Getting started
Cuevera doesn't require an account or an internet connection — everything lives in a local library on your device. The fastest way to get going is to import songs you already have (OnSong files, ChordPro files, or stem ZIPs), or add a song from scratch on the Songs page and write its lyrics and chords yourself.
The app is organized around a left sidebar (desktop) or bottom tab bar (phone/tablet): Songs, Sets, Instruments, Requests, Band Connect, and a Settings group covering MIDI, Pedal, Display, Stems, Import, Backup, and License.
Song library
The Songs page is both your library browser and the metadata editor for each song. For any song you can set:
- Title, Artist, Genre — Genre has an Auto button that looks the song up online to fill it in.
- Key — has an Auto button that detects the key directly from the song's backing track.
- BPM and performance notes.
- Sections — Intro, Verse, Chorus, Bridge, and so on, each with its own color tag (Harmony / Solo / Bridge / Tag) used to highlight it in the performance view.
- Song Start MIDI — a Program Change / Control Change command that fires automatically the moment you open the song, tied to a saved patch from your Instruments library or a manual device/channel/program number.
From here, ✏ Edit Lyrics opens the lyrics/chords editor, and the library tree lets you search across your whole collection by title or artist.
Editing lyrics & chords
The lyrics editor uses the same header and layout as the performance view itself, so what you're editing looks like what you'll see live. It uses simple inline chord notation:
- A line ending with a colon is treated as a section header (e.g.
Chorus:). - Chords go directly before the syllable they belong to:
[G]Amazing [D]grace. - Chord-only lines (intros, turnarounds) are written as bracketed chords with no lyric text:
[F][C] [F][Am].
You can load and play the song's backing track from the editor while you work, so you can check chord placement against the actual recording.
Section Studio Windows
Section Studio (under Sections) is a waveform editor for setting exactly where each section of a song starts. Click along the waveform to mark a section's start time — it automatically advances to the next section after each click — with beat markers, zoom, and stem mute/solo to help you find the spot by ear. It also auto-detects BPM, and key/genre if they aren't already set.
Optionally, you can download a local speech-recognition model (about 140MB, runs entirely on your device — no audio is uploaded anywhere) that transcribes the vocal track and matches it against each section's saved lyrics, suggesting section start times for you to accept or adjust. A related Generate Lead Sheet tool transcribes vocals and detects chords to draft a first-pass lyrics/chords document for a song that doesn't have one yet.
Performance view
This is the screen you run during a gig: full-screen lyrics and chords, with the current section highlighted as a solid block so you always know where you are. The header shows the song title, artist, key, and BPM together on one line, with the same controls whether you're on desktop or tablet.
- Section bar — tap any section to jump straight to it. Sync mode queues the tap instead, so it takes effect cleanly at the end of the current section rather than cutting it off.
- Transpose — shift the displayed key up or down without touching the saved song, with a one-tap Reset back to the original.
- Stem mixer — mute or solo individual stems (click, vocals, guitar, etc.) once a song's stems are loaded.
- Auto-scroll — the current line is highlighted as the track plays, and the view follows along automatically.
- Tap zones on the far left/right edges jump to the previous/next song in the current set.
- ⧉ Lyrics Display opens a second, lyrics-only window — handy for a stage monitor or a second screen the rest of the band can see.
Setlists
The Sets page builds ordered setlists for a gig or rehearsal. Search your library and add songs to a set, drag to reorder them, and Cuevera remembers your last-viewed song or set so you're dropped right back into it next time you open the app — no need to re-navigate before a show.
Backing tracks & stems
A song can play back either a single audio file or a full multi-track stem mix, added from either the performance view or the lyrics editor via the ⋯ track menu:
- Single WAV/MP3/M4A/FLAC — one backing track for the whole song.
- Stem ZIP — a ZIP archive containing multiple audio files (click track, music, vocals, etc.), each shown as its own mute/solo channel in the stem mixer.
