The advantage of this setup is that separate programs can collaborate to make complex sounds.
The disadvantage of this setup is that it makes it very hard to reproduce results, you basically need a Docker image with the exact same version of everything. And some script to launch and connect all programs correctly.
Some composition systems like LMMS reduce that problem by having synthesizers as plugins, so that you don't have to setup any connections yourself.
Contains a large database of instruments, and allows you to edit them. This is a fun toy.
Instruments are edited on a GUI. It is a multi-window program, and you open new windows from new windows from new windows, all filled with hundreds of virtual knobs that you drag with your keyboard, and which would be better done from textual software like Csound. It is a thing of beauty.
And they have some crappy policy of asking for 45 USD for binary downloads.
Compiling from source:
git clone https://github.com/zynaddsubfx/zynaddsubfx
cd zynaddsubfx
git checkout a789866de4d45a784c1f4d95fcf5a1938347baef
sudo apt build-dep zynaddsubfx
mkdir build
cd build
cmake ..
make -j`nproc`
fails with:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/usr/bin/cxxtestgen", line 7, in <module>
import cxxtest.cxxtestgen
File "/usr/share/cxxtest/cxxtest/__init__.py", line 33, in <module>
from cxxtest.cxxtestgen import *
File "/usr/share/cxxtest/cxxtest/cxxtestgen.py", line 18, in <module>
import __release__
ModuleNotFoundError: No module named '__release__'
Ubuntu 20.04: sound preview worked, first hat that trailing Contra-like sound artifacts (like spd-say), but then it went away?
Feels like a lot of effort was put into usability, including keyboard shortcuts by default, seems like a powerful and easy to start using software to compose music!
Has OK step sequencer non-realtime up/down/left/right guitar based composition interface.
Has chord insertion.
Has bend editor.
Could be more amazing, but it is OK.
A bit limited by being very "guitar oriented". Shows you guitar strings, and you enter offset to each string. So to enter two adjacent notes you need to use two seprate strings and thing about the offsets. If only it had a more piano based interface.
Drum notation is also atrocious, you have to go to the top chord, and use high numbers starting at 36.
Very easy to use and pretty powerful MIDI creator!!!
One of the rare audio applications actually works with PulseAudio on Ubuntu 20.04 out-of-the-box, so you don't have to turn off every other audio application!!!
Has lot's of plugins built-in just working out of the box, e.g. ZynAddSubFX out-of-the-box without doing a gazillion complex setup connections.
Most plugins are just simple toys however, ZynAddSubFX is the only super powerful one. The others are more LMMS integrate however, and seem to use a more dedicated LMMS GUI style.
TODO can you do liver performance with a virtual instrument?
If you open vmpk, you can then right click on a piano track, and go MIDI, Input and it just shows up there, and it does produce sound as shown at: www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpeP2th08ak
TODO: what about recording the input MIDI? Yes, there is a record button on the piano roll!
XML file format (but with 99% of the action of interest in a domain-specific language on the CsInstruments and CsScore elements) that can be played and the reference implementation. Offers complex effects out-of-box apparently.
Allows you to easily define instruments with seemingly arbitrary mathematical functions, and then use them to play notes at given time intervals.
The instrument functions can be parametrized, and each note played can have different parameters.
The instrument definition actually defines a block diagram graph, much like a hardware synthesizer would.
Csound is so not-bloated that it contains an UI system. And it includes an interactive virtual MIDI keyboard that interacts with parameter knobs: www.csounds.com/manual/html/MidiTop.html
If only it had been written in Python... the array manipulation boilerplate would be likely perfect for NumPy, and this would have been exactly what Ciro Santilli wanted!
CSound states that one of its design goals is backward compatibility, and it shows. Some of the stuff is utterly arcane, e.g. you have to remember what GEN10, GEN11, etc. mean instead of having named enums.
It just worked on Ubuntu 20.04 no questions asked:
iainmccurdy.org/csound.html about 100 CC BY-SA examples. Each is a minimal study showing a specific technique, not a full composition, some seem advanced. Dude's a beast.
Documentation-wise, it's a bit lacking. The only dude who can explain it really well, Dr Richard Boulanger, made the "The Csound Book" closed source, so, congrats, this will forever hurt the popularity of Csound.
2.5.0 manual prebuilt download install on Ubuntu 20.04 just worked. Launch directly from unzip without install. Play with examples under install/Examples
Pop music cannot be good by definition: any art that appeals to the masses (Popular!) has to be a boring watered down version of everything, and therefore boring shit. Just like the movies: high budget movies are shit.
. Source. Later used as a vocal sample in the Sweet Lullaby by Deep Forest (1992), which notably featured in Where the hell is Matt (2006), an early YouTube viral video. The original destroys the Deep Forest version however.
The 60's and 70's were the days, those great proxy wars and CIA dictatorships allowed hippies to make awesome freedom music without too imminent a fear of death.
Songs making fun of things or that are pure Brazil nostalgia are also accepted. No love songs, ever. Except some by Caetano, but that's it!
Ciro Santilli
OurBigBook.com