. Right-click to edit generation options

: Mutate melody. Right-click to edit mutation options

: Drag melody as MIDI. You can drag the edited melody directly to the DAW

: Access melody presets. You can save a preset here. All the settings are
saved with the preset

: Undo last change

: Redo

C Major: the scale the melody will use

120.00 BPM: playback tempo. By default this is the host tempo. Overriding
the tempo is possible, see “Use Host Tempo” in the settings.

RapidComposer User Guide 152

4/4: the signature to use. By default this is the host signature. Overriding the
signature is possible, see “Use Host Signature” in the settings.

+0 Octaves: octave offset applied to the melody

Default: note lengths options. Right-click for menu. Possible values: Default,
Legato, 2/4, 1/4, 3/16, 1/8, 3/32, 1/16

100%: ‘note on’ velocity for melody notes

Playback options
By right-clicking on the ‘PLAY’ button you can enable chords track playback, which
can be very useful during melody editing. You can set the volume (actually ‘note
on’ velocity), voice leading and instruments here:

RapidComposer User Guide 153

Piano roll options
The piano roll does automatic vertical zooming by default. You can scroll the
keyboard (vertical drag or mouse-wheel) and zoom the keyboard (Ctrl+vertical
drag or Ctrl+mouse-wheel). Double-click to return to automatic zooming.

Clicking on the ‘cogwheel’ icon will show more options:

Melody sections and operations

The melody includes several melody sections. A shape and rhythm is assigned to
each section. The shape and rhythm comes from a motive that are displayed as
capital letters from A to H and indicated with different colors. You can see the
motives above the sections:

There are lots of things you can do with a section: you can resize, remove, mute,
duplicate, split, glue, regenerate them, add variations (which belong to the

RapidComposer User Guide 154

section, and not the motive!). Add rest or held notes. Inside the sections you can
freely edit the notes.

The top bar (ACTIONS) offers the following buttons in this order: remove ( ),
mute/rest ( ), create new motive ( ), clone motive for editing ( ).

The MOTIVE and RHYTHM bars select the motive and rhythm for the particular
section. The two letters need not be the same, you can use the rhythm from
motive A for motive B, for example. Clicking a letter will select the motive, but
clicking on the SAME letter will regenerate the motive, or just the rhythm for the
clicked motive.

The VARIATION bar offers often used melodic transformations. Right-clicking

resets/removes the transformation, Ctrl-clicking will apply the change to all
sections, not just the edited one.

: horizontal offset in 16th note steps

: transposition by scale steps
: retrograde (mirroring horizontally)
: inversion (mirroring vertically)
: contour transformations (keep the same basic shape, but make the
intervals
between notes larger or smaller)
: menu with further variations:

• Rhythm Displacement: either a single randomly selected note or all notes

left to or right to a randomly selected note will be shifted by the specified
amount making an interesting rhythmic effect. This is often used in
melodies.

RapidComposer User Guide 155

 • Simplify: removes less important notes from a motive. You can set how
many times this is performed.
• Split Long Notes: find the longest note in the motive and split it at a
sensible position, thus making two notes from a longer note.
• Connecting Notes: insert an additional short note between 2 motive notes,
by making a connection between them. ‘Approach’ means the inserted note
will be between the two notes, e.g. C → E → F. The ‘Opposite’ option inserts
a note from the other direction, e.g. C → G → F
• Lead-in Notes: insert lead-in (pick-up) notes before the section, at the end
of the previous section. This variation is not available for the very first
section.

A context pop-up is available if you right click in a melody section with all possible
operations on a section:

RapidComposer User Guide 156

Generation Settings (For a Section)
Each section has its own settings, which were assigned during melody generation.
You can change these settings and regenerate the motive or just the rhythm. The
simplest way for regeneration is clicking on the same highlighted letter in the
MOTIVE or RHYTHM bar. The settings are very similar to global melody settings:

You can generate ( ) or mutate ( ) the rhythm or motive. Ctrl-click to

generate both motive and rhythm.

RapidComposer User Guide 157

Rhythm settings

Density: it is proportional to the number of melody notes used. 100% means the
maximum note count for all types of rhythms. For straight rhythm 100% means a
note on each 1/8 grid.
Method: the rhythm generation method. Possible values:
• Weighted Random: probabilities used for notes: downbeats > on-beats > off-
beats > 1/8 notes. The 'randomness' setting affects these probabilities.
• Subdivision: works by dividing time into halves
• Modern: rhythm used in deep house and other modern genres

Motive settings

Steps/Leaps: the proportion of steps and leaps. For each motive a random value
is used between the minimum and maximum values on slider.
Repetition: the probability of note repetition. Melodies often have repeated
notes. For each motive a random value is used between the minimum and
maximum values on slider.
Returning: the probability of repeating the note before the previous melody note,
like in C → D → C
After Leap: specify what should happen after a leap. Possible values:
• Step in the opposite direction
• Step anywhere
• Step or small leap in the opposite direction
• Leap in the opposite direction
• Anything

Leap Weights: the probabilities of jumps (leaps) in the melody in both directions.
Scale Note Weights: the probabilities of each scale note to be used.

If you set all leap weights to the same amount, only scale note weights will be
used. Similarly if you set all scale note weights to the same amount, only the leap
weights will count.

The timeline

RapidComposer User Guide 158

Dragging the timeline vertically will zoom in/out, horizontal dragging scrolls the
timeline. Double-clicking will automatically zoom out the melody to the most
optimal view.

RapidComposer User Guide 159

Creating melodies
Melody generation

Clicking on the ‘Generate’ button ( ) will generate a new melody based on the
melody generation settings.

Right-clicking on the ‘Generate’ button ( ) will open the generation setting

dialog.

Under the ‘Global’ tab you’ll find the following basic settings:

RapidComposer User Guide 160

Melody Length: in bars and optionally in quarter notes
Melody Variety: an important setting: the number of motives to use. Motives are
denoted as capital letters from A to H (maximum 8 motives). Typically 1 to 3
motives are used.
Rhythm Variety: another important setting for the rhythmic variety: the number
of motives to use for rhythm.
Note Range: the allowed notes to use. Please note that some variations
(transposition, lead-in notes…) may create notes outside of this range.

RapidComposer User Guide 161

Under the ‘Rhythm’ tab you’ll find the following settings:

Rhythm: straight, triplet, swing or syncopation

Density: it is proportional to the number of melody notes used. 100% means the
maximum note count for all types of rhythms. For straight rhythm 100% means a
note on each 1/8 grid.
Method: the rhythm generation method. Possible values:

RapidComposer User Guide 162

 • Weighted Random: probabilities used for notes: downbeats > on-beats > off-
beats > 1/8 notes. The 'randomness' setting affects these probabilities.
• Subdivision: works by dividing time into halves
• Modern: rhythm used in deep house and other modern genres

Under the ‘Motive’ tab you’ll find the following settings:

The melody consists of steps and leaps. Step means a single scale step, a leap is
bigger than a scale step. The proportion of steps and leaps, note repetitions,
probabilities of leaps and scale notes, describe the melody shape.

RapidComposer User Guide 163

Start Note: the possible start notes for the motives (scale degrees)
Steps/Leaps: the proportion of steps and leaps. For each motive a random value
is used between the minimum and maximum values on slider.
Repetition: the probability of note repetition. Melodies often have repeated
notes. For each motive a random value is used between the minimum and
maximum values on slider.
Returning: the probability of repeating the note before the previous melody note,
like in C → D → C
After Leap: specify what should happen after a leap. Possible values:
• Step in the opposite direction
• Step anywhere
• Step or small leap in the opposite direction
• Leap in the opposite direction
• Anything

Leap Weights: the probabilities of jumps (leaps) in the melody in both directions.
Scale Note Weights: the probabilities of each scale note to be used.

If you set all leap weights to the same amount, only scale note weights will be
used. Similarly if you set all scale note weights to the same amount, only the leap
weights will count.

