The First Usage of Sonic Pi

Today, I am going to show you how to use Sonic Pi program to produce music for anyone! For composers, for makers, for open-source music enthusiasts, for leisure time hobbies... That sounds good to us :D Special thanks for Sam Aaron!

The need list:

1. Your computer (Here I'll show on Windows, Raspbian (Raspberry Pi), Mac OS X)

2. Internet connection to download Sonic Pi

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Although Sonic Pi is open source program to prepare musics, you can make a donation today to help creator to do beautiful things again for you.

1. Open your web browser

2. Surf to http://sonic-pi.net/

3. Select your operating system

4. Download the program to your pc

On Windows, go to Start >> type "Sonic Pi" >> open the program >> write these codes:

play 60
sleep 1

>> volume up your speakers till between %60-70 or to your want >> Click on "RUN" button >> Enjoy!

You can use STOP button to stop the actual music, SAVE for saving the codes, REC for making the voice file.

Also, if the codes seem tiny, you can enlarge by clicking on SIZE- and SIZE+ buttons.

There are ALIGN, INFO, HELP, and PREFS buttons to use.

On preferences, you can modify your music editor's color, full screen, log options e.t.c.

Note: play 60 is the function that the note to play (as a MIDI number) then sleeps 1 second. The Sonic Pi Cheatsheet PDF file includes some detailed brief for notas.

On your Sonic Pi program, there are list view located on the bottom-left panel. Go to 3 Samples among others on the list, and choose whatever you want. I am sharing some example codes:

sample :loop_amen, norm: 1, decay: 1
sample :ambi_drone, beat_stretch: 1
wait 1.7
sample :loop_amen, norm: 1, decay: 1
sample :ambi_drone, beat_stretch: 1
wait 1.7
play 65, decay: 1

You can listen this sound with click on play on Sonic Pi program or listen the file my-recordings.wav which is attached.

On http://sonic-pi.net/ website, there are a lot of sample music codes. Such as longer track is like that: ACID WALK

in_thread do
  use_synth :fm
  sleep 2
  loop do
    28.times do
       sample :drum_bass_hard, amp: 0.8
       sleep 0.25
       play :e2, release: 0.2
       sample :elec_cymbal, rate: 12, amp: 0.6
       sleep 0.25
     end
     sleep 4
   end
 end
 use_synth :tb303
 with_fx :reverb do |rev|
   loop do
     control rev, mix: rrand(0, 0.3)
     with_fx :slicer, phase: 0.125 do
       sample :ambi_lunar_land, sustain: 0, release: 8, amp: 2
     end
     control rev, mix: rrand(0, 0.6)
     r = rrand(0.05, 0.3)
     64.times do
       play chord(:e3, :minor).choose, release: r, cutoff: rrand(50, 90), amp: 0.5
       sleep 0.125
     end
     control rev, mix: rrand(0, 0.6)
     r = rrand(0.1, 0.2)
     with_synth :prophet do
       32.times do
         sleep 0.125
         play chord(:a3, :m7).choose, release: r, cutoff: rrand(40, 130), amp: 0.7
       end
     end
     control rev, mix: rrand(0, 0.6)
     r = rrand(0.05, 0.3)
     32.times do
       play chord(:e3, :minor).choose, release: r, cutoff: rrand(110, 130), amp: 0.4
       sleep 0.125
     end
     control rev, mix: rrand(0, 0.6)
     with_fx :echo, phase: 0.25, decay: 8 do
       16.times do
         play chord([:e2, :e3, :e4].choose, :m7).choose, release: 0.05, cutoff: rrand(50, 129), amp: 0.5
         sleep 0.125
       end
     end
   end
 end

We can use samples to write more longer track codes like this:

use_debug false
bizet_bass = (ring :d, :r, :r, :a, :f5, :r, :a, :r)
#bizet_bass = (ring :d, :r, :r, :Bb, :g5, :r, :Bb, :r)
with_fx :reverb, room: 1, mix: 0.3 do
  live_loop :bizet do
    with_fx :slicer, phase: 0.125 do
      synth :blade, note: :d4, release: 8,
        cutoff: 100, amp: 1.5
    end
    16.times do
      tick
      play bizet_bass.look, release: 0.1
      play bizet_bass.look - 12, release: 0.3
      sleep 0.125
    end
  end
end
live_loop :ind do
  sample :loop_industrial, beat_stretch: 1,
    cutoff: 100, rate: 1
  sleep 1
end
live_loop :drums do
  sample :bd_haus, cutoff: 110
  synth :beep, note: 49, attack: 0,
    release: 0.1
  sleep 0.5
end
use_debug false
live_loop :low do |idx|
  #  idx = 0
  synth :zawa, wave: 1, invert_wave: 1, phase: 0.25, release: 5, note: :e1, cutoff: (range 60, 120, 10)[idx]
  sleep 4
  idx += 1
end
live_loop :lands, auto_cue: false do |idx|
  use_synth :dsaw
  use_random_seed 66679
  with_fx :reverb, room: 1  do
    16.times do
      ns = (scale :e2, :minor_pentatonic, num_octaves: 3)
      play ns.choose, detune: 12, release: 0.1, amp: 2, amp: rand + 0.5, cutoff: rrand(70, 120)
      sleep 0.125
    end
  end
end
live_loop :bikes do |idx|
  sleep 0.25
  sample :guit_em9, rate: -1
  sleep 7.75
end
live_loop :time, auto_cue: false do |idx|
  sample :bd_haus, amp: 2.5
  sleep 0.5
end

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That's all!

This presentation was recorded at GOTO Amsterdam 2014 http://gotoams.nl

Sam Aaron - Postdoc Researcher at The University of Cambridge & GOTO Fellow

This talk introduces Sonic Pi, a music language and environment running on the Raspberry Pi specifically focussed on introducing core Computer Science concepts for KS3 students.

NOTE: This instructable's step is aimed for visually impaired people to hear the sentences to learn what's going on here. Watch the video, it explains all steps.

NOTE: You can also listen the recorded musics on the video with voice.