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Started by Craig R. Latta
Mon, 17 Aug 1992 08:00
... Monthly Electronic and Computer Music FAQ, via NetJam, Berkeley, part /usr/users/ftp/ftp_public/misc/netjam/doc/FAQ/split/5 ...
Author: Craig R. Latta
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 08:00
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 08:00
507 lines
20892 bytes
20892 bytes
Sequential, Inc.
3051 N. First Street
San Jose, California 95134
(408) 946-5240
Comment: synthesizers
Updates by: rsk Last update: Oct 87
Siel
KSL Inc.
590-A Apollo Street
Brea, California 92621
Comment: synthesizers
Updates by: rsk Last update: Jul 85
TOA
480 Carlton Court S.
San Francisco, California 94080
(415) 588-2538
Comment: amplifiers, speakers, mixers
Updates by: rsk Last update: Oct 87
Tascam/Teac
7733 Telegraph Rd.
Montebello, California 90640
(213) 726-0303
Comment: recording equipment
Updates by: rsk Last update: Oct 87
Wersi USA
P.O. Box 5318
Lancaster, Pennsylvania17601
Comment: organ kits
Updates by: rsk Last update: Jul 85
Yamaha International
6600 Orangethorpe Avenue
Buena Park, California 90620
(714) 522-9011
Comment: synthesizers, samplers, sequencers
Updates by: rsk Last update: Jul 90
--
Rich Kulawiec, Colorado State University, rsk@cs.colostate.edu, handel!rsk
---
Q: Where may I find an electronic music bibliography?
A:
See the file:
anonymous@ftp.cs.ruu.nl:MIDI/DOC/bibliography
or
anonymous@131.211.80.17:MIDI/DOC/bibliography
---
Q: How can I build my own MIDI interface?
A:
From: henges@ingr.com. (John Hengesbach)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac,rec.music.synth
Subject: Re: DIY MIDI interface?
Keywords: MIDI
Date: 30 Dec 88 16:05:21 GMT
In article <817@ttrdf.UUCP> fjo@ttrdf.UUCP (Frank Owen ) writes:
>
> Has anyone figured out how to kludge up a Do-It-Yourself MIDI interface
>for the Macintosh? It seems that the one Apple sells has practically no
A reply...
MINIMAL MAC--MIDI INTERFACE
===========================
Well, here it is all you MIDI fans. THE ultimate in
simplicity!! This is a simple schematic for a serial
to MIDI converter.
There are two functions performed here. One is the
conversion from current loop to RS-422. The second function
is supplying the 1 MHz signal for the serial chip to sync
up with the 31.5K baud rate of MIDI.
>>>>>>> DATA FLOW >>> (MAC TO MIDI INSTRUMENT) >>>>>>>>>
+-------+ +------+
To MAC 4 10|26LS32 | |7407 |
Serial >------+ |11 1| |2 +------+ 5
Port 5 9| +-----+ +-----+R=220 +-----< \
DB9 pin >------- | | | +------+ \ (5 pin DIN socket)
Numbers | | | | | MIDI OUT
+-------+ +------+ / (to instrument)
+------+ +------+ 4 /
+5 volts -+R=390 +--+ +5 volts -+R=220 +-----<
+------+ | +------+
+-------+ | +------+1 +------+ 4
8 6|26LS31 | | |MCT2 +-----+R=220 +-----< \
>------+ |11| 5| | +------+ \ (5 pin DIN socket)
9 5| +--+--+ | | MIDI IN
>------- | 4| |2 5 / (from instrument)
| | +-+ +------------------< /
+-------+ | +------+
|
v
Ground
<<<<<<<<<<<<< DATA FLOW << (MIDI INSTRUMENT TO MAC ) <<<
+-------+ +------+
7 10|26LS31 | |1 MHZ |
>------+ |9 8| OSC |
3 11| +-----+ |
>------- | | |
| | + |
+-------+ +------+
Power connections:
GROUND +5
----- --
7407 7 14
26LS31 8,12 4,16
26LS32 8,12 4,16
OSCILLATOR 7 14
Notes:
The optical isolator MCT-2 above can probably be any relatively
fast optical coupler. Note that the 390 ohm resistormay need to be
adjusted to make sure the output does not saturate. Using a scope
while feeding a MIDI signal in should show you whether the signal
looks clean.
The diagram has been drawn to show MAC signals on the left
and MIDI signals on the right. There have also been allowances made
for the fact that 80 column ascii displays are not **exactly**
graphics terminals. Also note that the MAC pin numbers are for the
DB9 connector **NOT** the 8 pin mini-DIN connector!!
