Bluetooth foot pedal — How to avoid double page turns?

ShiroKuro

I use a Page Flip Butterfly with my iPad. I bought it in 2018.

Not all the time, but often enough that I’m concerned, I accidentally advance the score by two pages. I don’t consciously double tap but maybe it’s something I’m doing?

Anyway, this is something I really want to avoid when I perform next week.

Does anyone have any advice about how to avoid this?

BTW I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the device, I think it’s me. But if getting a newer model would let me prevent this problem, I would consider it.

rogerch

ShiroKuro I've had trouble with this as well. I've had my page turner for less than a year and I can't say I've mastered it. I've found that I need to keep my foot off the pedal when not turning the page, and then for turning the page it's a quick stab with my foot. It seems to work best if I'm wearing only a sock on my foot. With experience I've gotten better at it but I'm not good enough with it yet that I would feel comfortable using it in a performance.

Sgisela

ShiroKuro interesting to read how different people use it. I keep my pedal slightly off to the side of the pedal lyre, so my foot is not hovering over the pedal, it’s resting on the floor. When I need to turn the page, I move my foot and tap the pedal. If anything, my problem is that the page sometimes doesn’t turn, not that I tier multiple page turns.

pseudonym58

How do you actually use the pedal? I found it very uncomfortable to keep my left foot raised over the pedal, only lowering it when I wanted to turn the page. I ended up keeping the pedal depressed and only raising it and immediately lowering it each time I wanted to see the next page. I never got very comfortable with the thing, so I still read from printed music. I believe I have the same model. EDIT: No, I have one called Firefly by the same company.

Sam

My Airturn has an app. In the app you can set how the switches work - its been awhile since I did it, but I seem to remember you can set it to send a pulse on/off and no key repeats. Might be worth looking into if your pedal has an app. I also set the codes that mine sends so it always goes forward no matter which switch I press.

Sam

rogerch

Sam My Airturn has an app. In the app you can set how the switches work - its been awhile since I did it, but I seem to remember you can set it to send a pulse on/off and no key repeats.

Thanks for the tip, Sam! I turned the repeat off on mine and that helps a lot!

ShiroKuro

@Sgisela i agree, it is interesting to read how everyone uses theirs!

@pseudonym58 , like @Sgisela I also keep my pedal just to the left and a little forward of the pedal lyre. I keep my left foot on the floor, and when it’s getting close tot the time where I’ll need to turn the page, only then, I move my foot up so it’s hovering over the pedal, and then do a gentle tap. So I don’t hold my foot up or rest it on the pedal. I’ve been playing with a page turner for a long time, this current one is actually the second one I’ve purchased.

I’m pretty sure there’s something wrong with my “pedal technique” because I generally only end up with a double page turn at the same spot. In my upcoming concert piece, I haven’t had a double turn in the first piece (yet, knock on wood) but in pieces #2 and #3, I very often end up with a double turn when trying to turn to the last page. IOW I end up on the first page of the next piece.

@rogerch does that mean you play from a paper score when performing?

At this point, I don’t think I can switch back to paper for the concert — which is now only three days away! 😳

@Sam I don’t know if this version has an app, I will go and google it!

rogerch

ShiroKuro @rogerch does that mean you play from a paper score when performing?

Either paper score, memorized, or improvised. So far I've only been using the page turner (AirTurn Duo) for my sight-reading practice. When things go wrong the interruption is annoying but the stakes are lower than in a performance.

MRC

I used a PageFlip Firefly for 4 years, but I found I was getting more and more double page turns. I'm now using an AirTurn Duo, which for the moment is working better than the PageFlip: we'll see how it holds up after a few years.

I couldn't find a way with either of these pedals to prevent double page turns. I use ForScore as my music reading app. In "Performance" mode, if you turn pages by tapping on the screen, a double tap will be interpreted as a single one, which prevents unwanted double page turns when turning with your finger, but unfortunately this doesn't work with signals input through a Bluetooth pedal.

My preferred technique with a Bluetooth pedal is to put it next to the Una Corda pedal, rest my foot on it and do an up-down movement when I need to turn a page. When I need my left foot for the Una Corda or the Sostenuto pedal, I'll have to move my foot across and I may have to turn a page by hand.

ShiroKuro

MRC I used a PageFlip Firefly for 4 years, but I found I was getting more and more double page turns.

Maybe mine is just getting old. I’ve had it for 6 years!

Tomorrow I’ll try changing the battery 😅

FrankCox

If you use mobilesheets there's apparently a setting to avoid double page turns. It requires that you hold the pedal down for a short time before the page turn activates.

I don't have a pedal myself so I haven't looked at, looked into or tried it but it's apparently in there (somewhere).

WieWaldi

It's so weird that the score viewer apps don't just have a simple threshold implemented. Me as a software developer, I would simply implement a setting of XXXX milliseconds that needs to pass by, before another "page-turn" click is accepted. And a long press would reset the score. Only one pedal-button is needed, then. Make hardware as cheap and simple as possible. And as a "page turn" I would not just go one page forward, it would be a programmable display section to satisfy the needs of repeats and codas. Something like display bottom 3 staffs of one page together with top 2 staffs of next page. This programmable concept would also allow to overlap always one staff, if needed.

