DownbeatWhy we are building this
One band, one account. Build the show on a Mac, play it from everyone’s pocket.
The overhead is the problem, not the playing
A band spends more effort organising a show than performing it. Setlists live in group texts, charts live in a Google Doc somebody forgot to share, backing tracks live on one laptop, and the arrangement everyone rehearsed is not quite the one being played tonight. None of that is music, and all of it lands on whoever is holding the laptop.
You already own the hardware
Everyone in the band is carrying a phone that can hold the set, the charts, the cues and a personal mix. Downbeat Producer builds the show on a Mac; Downbeat Player puts it in everyone’s pocket, in sync, and working when the venue’s wifi does not.
Two kinds of musician, one account
A gigging band is one audience. A teacher with six students is another — no setlist, no PA, nothing on a stage. Fretboard is for them, free and open without an account, because a chord sheet you can build and hand to a student is useful on its own. The account, the library and the sheets are common ground between the two.
In Carl’s words
Playing in a gigging band is one of the coolest things I get to do. It can also be one of the most frustrating.
What you learn quickly when you perform is that two different musical experiences are going on at once — what the audience sees and hears, and what the musicians see and hear. Out in the house it can sound great: every instrument sitting well in the mix, the vocals clear, the audience loving it.
But there’s one problem. You can’t really hear anything.
If you’re a band on a budget without separate front-of-house and stage mixes and a good engineer to run them, without wireless in-ears each of you can adjust, without a mixer with a monitor send for every member — you can end up feeling like you’re performing down the hall from where the show is actually happening.
I’ve been there, and it isn’t enjoyable.
So rather than carry on feeling like an outsider at my own gigs, I got to work, with a few goals in mind:
- Everyone in the band can hear what they want on their own phone or tablet — backing, click and guide tracks included
- Anyone who wants a chart sees exactly what they want, on a screen or on paper
- Built for musicians who don’t want to learn another complicated app
- Every feature earns its place by reducing the band’s overhead
- Perform the same way you rehearse
- Open and extensible, so nobody is locked into a proprietary file format
- Affordable
The biggest goal of all is to close the gap between wanting to perform and actually performing.
Downbeat exists to get musicians to the moment where they can confidently strike that first chord, breathe in to sing that opening line — and enjoy the show.
We’re musicians building for musicians. Whatever helps you feel prepared and excited for your next show, tell us. We want to hear what’s working and where we can do better.
Where it is today
Downbeat is in beta and openly unfinished. Producer runs shows on macOS now. The Player beta runs on TestFlight for iPhone and is invite-only while the group is small, with Android close behind. Fretboard is live and free. We are just getting started, and the Updates page is where the work gets written down as it happens.