The age old question of where to get power for this always
remains. On the pre-MAC-PLUSs, there was power available from the
serial port connector. I solved this problem by finding a 7 VDC
AC adapter at a parts store and using a 5 volt voltage regulator
IC to bring it down to 5 volts. This is left as an exercise for
the student.....
The 26LS31 and 26LS32 are the same type of chips which are
used in the MAC for RS-42? conversion. I got them from a store in
Santa Clara California (Anchor Electronics (408) 727-3693). They
also have 1 Mhz Oscillators as well.
I have built several variations of this over the last two
years and have had good success using a variety of music software
with them.
John Hengesbach
(205)772-1669
uunet!ingr!henges
Intergraph Corporation
Huntsville, AL 35807
[SEE ALSO: the June 1986 BYTE magazine article on building a MIDI
board for the IBM PC -- crl]
---
Q: Where can I find out all about MIDI?
A:
Email LISTSERV@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU, with the phrase GET MIDISPEC
PACKAGE in the message body. You will get the following message, as
well as the files to which it refers.
Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1991 18:32:49 -0500
From: Revised List Processor (1.7a) <LISTSERV@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU>
Subject: File: "MIDISPEC $PACKAGE" being sent to you
*************************************************************************
* *
* MIDISPEC Package *
* *
* The following series of plain text files are the contents of the *
* MIDISPEC PACKAGE. They are a reference resource compiled from several *
* sources, mostly by Greg at LEE@UHCCUX. The Primer, originally written *
* by Bob McQueer, is in constant revision. The other files are subject *
* to periodic review and update. The package as a whole may be added to *
* as MIDI expands. *
* *
* They have been placed here to make it possible for users to retrieve *
* or subscribe to the whole set of documents as a "package" so as to *
* automatically get the updated documentation when it is made *
* available. Access to the complete package is possible via GET *
* MIDISPEC PACKAGE. *
* *
* You can subscribe to it with: AFD ADD MIDISPEC PACKAGE (note that you *
* will need to use the PW command to define yourself a password before *
* you can use the AFD command -- see LISTAFD MEMO for more details). *
* If you wish to only be informed when the files are updated, use the *
* FUI ADD MIDISPEC PACKAGE command. *
* *
*************************************************************************
* filename filetype Filelist File description
* -------- -------- -------- -----------------------
MIDISPEC $PACKAGE EMUSIC The Package Definition
MIDI1_0 MIDISPEC EMUSIC The MIDI Version 1.0 Specification
PRIMER MIDISPEC EMUSIC A MIDI Tutorial
MIDIBNF MIDISPEC EMUSIC MIDI Considered in Backus-Naur Form
CTRLTAB MIDISPEC EMUSIC Listing of Controller/Mode Command Codes
STATTAB MIDISPEC EMUSIC Listing of MIDI Status Codes
NOTESTAB MIDISPEC EMUSIC Listing of MIDI Notes by Octave
FILEFMT MIDISPEC EMUSIC Descr ption of MIDI Standard File Format
SDSFMT MIDISPEC EMUSIC Description of MIDI Sample Dump Standard
TIMECODE MIDISPEC EMUSIC Description of MIDI Time Code Format
---
Q: What are the details behind current sound formats?
A:
Contact Guido van Rossum (guido@cwi.nl), and possibly the
USENET newsgroup alt.binaries.sounds.d (I don't currently read that
group) for his "audio formats guide". I'm awaiting information on
automatic availability. I will make it so if Guido won't.
+++
C: [Vendor-specific issues]
---
Q: Where can I find information about the NeXT MIDI driver?
A:
Date: Thu, 24 Oct 91 16:59:46 PDT
From: Conrad_Geiger@NeXT.COM
To: nextmusic@silvertone.Princeton.EDU
Subject: MIDI driver documentation
Draft Documentation Available - MIDI driver documentation
NeXT Publications Group
A new document describing the MIDI driver is available on the
Internet archive servers. This document is a revised and expanded
version of the Release 1.0 MIDI driver documentation, and is not
present in Release 2 or in the hard-copy technical documentation.
The document is available by anonymous ftp (file transfer protocol)
from one of the following Internet archive servers:
________________________________________________________
hostname Directory
________________________________________________________
cs.orst.edu pub/next/documents/TechSupportNotes
sonata.cc.purdue.edu pub/next/submissions
etlport.etl.go.jp (Japan) pub/NeXT/documents/MIDIDriver
The two files that make up this draft document are:
MIDIDriver.tar.Z
MIDIDriver_README
MIDIDriver.tar.Z is 54.2 kilobytes in size. Unarchived, it's a
directory called MIDIDriver that occupyies 141 kilobytes and consists
of:
Introduction.rtf -- An introduction for users of MIDI on NeXT
computers, including information on MIDI interfaces, the MIDI data
format, and whether to use the driver functions or the Music Kit.
