A now-playing and next-tanda visualizer for tango DJs on macOS using Music or Embrace
Mirada launches a standalone application that displays the following info for your dancers for use on an external monitor or projection screen:
- When a song is playing, Mirada displays the following:
- Current song's genre, artist and title (with parenthetical items at the end of title moved to their own line, for those who store year/singer info in the title field).
- How many songs are in the current tanda, and what number the current song is.
- The genre and artist of the first song in the next tanda or, if the next tanda is an announcement or the last tanda, the appropriate legend.
- If the current tanda is the last tanda, the next-tanda area simply displays "Last Tanda".
- When a cortina is playing, Mirada displays the legend "UP NEXT ..." with the genre and artist of the first song in the next tanda. If the next tanda is an announcement or the last tanda, that legend displays instead.
- When an announcement is playing, Mirada displays the title of the track (this is useful for demos, background music, etc -- simply rename the title to a welcome message or similar).
- For mixed alternative/traditional milongas, Mirada enables you to replace the artist info in the next-tanda area and the cortina screen with "Alternative".
- If "La Cumparsita" has been played anytime in the last 10 tracks, Mirada displays a thank-you message (useful if you play background music after the end of a milonga).
- If no music is playing, a background image of your choice appears.
- A variety of color schemes are available to customize for light conditions, holiday themes, etc.
- The source player can be switched to either Music or Embrace as desired.
Mirada more or less works automagically, but does require a bit of configuration in your source library:
- For cortinas, tanda lengths, and next-tanda info to be correctly detected, your cortinas must have a genre tag of
Cortina - For announcements to be correctly detected, announcement tracks' grouping tag must contain
announcement - For the alternative-anonymization feature to work correctly, alternative tracks' grouping tag must contain
#nu
Mirada is built using Electron Forge and relies heavily on a few Node modules to do its thing:
- run-applescript to talk to Music and Embrace
- electron-store for variables and preferences
It also subscribes to com.apple.Music.playerInfo and/or com.iccir.Embrace.playerUpdate to detect change events and kick off the screen refresh.
Huge thanks are in order to Eric Scace for invaluable development assistance and to Ricci Adams, creator of Embrace, for making enhancements to his already-fantastic app in order to allow Mirada to converse with it better.
Most tango dancers are familiar with the concept of cabeceo, in which the leader "asks" the follower to dance by making eye contact. The concept of mirada may be less known, but grants the follower the same power to seek out a leader's gaze -- thereby leveling an often-gendered playing field. This Mirada app also seeks to level the field for dancers by giving everyone at a milonga musical information that makes for a better experience ... and encourages dancers to learn about tango music in the process!