Three Phase Oscillator

Another Processing library that I have looked into is RWMidi Processing which is another relatively simple and easy to use set of MIDI tools. To illustrate how to use the library Wesen, from Ruin & Wesen, produced a screen cast on how to make a “Game of Life” sequencer. I decided to have a look at the sequencer to see if I could route the MIDI from Processing to other applications, like Ableton Live and Reason. I accomplished this using the IAC Driver found in the Audio MIDI Setup utility. I routed the MIDI data to Reason to have a listen to the results, then started manipulating some of the behavior of the sequencer. Later I decided to route the MIDI to Ableton Live. After that, one thing led to another and now I have the building blocks for a new track. Here’s a rendered snippet of the MIDI data that I captured and edited for the piece.

Sine of Life

Sequence of Randomized Pitches and Durations

I’ve been researching audio libraries for Processing recently since I will soon be starting the development of a specialized music application for personal use. I considered using MaxMSP, but Processing seems to suit this project a bit better. If you’re not familiar with Processing, it is an IDE designed for designers, artist, musicians, or anyone interested in exploring new ideas. Although it is mostly used for visual projects there are several examples of music software, like Tiction, which I wrote about in an entry titled Sound For Dali’s Melting Clocks. One of the libraries I’m investigating is called jm-Etude. It’s very easy to implement and use, and makes a few of the features in jMusic, a Java music composition project, accessible in Processing. Here’s some audio from a quick sketch designed to create a random sequence of notes. I also randomized the durations from whole notes to sixteenths, excluding tuplets for the time being.

Randomized Pitch Durations

Minim Sound Library for Processing.org

This sound was made by manipulating the frequency and panning of a sine wave using the Minim sound library in Processing. I found that adjusting the portamento parameter has some strange and interesting results. Certain values for portamento seem to cause the sine wave to degrade into noise when manipulating the frequency of the waveform. I captured several minutes of this noise and then selected a small segment that has some unusual modulation going on.

Minim Sine Wave Experiment

 

Sound For Dali’s Melting Clocks

I created this track using Tiction (recently featured on CDM), an interesting piece of MIDI sequencing software created by Hans Kuder and developed in Processing. Tiction works by connecting nodes together to form loops. Each node has properties that can be adjusted like the number of “tics”. Dragging the nodes around the screen changes the pitch and volume of the nodes. I routed the MIDI output from Tiction into MDA’s DX10 while dragging and adjusting the nodes on the screen. After capturing the output I processed it through Pluggo’s Comber and a little bit of reverb. Here I have rendered the first fifty seconds as an excerpt for today’s sound.

Melting Clocks