Free Chrome extension to change pitch, speed and loop videos in your browser
Hi all. I have a tip I'm using right now to learn a song in a different key than one used on the video recording by David.
This free Chrome browser extension allows you to change the pitch and speed of video/audio and loop within a video, and it (currently) works with the videos on bluesharmonica.com. Think of it as what the Amazing Slowdowner does, but in a browser.
I'm sharing this tip because it's common that people post the typical message "I have a C harp but I need an A harp!". Sure, there's the intro lesson for the C harp and you will eventually need to play (and, obviously, buy) harmonicas in other keys, but... this is the 21st century so we can actually use software applications to change the pitch of any recording and use that to play along on a different key.
So, for example, you can raise the pitch by one tone and a half (in the extension, set transpose to 3) to make the recording for an A harp (played in E) playable in a C harp. That will allow you to practice all the lessons recorded for the A harp in that C harp you bought before enrolling in the site and realizing that you need an A harp.
In my case, it also allows me to follow along the Rice Miller artist study videos on my low F harp, despite they being recorded for a low C harp (that I don't yet have). David provides mp3s for the low F, but the videos, which contain more than just the recordings of the choruses, are for the low C, and that's kind of a bummer if you want to play along while watching them. Chrome extension to the rescue! Set "transpose" to 5 (i.e. two and a half tones higher) and, voilà, the recording for the low C (low G, since this is 2nd position) is played at the same key as the low F (low C, again 2nd position) and I can play along the videos. David voice's of course is also transposed, so he sounds a bit like the smurfs :), but you can stilll understand most of what he says at a higher pitch.
Hope this is of help for many of you and, whenever someone doesn't yet invest on a harp on another key, it allows them to keep going on with the set of harps they already have.
Happy harping!
Thanks for sharing this!