When the chords track is enabled, Chord Options is displayed instead of Start
Note:

RapidComposer User Guide 164

Chord Options: select the possible first note of the motive, as well as notes that
must be chord notes when generating a new motive

RapidComposer User Guide 165

Under the ‘Variations’ tab you’ll find the following settings:

For each variation a minimum and maximum probability is set in the sliders.
During melody generation for each melody section all variations use a random
probability between the minimum and maximum value. The variation is added
according to the selected value.

RapidComposer User Guide 166

Enabling the chords track

The chords track can be enabled by clicking on the small ‘chord’ button:

The chords can be set by clicking on the chord note or chord name. Chord boxes
are splitted/joined by using Alt-click (Option-click on macOS). It is possible to drag
the chord edges to make a chord shorter or longer.

Pressing ‘Generate’ ( ) will create motives based on the Chord Settings under
the Generation Options / Motive tab. This includes the possible first note, and
whether to place chord notes on downbeats only or downbeats and on-beats (first
and third beats in a bar), or all notes should be chord notes.

When a motive is repeated under a different chord, the program tries to set the
transposition to match the second chord, but sometimes this is not possible. The
reason is that motives contain scale notes, and a repeated motive copies the
original motive note by note. This means that the repeated motive cannot always
be adjusted for different chords.

For best results use different motives (letters) for each melody section, with one
or two rhythm patterns repeated. Making all notes to be chord notes may result a
boring motive.

There are no chord-relative notes in a motive, so changing a chord won’t update

the motive to match the new chord. The chord notes are displayed on the piano
roll, so it is easy to adjust the notes if needed.

There are melodic transformations that introduce non-chord notes. Vertical

inversion and random transposition is not used when new melody is generated
with enabled chords track.

RapidComposer User Guide 167

Melody mutation

Clicking on the ‘Mutate’ button ( ) will slightly change the melody based on the
mutation settings.

Right-clicking on the ‘Mutate’ button ( ) will open the mutation setting dialog:

Mutate Rhythm: You can slightly change the rhythm of all, some or just one
melody section.
Mutate Motive: You can slightly change the shape of all, some or just one melody
section.
Mutate Variations: You can slightly change the rhythm of all, some or just one
melody section. When replacing variations, the probabilities in the ‘generation
settings’ will be used.

Melody editing
Editing melody notes is not just possible but experimentation is encouraged.
When you move the mouse over a section, the original motive notes are displayed
without any variations (transposition and horizontal offset are still applied). Make
modifications, and preview the melody until you are satisfied with the result. Drag
the melody to the DAW when you finished it.

RapidComposer User Guide 168

MIDI Mutator
Overview
The MIDI Mutator tab is a collection of tools to modify any aspect of a MIDI
sequence: rhythm, timing, accents, chords, chord voicings and shape. For
example you can replace the rhythm but preserve the notes, or try other chord
voicings for the loaded track.

The MIDI Mutator features a Markov model which is able to create similar MIDI
sequences from a dropped MIDI file. It is available in the Shape menu.

Workflow

You drop a MIDI file (e.g. a bass line or chord pattern) on the workspace, then
select which aspect you want to modify (click on Rhythm, Timing, Accents,
Chords, or Shape). A sub-page opens with the available actions. Make the
changes by clicking on the appropriate button. Preview the modified notes, and if
you are satisfied with the results, you can save the notes, or drag the notes as
MIDI directly to your DAW.

You can edit any phrase in the MIDI Mutator by Shift-double-clicking on it. After
editing it is possible to apply the changes, optionally with chords, scale or tempo.
Not just one phrase, but multiple phrases can be edited at once (after editing a
single phrase will be written back to the composition).

User interface
There are three main pages in the user interface:
• MIDI Mutator: the main editing workspace
• Settings: miscellaneous and user interface settings, keyboard

RapidComposer User Guide 169

shortcuts.
• Support: update checking, version history and feedback

The user interface consists of the tool bar and transformation options at the top
and the workspace where you can directly edit the notes.

: Play back the currently edited notes. At the end of the playback the cursor
returns to the playback start position.

: Loop playback

C Major: the scale used for diatonic operations. While the chords are
automatically updated after each note editing, the scale can be changed
manually. After dropping the MIDI file, the scale is set according to the notes, plus
some other scale suggestions may be available.

120.00 BPM: playback tempo. By default this is the host tempo. Overriding
the tempo is possible, see “Use Host Tempo” in the settings.

RapidComposer User Guide 170

4/4: the signature to use. By default this is the host signature. Overriding the
signature is possible, see “Use Host Signature” in the settings.

16/4: the length of the phrase in signature denominator units. You can increase
of decrease the length.

: Drag the edited notes as MIDI. You can drag the edited notes directly to the
DAW

: Access saved sequences. A single click saves the current notes and options
with the current date and time. Right-click to display earlier states that can be
restored.

: Undo last change

: Redo

Piano roll options

The piano roll does automatic vertical zooming by default. You can scroll the
keyboard (vertical drag or mouse-wheel) and zoom the keyboard (Ctrl+vertical
drag or Ctrl+mouse-wheel). Double-click to return to automatic zooming.

Clicking on the ‘cogwheel’ icon will show more options:

RapidComposer User Guide 171

Most options are self-explanatory here. At the bottom there are two useful
settings for MIDI file import: you can crop the empty space, and limit the length of
the dropped MIDI file.

The editing toolbar

: snap setting in the editor

: grid setting in the editor

: quantize. Select the division and set the amount of quantization by

dragging the ‘Q’ vertically.

: lock and unlock notes. You can preserve ‘good’ notes by locking them.
Please note that some operations may slightly change the position of the locked
notes. Double click to lock/unlock all notes. Shift-click will lock/unlock the
unselected notes.

RapidComposer User Guide 172

 : select all notes beginning/ending at the same time, or having the same
pitch with a single click. Shift-click on a note to select all notes under the same
chord.

: invert horizontally or vertically. Ctrl-click does chromatic vertical

inversion. These are applied on unlocked selected notes, or all unlocked notes if
there is no selection.

: diatonic transposition for vertical dragging or using the mouse wheel. Use
Ctrl-drag or Ctrl-mouse wheel for chromatic transposition

: change ‘note on’ velocities. Ctrl-drag will set all velocities to the same value.
Double-click will set all velocities to 100 (of 127 being the maximum). This is
applied on unlocked selected notes, or all unlocked notes if there is no selection.

: change note lengths easily by 1/32’s. Ctrl-drag to set all note lengths to the
same value. Double-click will set all notes to maximum length, but overlapping is
avoided. This is applied on unlocked selected notes, or all unlocked notes if there
is no selection.

The timeline
Dragging the timeline vertically will zoom in/out, horizontal dragging scrolls the
timeline. Double-clicking will automatically zoom out the melody to the most
optimal view.

The chords track

The chords track is displayed above the timeline:

RapidComposer User Guide 173

The chords can be set by clicking on the chord note or chord name. Chord boxes
are split/joined by using Alt-click (Option-click on macOS). It is possible to drag the
chord edges to make a chord shorter or longer.

Please note: chords are automatically updated after each editing operation!
Chords depend only on the current notes.
No chords are shown for monophonic content (e.g. bass line or melody)

The workspace
Notes can be edited on the workspace. By default chord notes are green, scale
notes are blue, and other non-scale notes are red, but this can be set up in the
User Interface settings.

Some shortcuts:

Create note: Ctrl-click or double click on background

Split/join notes: Alt-click inside note
Toggle note selection: Ctrl-click inside note
Resize notes: drag right edge horizontally
Move/transpose notes: drag notes
Duplicate notes: Ctrl-drag selected notes
Delete notes: press Delete key or
select ‘Delete’ in the context menu (right click)
Cut/copy/paste: use the context menu (right click)

Working with MIDI files

The first step is dropping a MIDI file on the workspace. A single track can be
edited, so for multi-track files the first track is used that includes notes. Any
monophonic or polyphonic pattern can be used. Some options in the UI appear
only for monophonic or only for polyphonic notes.

