Music Lang

A draft of a language to program write music ! (and dump it to MIDI format using mido)

// starting from a3
c c g g a a g  // whitespace is ignored
f f e e d d c  // can you guess the tune ? 

Only the above works for now, future features are listed below.

How to use

Clone this repo and do

python -m midi <my-text-file>

to generate a .mid file that you can then read with your favorite media player.

Notes

Notes are single-letter symbols using their anglo-saxon names (A-G == from la to sol). You can add the exact octave to play:

// a3 is default
a 
// == 
a3

If no octave is provided, the interpreter will deduce one from the default note reference (a3 by default).

Rhythm

Each note has a duration. The default duration is 1, == a noire.

Follows that:

• 1/2 une croche;
• 1/4 une double;
• 2 une blanche;

and so on. You can set a specific note's duration with <note>/<duration>:

c c g g a a g/2
f f e e d d c/2

Add a dot at the end of the duration to eg have a croche pointée:

g/1/2.

Alterations

Simply <note>_[b#]:

c_b
c_#

Blocks

Blocks allow you to control default duration & reference frequency as you would scopes:

{
    !/2  // set the default duration to croche for this block
    c c g g
}

Repetitions

a * 3 // repeat notes
{ a a } * 3 // or entire blocks

Loops

loop 35 times {
    c c g g
}

Phrases

Describe and reuse phrases here and there!

theme = {
    !/1
    c c g g a a g/2
    f f e e d d c/2
}

couplet = { g g f f e e d/2 }

theme
couplet
couplet
theme

Plusieurs portées ?

Plusieurs fichiers duh

Ou sinon

// Portée 1
a a b b
---
// Portée 2
c c d d

Plusieurs voix sur une meme portée ?

Ideas welcome

See more unstructured ideas.