MIDI IN

I first made e-ther because I wanted to play it as a theremin-like instrument. The ways that people are finding to use it is blowing me away.  Here's Josh explaining Granulator and using e-ther to control its parameters. It's hi-tec and very effective.  The movable piece of wood to hold the horizontal control is low-tec but equally effective! e-ther:  https://peacockmedia.software/e-ther/

I haven't gone out of my way to send free stuff to influential Youtubers. I don't always enjoy those videos. When someone has bought the product, the review is way more genuine. I've enjoyed Kale's videos for a long time, He enjoys building, collecting and experimenting with musical instruments from didgeridoos to modular synth components.  I was delighted when he ordered an e-ther with no prompting from me. Here are his unboxing and his first experiments with the device.

 The default configuration for MIDISID  looks fine and is functional. I have fitted wooden cheeks to my own, which gives it a look and tilts the top forward, making it a little easier to use when you're sitting back from it. MIDISID was designed from the start with 'bring your own box' in mind. It's a modular design, the top and bottom parts are easily separated and connect with a 4-way jst-sh cable. In my head I saw it being used in a sloping-top case. Paul of Bad Dog Designs has come up with a different solution. It achieves the same goal - tipping the controls and screen forward. It's a 3D print in two parts. It takes zero effort to fit - MIDISID just drops in. I don't know whether he has made the design files public but  please contact him  if you're interested. Update Nov '23 The current version of MIDISID is now larger, has a tilted front and custom side supports: Owners are still being creative with enclosures. Here's a beautiful one from  @k...

This is an original tune that goes back a long way and if you rummage through my older videos you'll find versions (sometimes called Eastern Promise) played using real C64 (3 voices).   This time I wanted to use MIDISID and make a multitracked version using SID voices. It still doesn't use a large number of voices. There are six tracks in Logic, including two percussion tracks which somehow aren't shown in the video, and I'm mostly using polyphonic mode but I think the chords just have two or three notes.   The only effect I've applied is a little reverb on the recorder. The rest is as captured from the back of MIDISID.The advantage of multitracking is that you can set the relative levels of the voices, which is hard to do with SID when you're using different sounds using different waveforms.   More info about MIDISID:  https://peacockmedia.software/midisid/

The first MIDISID batch ('earlybird' pricing) have now all gone, I have the materials for the second batch and the first of those are now made.  There are now black and purple editions. At risk of going all Tim Cook, the black really does look gorgeous. Hardware-wise they're hardly altered but the firmware ('MIDISID OS') has come a long way, new features include: you can set glide speed modwheel support; choose vibrato, filter cutoff or pulse width Increases the range of vibrato, to enable spooky effects Now supports RPN 0 messages - for setting the pitch bend range. (This was important for getting my tiny MIDI theremin working - see https://twitter.com/midi_in_out/status/1574870874158764035 ) ( The manual is here in case you'd like to read about all of the features.) I'll shortly be mailing those who have bought MIDISID already with details for the new firmware. Giveaway Because I'm an idiot, I (genuinely) accidentally bought a second copy of @C64Audio...

No music video this week, I have a piece of music which I am really happy with, but I'd rather give it another week and make it better than rush something out half-baked. So here's what happened with my first attempt at an 'enclosure' for MIDISID .  I like the idea of a slanted-front box with wooden sides, but I had the idea of angling the top by just adding wooden sides.  Here's the first go. It's simply a rectangle of scrap wood, around 65mm x 100mm, cut at an angle through the centre to make two identical pieces. Sanded and waxed.  I made the angle brackets (10mm x 10mm x 50mm) from a chip tube. (Later found to be a little bit flexible, would be better cut from metal). They're drilled with smaller holes for tiny self-tapping screws, and bigger (3mm) holes for the mounting holes in MIDISD's PCBs. Note that MIDISID comes apart for installing in a box or enclosure. The top part is connected to the bottom with a standard JST-SH 4-way cable, you can buy a ...

During the week I learned that SCUMMVM (which allows you to play a large selection of adventure games) has options for routing the music to a device of your choice, while still playing speech and sound effects through the computer. (I'm guessing there was a small window in time when games stored their music as MIDI and also had sampled effects and speech.) There are some things that I want to add. This of course relies on the audio being available as MIDI within the game. I found other games that didn't work this way. When it worked, it worked surprisingly well and is fun. But like playing .mid files into MIDISID, it's not perfect. Because of the limitations and the way that it maps the channels, sometimes parts of the music are lost.  (This is part of the reason why I edited the DOTT intro.) This applies to playing .mid files too, although with .mid files you have the option of editing the files a little to get more from them. It's easy to find the .mid files for the m...