Re: FLASH: Music needed please

[Marc Hoffman (Dart Frog Media)]

At 09:03 AM 8/8/99 -0500, you wrote:

>

>I would like to know if there is some software, that can produce music like 

>an electronic keyboard would, such as scales and individual notes. Also made 

>to sound like specific instruments.

>perhaps Marc, and Kevin(?) the music wizz' could haelp me out.

>


There are a few elements to this.


First is generating the tones of melodic and percussion instruments. Most

sound cards can do this; those with Wav table synthesis sound more like

real instruments than those without. Your typical Soundblaster card will

often have wav table synthesis. It's also possible to generate the tones

purely by software (Yamaha popularized that trend) but you still need a

sound card to convert those little ones and zeroes to audible frequencies.

If you're generating music for the masses, however, your music will

probably be played back by the sounds that are onboard your users' sound cards.


Second is selecting and accessing the tones. There are inexpensive ($30 US

or so) programs to do this. Again, if you buy a SoundBlaster there will

probably be software bundled with it such as Vienna Sound Font Studio

(which even lets you alter each instrument sound).


Recording the sound in a sequence is next. This is done by a MIDI (musical

instrument digital interface) sequencer program. These can be had pretty

cheaply too, and will let you select particular sounds (which reside on

your sound card) and might give you several interfaces for composing,

including a virtual keyboard that you play by clicking with your mouse or

typing specific keys on the computer keyboard, plus often there's an

interface called a piano roll (after the old player pianos that used rolls

of paper with slots cut in them), which lets you easily move notes around

in pitch and time.


After you record a MIDI sequence you can edit it much as you would edit a

text document in a word processor.


There are inexpensive kits on the market that include a little musical

keyboard, MIDI software, and a cable that connects the keyboard to a

standard sound card. For under $100 US (plus the cost of the soundcard) you

should be able to get your feet wet, Quack :-)


Sometimes getting set up is a bit tricky (more technical than plugging in a

new mouse, but much easier than building your own computer). If you're used

to making Flash with layers and movie clips and whatnot, MIDI should not be

too hard. The hardest thing will be coming up with musical ideas unless you

have some experience or raw talent for making music.


A totally separate solution is to get a program like Acid that lets you

piece together different grooves and licks of music so you don't need as

much musical skill or knowledge.


For more information, do a little basic reading about MIDI and sound synthesis.


------------------------------------------------------------------------

To UNSUBSCRIBE send: unsubscribe flasher in the body of an

email to

list-managershocker [dot] com

.  Problems to:

ownershocker [dot] com

N.B. Email address must be the same as the one you used to subscribe.

For info on digest mode send: info flasher to

list-managershocker [dot] com