Tablight
Overview
Tab
Chord
Key
About
server
⚙
instrument
type
guitar
piano
violin
lefty
?
Lefty
mirrors the fretboard for a left-handed player — the low string on top, and the frets running the other way.
Guitar only.
play
?
Play
chooses which notes sound — the display always shows the full part.
everything
plays every note as written.
reachable only
silences notes the instrument can’t reach — below the violin’s lowest string, or off the guitar’s neck (tuning and capo counted). Chords are kept, so it suits the guitar.
melody
also drops each chord to a single line, sounding only its top note — clearer on the violin. If that top note is out of reach, the step rests.
With
melody
chosen, the
🎻 violin mode
button appears — tap it to hand-drop notes the auto top-line kept by mistake, then
↧
export the result as a standalone melody file. It only shapes this top line, never the full song; for that, edit on overview.
everything
reachable only
melody
sound
guitar
acoustic steel
acoustic nylon
electric jazz
electric clean
electric muted
overdriven
piano
acoustic grand
acoustic grand (HQ)
electric grand
electric 1
electric 2
scale
labels
?
Labels
set what's shown on each note — fret dots on guitar, keys on piano.
notes
— the note name (C, D, E…).
scale degrees
— the note's number in the key (1–7, tonic = 1).
off
— blank; notes light up only as they play.
notes
scale degrees
off
scale box
?
Off
shows every in-key note across the whole neck.
On
lets you tap root notes to frame one movable scale position — a compact “box” shape — and hides the notes outside it, so you can learn one shape at a time.
Guitar only.
intervals
?
Intervals
show the musical distance from each note to the one before it, counted in semitones and shown as the interval name (e.g. m3 = 3 semitones, P5 = 7).
Handy for seeing and hearing how a melody moves, not just which notes it lands on.
falling notes
show
?
Falling notes
shows the notes coming up as bars that drop onto the piano — like Synthesia. A taller bar is a longer note.
It runs on the
piano
, in
practice mode
— tap
⛶
and turn the phone to landscape — while a recorded take is
looping
. Otherwise the keys just light up as they sound.
overlap
?
Overlap
lets a key stay lit while later keys are pressed, so a note held under a moving line shows several keys down at once — the way both hands really play. This is the
how long do I hold it
view.
Turn it off for one key at a time: each key lights from its press to its release and never overlaps the next — the
when do I press it
view. Short notes and rests still show either way. Off by default.
lead
?
Lead
sets how far ahead the falling blocks appear — a longer lead gives more warning but packs the notes closer together.
The range is capped on smaller screens, where the lane is shorter, so the blocks stay readable.
2.5s
next note
show
?
Next note
lights where your hand goes next — one step ahead of the note you hear — so you can move the bow to the right string and set the finger before it arrives.
It shows on the
violin
while a melody plays or a take loops. Turn it off for a clean board.
lead line
?
Lead line
draws a faint path from the note sounding now to the next one — across the strings when you change string, along one when you shift finger.
Follow it to see the move coming. Off leaves just the lit next note.
timing
?
Timing
adds a ring that closes onto the next note, reaching it right when to play — so you feel
when
the note lands, not just where.
It rides on the recorded rhythm, so it shows while a
take loops
. Even-paced autoplay has no rhythm, so no ring there.
record
speed
?
Speed
plays a recorded melody back slower for practice — 10 % to 100 % (full speed). It changes tempo only, not pitch.
It stays in sync with the speed slider in the bottom transport bar, and re-times a running loop as you drag it.
100%
gap
?
Gap
is the silent pause between loop repetitions — the breath before a looped take starts over, from 0 to 3 seconds.
It's an absolute pause: the speed setting doesn't stretch it.
1.5s
ladder
?
Ladder
practice: with this on, the loop plays back a little faster each time it comes round — climbing from your current
speed
up to 100 %, then holding there.
Set how big each
step
is. Slide
speed
back down whenever you want to drill from slow again.
It works on any instrument and always begins switched off.
step
+5%
✕ clear recording
autoplay
?
Autoplay
changes what
▶
does. Off, it’s press-and-hold — one note per press, sounding for as long as you hold it.
On
, a single tap plays the melody straight through on its own, and
▶
becomes
⏸
.
notes
sets how many notes sound per minute — at 120 you hear 120 of them. It is
not
a tempo: every note is given the same length, so there is no rhythm and nothing to count beats against. That’s deliberate — it’s an even drill pace you choose.
For a beat to play along to, use
metronome
below; its
bpm
is a separate setting. For the melody’s real timing, record it and use
loop
.
auto
notes
80/min
display
dark mode
No sequence loaded. Analyse a tab or melody on the Overview page first.
set key — all sections
?
