Cheerful metronome
A free online metronome built for traditional music, running in the browser with nothing to install and no account. Set the tempo anywhere from 30 to 300 BPM with the slider, or tap the beat and let it read the tempo back to you. Beyond a plain click it plays real rhythm patterns from eight musical families — Irish, Breton, Scottish, English, Cajun, Canadian, American and World — on bodhrán, spoons or foot percussion. Choose the tune type you are working on, a jig, a reel, a hornpipe, a polka, a Breton an dro or a waltz, and it accents the bar the way a session would.
Questions
Do I need an account or an app?
Neither. The metronome runs in the page you are reading, on a phone as well as a computer. An account is only needed to keep a repertoire of scores in AbcMusicStudio.
Can it play a bodhrán instead of a click?
Turn on Pattern, pick a family and a style, then choose one or more percussion instruments: bodhrán, spoons, foot stomp. They all play the same pattern together, and each has its own volume and reverb send. Session mode decides how much the pattern moves: Pulse repeats one bar, Session varies it every phrase as a real session does, Groove adds fills and pickups.
How fast should I play a jig or a reel?
When a rhythm pattern is active the Tempo section offers five speeds for that style: Very Slow at about 40 % of session speed, Slow at 55 %, Practice at 70 %, Near at 85 %, and Session at 100 %, the speed the style is usually played at. The figures follow the beat unit, so a 6/8 jig is counted in dotted quarters rather than quarters.
Can the tempo speed up on its own while I practise?
Yes. Tempo progression raises the BPM after a number of bars you choose, from 1 to 32, by a step of 1 to 20 BPM. A progress bar shows how many bars are left before the next rise, which lands on the downbeat so the change stays musical. Stopping the metronome resets the progression to its starting tempo.
Does it handle odd time signatures?
Pick a common time signature or type your own, 7/8 for instance, and set how strongly the first beat is accented. The World family also carries Balkan patterns in 7/8 and 9/8, so an odd-metre tune gets a real rhythm rather than a bare count.