You can choose what you want to change by highlighting one of the top left
buttons:

RapidComposer User Guide 174

Changing the rhythm
Make sure Rhythm is highlighted in the top left columns.
Various rhythm options are displayed. Some of them will completely replace the
original rhythm from the MIDI file, other operations just slightly modify it.

When changing the rhythm, locked notes will be preserved but their position may
change.
An ‘event’ is multiple notes beginning at the same position, e.g. when a chord is
voiced. When changing ‘events’, all notes are affected that begin at a specific
time.

• Algo #1: regenerate the rhythm using 'Probabilistic Rhythm'. Right click to
set ‘randomness’ from ‘expected’ to ‘random’.
• Algo #2: regenerate the rhythm using 'Subdivision' which works by dividing
time into halves. Right click to set the subdivision type: ‘Random weighted’,
‘Random’ or ‘Successive’:
◦ ‘Random weighted’ selects a position randomly and divides the interval.
Long undivided intervals have higher probability to be found.
◦ ‘Random’ selects a time interval randomly to divide. Short and long
intervals have equal chance to be divided.

RapidComposer User Guide 175

 ◦ ‘Successive’: after a subdivision, the new subdivision occurs at the left or
right side of the division place. When the smallest allowed interval (1/8) is
achieved, subdivision will continue with the longest interval.
• Algo #3: regenerate the rhythm using 'Generic Rhythm'. This rhythm has no
settings.
• Algo #4: regenerate the rhythm using 'Euclidean Rhythm'. This rhythm has
no randomness or any settings.
• Algo #5: regenerate the rhythm using 'Polyrhythm'. This rhythm has no
randomness.
• Repetition: specify if you want the first few bars repeated.
• Event length: this tells the algorithm how to map original notes to the new
rhythm. Because rhythm changes, the original notes may have a shorter or
longer space in the new rhythm.

• Modern: rhythm used in deep house and other modern genres. Select the
note lengths to be used in the pattern.

• Notes&rests: also useful in modern genres, this rhythm preserves note and
rest lengths, and will use them without changing them.

• Use rhythm from MIDI: it is possible to use the rhythm from another MIDI
file. Drop the MIDI file on ‘Drop MIDI’. It is possible to skip the first rhythm
events.

• Displacement: this will offset the rhythm for a single note or multiple notes,
to left or right, by the given amount. Use this to introduce minor changes in
the rhythm.

• Randomize positions: offset note or event position and/or lengths randomly.

• Slice: slice the rhythm based on the division, and rearrange slices randomly

RapidComposer User Guide 176

Changing the timing
Make sure Timing is highlighted in the top left columns.
Depending on the signature, each beat can be slightly shifted earlier or later in
1/1024th units. This changes the feel of a rhythm pattern. Timing presets can be
saved and loaded by clicking on the ‘heart’ button in the right bottom corner:

Changing the accents

Make sure Accents is highlighted in the top left columns.
Various accent options are displayed. Accent means ‘note on’ velocity.

Set accents: replace accents. Place strong accents at the given intervals and
weak accents to all other notes. 100% means ‘note on’ velocity 127.

Randomize accents: change accents randomly to a given amount.

Changing the chords

Make sure Chords is highlighted in the top left columns.
Various chord options are displayed, but only when the edited notes are
polyphonic.

RapidComposer User Guide 177

 • Extend voicing: add a voicing note below the lowest note (unless the lowest
note is locked)
• Widen voicing: select the voicing with the biggest distance between pitches
based on 'density' and 'note range' (only the unlocked notes)
• Randomize voicing: create random chord voicing based on 'density' and
'note range' (only the unlocked notes)
• Density: this value determines the number of voicing notes to use
• Note range: the distance between the lowest and highest allowed chord note

Clicking on the three dots will offer more chord options:

• Randomize progression: use a random chord progression based on the

'chords count'
• Form new chords: change some chord notes to form another chord. This is
not always possible, only when chords are repeated.
• Make monophonic: remove parallel notes to make a monophonic phrase

Changing the shape/notes

Make sure Shape is highlighted in the top left columns.
Various shape options are displayed. Some of them will be available for
monophonic notes only, and hidden for polyphonic patterns.

RapidComposer User Guide 178

You can find the most interesting feature, the Markov generator here:

The dropped MIDI file is analyzed, and based on the analysis, new variations can
be created that are similar in style to the original MIDI file. This works like AI but
here you have full control over the note selection (set the weights depending on
what is important for you), and it is not necessary to use thousands of MIDI files
for a lengthy training.

If Expectedness is 100%, always the note with the highest weight is selected as
the ‘next’ note (no randomness). For 90%, the ‘next’ note is randomly selected
from the 2 best notes, for 80% the ‘next’ note is randomly selected from the 3
best notes, etc.

Set weights for matching rhythm, melody or using the same scale note as in the
original MIDI file.

You’ll find other options, of which Structure is very useful: it lets you set up
repeating sections. The letters A, B, C… mean different sections that can be
repeated. The numbers after the letter denote the length, e.g. A:6/4 means 6
quarter notes. It is possible to enter a custom formula too.

RapidComposer User Guide 179

The “Scale option” is used only when the file is dropped and analyzed, and
cannot be changed later if a file is already loaded in the MIDI Mutator. So you
need to set that before using a new MIDI file. It is possible to use a chromatic
scale but that is not recommended as the Markov generator works best with
diatonic scales. All other options can be changed any time.

Other ‘Shape’ options:

• Add/remove notes: add a 3rd, 5th or 7th note below the bottom note or above
the top chord note.
• X Lowest: delete the bottom/lowest chord notes
• X Highest: delete the top/highest chord notes

RapidComposer User Guide 180

 • Randomize pitches: add a random scale steps (or semitones) to a few notes.
Set up the possible notes for a click on the three dots button.
• Contour: Contour transformation, scale the note pitches. This works on
monophonic phrases only
• Flatten contour: Makes the notes shape smoother. Sometimes it is not
possible to further flatten.

• Add connecting notes: Insert 'connecting' notes between melody/bass notes,

to make a smoother transition from one note to the other. You can set
connection direction too.

• Remove short notes: Remove notes shorter than the threshold

RapidComposer User Guide 181

Chord Rules Editor
The chord rules are a collection of possible ‘next’ chords, with probabilities.
RapidComposer can generate chord progressions based on these rules. It can
even insert borrowed chords in the progression (in the Chord Selector) that are
not part of these rules, to make the progression more interesting.

The possible ‘first’ and ‘last’ chords are listed for the chord progression, as well as
‘next’ chords for all the possible chords. There are small sliders under the ‘next’
chords to assign a probability. The sliders are color coded from red (not probable)
to green (probable).

Because the rules work with any scales, the roman numeral notation are used
here. If you right-click on a chord, you can delete, edit or duplicate the chord.

RapidComposer User Guide 182

It is important to list all possible ‘next’ chord in the left column. When there is an
error in the rules, chords are highlighted with red.

RapidComposer User Guide 183

MIDI Import
Importing MIDI files require more attention than in other software, because it is
slightly more complex. Importing a MIDI file involves:

• Selecting the MIDI file

• Analyzing the MIDI file for scale to set composition scale
• Analyzing the MIDI file for chords to set up the master track
• Converting tracks to chord or scale-relative form
• Breaking up long tracks to phrases
• Setting up composition structure
• Setting track instruments

You can drag and drop MIDI files directly on the composition which inserts the
MIDI file as a phrase. It is useful if the MIDI file is simple (single-track). Holding
down Ctrl during dragging will convert the MIDI notes to chord-relative notes. It is
also possible to drop MIDI on the phrase browser or on the rhythms browser to
save it as a phrase/rhythm. The following applies to importing multi-track MIDI
files.