Set key — all sections
applies one key to every section at once, instead of setting each section on its own card.
Pick the tonic and the mode, then
Set key
— every section is overwritten with it.
Use it when the whole song stays in one key. Where sections genuinely change key, set them card by card instead.
tonic
C
C#
D
D#
E
F
F#
G
G#
A
A#
B
mode
ionian (major)
dorian
phrygian
lydian
mixolydian
aeolian (minor)
locrian
Set key
—
Build sections
?
Build sections
re-splits the song into sections and gives each one its own key, chosen so that the section stays inside the accidental budget you set.
Max accidentals
is how many notes may fall outside that key. They’re counted as
pitch classes
— distinct note names, regardless of octave or of how often they sound. A budget of 1 allows one out-of-key note name, however many times it turns up and wherever it sits on the neck.
0–1
keeps sections in key where it can, but lets a single stray note name stay put rather than break a section in two. This suits most songs.
0
is strict: every note in key. One stray note is enough to start a new section.
max accidentals
−
+
Build sections
—
Build tab
?
Build tab
works out a playable tablature for the notes.
Tuning
,
capo
and
min
/
max fret
constrain where fingers may land; the string buttons switch individual strings off so the fingering keeps clear of them.
Capo
and
min fret
are not the same. The
capo
sets the reference point — the fret it clamps becomes the effective open string, so every number in the tab is counted up from there.
Min fret
is a lower bound on those numbers, measured from the capo rather than the nut: the lowest fret above the capo that the tab is allowed to use.
A new staff starts at every section — three sections give three staffs.
tuning
Standard
Drop D
Open G
Open D
DADGAD
Half down
strings
capo
−
+
min fret
−
+
max fret
−
+
Build tab
—
▼
Tab
labels
?
Labels
set what each marker on the follower fretboard reads.
frets
— the fret number, so you know where the finger goes;
notes
— the note name.
frets
notes
played notes
?
Played notes
keeps the notes just played on the follower fretboard — the one ringing plus the couple behind it — so you can see where the line came from.
Off shows only what is still coming.
press Calc tab to generate tablature
Set tab
—
?
Set tab
stores this calculated tab as the song’s tab.
It
replaces the tab loaded earlier
— the Tab page and
overview ▸ tab mode
show the stored tab, so from now on they show this one. The old tab is gone unless you saved it to a file first.
From
overview ▸ tab mode
you can edit the stored tab or export it as a file.
falling notes
?
Falling notes
shows upcoming notes as bars dropping onto the keys, Synthesia-style — a taller bar is a longer note.
Shown on the
piano
while a recorded take is
looping
.
speed
?
Speed
plays a recorded melody back slower for practice — 10 % to 100 % (full speed). It changes tempo only, not pitch.
It stays in sync with the speed slider in Settings, and re-times a running loop as you drag it.
100%
ladder
?
Ladder
practice: with this on, the loop plays back a little faster each time it comes round — climbing from your current
speed
up to 100 %, then holding there.
Set how big each
step
is. Slide
speed
back down whenever you want to drill from slow again.
It works on any instrument and always begins switched off.
step
+5%
↺
⇤
section
⇥
←
measure
→
◂
note
▸
▶
?
● record
gives the melody its rhythm. Tap ●, then play the melody through on the
green ▶ play
button, in time — the gap between one press and the next becomes that note’s length. Tap ● again to stop.
Notes that picked up a timing get a dotted underline in the
seq
row.
Record in parts.
Recording starts at the cursor, so you can do a phrase at a time — everything already recorded is kept.
Fix a part
by putting the cursor on the first note to redo (or setting a mini-loop around the notes — long-press its start note, then its end note), then tapping ● again: only the notes you replay are overwritten, and you’re asked to confirm first.
The other
▶
, just right of ●, is
loop
: it plays the recorded take back over and over. Tap to pause, tap again to resume. With a mini-loop set, only that range repeats.
The
[ ]
button beside
loop
also sets one: press
[
to mark the start on the last note you heard, then
]
for the end — both those notes are included, an unheard one never is. The badge’s
×
clears it.
speed
plays the take back slower to practise along — 10 % to 100 %. Tempo only, the pitch stays put, and a running loop re-times as you drag.
record
●
?
▶ loop
plays the recorded take over and over — tap to pause, tap again to resume.
The
[ ]
button sets a
mini-loop
, a slice to drill. Press
[
to mark the start on the last note you heard, play on, then press
]
to mark the end — both those notes are included, and a note you haven’t heard yet is not. The
×
on the badge returns to the whole take.
loop
▶
[
loop
×
speed
100%
🎻
↧
⛶