Ecasound

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If you begin to play with a sample player like Specimen, or if you've got a huge number of virtual synths running, Ardour may become too cumbersome to record with. I've been looking for something simpler and finally found Ecasound.

To install it enter (in a terminal):

sudo apt-get install ecasound

Then you can start recording with (assuming jackd is started) :

ecasound -i jack -o somefile.wav

Connect your virtual instruments output in Qjackct>Connect>Audio Tab to the ecasound input. Then push play...

I used then Audacity to remove the blanks and add a fade-out. You can install it with

sudo apt-get install audacity

Ecasound as many unique sound processing feature, including some useful effects, that can be used realtime or not. See Ecasound Examples for more information.

Happy music making !

Specimen

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I've been looking for a linux sampler, and I found that the linuxsampler package was no longer in the Ubuntu repositories, because this isn't free software. Nevertheless there is the Specimen sample player package. To install it enter in a terminal :

sudo apt-get install specimen

Then run it (assuming jackd is started) with

specimen &

Then you'll have to create a patch using Patch>Add. Name it 'test'. Then click on the "Load Sample" button below the 'Sample' label. If you don't know what to load, just load /usr/share/sounds/login.wav . You can then click on the C5 key of Specimen's virtual keyboard to hear your sample. The default volume is very low, so add volume both to the sample and the master volume. Then if you click on the gray bar just above the B key on the keyboard, you'll activate it (left click sets the lower note, rigth click the upper, middle click the root). Click then on the B key to hear your sample, half a tone lower.

You can now head to http://freewavesamples.com/ and download some samples. Don't forget to set the root note according to the pitch of your sample with a middle-click on the grey bar above the keyboard.

Refer to this post if you want to connect Specimen to Seq24, or this one to do so with Muse.



Happy music making !

Writing and recording a song with Muse, Hydrogen and Zynaddsubfx

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This post is about the Muse sequencer, you may want to use Seq24 instead.

First, you'll have to install jackd and the low latency kernel.

Then you can install Muse, Hydrogen and Zynaddsubfx by entering (in a terminal) :

sudo apt-get install muse hydrogen zynaddsubfx

You can now launch Qjackctl :

qjackctl &

Then click on the Start button to start the jack daemon.

Launch Muse :

muse &

Then launch Hydrogen :

hydrogen &

and minimize it.

In Muse, go to Settings>Midi Ports/Soft Synth. Click on the Peripheral Name of the Port 1 and select Hydrogen Midi-In

Now right-click in the track area and select "New Midi Track". O-Port should show 1(Hydrogen Midi-In).

Then right-click in the sequences area on the right. Select "Pencil". Draw a four-bar sequence. Then select "Pointer" and double-click on your sequence.

You can now click on the piano keys above d#2 to ear hydrogen play. Then you can right-click in the grid, select "Pencil" and draw some notes. Press the "Play" button to play your sequence. When you're satisfied of it you can cut and paste it in the main window to repeat it.

Now start Zynaddsubfx with

zynaddsubfx -r 48000 -b 128 &

In Instrument>Show Instrument Bank, select an instrument.

In Muse, go to Settings>Midi Ports/Soft Synth, and change Port 2's Peripheral Name to Zynaddsubfx.

You can now add a Midi Track, set its O-Port to 2(Zynaddsubfx), and record a Zynaddsubfx tune.

Since Zynaddsubfx is multi-channel, you can have several Zynaddsubfx tracks with only one Zynaddsubfx instance running. To do so, move Zynaddsubfx channel to "2" with the up and down buttons just above the volume, click on the "Enable" checkbox, and select an instrument. Then in Muse, add a Zynaddsubfx track and set its "Ch" attribute to "2". You can now add a second instrument theme.

Muse has its own drum kit. You can use it by adding a Drum Track instead of a Midi Track.

You may now want to record your song using Ardour. Read the end of this post, it's Seq24-centered but the recording steps are exactly the same.

Happy music making !

Installing the realtime kernel and the Jack audio daemon

[2011 warning : this pst is pretty much old and probably no longer really accurate]
[2011 update 2 : As far as I know realtime has now been merged into the main Linux kernel, so there's no longer a need to install any special linux-rt package to have it installed on your Ubuntu box]

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If you want to make music under Linux, you need a realtime kernel along with jackd and it's user control GUI. Here's how to install them :

In a terminal, enter

sudo apt-get install linux-rt jackd qjackctl

Then reboot your computer. You can now stop the PulseAudio service :

/etc/init.d/pulseaudio stop

and launch qjackctl

qjackctl &

Then go to setup, in parameters, check the Real Time checkbox. Click Ok. You can then click on the Start button to start jackd. Your linux station is now set up to play music.

You may now want to read this post on how to make a song using Seq24, Hydrogen and Zynaddsubfx.

Happy music making !

Mx44

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Mx44 is as software synth with a small footprint. You can install it with

sudo apt-get install mx44

Then run it with

mx44 &

Read this post on how to connect a synth to Seq24, or this one to connect it to Muse, if you have not already done so.

To choose a Mx44 patch, select a bank with the two combo boxes on the left, then select a patch with the radio buttons.

Happy music making !

Lash

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Lash is a tool for audio session saving and restoring.

To install it, run the command :

sudo apt-get install lashd lash-bin

Then (assuming jackd is started) launch the Lash Panel :

lash_panel &

now start Seq24 and Zynaddsubfx :

seq24 --manual_alsa_ports & zynaddsubfx -r 48000 -b 128 &

You may now write a song. You no longer need to save your song in Seq24 or your settings in Zynaddsubfx. Simply save your Lash session using the Save Project button in the Lash Control Panel. Then if you click on Close Project, you can reload it later and your Seq24 and Zynaddsubfx parameters will be restored, along with your jackd midi connections.

Hydrogen is supposed to be Lash-aware, but it doesn't seem to work on Ubuntu 8.04 for now. So you'll have to launch Hydrogen and route its midi manually. Don't forget to close it before you save your lash session, or it will start to load (and fail) the next time you'll load the session. UPDATE : I tried this and all my Lash clients closed along when I closed Hydrogen ! I didn't disconnected Hydrogen's midi input from Seq24, this may have caused the crash. But besides this I discovered Lash was way to much resource-consuming to record to Ardour on my hardware. I had then to give up Lash, but you may find it useful if you got a powerful machine.

Here's a list of Lash-aware applications.

Happy music making !