Come sit down for a session with our Tabla Pro! But don't get too comfortable. Our tabalji will blow your mind with his virtuoso tabla playing and inspire you to greater heights in your own musical journey. You will swear there is a real person playing tabla for you!

Note: iTablaPro includes all features of iTanpura plus a lot more! And as of version 5.1, iTablaPro is a universal app with iPad native resolution graphics.

Now available: Version 5.3 with iOS4 support, auto-tuner, metronome and Tap Tempo functionality. Note: All updates are always free!

And the reviews are in:

The Tabla is a percussion instrument widely used in Indian Classical music both as a solo instrument and as an accompaniment to vocal or instrumental music. In recent times it has also gained acceptance in western and fusion music. It has two pieces - the left part or the "baya" provides the heavy bass while the right part or the "daya" provides the main percussion sound.

And now presenting - iTablaPro

iTablaPro is an electronic tabla and tanpura (drone) player for the iPhone and iPod Touch. But even more importantly, it is the first electronic tabla and tanpura that actually sounds like the real thing, ideal for Indian Classical musicians and students. It includes support for all common taals used in Hindustani music, making it the perfect companion for daily riyaz (practice).

Features include:

1. ✓FIVE fantastic instruments in one app: Tabla, two Tanpuras, a Sur-Peti (Shruti-Box), plus a Swar Mandal all controlled by a single set of pitch controls
   

2. ✓Uses sound samples from actual instruments for the most realistic sound. These are the same beautiful Hemraj tanpuras from iTanpura
   

3. ✓29 taals including Ada Chautaal(14), Ashta Jhaptaal (8.5), Bhajani(8), Chartal-ki-Sawari(11), Chautaal(12), Dadra(6), Deepchandi(14), Dhamar(14), Ektaal(12), Jai Taal(13), Jat Taal(8), Jhaptaal(10), Jhoomra(14), Keherva(8), Matta Taal(9), Moghuli(7), Neel Taal (7.5), Pancham Sawari(15), Pashto(7), Punjabi / Sitarkhani(16), Rudra Taal(11), Rupak(7), Shashanka taal (5.5), Shiva Taal(9), Soolfakhta(5), Sooltaal(10), Teentaal(16), Teevra(7), and Tilwada(16)
   

4. ✓Multiple variations for most taals
   

5. ✓Integrated Auto-Tuner: Tune iTablaPro to your instrument such as harmonium, or use it to tune other instruments (microphone capability required such as iPhone built-in mic or 2nd/3rd generation iPod Touch with external microphone)
   

6. ✓Metronome: Now includes a built-in metronome with the most common time signatures
   

7. ✓Tap Tempo: Just tap out a beat on the lower display and watch the app sync the tempo!
   

8. ✓Presets: Save your frequently-used combinations of pitch, tanpura & swar mandal tuning, taal & tempo as named presets. Includes presets for the 80 most popular raags plus you can create unlimited custom presets.
   

9. ✓Full-featured mixer to adjust volume and panning of each instrument independently
   

10. ✓Includes an option for "Sur" tabla for a more bass tabla sound suitable for vocal music
    

11. ✓Extremely accurate tempo tested to within 1 milli-second
    

12. ✓Wide range of pitch from lower A (A2) through upper E (E4) for one and a half octaves of tuning
    

13. ✓Each taal has different thekas for slow, medium & fast tempos for more natural-sounding accompaniment (actual range of tempos depends on the taal)
    

14. ✓Wide range of tempo from 10bpm to 500bpm (depending on the taal)
    

15. ✓Automatic range selection (ati-vilambit, vilambit, madhya, drut & ati-drut) based on tempo slider. The slider range auto-adjusts to the taal.
    

16. ✓Extremely precise control of fine-tuning and tempo by clicking on the slider endpoints (- or +). Every click changes the tempo by 1 cent or 1 bpm
    

17. ✓For even easier control, simply double-tap on any slider (including the tempo slider) to get a popup picker wheel
    

18. ✓Displays current matra being played as well as the current divisions (Sam, Taali, Khaali, etc.)
    

The application has the following tabs:

Mixer Tab: The first tab is the Mixer tab. It has two sections:

Pitch Controls: The top section is common to all the instruments (tanpuras, tabla, sur-peti and swar mandal) and is used to set the "base" pitch of Sa.