The MIDI Import page guides you step by step:

RapidComposer User Guide 184

1. Selecting the file to import
Type the filename, or click on the ‘folder’ button to select a file. The easiest is
dropping a MIDI file on the RapidComposer window.

Once you selected a file, the track list is filled:

RapidComposer User Guide 185

2. Select tracks to import
Check/uncheck the first column (IMPORT)

2.1. Select tracks that contribute to the harmony (for chord

detection)
Check/uncheck the second column (ANALYZE). Drum tracks are disabled by
default, but melody tracks are usually not needed for chord detection. Uncheck all
tracks that make the chords unnecessarily complex. Check the ‘Chords Preview’,
where the first few chords are displayed.

2.2. Select which tracks have to be converted to chord-relative or

scale-relative form

Set the third column to Chord+, Scale+ or None. In most cases all tracks should
be chord-relative (Chord+).

3. Set scale detection options

Detected scales are offered in the ‘Scale:’ menu. Select the one to use.

4. Set chord detection options and check chords

RapidComposer User Guide 186

Check the chords preview, and if the chords are too complex, uncheck tracks to
exclude from analysis.

5. Set other options

5.1. Set structure options, and if you need phrase detection
RapidComposer can break up long tracks to shorter phrases, if you enable “Auto
Detect Phrases”:

5.2. Set the instrument to be used for the imported tracks

There are several options here:

You can use a GM soundfont. If you prefer using VST or VST3 plug-ins, you need to
set up the tracks manually. Please remember: “General MIDI” instruments do not
generate audio; they must be used when you send MIDI events to a DAW or an
external software or hardware synth.

6. Press the “Import” button!

Or the “Import Into Current Composition” button:

Check the imported composition. You can still go back to the MIDI Import page,
change settings and re-import the file if you find something is not optimal.

RapidComposer User Guide 187

Chord voicings
You can define and use chord voicings in RapidComposer. Voicing is “simultaneous
vertical placement of notes in relation to each other”. More than 20 predefined chord
voicing files are included as .rcVOIC files in the RapidComposerV5/DB folder.
There are two types of voicing in RapidComposer: voicing for a concrete chord, or
universal voicing that works with any chords.

Voicing editor on the master track

The visual voicing editor opens when you click on the small V button in the Master
Track, which allows you to conveniently set chord notes:

RapidComposer User Guide 188

Voicing for a master track chord
It is possible to assign a voicing to master track chords in the Quick Suggestions
pop-up. Clicking on a chord will open Quick Suggestions, which offers a voicing
editor:

RapidComposer User Guide 189

You can also edit voicing for a given chord by clicking on the voicing:

A voicing editor is added also in the Chord Selector, together with Chord Builder:

RapidComposer User Guide 190

Universal voicing
Universal voicings work with any chords, so during editing you work with 1st, 3rd,
5th, 7th, etc chord notes, rather than with concrete chord notes:

Save the voicing using the Save… button. Universal voicing can be assigned to
tracks or phrases (in the Track Inspector and Phrase Inspector), or even to a chord
on the master track by selecting a preset from the voicing menu. By default
phrases use the track voicing, tracks use the master track voicing. 'Acoustic
Guitar' is a special voicing where the chord notes are looked up from the guitar
chord database.

You can not only use chord notes, but also add non-existent chord notes, e.g. a
7th note to a major chord. This means a phrase can use the 7th note, even if the
master track chord is a simple major or minor chord. This means amazing
flexibility. Use the “Add Extra Note” buttons.

RapidComposer User Guide 191

Idea Tool (full edition)
The Idea Tool supports different workflows and several ways to generate the
master track chords. In addition individual tracks can be generated, or just the
master track chords.

Overview

Entering Idea Tool mode

Click on the editing mode menu, and select 'Idea Tool':

RapidComposer User Guide 192

RapidComposer’s Idea Tool can easily create a new composition with the
following: a random or key-specific or rule-based Chord Progression, any number
of Phrases or Phrase generators arranged in a fixed or random pattern, with
optional rhythm patterns and phrase variations… in basically seconds!

Workflow
Three different types of workflow are offered:

• Generate Master Track And Independent Tracks

All tracks are independent, and the master track is created first
• Use Existing Melody Track '…' Then Harmonize Melody Then Render
Other Tracks
There is a dedicated melody track with an existing melody in it. First the
melody is harmonized to set up the master track chords, then all other
tracks are generated. The melody track is untouched.
• Generate Melody Track '…' Then Harmonize Melody Then Render Other
Tracks
A melody track is generated first based on the current master track. Then
the new melody is harmonized which will possibly result slightly different
chords on the master track. All other tracks are generated afterwards.

Master track options

There are several methods to choose from to add chords to the master track:

• Select scale and (relative) random progression from browser for that
scale
Provide a scale, and the program will find a progression for that scale

RapidComposer User Guide 193

 • Select scale and choose from specified list of (relative) progressions
randomly
Provide a scale and a list of possible progressions of which one is selected
randomly
• Select scale and generate progression based on rule
Provide a scale and a chord progression rule, and a new progression is
generated. Chord count and diversity (from expected to unexpected) can be
selected.
• Select from specified progressions with absolute chords, then find a
scale
The program will choose one of the provided progressions, and finds a
suitable scale for it
• Select random progression with absolute chords, then find a scale
Same as the previous option, but any 'absolute' progression can be used
from the browser

Additional chord options:

• Use roman numerals for chords

Roman numerals will be displayed for chord degrees instead of note names
• Automatically transpose and invert chords for optimal voice leading
Apply 'Chord Magnet' which guarantees smooth voice leading. Use with care
because it affects all tracks. Typically voice leading is handled in tracks.

Track options
The only mandatory input for creating a track is adding a few phrases in the
'Phrases' list.

RapidComposer User Guide 194

You can add one or more phrases or phrase generators, or even many. Clicking
inside the 'Phrases' list will open the Phrase library where you can drag and drop
phrases in the list, or pressing the 'Add Selection' button will add the selected
phrases from the library.

It is important to set the actual number of phrases that will be used from this list.
Click on the 'Use:' menu, and make your choice (1 to 4). The arrangement menu
is set up based on your choice in the 'Use' menu. It offers various ways phrases
can be arranged. E.g. if you plan to use 2 phrases (A and B), you can choose from
ABAB…, AAAB, AABA, AABB, etc, but for 4 phrases used patterns like ABCD,
ABACAD, AABBCD, etc is offered.

Optional track settings

You can provide rhythm patterns to use in the 'Rhythm Patterns' list:

RapidComposer User Guide 195

The rhythm patterns in the list will be used for the phrases. For phrase
generators, the rhythm is used the original rhythm, ignoring any rhythm
generators. For ordinary phrases the rhythm patterns will be applied to the phrase
using the 'Apply Rhythm' variation.

It is possible to add variations to phrases. Variations are transformations applied

to one of more phrases. They may add or remove notes, change the timing or
rhythm of notes, mirror the phrase, add chord notes or a fixed interval, the
possibilities are endless. RapidComposer users come up with interesting new
ideas from time to time, so the list is growing.

RapidComposer User Guide 196

The 'Variations/Phrase' slider controls the average number of variations applied to
a phrase. 0.5 means every second phrase will have a variation, 1.0 means every
phrase has exactly one variation, 2.0 means every phrase will have 2 variations,
etc.

Load/Save/Copy/Paste Track Settings

You can copy and paste track settings if you click on the menu button:

You can choose from the following menu:

Other than track settings, there are possibilities for fine tuning how variations are
assigned to phrases. Phrases from the list are usually used multiple times, but
‘Bind Phrases And Variations’ will use the same variations for the same
phrases. That is when phrase ‘A’ appears in the composition, all the instances will
include the same variations. When ‘Use Rhythms For ‘Apply Rhythm’’ is
checked, and an Apply Rhythm variation is in the list, the rhythm patterns will be
used by Apply Rhythm, rather than used in rhythm generators.

