LaDiDa and Songify for iPhone

08.07.2011
A nice voice and some musical talent are great tools to have at your disposal, but software maker thinks all you need to create music is an iPhone and one its apps.

"Most people aren't trained in music, and they're intimidated by the idea of creating music themselves," Khush CEO Prena Gupta told me in an interview. "We want to remove that barrier."

To that end, Khush has focused its app-making efforts into products that put music creation tools in the hands of novices. The company made a splash last year with , which it bills as a "reverse karaoke" app that provides pitch correction and accompaniment for your singing. Khush's latest app, , doesn't even require you to sing--just speak into your iOS device, and the app will turn your words into an auto-generated song.

I put both Khush apps through their paces and found a lot of fun--as well as more than a few flaws--in their approach to music creation.

Let's start with LaDiDa. Launch the app, and you'll go to a home screen that features an image of a microphone and volume level readout. (I found the readout to be slightly distracting, as it continually fluctuates even when you're not recording.) Tap a record button and start singing; when you're done, LaDiDa processes the results in just a few seconds and produces a finished track that you can play back. The track plays with a default accompaniment, but you can go to a settings screen to adjust the style, tempo, and reverb. You're also able to adjust the amount of pitch correction that LaDiDa uses--a feature that will be welcome to anyone whose desire to sing is greater than their ability to carry a tune.

LaDiDa's pitch correction capabilities are quite impressive, actually. I like to flatter myself that I have a respectable singing voice, though my range is a bit limited and I've been known to hit my share of flat notes. Still, LaDiDa did an admirable job smoothing out the rougher edges of my voice. Even when I tried to intentionally sing off-key, the app made my miscues resemble actual human singing. If you listen to --I implore you to not click on that link--there are a few notes in the original version that would have made all the dogs in the neighborhood howl in protest; in the sweetened LaDiDa version, you can hardly notice their presence.