1. ➡The two buttons tune the pitch up or down one note at a time
   

2. ➡The slider allows fine-tuning of the pitch within a two-note range
   

3. ➡Click on the endpoints of the slider (♭ or ♯) to further fine-tune the pitch by 1/100th of a note
   

4. ➡Hold down on the pitch slider endpoints for faster pitch adjustment
   

5. ➡Double-clicking on the slider brings up a fine-tune value picker wheel
   

6. ➡The display in the middle shows the current note name (i.e. C#) in the center, the octave on the upper right, and the current fine-tune relative value on the upper left. The color of the text in the display indicates whether the fine-tune slider is exactly in the middle (green), to the left of center (yellow), or to the right of center (cyan).
   

7. ➡The i (info) button on the top right takes you to the information and help pages
   

Mixer: The bottom section contains the mixer used to turn all the instruments on or off, and set their relative volume and panning.

1. ➡Use the Volume/Panning segmented control to switch the sliders under it from volume controls to panning controls
   

2. ➡Use the switches on the left to turn the instruments on or off
   

3. ➡Use the sliders on the right to adjust the volume or panning of each instrument

   

   
   

Controls Tab: The Controls tab is used to control the two tanpuras and the tabla. It has two sections:

Tabla Controls: The top section is used to pick the taal, the Style and the tempo.

1. ➡Use the Taal left and right buttons to select the taal. Or click on the taal name to bring up a taal selection picker.
   

2. ➡Each taal has one or more Styles. Use the Style left and right buttons to select a Style (if available). Or click on the style name to bring up a style selection picker.
   

3. ➡To use the Metronome, just pick the special Metronome taal at the top of the list of taals, and choose the time signature from the style picker
   

4. ➡The Tabla Play/Stop button on the right turns the tabla on or off
   

5. ➡The Master Play/Stop button on the left to turns all instruments on or off
   

6. ➡The Tempo Display in the middle shows the current matra in the center, the tempo range on the bottom, the tempo in bpm on the upper right, and the division on the upper left. When the tempo is less than 40 bpm, the display also shows a dot for each quarter-matra to the right of the matra.
   

7. ➡The slider and the buttons around it let you control the tempo in a variety of ways:
   

8. ✦Move the slider to directly adjust the tempo
   

9. ✦Click on the tempo slider endpoints (- or +) to adjust the tempo by 1 bpm
   

10. ✦Hold down on the tempo slider endpoints for faster tempo adjustment
    

11. ✦The x/2 button halves the tempo, and the 2x button doubles it

    

    
    

12. ✦Hold down on the tempo display or double-click on the tempo slider to get a tempo picker wheel
    

13. ✦To use the Tap Tempo feature, simply start tapping the beat on the tempo display and watch the tempo match your tapping!
    

Tanpura Controls: The bottom section is used to tune the two tanpuras. Each tanpura has the following identical controls:

1. ➡Use the switch to change the tuning of the first string or to turn off the tanpura
   

2. ➡Clicking on Off turns off that tanpura
   

3. ➡Clicking on Pa, Ma, or Ni tunes the first string to that note
   

4. ➡Clicking on ... takes you to the Custom Tuning screen where you can choose a different standard note (such as Dha) or use the slider to fine-tune a custom note
   

Presets Tab: The Presets tab lets you load presets, delete existing ones, or save new presets. iTablaPro ships with a few presets, but you can add your own as well as delete the existing ones at any time. To restore the original factory presets, just reset the presets from the settings page. A preset saves the state of all currently playing instruments.

1. ➡The presets table shows the details of the preset in a subtitle including the pitch, the tuning of the tanpuras, the taal, the tempo and the style.
   

2. ➡To play a preset, simply choose the name from the list of saved presets. To only load portions of a preset, turn off one or more switches. For example to load everything from the preset except the pitch, turn off the Load Pitch switch.
   

3. ➡To delete a preset, click on the Trash icon on the top left, or simply swipe your finger across the preset row
   

4. ➡To create a new preset, first set the pitch, the Tanpuras, Tabla, Taal, Swar Mandal, etc. Make sure everything you want to include is playing (important!), and then click on the New Preset (+) icon on the top right. Enter a name for the preset when prompted, click OK and you're done!

   

   
   

Swar Mandal Tab: The Swar Mandal tab lets you configure the Swar Mandal settings. The Swar Mandal has 15 strings each of which can be assigned to a note. This screen lets you configure what notes to play, how loud to play them and whether to play them once or repeat them at a certain loop duration.