DriverOverview.rtfd -- A conceptual overview of the NeXT MIDI driver.
CFunctions/ -- Specifications of the MIDI C functions
Your feedback on the document is welcome. See the file
MIDIDriver_README for details.
Doug Keislar
NeXT Computer, Inc.
---
Q: What's coming (as of 25 October 1991) in the way of NeXT music
apps?
A:
Date: Fri, 25 Oct 91 17:43:25 PDT
From: Doug_Keislar@NeXT.COM
Subject: Re: NEXT MUSIC APPS
Cc: nextmusic@silvertone.Princeton.EDU
In response to your inquiry, here's a document from NeXTanswers that
mentions most of the music software (and some of the sound software)
that's available or coming. I'm sure I've omitted some; if anyone on
this mailing list has additions or corrections, please send me email.
Doug Keislar
NeXT Computer, Inc.
NeXT Computers are an ideal music platform with their built-in
CD-quality sound and DSP sound synthesis. Several companies have
announced commercial music software for the NeXT. Metaresearch's
SoundWorks is a sound editor that features digital recording, mixing,
and editing. Imagine has announced First Chair, a MIDI and audio
sequencer that will include SMPTE synchronization and multimedia
capabilities. World Class Software is developing a program called
Songwriter's Toolbox, which is a training, analysis, and production
environment for composing songs in a variety of contemporary musical
styles. Coda was working on MusicProse, a notation program, but has
no immediate plans to ship it. See the Software and Peripherals
Catalog for more details on these programs. (You can get the catalog
by calling 800-848-NeXT in the U.S.)
NeXT bundles a great deal of music-related software in 1.0 and in 2.0
Extended, though most of it is not music applications per se. The
Music Kit is an extensive development tool for programmers; see the
NeXT documentation. There are some bundled music demos that can be
used by non-programmers, such as ScorePlayer, which can be launched
by double-clicking the scorefiles in /NextLibrary/Music/Scores, or
the demo program /NextDeveloper/Demos/Ensemble. (Ensemble is new in
2.0, replacing Synthesizer.) Ensemble combines MIDI in and out with
DSP synthesis, soundfile playback, real-time algorithmic
composition, interactive note processing, and more. See its on-line
help for details.
In the /NextDeveloper/Examples directory, the MusicKit, MidiDriver,
Sound, and SoundEditor subdirectories contain programs that are
runnable by anyone who knows enough Unix to change directories and
compile in a shell window. The source for Ensemble is included in
the MusicKit examples directory. (Suggestion: copy anything in
/NextDeveloper to your home directory before compiling or editing.
Also see NextAnswers sound.350.)
IRCAM in Paris has created an extensive software environment for
real-time music synthesis and performance using the IRCAM Signal
Processing Workstation, a signal-processing board based on two i860
chips and manufactured by Ariel. The software is free and is
available from the Stanford archive server (see below), but it
requires the board to run. The software includes:
-- The MAX graphical programming environment, which allows you to
graphically connect different real-time modules to create musical
algorithms. Unlike the Macintosh version, the new NeXT version
allows you to create not only MIDI data, but also digital signals on
the i860 board. The board can be used as a synthesizer or sampler
with real-time pitch-tracking and sophisticated sound processing.
-- A spectrogram editor that lets you draw outlines on a
frequency-domain plot of a soundfile and filter the sound so that you
hear only the selected parts.
-- Animal, an IB-like application with which you can lay out sounds
on a music keyboard as a function of key number and key velocity.
-- Faster Than Sound (FTS), a program that manages event and sound
scheduling, MIDI processing, and other communication tasks.
-- An array-processing library of hand-coded number-crunching
routines for the i860.
-- A real-time, multitasking operating system for the i860, with a
UNIX-like API.
Ariel is also shipping another board with five DSP56001's, called the
QuintProcessor. In the future, the Music Kit will talk transparently
to QuintProcessors, providing another powerful real-time synthesis
engine. Common Lisp Music, mentioned below, can already make use
of any QuintProcessors that are installed.
Some public-domain software is available on the Internet archive
servers. Z-quencer is a simple MIDI sequencer with the music
displayed in piano-roll style (rather than as music notation).