But this is just my thought as a software developer, and I don't know the needs of a professional musician.

Btw: I found a good method to page turn printed music: Glue post-it stickers to the border of your sheet music. So you can't miss a page nor get accidentally two of them. Ring binding preferred.

ShiroKuro

WieWaldi It's so weird that the score viewer apps don't just have a simple threshold implemented.
I agree!! This would solve so many problems. -_-

As for turning paper scores, I used to have a set up that worked pretty well but it was limited. Even with the concern of double page turns, I still much prefer the digital method.

MRC

WieWaldi It's so weird that the score viewer apps don't just have a simple threshold implemented.

Some years ago I wrote to the ForScore customer support asking them if there was a way to make the app ignore the second click of a double click on a Bluetooth pedal. Here's the reply I got:

Thanks for contacting us and I appreciate your feedback. Unfortunately we’re not able to offer a “debounce” feature for Bluetooth devices in the same way that we do for touch gestures on the screen due to technical limitations that make such a feature unreliable.

I'm no software developer, but I do wonder what those "technical limitations" could be.

WieWaldi

MRC Those "technical limitations" is the unwillingness to do software changes. I would say, this is about one or two weeks in total, but distributed to different departments and therefore different people involved:

Feature definition
Human-machine interface (aka define menu layout)
High level archtecture
Low level archticture
Detailed design
Code implementation
Unit test
Code integration
Component test
Software test

You must know, software development has a lot of bureaucracy nowadays.

ShiroKuro

@WieWaldi very interesting!

I wonder if part of it has to do with the fact that there are different devices (and device makers) and forScore thinks it's not worth their time, or too much trouble, to figure out fixes for each device/device maker? Maybe?

WieWaldi

ShiroKuro I don't think so. If they implement a timeout that starts after a pageturn, let's say a 1000 ms timer that disables further page turns, it is safe to say it works on ANY device of ANY manufacturer.

Trust me, the company doesn't see the need to implement it. They think following:
Is it effort? yes (it cost money).
Is there risk of making bugs? yes (bugfixing costs money).
Do we earn more money? No, our customers buy the software as it is.

MRC

WieWaldi Trust me, the company doesn't see the need to implement it. They think following:
Is it effort? yes (it cost money).
Is there risk of making bugs? yes (bugfixing costs money).
Do we earn more money? No, our customers buy the software as it is.

Thanks, WieWaldi, this was what I suspected.

ShiroKuro

I wonder what score app is most commonly used by professional musicians these days? At one point, I thought it was forScore, but maybe there are others now that are more popular?

BTW, I changed the batteries, no change (i.e., there are still double page turns every so often).

Now, should I double-turn, I'm trying to either go back a page with my foot, or find a spot to turn (tap) with my hand without messing up.

It should be ok. My concert is tomorrow. 😳

WieWaldi

ShiroKuro I am very sure, this is hardware wear off. If something like the cushioning wears off, bounces become more likely. When I was a student in 1^st (or 2^nd) grade, I remember a physics lesson about a keyboard concept with an electro-magnetic induction switch (very expensive), that never does a double press nor omit a single, no matter how badly it is worn out. The physics professor told, this type of buttons are made for industrial usage, especially in difficult conditions with stuff like acid chemicals in the air. He told bouncing is an issue that happens on all normal mechanical buttons, and the only way is to detect a "drive through" movement, like this electro-magnetic induction, or a light barrier (like Novus NV5 key sensors, haha). But if the button is a conventional one, that triggers when two metal plates are touching and electric current starts to flow, you always get micro-bounces. And with wear and tear, the micro bounces become bounces beyond the sampling rate, and then you get double and triple presses. I remember we students started a discussion how software could solve this, and the professor agreed. After a few minutes he said, software isn't physics and he is here to teach us about physics concepts like the electro-magnetic induction.

tl;dr;
Wish you good luck on your concert!

MRC

ShiroKuro I wonder what score app is most commonly used by professional musicians these days? At one point, I thought it was forScore, but maybe there are others now that are more popular?

I have been using ForScore since I bought my first iPad in 2019, but your question prompted me to look at the alternatives. I'm looking at Mobilesheets, which has an iOS version since 2022, and I'm delighted to find that the free "lite" version only turns one page when I double click the pedal! I tried with both PageFlip and AirTurn, and I can't trick the app into turning two pages at once. So, yes, its possible to make the app ignore the bounce. Yah boo sucks to ForScore! 😛

This makes me wonder if I should change from ForScore to Mobilesheets. It would be a big bore, as apparently there is no way to transfer the annotations from ForScore to Mobilesheets, but it might be worth it for new pieces for my next chamber music concerts. I'll have to have a longer look at Mobilesheets.

ShiroKuro

WieWaldi I am very sure, this is hardware wear off

Ahh, that makes a lot of sense. Maybe I should just buy a new one, as I think I said, this one is 6 years old now, and I’ve been using it closely to daily since then. Also, looks like the model I have is not programmable, but the other two are. This is from the company website, I’m guessing (hoping) I can get a cheaper price somewhere else.