Wouldn't it be great to send and receive MIDI in realtime in a really simple language like python? I've written some snappy sequencers using the Sony PSP, and numerous microcontrollers (from 4 Mhz to 600 MHz!), but they can't easily leverage the internet to let composers and performances collaborate via long distance. And using a convenient language like python usually means serious performance…
Reviewing the Pyramid Eel and reflecting on other instruments, I set my foot down in the sand and label the first Pyramid Eel "done." Watch the video to hear the full details!
I recently upgrade the generators on my Electric Eel instruments to include optical encoders. Check out this video to see how it works. This means I'll be able to measure the speed and acceleration of the bow, leading to much more sensitive and expressive instruments. I've been wanting to do this for YEARS and now it's finally happening... Over the years of playing my generator-based Electric Eel…
Enjoy the time-lapse vid and 80s synth-shread montage music and find out New Synth Knob Multiplexer - 64 Analogs in one! Part 3 So you know I'm exactly halfway in the middle of my 64-in-1 analog knob multiplexer project, right? To keep it exciting, I did a "Soldering Challenge." Enjoy the time-lapse video! My bigger goal is to demonstrate all 64 knobs at once, but that's so many circuit boards...…
You've seen it run with 5 synthesizer knobs, but now the stakes are higher! I'm going to daisy-chain three of my circuit boards together. Then I'm going to run them at top speed. And if that wasn't enough, I've been preparing a special treat, so watch through the second half of the video :)
I recorded this gorgeous, classic hymn on three different Electric Eels! Lowest two parts are played on Bowed Eel. Violin 2 is played on Blue Guitar Eel. Violin 1 is played on Red Saxophone Eel. I'm looking for more players who want to play classical music on DIY/DSP Instruments! Electric Eels return the nuance of movement to electronic instruments. I free synthesizers from the desktop/laptop…
New! Fresh in the mail. A circuit board I designed. Check out the edgy and powerful design ! It muxes 64 analog signals, especially synthesizer knobs, into 1. It lets you read a wholllle lot of knobs with just a few pins. You can use three pins from an Arduino or other microcontroller and read all 64 daisy-chain knobs! You need this board to make professional synthesizers with lots of knobs .
This is a great article with lots of pictures and explanation: https://dev.opera.com/articles/drum-sounds-webaudio/ He makes a kick drum and a hit-hat! If you would like to hear how it sounds, check out: https://chrislo.github.io/drum_synthesis/
http://www.yoyogames.com/tech_blog/95
1. I was excited about SoundSlice - it let you enter tabs 2. I was excited about Chordify.net - It auto-extracts chords from youtube 3. I was excited about Youtab.me - It extracts chords better than Chordify.net (betting timing) 4. Now I'm excited about Chordify.net again. - It lets users improve chords. This is the email they sent me earlier this evening: NEWSLETTER Groningen, 18 Feb 2015 Chord…
A project done in quite a hurry! Shared at the Spotify Monthly Music Hackathon in NYC. The goal was to intermingle an ancient musical practice with chiptune sounds.
http://openmikes.org/
Seriously the future is here... Another program to generate chords from youtube videos!!! Example: https://www.youtab.me/…/nMTJ_0spI4v/jets-to-brazil/chinatown This is even smoother than http://chordify.net ! It's faster and has better division of the chords (they're not all lined up on the beginning of a measure). Wow! (beware it's burning hot new and crashed on a few songs I tried!)
If you get the most excitement out of building and designing your own instruments, a DIY-performance scene could be a really fun part of it! I found Shannon's short chat full of amazingly level-headed and professional tips. Burn two minutes of time: you'll only hear advice this good once in a long while. By the way, if you're curious about Shannon Curtis, preview her albums:
Think DSP- Digital Signal Processing in Python This book looks great - it's a work in progress by Allen Downey , a professor at Olin College. Every example includes Python code to perform the calculations as well as read and write waveforms. Many examples use music so that should be valuable to readers of this blog and people who like to DIYDSP. So go ahead and download the free PDF or read it in…
This is very special to me. This is exactly what I have been looking to do with the digital music instruments I have been designing and building - Give them a modular synthesizer editor. This is a software and a hardware project. It lets you graphically edit a patch for a DSP-based music instrument, then upload it into a small circuit board. That means you can put that instrument into a box with…
Live Demo of Binaural Sound with the Web Audio API What is Binaural Sound? Binaural sound is a way to make 3D sound! Binaural means "Two Ears." How does it work? It starts with any sound you like, such as a dog barking. Then it convolves that dog bark sound with a special signal. The result: it sounds like the sound is coming from in front of you, or to your right or left! Try out the real-time…
I've posted hugh's demo on DIYDSP.com for you to try out. This is a Javascript library for "Feature Extraction." If you don't know what "Feature Extraction" is, let me tell you: It's a term used in Machine Learning. A "Feature" is quite simply a "calculation." For example, if you examine a stream of sound or a file, you may want to calculate the average loudness of the stream every 50…
My new playlist: Electric Eel Christmas Carols Subscribe to find out when new songs are added on my upcoming trip to Germany! This is me playing traditional Christmas Carols like Silent Night, Joy to the World, etc., on an instrument I designed while at the MIT Media Lab. It's called the Electric Eel. I designed it because I was stuck between the two worlds of electronic and acoustic music. I like…
A Sample and Sequence Encoding Library for Volca Sample Did you know that you can upload samples and sequences into the Korg Volca? Yes, it's possible and now it's much easier with this software from Korg, including the source code. Wow! This program takes your sequences and samples and turns them into an audio file that you play into the Korg Volca Sample to record the data into its memory! Wow!…
This is a long, but brilliant essay. I especially enjoyed the section on Music Instruments about 1/4 down the page. The theme argues the idea that civilization/society/humans create for the sake of social status, not for the effect of the creation. For example: We choose to learn to play guitar to "be cool," or piano to indicate we want to be thought of as high-class rather than because we value…
This is music Hack Day, November 8th - 9th 2014, in Cambridge, MA, at Microsoft N.E.R.D. The day begins with an incredible amount of information dissemination and research on topics related to online music software development and APIs.
http://infoluthier.free.fr/francois%20denis/en/resources/Articolo.Denis.pdf
If you didn't know, the Bitbox is an excellent, efficient graphics and audio project for the stm32f4 microcontroller. In a small package you get VGA out, Micro SD Card, USB Keyboard and Controllers in, and headphone out. Over on DIYDSP.com, I give step-by-step instructions for compiling it under Lubuntu 13.10 .
If you're not familar with .mod format, you should read up on it , because they're an efficient way to store music. Instead of recording a full waveform, like mp3/aac, they store a number of short samples and a score file for the music. Having mod-playing code on a platform is extremely useful because it allows that platform to play songs with very limited resources - which is often the case in…