Looching is a program that plays continuous background music on the
DSP. Programmers at NeXT created the Lisp Scorefile Package, a Lisp
front end for generating Music Kit scorefiles, and RecordApp, a
program for sound recording. (See NextAnswers misc.227 for
instructions on obtaining software from archive servers.)
Also available for programmers are some environments for software
(non-real-time) sound synthesis and soundfile processing, mostly
ported from other Unix platforms. Some also do real-time DSP
synthesis. Generally these are available with source for a nominal
fee or free of charge. CSound was created at M.I.T. and was given a
NeXT front end by Pete Yadlowsky (pmy@virginia.edu). F. Richard
Moore at U. C. San Diego (frm@sdcarl.ucsd.edu) has ported cmusic, a
software synthesis language, and pvoc, a phase vocoder (for
sophisticated analysis and resynthesis of recorded sound). Paul
Lansky at Princeton ported cmix and rtmix, programs for soundfile
processing and mixing. John Rahn at the University of Washington
(jrahn@blake.washington.edu) has a Lisp kernel for music composition.
Mara Helmuth (mara@woof.columbia.edu) wrote Patchmix, a graphical
unit generator patch program that helps you construct synthesis
instruments and that writes out cmix code.
At Stanford University, Heinrich Taube has created Common Music, a
compositional environment based on the Common Lisp Object System; it
creates scorefiles, soundfiles, and DSP synthesis using the Music
Kit. Bill Schottstaedt has developed Common Lisp Music, a
Lisp-based software synthesis language that uses the DSP for
acceleration rather than real-time synthesis. Perry Cook has
written SPASM, an interactive vocal synthesis application,
ResonatorLab, a real-time digital filter tool, and miscellaneous
other tools that can be used by non-programmers. Glen Diener is
developing a music notation program. The Stanford materials are
available by anonymous ftp to ccrma.stanford.edu.
At Northwestern University, Bill Parod has created Just, a NeXT
application for exploring tuning systems.
There is an extension to TeX for music notation called MuTeX. See
NextAnswer misc.390 for ftp sites that have MuTeX. We are told this
works with the NeXT version of TeX, but that it doesn't include 92dpi
screen fonts, so you have to print the scores on your printer to see
the notation. Presumably someone could use TeX's companion program
METAFONT, also bundled on NeXT's 2.0 Extended software release, to
create a 92dpi screen font from the provided MuTeX fonts.
Note that there are non-NeXTstep programs available for other
platforms that might run on NeXT computers under SoftPC or X. For
example, SCORE is a powerful music notation program for the IBM PC,
and there are some public-domain sound tools that run under X
windows.
---
Q: Where can I get a Macintosh program to translate between different
soundfile formats?
A:
Date: Sat, 26 Oct 1991 16:25:22 -0700
From: Tom Erbe <tom%MILLS.EDU@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU>
Subject: Soundfile header conversion program
To: Multiple recipients of list EMUSIC-L <EMUSIC-L@AUVM>
I just wrote a little program for the Mac that does Soundfile header
conversion. It translates between IRCAM, NeXT .snd, Sound Designer II,
AIFF and DSP Designer files. It will open any file as a 16-bit linear
soundfile, if you want. I am making no attempt (at least not yet) to
support anything other than 16-bit linear. You can also change things
in the header like sample rate and number of channels. This is my
first program for the Mac, so it might have bugs. If you want a copy,
you can get it through ftp to "mills.edu", it is "ccm/SoundHac.hqx".
Or I could mail it to you if you don't have ftp. Please send bug reports!
Tom Erbe * Technical Director * Center for Contemporary Music * Mills College
tom@mills.edu * Mills College, Oakland, CA 94613 * (510) 430-2191
---
Q: I'm just starting on MIDI and want to know how to send MIDI from my
SCO UNIX box (and who do I buy a card from? are there device
drivers available?)
A:
From: tjt@blink (Tim Thompson)
Newsgroups: rec.music.synth
Subject: Re: MIDI FAQ?
Date: 28 Dec 91 14:34:29 GMT
Andrew Beattie (tab@ibmpcug.co.uk) writes:
> I'm just starting on MIDI and want to know how to send MIDI from my SCO UNIX
> box. (and who do I buy a card from? are there device drivers available?
If SCO UNIX implies you're using an AT-bus 386 of some sort, there
is a UNIX device driver available called devmidi that can be found in
--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Craig R. Latta Experimental Computing Facility (XCF)
Composer, Software and ParcPlace Systems, Inc. (latta@parcplace.com)
Recording Engineer NetJam, Berkeley (netjam-request@xcf)
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