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Show HN: An attempt to rethink a music sequencer design

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Re: Show HN: An attempt to rethink a music sequencer design

#81

Post by sdnguyen90 »

ssharp wrote: post #10

"Most of the DAW interfaces often seem overcomplicated, and they only tend to get more and more bloated over time." How much can you simplify the interface and still make it do everything producers want to do? Garageband simplified the interface quite a bit compared to Logic, but even that can get complicated and ultimately isn't as flexible as other DAWs. I've been a fairly loyal user of Sonar and FL Studio for over…

Can anyone explain why none of the major DAW's have a simple step sequencer like FL Studio's? From my observations, FL Studio has a fairly large user base and IMO the step sequencer is the only thing that sets it apart from other DAW's.

Re: Show HN: An attempt to rethink a music sequencer design

#82

Post by jdietrich »

archagon wrote: post #41
ssharp wrote: post #10

"Most of the DAW interfaces often seem overcomplicated, and they only tend to get more and more bloated over time." How much can you simplify the interface and still make it do everything producers want to do? Garageband simplified the interface quite a bit compared to Logic, but even that can get complicated and ultimately isn't as flexible as other DAWs. I've been a fairly loyal user of Sonar and FL Studio for over…

If you're an artist of sound and musical texture, then sure — a powerful DAW can't be replaced. But if you want to specifically focus on composition — harmony, melody, counterpoint — then a DAW becomes a looming, impenetrable fortress. In my experience, musical creativity thrives when you're able to iterate on your ideas in a rapid loop, adding and removing notes almost as quickly as you think of them. There is plent…

>There is plenty of room in the music software landscape for tools that focus entirely on placing notes instead of generating production-quality sound.

There's already an industry standard for that - Avid Sibelius. If you're composing in a traditional manner, a DAW probably isn't the right tool.

http://www.avid.com/sibelius

Re: Show HN: An attempt to rethink a music sequencer design

#83

Post by jdietrich »

hashkb wrote: post #5

Finally a music tool with version control. I've been wishing for this to happen for so long! The first big player (Ableton etc) to integrate versioning will have a huge advantage.

Splice is a user-friendly version control and backup system that supports Ableton, logic and FL Studio.

https://splice.com/

Re: Show HN: An attempt to rethink a music sequencer design

#84

Post by archagon »

archagon wrote: post #52

After playing with it a little, a few suggestions: 1. Make it possible to (inertial) pan and pinch zoom when using a Mac trackpad. This would be significantly faster than using the lower navigator for Mac users. Also, I don't think it's a good idea to make the scroll wheel change the x-scale. 2. Add a shortcut for deleting notes when in "feather" mode — maybe middle-click? (I see right-click is reserved for changing…

Also, creating a new layer should be simpler — putting it in the New Project menu is weird. Maybe just have a "+Layer" button under the lowest layer? It should also be possible to drag layers and change their order.

Re: Show HN: An attempt to rethink a music sequencer design

#85

Post by seltzered_ »

tomxor wrote: post #25
ssharp wrote: post #10

"Most of the DAW interfaces often seem overcomplicated, and they only tend to get more and more bloated over time." How much can you simplify the interface and still make it do everything producers want to do? Garageband simplified the interface quite a bit compared to Logic, but even that can get complicated and ultimately isn't as flexible as other DAWs. I've been a fairly loyal user of Sonar and FL Studio for over…

It is possible to simplify the interface by reducing the number of tools without necessarily removing functionality. The idea is to identify large sets of tools that can be replaced with a handful of powerful combinable tools to perform the same tasks - this is not always easy but if done well can end up not only simplifying UI but providing more powerful, intuitive tools and reducing unnecessary learning. I think Mo…

FWIW, for the 2D graphics packages I'd argue Acorn has tried to do this in generating shapes where it has an interface letting one chain-together and re-arrange actions.

(shameless plug) I've tried taking the approach of making a plugin for existing tools (Sketch, Sketchup, Photoshop, etc.) to make accessing the large set of tools easier via touch gestures at https://thimblemac.com . It also tracks most-recently-used tools.

Re: Show HN: An attempt to rethink a music sequencer design

#86

Post by archagon »

jdietrich wrote: post #82
archagon wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're an artist of sound and musical texture, then sure — a powerful DAW can't be replaced. But if you want to specifically focus on composition — harmony, melody, counterpoint — then a DAW becomes a looming, impenetrable fortress. In my experience, musical creativity thrives when you're able to iterate on your ideas in a rapid loop, adding and removing notes almost as quickly as you think of them. There is plent…

>There is plenty of room in the music software landscape for tools that focus entirely on placing notes instead of generating production-quality sound. There's already an industry standard for that - Avid Sibelius. If you're composing in a traditional manner, a DAW probably isn't the right tool. http://www.avid.com/sibelius

I've used Sibelius (and Finale) back in the day. For classical music, maybe it's indeed the right tool to use. But if you're writing modern music, with all its syncopation and irregularity, it's simply painful. Rests, dotted notes, and ties everywhere. Massive, piece-wide refactoring pains with even the smallest changes. Key signature horror. Obscure notation. Lack of true support for pitch bending and non-standard tunings. It's like trying to translate technical writing into a foreign language.

Classical notation was fantastic for use with pen & paper when music was much more conservative and on-the-beat. But we have computers now. We can come up with something better — whether it's software like StaffPad[1] as a first step or something even farther removed from classical paradigms.

I've also written a bit about this in my blog[2]. Frustration with classical notation was one of the reasons why I worked on my own "anti-DAW" music app. (Though it's a somewhat less ambitious project than Helio.)

[1]: http://staffpad.net

[2]: http://beta-blog.archagon.net/2016/02/05/composers-sketchpad...

Re: Show HN: An attempt to rethink a music sequencer design

#87

Post by tchaffee »

I was recently searching for a Linux sequencer and was disappointed with what's out there so this comes at a good time. It looks pretty nice and I'll try it out soon. Two suggestions: take a look Seq24 which is made for sequencing stuff in a live environment. You might find ideas to borrow from it. Also, on your github page you say "Most of the DAW interfaces often seem overcomplicated". But this isn't a DAW is it? I use both DAWs and sequencers and my DAW interface is complex, but needs to be because it deals with audio and there is a lot of tools I need to work with that audio. I think there is much more opportunity to keep sequencer interfaces clean because they do less.

Re: Show HN: An attempt to rethink a music sequencer design

#88

Post by MrLeap »

badosu wrote: post #64
MrLeap wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's pure data in this analogy? https://puredata.info/ A hex editor?

Well, pure data is a 'higher-level' sound programming environment, so it could be emacs.

Its hard for me to think about it as high level when you're adding sine waves together to make sounds.

Re: Show HN: An attempt to rethink a music sequencer design

#89

Post by jancsika »

MrLeap wrote: post #63
badosu wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There's vim as well: http://csound.github.io/"

What's pure data in this analogy? https://puredata.info/ A hex editor?

I'd imagine a hex editor for music would be like a chiptune tracker.

Pure Data's domain is digital signal processing, with an emphasis on sound. It's good for prototyping because one edits the signal graph, GUI, and event-triggered scripts in the same visual window using the same event loop.

So in a way it's good for building idiosyncratic little "musical hex editors": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rz1uNLHorEs

I say idiosyncratic because when you can connect anything to anything else, weird things start to happen. (For example, adding two more boxes to the diagram to control the crossfader with the pitch of someone's voice.)

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