[theatreofnoise]

Hello, I recently came across some works by Brian Eno involving generative music. After a bit of research I found out he used a software by SSEYO called Koan, now discontinued. However the guys behind that project are now working on a software called Noatikl (most recent is v. 2) and - being honest - it has a lot of potential so far, even if I am a noob about midi programming.

I also found there's another music generator software called Nodal but I had no time to try it or read its manual... So can anyone point out the differences between those two softwares?

Also feel free to share your considerations about generative music!

[aeoR]

I prefer aleatoric music, but this seems like a nice concept.

[theatreofnoise]

Originally Posted by aeoR

I prefer aleatoric music, but this seems like a nice concept.

I agree with you - it really seems nice. I hope I will confirm this opinion once I will have spent some more time using this software, since right now mine is just a first impression.

Noatikl's manual doesn't help for sure, it isn't so precise about certain aspects and contains some errors... I think the only way to learn how to use it is, as always, experimenting.

I would like to find some Nodal users who can tell what's different from Noatikl though.

[Djreject]

Try Pure data or Max/msp

It's very user friendly (once you read the 10000 pages of tutorials lol)


I use it a lot to handle midi message in various ways

[st326]

I use generative techniques all the time, but it's very rare that I'll go all the way to a 100% generative track. In fact, I think I only ever did one, something chamber music-like that was inspired by Toccata in F by Widor that I wrote as theme music for a freind's web show. I wrote that in C++ using the RtMidi library -- I got the notes out back into Logic and then did some more conventional production that side to get it to sound right.

For my other stuff, I usually have one or two things going on that are either fully or partly generative. I've recently been using Reaktor a fair bit for this -- I love Spiral. I also use the midi filtering in Ableton a lot, which is actually pretty powerful if you stack it up carefully -- since I often want to still guide the generative stuff with something I've played manually, this actually works pretty well.

I've written a couple of things with Max, but I'm not in love with it. I don't like the way it represents note on and note off information at a very low level which makes it really difficult to avoid stuck notes and other similar issues.

[agargara]

Have you seen the "Patternarium"? It makes generative electronic music loops that evolve based on the votes of users.

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[Broton42]

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Tim Exile's tumblr, timblr, has some nice projects of his especially the one I just linked.

[gbsr]

though it's not technically generative, here's a little tutorial on how to use euclidean rhythms with live (your daw of choice, i see):

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there's also ta thread on the live fora about generative music, which i mirrored here:
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since you are using live, take a look at some rhythms and how rhythms works, and put together some midi racks using some arpeggiators and some scale plugins and you are well on your way.
there are lots of maxmsp/maxforlive/pure data patches available doing that thing, and there's tons of books and papers on the subject as well. but yeah, read up some rhtyhms and rhytmical patterns + scales and different modes and you should be set.

for good measure; get an audio->cc envelope plugin and send the cc to FM modulation with SAMPLER, crack open a beer and go "look mom, AUTECHRE WITH NO HANDS!".

[I/O_Madness]

Autechre has done generative stuff on some of their albums... I've never heard of Noatikl, but I use Max/MSP and it's a cool program that you could do stuff like that in. It's a little steep learning if you don't know programming, but not too bad.

[RFJ]

I'd like to know a little more about nodal.

Like has anyone used it and what are your thoughts. The only reviews I can find on it are older before the most curent version and don't speak to the quality of it's synth.

From what I can tell they upgraded it's capibilities quite a bit with ver 1.8.

Was going to make a thread about it but thought I'd ask here first.

[shadowform]

I use some software called Mixtikle which is an extension of Noatikle. Noatikle generates the audio and patterns contained in cells and Mixtikle generates the combinations of cells and the structure if the piece.

I have it on my iPad, (I think you can get it for pc too), and I've used layers of generative stuff in tracks made in Nuendo.

I think generative music is really cool and definitely shouldn't be mistaken as a shortcut, the stuff in Mixtikle at least, in my opinion, is often more involved and technically more complicated than traditional composition methods.

[Evelon]

I enjoy using Buzz for making generative compositions. There are some really quirky and fun machines, triggers, remote/peer controllers, etc.

Also, I really like xoxos' (Rurik Leffanta) midi VSTs aswell. Most of them are free(ware)!

[theatreofnoise]

Are there any iOS apps that can do that?

I mean not playing sounds but sending generative midi messages to a computer.

[I/O_Madness]

Originally Posted by theatreofnoise

Are there any iOS apps that can do that?

I mean not playing sounds but sending generative midi messages to a computer.

There's this app by Cycling 74 if you have Max/MSP, which allows you to set up GUI's in Max and use them on your iPad. The control data gets sent to your computer, and from there you could make something that does generative stuff.

If it's going to a computer anyway, there's not really a need for the ipad to do the processing of the algorithm.

[theatreofnoise]

Originally Posted by I/O_Madness

There's this app by Cycling 74 if you have Max/MSP, which allows you to set up GUI's in Max and use them on your iPad. The control data gets sent to your computer, and from there you could make something that does generative stuff.

If it's going to a computer anyway, there's not really a need for the ipad to do the processing of the algorithm.

Unfortunately I haven't got Max, looking forward to get Max4Live w/ the next update to Suite 9.

I started this thread as I first downloaded a demo of Noatikl which I couldn't get working so I gave up. I have found some pretty interesting stuff for Reaktor 5 though.

Another thing I'm willing to try is Nodal, if anyone has an opinion about it I'd like to read one.

As for the iPad I just wanted to know if there was something similar that had a more straight hands-on approach.