Generating tracks
Finally after you decided your workflow, added tracks and set instruments for
them, and when you set up how the master track chords are filled, a dropped a
few phrases in the phrase list, you are ready to make a composition, just press

RapidComposer User Guide 197

the 'Generate' button:

If you are not satisfied with a single track, you can regenerate the track only, by
pressing the red lightning icon in the track header:

You can exclude any tracks from the idea tool by click on the blue light-bulb icon:

Possibilities of the Idea Tool

The Idea Tool can easily be used to great effect for electronic and dance-based
music. Set your tempo to something medium-fast or above that (anything
between 130 and 180 usually work pretty well for most electronic styles), pick
some common dance-type chords (usually the vi-IV is a common chord sequence,
such as Am to F in the key of C major)… and use some of your favorite VSTs that
do the sound of dance music well and just experiment!

You can get a lot of good results when RC is a VST inside your favorite DAW, too…
as you’ll be able to run RC right alongside some audio drum loops, or a sequenced
beat you made…. to easily come up with some synth melodies or dance style
chord rhythms.

The possibilities are truly endless with RapidComposer, and especially the Idea
Tool.

RapidComposer User Guide 198

Phrase Morphing (full edition)
Phrase Morphing means that when you place a 'source' and 'target' phrase in the
composition, the phrases between the two will be composed automatically by
RapidComposer so that there is a smooth transition from the source phrase to the
target phrase. There are several options to control this transition. Usually there
are many possible transitions, if you don't like the one offered by the program,
pressing 'Regenerate' will create a different transition.
The following will explain the usage step by step:

1: Start a new composition.

Press Ctrl-N/Cmd-N
OR

Press the 'Files' button:

Click on 'New Composition':

2: Add a new line.

Press the 'Structure Inspector' button . Select 'Line 1', and click on the bottom
'plus' icon as shown on the image:

RapidComposer User Guide 199

You will see this:

You can close the panel as it is not needed now.

3: Zoom out the timeline.

Ctrl-click on the timeline, and drag the mouse horizontally until you see 8 bars:

You should see this:

RapidComposer User Guide 200

4: Select 'Nylon Guitar' as the instrument.

Since we will work with acoustic guitar patterns, select 'Nylon Guitar' as the
instrument. Right-click on the track header to open the track inspector.

RapidComposer User Guide 201

Select 'MIDI: GeneralMIDI' as the instrument, and 'Nylon Guitar' as the preset. You
can use the included GeneralUser GS soundfont.

Note: you can choose a different instrument, but make sure 'Use Guitar Chords' is
checked in the 'Track Hints' menu. This means that acoustic guitar chords will be
used in this track.

5: Add the source phrase at the beginning.

We will make a transition from 'FingerPicking4' to 'FingerPicking1' in this example.

Open the 'Phrase Browser':

RapidComposer User Guide 202

Note: the rest of the tutorial uses screenshots from an earlier version of
RapidComposer, but the same applies to the current version.

Click on a phrase which will be the ‘source’ phrase (in this example
'FingerPicking4'), drag and drop it to the beginning of the track:

Result:

RapidComposer User Guide 203

Sometimes it is easier to double-click on the workspace to add a phrase. So you
may double-click at position 1 on the workspace to insert 'FingerPicking4'.

6: Add the target phrase at the end of the track

Now click on the ‘target’ phrase (here 'FingerPicking1'), drag and drop it to the
end of the track:

RapidComposer User Guide 204

Result:

RapidComposer User Guide 205

7: Add the Phrase Morpher between the source and target phrases

Method 1: drop the 'Phrase Morpher' at beat 5 Now click on 'Phrase Morpher' in
the Phrase Browser, drag and drop it immediately after the first phrase (at beat
5):

RapidComposer User Guide 206

Result:

RapidComposer User Guide 207

Note: you may need to resize the 'Phrase Morpher' to extend until the last
phrase. Make sure the resizing mode is set to 'Regenerate' (the menu above the
workspace).

Method 2: pressing the 'Morph Between 2 Phrases' button Select the source and
target phrase. Right-click on any phrases to open the Phrase Inspector. When
exactly two phrases are selected, you will find the 'Morph Between 2 Phrases'
button in the Phrase Inspector:

RapidComposer User Guide 208

Pressing that button will automatically insert a Phrase Morpher between the two
phrases:

RapidComposer User Guide 209

The phrase morpher is added between the source and target phrases, and is filled
with generated notes.

You can press the 'PLAY' button to listen to the track.

8: Change options and regenerate

Once you set up the phrase morpher, you can transpose or completely replace
the source and target phrases. The phrase morpher will be automatically
recalculated in these cases. Phrase Morpher has a few parameters that influence
the way notes are generated.

Right-click on the Phrase Morpher to open the Phrase Inspector. Click on the small
'magic stick' icon at the top of the inspector to show the generator parameters.

RapidComposer User Guide 210

Options and explanations:

• Quantization:
Horizontal note movement control. Specify if you allow notes moving in time
and if so how they are quantized. Notes moving in time will change the
rhythm, so if that is not what you want it is best to disable this option.
• Vertical Movement:
Vertical note movement control. Specify if you allow notes moving vertically
(becoming higher or lower notes) and if so how they are handled. Moving
notes can be snapped to scale notes or semitones.
• Pair Note Additions And Removals:
When checked adding a target note and removing a source note will happen
at the same time as much as other conditions allow. This results a smoother
transition.
• Handle Chord Notes Together:
When checked chord notes with no offset will be added/removed together.
• Apply Automatic Transposition:
Specify if transposition is applied to the generated phrases. When checked
the highest note of the source phrase will approximate the highest note of

RapidComposer User Guide 211

 the target phrase. This setting is ignored when guitar chords are used.

If you change any of the above options, the preview is updated. In this tutorial we
disabled the 'Vertical Movement' and 'Pair Note Additions And Removals'
options. You can press 'Regenerate' if you want to see another transition:

Pressing 'Apply To Selection' will replace the phrase in the composition:

RapidComposer User Guide 212

If you close the Phrase Inspector you should see something like this:

RapidComposer User Guide 213

Settings
Accessing the program global settings is possible by clicking on Settings in the
top bar:

MIDI

Select a MIDI input device. If your device is not in the list,

MIDI In:
please press Rescan MIDI Devices
Receive MIDI
When a MIDI Start/Stop/Continue message arrives from the MIDI
Start/Stop/Contin
In, it will start or stop playback.
ue
Receive MIDI When a MIDI Song Position Pointer message arrives with MIDI
Song Position Start, it will start playback from the song position in the
Pointer message.
Select a default MIDI output device. A separate MIDI device
Default MIDI Out: can be chosen for each track. A newly created track will use
this 'Default MIDI Output'.
Send MIDI
The application sends MIDI Start/Stop/Continue message when
Start/Stop/Contin
the transport state changes.
ue
Send MIDI Song The application sends MIDI Song Position Pointer message when
Position Pointer the transport state changes.
Send MIDI Clock The application sends MIDI Clock messages during playback.
Send MIDI Reset The application sends MIDI Reset All Controllers before playback
All Controllers if this setting is enabled.

RapidComposer User Guide 214

Send MIDI Reset The application sends MIDI Reset Pan before playback if this
Pan setting is enabled.
Send MIDI Reset The application sends MIDI Reset Volume before playback if
Volume this setting is enabled.
Send MIDI Song The application sends MIDI Song Position Pointer message when
Position Pointer the transport state changes.
Rescan MIDI
Check for newly attached or detached MIDI devices
Devices

Audio

[Windows:] Select one of ASIO (recommended), Windows MME

Audio API: (not recommended), WASAPI shared or exclusive mode
[macOS:] CoreAudio is the only choice here.
Audio
The audio device that you will use, e.g. built-in, or USB sound card
Device:
ASIO
[Windows only] ASIO channels to use
Channels:
Sample Rate: It is best to use the default sample rate for the device
Preferred The latency depends on the buffer size, the smaller the buffer the
Buffer Size: lower the latency is.
Press to check if your audio device works. A 440Hz sine signal at -
Test Audio
6 dB is sent to your audio hardware.
Adjust Master Gain. This setting affects all audio and is applied as
Master Gain:
the last step before sending the audio to the output device.

