Dr.Betotte - 2.1.1

I needed a good drum-machine and step-sequencer both for teaching and for practice. When I tried Dr. Betotte, I was hooked. I soon realized that it did everything I needed. I'm writing a review to help others who might find it useful.

Upon launching you see a "Dr. Be*t"-style metronome, but with many enhancements which take advantage of the Mac's extra processing power. It's easy to create simple metronome patterns in most time signatures. And just as easily you can create more complex accent patterns in patterns up to 16 beats.

The tempo range goes from 10 to 310. There are swing settings both for 8ths and for 16ths. And there's a half-time button. Volume sliders and mute buttons control different beat values, and a beat (accent) sound.
There are some added practice functions including a tempo ramp function, a timer (with loop and alarm)-- especially useful for timed drum drills.

3/8, 6/8, 9/8, 12/8 rhythms are easily made by using the triplet slider, and muting the 8th & 16th notes.Dr. Betotte doesn't ship with odd-meters: 5/8, 7/8 or 11/8. But there is a way to make them using the pattern editor.

In addition to the basic metronome rhythmic patterns, you use a pattern editor to create custom rhythms of any number of beats where each beat is divided into 24 ticks. The editor shows a matrix with 12 sounds vertically and the 24 subdivisions horizontally. You can only view one beat at a time. But switching between beats is easy. It would be nice if a future version would allow you to view more beats and fewer subdivisions if desired.

There is another mode where you can edit/create chord progressions. It's limited rhythmically, with only two chords per measure. The 1st chord is on beat one, and the second chord can be on any 8th note after that (but all 2nd chords will play on the same beat that you set). Chords can contain any notes and each chord can be named freely. You can't change the volume of individual chords, but you can control the overall chord volume and change tranposition as well. Dr. Betotte includes a small number of standard jazz progressions. It's a very useful practice tool for jazz students of any instrument and style.

There is yet another mode where you can choose/edit custom sets of your own sounds. There are two types of sound-sets: beat sets and drum sets. Beat sets are for metronome functions, and drum-sets are for drum-machine functions. You can select, edit, and/or create either type. Dr. Betotte comes with a decent library of sounds. But you are able to use your own favorite drum sounds as well. I'm pretty sure AIF and WAV are supported.

The weakest part of the v2.1 is the documentation which is a bit scant. There are a few features of the interface which are a little but vague. However, the developer is very friendly and is quick to answer questions.

It's worth mentioning that GarageBand- a capable practice tool-- cannot automate tempos, does not support step-sequencing, and cannot handle some odd-meters. While you can't program meter changes in either program, Dr. Betotte will allow you to create very long patterns with more complexity than anyone would ever need.

The more I have used the program, the more I like it. (How refreshing!.) It is a very smart program that is designed to help you practice just about anything you want to work on rhythmically and harmonically. At $20, this is a great deal. The author seems dedicated to developing this product.