1. ➡Clicking on the Play Once button plays the Swar Mandal once
   

2. ➡Turn the Auto Loop switch ON to auto-play the swar mandal at a set loop duration
   

3. ➡The Tuning section lets you assign notes to strings. NOTE: you must have at least one string tuned to play the Swar Mandal
   

4. ➡The Loop Duration section lets you choose how often the loop repeats when the Auto Loop switch is ON
   

5. ➡The Manual Play section is basically a large button that plays the Swar Mandal once every time it is clicked (similar to the Play Once button)
   

6. ➡Use the slider on the bottom to increase (+) or decrease (-) the swar mandal volume
   

NOTE: Playing the Swar Mandal AND the Tabla at high (Drut or Ati-Drut) tempos is not recommended since it can cause dropouts due to the limited number of simultaneous sound sources available on the iPhone OS. Please turn off the Swar Mandal when playing Tabla at higher tempos.

Tuner Tab: The Tuner tab lets you tune external instruments to iTablaPro, or vice-versa. NOTE: This requires an iPhone or an iPod Touch (2nd/3rd gen) with an external microphone connected to it.

1. 

   ➡Click on the Stop button to stop all sound in app
   

2. ➡Sing or play an instrument (the desired "Sa") into the microphone
   

3. ➡The display on the left shows the current iTablaPro pitch
   

4. ➡The display on the right shows the pitch of the external instrument as measured via the microphone. The color of the text in the display indicates whether the external pitch is the same (green), lower (yellow), or higher (cyan).
   

5. ➡Use the Microphone display on the right to tune the instrument to match iTablaPro
   

6. ➡Or click on the Capture button to auto-tune iTablaPro to the external instrument - this makes the captured pitch the new "Sa"
   

7. ➡Once captured, use the Octave Up/Down buttons to adjust the octave
   

Settings Screen: Clicking on the Gear icon on the top left takes you to the Settings screen. This screen lets you change the application's global settings.

1. ➡Taals Ordered By: This controls whether the display of the taals is ordered alphabetically or by the number of matras (beats) in the taal
   

2. ➡Use Sur Tabla: Turning this on switches the dayaan used around the C# pitch from the Tip tabla to the Sur tabla for a deeper sound that's an octave lower
   

3. ➡Bass Boost: This boosts the bass of the Bayaan (Dagga) - useful when connected to larger speakers
   

4. ➡Sync Start Sur-Peti: This sync starts and stops the Sur-peti with the tanpuras
   

5. ➡Tanpura Tempo: This controls the tanpura string-playing tempo
   

6. ➡Vary Tempos: Turning this on will slightly vary the tempo of the two tanpuras around the selected value above when played together for better realism
   

7. ➡Enable Ati-Komal: Turning this on enables the ati-komal (very low) variants of Re and Ga that are typically used in some raags such as Todi
   

8. ➡Alternate C# Javari: Switches to an alternate sharper sound for the male (C#) tanpura
   

9. ➡Reset Settings to Defaults: Clicking on this button will reset all settings to the original factory defaults
   

10. ➡Reset Presets to Original: Clicking on this button will reset all presets to the original factory defaults. NOTE: This will delete any saved custom presets.
    

Recommended Usage

1. ➡Turn on one or both tanpuras and set the pitch using the top section
   

2. ➡Pick the taal, this changes the list of styles available for that taal
   

3. ➡Choose the style from the list
   

4. ➡Set the tempo to your liking. Click on the plus/minus signs around the slider to fine-tune
   

5. ➡Start the tabla by pressing the tabla play button
   

Device Requirements

iTablaPro will run great on any of the following devices:

1. ➡iPhone (Original, 3G, 3GS, 4) with iPhoneOS 3.0 or later. The new iOS4 is completely supported as well!
   

2. ➡iPod Touch (1st, 2nd or 3rd Generation) with iPhoneOS 3.0 or later. Note the 1st generation iPod Touch does not have an internal speaker so headphones or external speakers are required. Auto-Tuner capability requires 2nd or 3rd generation iPod Touch with external microphone.
   

3. ➡iPad with iPhoneOS 3.2 or later.
   

NOTE: The tabla sound is very bass-intensive and cannot be properly heard through the iPhone/iPod internal speaker. For best effect, use high-quality headphones, a Speaker dock, or external speakers. For best effect, use a high-quality iPhone Speaker dock such as the Logitech Pure-Fi Anywhere 2 or any other good pair of external speakers.

About The Developer

Prasad Upasani is a professional musician, teacher and performer who also happens to be a talented programmer with over 15 years in IT. He has a Master's degree in Computer Science and a Bachelor's degree (Sangeet Visharad) in Indian Classical music. He lives in Southern California.

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YouTube Demo

Click here to watch on YouTube.