RapidComposer User Guide 215

Plug-ins
You can use VST and VST3 plug-ins in RapidComposer, both instruments and
sound effects. Add each plug-in to the list before using them in RapidComposer.
When you add an instrument plug-in, an instrument file is created (.rcINST) with
the presets. You can assign tags to presets in the Instrument Browser. The tags
will also be saved in the .rcINST file.

As a unique feature of RapidComposer you can save the internal state of a

VST/VST3 plug-in as an instrument, to be used at a later time.

Remove the selected plug-ins from the list. The plug-in will
not be offered in the instrument menu anymore
Add a new plug-in to the list
You can scan your VST directory to add all plug-ins. However
this is not recommended, as all plug-ins are loaded into the
application address space and executed afterwards, which
can crash RapidComposer for a faulty plug-in. When a plug-in
crashes, it is added to the blacklist, so it will be skipped when
scanning next time.

You can scan VST3 plug-ins. The plug-ins are scanned from
the standard VST3 folders. Unlike scanning for VST plug-ins,
scanning is more reliable. If a crash occurs during scanning,
you can check the log file, found in
Documents/RapidComposerV5 (VST3ScanLog.txt)
When a plug-in crashes, it is added to the blacklist, so it will
be skipped when scanning next time.
Set scanning and blacklisting options, like skipping already
loaded plug-ins and skipping plug-ins in the blacklist. You can
also clear the blacklist here.

Soundfonts
You need to add each soundfont that you want to be able to select for track

RapidComposer User Guide 216

instrument under the Soundfonts tab. The “Scan Soundfonts…” button will add
all soundfonts in the selected directory and sub-directories but beware: it may not
be a good idea to add hundreds or thousands of soundfonts, instead use a small
set of high quality soundfonts for your compositions.

Soundfonts are your best friend, because they quickly load, and do not jeopardize
the stability of RapidComposer by executing foreign code in the address space of
the program, like VST/VST3 plug-ins do. The included GeneralUser GS soundfont
is good quality and is suitable for starting the composition.

It is important to set the Soundfont Gain properly. The sound should not clip or
be too quiet.

It is recommended to enable the Reverb and Chorus which will create more
natural, not too dry sound.

Another way of adding soundfonts

Soundfonts are automatically added/removed from the 'Soundfonts' directory in
Windows: C:\Users\<username>\Documents\RapidComposerV5\Soundfonts
macOS: ~/Documents/RapidComposerV5/Soundfonts

If you copy an .sf2 file into that directory, it will be available in RapidComposer
the next time it runs.

Preview
It is important to have your preview instruments set that are used for specific
purposes. Any of these instruments can be a soundfont, or VST/VST3 plug-in, or
you can send MIDI messages to an external software or hardware synth. When
using the latter, you need to choose “MIDI: General MIDI”.

Chord preview options

Various settings for listening to chords in RapidComposer. You can set the same

RapidComposer User Guide 217

settings in the Chord Selector (click on the hamburger menu button).

Chord preview instrument

This is the instrument that is used the most, not just for chords but also for
listening to phrases. Using a piano is recommended here, e.g. the included
RCPiano soundfont.

Bass preview instrument

Used only when listening to chords together with bass notes (option:
Chord+Bass). You can set a piano instrument here too.

Scale preview instrument

Used only when previewing scales, e.g. by right clicking on a scale in the Scales
browser.

Rhythm preview instrument

Used only when previewing rhythm patterns. By default the RCClick soundfont is
used for this purpose.

Locations
You can change the default locations for user content, like phrases, rhythm
patterns and track templates.

Compositions
This is the folder where the compositions (.rcCOMP files) are saved. Please note
that always the last folder is used for saving a composition. The folder is updated
when you save a composition into another folder.

RapidComposer User Guide 218

Custom phrases
This is the folder where the user phrases are saved. Each phrase is saved in a
separate file. Sub-folders are automatically created based on the 'group' specified
when saving a phrase. Phrase files have the '.rcPHRS' file extension.

Default locations:
Windows: C:\Users\(Username)\Documents\RapidComposerV5\CustomPhrases
macOS: ~\Documents\RapidComposerV5\CustomPhrases

Custom rhythm patterns

User created rhythm patterns are saved here. Each pattern is saved in a separate
file. Sub- folders are automatically created based on the 'group' specified when
saving a rhythm pattern. Files have the '.rcRHYT' file extension.

Default locations:
Windows: C:\Users\(Username)\Documents\RapidComposerV5\CustomRhythms
macOS: ~\Documents\RapidComposerV5\CustomRhythms

Track templates
It is possible to save a whole track with phrases, variations and instruments to a
separate file which you can insert to compositions later. The track templates are
listed in the Track Template browser and saved in the Track Templates directory.

Default locations:
Windows: C:\Users\(Username)\Documents\RapidComposerV5\
TrackTemplates
macOS: ~\Documents\RapidComposerV5\TrackTemplates

Windows portable use

For portable use the locations of the Custom Phrases, Rhythm Patterns, Track
Templates can be made to point to directories on the pen-drive. For this use
relative paths, like “.”, “..”, or path names beginning with “\”. The reference path

RapidComposer User Guide 219

(“.”) is the RapidComposerV5 folder.

Miscellaneous
Explanations for the various settings on this page:

Editing
Auto Save Composition Before The edited composition is saved when
Quitting: you exit the program.
When you start the application, the last
Load Last Edited Composition at
edited composition will be loaded
Startup: automatically.
When checked, the following settings are
Restore Environment When saved and restored:. looping state,
Composition Loaded: timeline range, zoom, scrollbar positions,
playback speed, time pointer.
Maximum Note Height In Editor The maximum height of a note in pixels
(pixels): when zoomed vertically.
Notes are graphically displayed as either
a rectangle, with or without a narrowing
end.
Note Shape: Possible values: Rectangle, Rectangle
With Narrowing End, Rectangle With
Notched End, Rectangle With
Notched End At The Top
Specify how overlapped notes are
displayed. Overlapping analysis takes
some time, so it can be disabled if
Overlapped Notes: needed.
Possible values: Off, Parallel Notes,
Stacked Notes
Use Snap For Chord Positions: If enabled, master track chords can start
at 'Snap' boundaries, otherwise they

RapidComposer User Guide 220

 begin at beat boundaries.
Clicking on the workspace will set the
Move Playback Position For Click On
playback head. This is useful before
The Workspace: pasting phrases.
Do not transpose phrase when If checked, phrases are added at the root
added by double-clicking on the position when you double-click on the
workspace: workspace.
If enabled, you cannot select phrases in
Inhibit phrase selection in multiple
multiple tracks. For phrase selection all
tracks: phrases in other tracks are deselected.
If checked, phrases can be transposed in
Allow transposition in guitar tracks:
a track that uses guitar chords.
When you forget to apply changes made
Always Confirm Discarding Edited to the edited phrase, an alert window
Phrase: will ask you to apply changes or discard
editing.
Select your zoom preference when
dragging phrases. It is possible to zoom
out the compoaition to have more space
Auto-Zoom During Phrase Dragging for dragging.
Possible values: No, No (Zoom Out
Before Dragging), Yes
Highlight Middle C Note When Enabled, the middle C note will be
highlighted with green
Possible values: No, Yes
[Windows Only] When two
RapidComposer applications are open at
Allow Copy/Paste Between Two RC a time, you can copy/paste phrases
Apps between the two applications. Disable
this setting when not used.
Possible values: No, Yes
Invert scrolling direction when using the
Invert Piano Roll Scrolling Direction
mouse wheel.
Convert drum notes when changing The notes from the old drum map are
drum map looked up in the new drum map, and all
notes are converted. E.g. a 'snare drum'
note in the old drum map will look up