Cuevera streams stems directly out of the ZIP rather than unpacking them, so you can point your stem library at an external drive or SD card (set under Settings → Stems) without filling up internal storage. That same Stems settings page also lets you define name-based mute rules — for example, automatically muting any track named "Click" and unmuting "Lead Vocal" the moment a song's stems load.
MIDI cues
Under Instruments, add the MIDI gear you play (keyboards, a vocal harmonizer, etc.) along with its MIDI channel, then save individual patches under each instrument — name, bank/slot, program number. You can trigger any saved patch live with the ▶ button to confirm it's wired correctly before a show.
Actual per-song and per-section MIDI firing is configured on the Songs page (Song Start MIDI) and per-section in the section editor — tying a section to one of your saved patches so it fires automatically as your set moves forward. Settings → MIDI is for device management and testing raw Program Change messages, not for assigning patches to songs.
Foot pedal
Settings → Pedal configures a Bluetooth foot pedal (AirTurn BT-200 2-button, or BT-500/Duo 500 4-button) for hands-free control during a set. Assign each button to Next Section, Previous Section, Jump to Target, Sync WAV to Section, or leave it disabled. A Live Test panel shows which action fires as you press each button, and the page walks through pairing (the pedal needs to be set to "Mode 3" — keyboard arrow keys — for Cuevera to see its input).
Band Connect
Band Connect syncs your set live with the rest of your band over the same Wi-Fi network — no internet connection, no cloud server involved. One device hosts the session; everyone else joins by entering the host's local IP address and a display name, then follows along with the current song and section in real time.
- A Sharing toggle on the host controls whether bandmates can browse and pull songs from its library.
- Share a Song lets you browse a connected peer's library and pull an individual song — if it already exists locally, you'll get a prompt showing which copy is newer before it's overwritten.
- Synchronize runs a full two-way sync and flags any song both sides edited differently, so you can resolve each conflict individually rather than one side silently winning.
Song requests
The Requests tab keeps a running queue of songs to play next during a gig — search your library and add a pick to the queue, then use Play Next to promote one to "Now Playing."
Importing songs
Settings → Import is where you bring in existing material:
- OnSong ZIPs — lyrics plus an optional backing track, drag-and-drop or folder import.
- ChordPro files/folders and multi-song files, under "Other formats."
- Ultimate Guitar — search and pull chord charts directly (automated fetch is Windows-only; you can also paste a chart manually on any platform).
- Karaoke-Version.com stems Windows — downloads stems you've purchased there and imports them automatically.
- Instrument patches — Nord Stage 4 HTML exports and VoiceLive CSV exports.
- Library Maintenance — bulk-fill missing Genre (online lookup) or missing Key (detected from each song's audio) across your entire library in one pass.
Title_Artist_Key.zip to
auto-match to the right song on import. Any login credentials for Ultimate Guitar or Karaoke-Version are used
only to connect and are never saved — only the username is remembered.Backup & sync
Settings → Backup covers two different things:
- Database Backup/Restore Windows — copies your entire local library file (songs, sets, patches, settings) to a location you choose, and restores it wholesale (the app needs to restart afterward for a restore to take effect).
- Song Sync Windows — exports a portable package of just your song data to move between devices, or compares directly against a connected Band Connect peer and shows a diff of what's changed so you can choose what to bring over.
On iOS and Android, use Band Connect to move songs between your own devices in the meantime.
Display settings
Settings → Display sets the default font sizes used across the performance view — Section Headers, Chords, and Lyrics — plus the vertical gap between a chord and the lyric beneath it, with a live preview as you adjust. An Auto-size lyrics to fill screen width toggle measures each song's longest line and scales lyric text to fit automatically instead of using a fixed size.
License
Settings → License shows your current status — licensed, trial days remaining, or expired — and is where you activate a purchased license key. Activation checks the key locally on your device; Cuevera works fully offline both before and after activation.