RapidComposer User Guide 221

 'snare drum' (or similar name) in the
new drum map. Note: the matching
algorithm is smart, but it does not
always work well.
You can open the chord suggestions
below or right to the chord box. The
'Quick Suggestions' placement latter does not cover the phrases.
Possible values: Below The Chord Box,
Left Or Right To The Chord Box
Display left and right arrows and the
Show 'History' For Phrases current history index at the top right
corner of the phrase.
For better voice leading through the
Enable 'Lock To Scale' For All Added
changing chords, it is possible to enable
Phrases 'Lock To Scale' automatically.
Double-clicking on the structure bar
zooms in or out. Shift-doubleclick to
zoom into a part.
When zooming into lines/parts Possible values: Leave Timeline
Selection, Select Line/Part, Select
Line/Part and Enable Loop
Double-clicking on the structure bar
zooms in or out. Shift-doubleclick to
zoom into a part.
When zooming out from lines/parts Possible values: Restore Original
Selection, Deselect Timeline, Leave
Line/Part Selection

Rhythm Editing
The note velocity can be displayed
inside the notes as a horizontal bar. You
Display velocity bar in notes: can set the color of the velocity bar in
the settings.
Possible values: No, Yes

RapidComposer User Guide 222

 You can edit the velocity by dragging the
mouse vertically during resizing or
Edit note velocity: moving a note.
Possible values: When resizing note,
When moving note

Chords
Specify if sharps or flats are displayed.
'Automatic' will make the decision based
Sharps/Flats Usage: on the scale.
Possible values: Automatic, Use
Sharps (#) Only, Use Flats (b) Only
You can use the UTF8 sharp and flat
Use UTF-8 sharp (#) and flat (b): characters instead of # and b
Possible values: No, Yes
Set base octave, the octave for MIDI
note 0. This does not affect notes, only
used for labeling. (MIDI note 60 is always
Base Octave middle 'C' according to the MIDI
standard!)
Possible values: “0 (Note 60: C5)", "-1
(Note 60: C4)", "-2 (Note 60: C3)”
It is possible to display the slash (bass)
note automatically when the voicing has
Update Chord Slash Note When not got the root note in the bass. When
Voicing Is Set enabled, this option automatically sets
the slash note when the voicing
changes.
When a list of chords is to be displayed
(e.g. for a progression) this separates
Chord List Separator each chord.
Possible values: dash, space, comma
Display 2-Note Chords In Chord You can display the 5th chord, or any
Selector other 2-note chord in the chord selector.
By default chords consisting of less than

RapidComposer User Guide 223

 2 notes are omitted.
'Apply Voicing On Chord' means 1-to-1
mapping between master track chord
Default Chord Voicing Behaviour notes and phrase chord notes.
Possible values: Duplicate Phrase
Notes, Apply Voicing On Chord

Inspectors And Browsers

The inspectors can be opened in a
Open Inspectors In Separate
window which can be dragged outside of
Window: the main application window.
Tick this box if you want to keep the
inspector windows always on top.
Keep Inspectors Windows Always Important: you need to restart the
On Top: application so that this setting take
effect for already open inspector
windows.
Specify initial group state in this
browser.
Initial Scale Browser Group State: Possible values: Last Remembered, All
Collapsed, All Expanded
Specify initial group state in this
browser.
Initial Chord Browser Group State: Possible values: Last Remembered, All
Collapsed, All Expanded
Specify initial group state in this
Initial Chord Progression Browser browser.
Group State: Possible values: Last Remembered, All
Collapsed, All Expanded
Specify initial group state in this
browser.
Initial Phrase Browser Group State: Possible values: Last Remembered, All
Collapsed, All Expanded
Initial Instrument Browser Group Specify initial group state in this

RapidComposer User Guide 224

 browser.
State: Possible values: Last Remembered, All
Collapsed, All Expanded
Specify inspector/browser fade in and
fade out time.
Fade In/Out Time: Possible values: None, Very Fast, Fast,
Slow, Very Slow

New Composition
Set new composition length in bars.
Default Length:
Possible values: 1 to 64
Set the time signature in a new
Default Signature:
composition.
Set new composition default tempo.
Default Tempo:
Possible values: 1 to 600
Set track height in new composition (in
Default Track Height (pixels): pixels).
Possible values: 30 to 1200
When checked, the default new
composition (when you select 'Create
Use Universal Notation For Chords:
New Composition') will use scale degrees
for chords.
If checked, the master track will not
Start With Empty Master Track:
contain any chords
When displaying master track chords,
Maximum Chord Font Size On Master the font won't be bigger than this
Track setting.
Possible values: 8 to 80
Set default master track height
Default Master Track Height
Possible values: 30 to 100

New Track

RapidComposer User Guide 225

 Set the default instrument for newly
created tracks.
Possible values: SF2: Piano, SF2:
Default Instrument For New Tracks: GeneralUser GS, General MIDI: Piano,
General MIDI: No Patch Change,
Chord Preview Instrument

RapidComposer User Guide 226

 Set the midi controller set of newly
Set General MIDI Controller Set: created tracks to General MIDI
Possible values: No, Yes
Add 'MIDI Volume' by default to new
tracks.
Add MIDI Volume: Possible values: No, Add, Add With
Slider
Add 'MIDI Pan' by default to new tracks.
Add MIDI Pan: Possible values: No, Add, Add With
Slider
Add 'Transpose' by default to new tracks.

Add ‘Transpose’ Variation Possible values: No, Add, Add With

Slider
Add 'Expression' slider by default to new
tracks. Please note this is not the MIDI
Display Slider for 'Expression' Expression controller, but the
Variation: 'Expression' variation which affects MIDI
'Note On' velocities.
Possible values: No, Yes
Display audio gain slider and peak meter
Display Audio Gain And Peak
for SF2 and VST/VST3 tracks
Set the height of newly created tracks
New Track Height (pixels): (in pixels).
Possible values: 30 to 1200
Default note coloring for new tracks.
Possible values: Color Notes By Track
Color, Color Notes By Track Color +
Velocity, Color Notes By Note Kind
(Chord/Scale/Bass/Absolute), Color
Default Note Coloring Scheme:
Notes By Note Kind + Accent, Color
Notes By Rendered Note Kind
(Chord/Scale/Out-of-scale), Color
Notes By Rendered Note Kind +
Velocity

RapidComposer User Guide 227

 Default phrase name visibility for new
tracks.
Default Phrase Name Visibility: Possible values: Hide Phrase Names,
Show Phrase Names, Show
Articulations
Default shading under phrases for new
tracks.
Possible values: Hide Shading Under
Default Shading Under Phrases: Phrases, Show Shading Under
Selected Phrases, Show Shading
Under All Phrases
Default chord notes visibility in piano roll
Default Chord Notes Visibility In for new tracks.
Piano Roll: Possible values: Hide Chord Notes,
Show Chord Notes
Default note shading in piano roll for new
tracks.
Default Note Shading In Piano Roll: Possible values: Hide Note Shading,
Shade Black Piano Keys, Shade Scale
Notes, Shade Out-Of-Scale Notes
Default note name visibility on keyboard
for new tracks.
Default Note Name Visibility On Possible values: Hide Notes Names On
Keyboard: Keyboard, Show Notes Names On
Keyboard
Default note parameter visibility on
Default Note Parameters Visibility notes for new tracks.
On Notes: Possible values: Hide Note Parameters,
Show Note Parameters
Default phrase envelope visibility on
Default Phrase Envelope Visibility piano roll for new tracks.
On Piano Roll: Possible values: Hide Phrase Envelope,
Show Phrase Envelope

RapidComposer User Guide 228

MIDI Export
Chords can be added to tracks as MIDI
Export Chords As MIDI Markers:
markers when exporting MIDI.
Set 'Note Off' velocity to zero in exported
Set 'Note Off' Velocity To Zero
MIDI files

MIDI Recording
If the recorded phrase has a different
tempo from the composition BPM the
Detect&Adjust Beat Intervals In
recorded notes are analyzed and note
Recording: positions and lengths are recalculated to
conform to the main tempo.
The note timings are analyzed and a
small offset is applied to the whole
Align Recorded Phrase To Beats:
phrase so that note distances from beats
will be minimal.
After recording a phrase from MIDI input
you can automatically add the 'Quantize'
controller to the phrase. Alternatively it
Add 'Quantize' Controller: is possible to add 'Quantize' to the track
later.
Possible values: Do Not Add, 1/4, 1/8,
1/16, 1/32, 1/64

Plug-in Hosting
If checked, the VST/VST3 editor window
Open plug-in editor window after
is opened immediately when the plug-in
loading: is loaded.
Send VST Editor Keystrokes To You can optionally send some key
RapidComposer (VST2 only) presses to the main RapidComposer
window when editing in the VST plug-in
editor

RapidComposer User Guide 229

 Possible values: Space, Enter, Arrow
Keys, Escape, Tab, Home/End
VST/VST3 plug-in editor windows will be
Make plug-in editors always on top
on top of RapidComposer

RapidComposer VST/VST3/AU
When checked, the main window is
opened separately from the plug-in GUI.
Open RapidComposer In A Separate This may be necessary when there are
Window: UI issues (OpenGL is used to display the
plug-in GUI). Re-loading the plug-in is
required if you change this setting.
When checked, the RapidComposer
Make Window Always On Top: window will become the topmost
window, above the host.
Enable Auto-Scrolling During When checked, the composition will
Playback: show the playback position.
RapidComposer can be either fully
synchronized with the host (i.e. the
playback position in RapidComposer will
Start Playback From The Current
always be the same as in the host) or
Position Instead Of The Host you can use the playback position that
Position: you set in RapidComposer to start
playback from.
Possible values: No, Yes
When the above setting is enabled, the
playback will automatically start from
Reset Playback Position When
the last position until you set a new start
Playback Starts: position manually.
Possible values: No, Yes
macOS audio units (synth) only:
create a virtual MIDI port called
Audio Unit (Synth): Create Virtual
'RapidComposer' to send MIDI events to.
MIDI Port
Note: a virtual MIDI port is never created
for the AU MIDI FX plug-in!

RapidComposer User Guide 230

Analysis
During analysis the lowest note can be
designated as bass note if it is lower
than the specified note.
Treat Lowest Note As Bass If Below: Possible values: Never, C0, E0, A0, C1,
E1, A1, C2, E2, A2, C3, E3, A3, C4, E4,
A4, Always
This setting helps to align notes for more
Allowed 'Note On' Timing
precise chord detection.
Imprecision (in 1/1024th) Possible values: 0 – 64/1024 (max 1/16)
When the same notes (e.g. C, D, F, A)
Prefer 7th to 6th Chords During
result 6th and 7th chord (with inversion)
Chord Detection you can prefer using the 7th

History
Some VST/VST3 plug-ins' state
Save plug-in state in history: information is so big that is not
reasonable to store in the history.
In most cases the version tree used in
earlier versions proved to be too
complex. From v3.0 the simple list is
History Complexity: used for history.
Possible values: Simple (List), Complex
(Version Tree)
Storing all the previous editing may take
lots of disk space especially when VST
plug-ins are used. To limit the disk space
Number Of Past States Stored you can specify the number of past
states stored.
Possible values: 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 100,
150, 200

RapidComposer User Guide 231

Help
Enable/disable showing popup help
Show Popup Help: windows when you hover the mouse
over a UI element.
Specify the delay before the pop-up help
appears. Short: approx. 0.5 sec, Medium:
Popup Help Delay: 1 sec, Long: 2 secs
Possible values: Short, Medium, Long

Experimental Features
You need to restart RapidComposer if you enable any of these features.

If checked, you can use the 'Auto' scale

on the master track. The actual scale will
depend on the master track chord. E.g.
for a G Minor chord the scale will be set
Enable 'Auto' Scale (application
up as G Minor. It is not meant to be used
restart required): with relative chords. If you change this
setting, you need to quit and start the
program again so that 'Auto' appear in
all menus.
If checked, the Markov Melody Generator
Enable 'Markov Melody Generator'
will be available in the phrase browser.
If checked, the 'Random Note Generator'
will be available in the phrase browser. It
Enable 'Random Note Generator'
is usable for random pattern or
keyswitch triggering.
You can set fonts for the UI and chords,
and customize the text styles used by
Allow Font And Style Adjustments the chords. New settings will appear
under Settings / User Interface / Fonts
(only for advanced users)

RapidComposer User Guide 232

User Interface
RapidComposer has a very flexible user interface: you can change colors, adjust
font sizes, button shapes, shading and import/export UI themes. We won’t list all
the color settings here.

Keyboard Shortcuts
A keyboard shortcut is assigned to most operations. You can re-assign shortcuts,
or display them as an HTML page.

RapidComposer User Guide 233

Troubleshooting
Beginning version 5.2.2 a new troubleshooting window opens when the CAPS
LOCK is enabled during starting the standalone RapidComposer application. This
is more convenient than holding down the Ctrl or Alt key that used to work in
previous versions.

Skip loading the most recently edited composition

When to apply: when RapidComposer crashes during start-up. The crash is
caused either by a bug or a badly behaving VST/VST3 plug-in.

RapidComposer User Guide 234

Skip audio initialization
When to apply: when there are problems with setting up audio. In rare cases
RapidComposer sets the wrong audio device by default which causes problems
when you try to set another audio device.

[Windows:] When using ASIO drivers, it is possible that there are old, unused,
obsolete ASIO drivers installed on your PC. If this happens, you have to manually
delete the old entries in the Windows registry.

• Open the Windows registry (Start → run → regedit)

• Open the folder HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE → Software → ASIO
• Delete the unnecessary audio card entries you do not want or need by right-
clicking the entry and choosing delete.

Force using ‘software’ rendering

When to apply: when there are rendering issues. By default hardware
accelerated rendering is used but sometimes display drivers have bugs (e.g. some
Direct3D11 drivers on Windows)

Force using non-retina screen (macOS only)

When to apply: when there are rendering issues on retina screens. This disables
retina screen detection. See also: “Disable retina screen detection” setting

Reset window position and UI color scheme

When to apply: when the window opens fully or partly offscreen and there is no
way to resize it

RapidComposer User Guide 235

Loading a composition without plug-ins
Solution: Alt-click on “Open Composition…” or on recent compositions.

When to apply: when there is an issue during opening a composition file.

Typically the problem is a VST/VST3 plug-in.

RapidComposer User Guide 236

Support
Version and build date is displayed on this page. You can check for updates or
send bug reports, or open the on-line user guide in your web browser.

Checking for updates

Click on “Check For Updates”. If there is an update available, the program offers
downloading it. RapidComposer does not start installation, and does not install
anything automatically, you need to start the installer manually.

Reporting bugs
Pressing the “Send Bug Report” button opens the standard “mailto:” URL handler
on your computer. In some cases this is not configured (e.g. when using a web
based e-mail client). In this case please send us your questions, suggestions and
bug reports to support at musicdevelopments dot com with as much information
as possible: OS version, plug-in host version, RapidComposer version , the steps
required to reproduce the issue. You can include a problematic composition file (with
.rcCOMP file extension) as an attachment. Adding a crash report (on macOS) or
screen capture is very helpful.

RapidComposer User Guide 237

Trademarks

Cubase, VST, and Nuendo are trademarks of Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH.
Logic, Mac, and macOS are trademarks of Apple Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries.
Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and other
countries.
All other product or company names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective
owners.

RapidComposer User Guide 238