Trackers for Music Kit 2

[Tom]

Hello,

I think there were several people working on trackers for Paul Slocum's Music Kit 2. Did any of these projects ever reach a state where it was usable ?

Cheers

Thomas

[djmips]

Pardon my ignorance, I've heard of trackers before but I've forgotten what they are. Are you talking about an editor on a PC to edit music for the 2600 (specifically for Pauls driver?)

 

My idea was to use a standard MIDI editor that I already have (such as Steinburg Cubasis) and then write a tool to convert to 2600 format... hmmm I just had an interesting thought. How about a TIA synth VST instrument for steinburg. I seem to recall that someone has already done one for the SID....

 

Supercat mentioned some idea about automatically 'arranging' tunes for the 2600's limited frequency set.

[Tom]

Pardon my ignorance, I've heard of trackers before but I've forgotten what they are.

They're programs to compose music, typically they have an interface like this : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ScreamTracker (Scream Tracker was a fairly famous tracker that ran under DOS). The Amiga / PC trackers usually worked with sampled sounds, but for instance the C64 trackers of course use the SID.

 

Are you talking about an editor on a PC to edit music for the 2600 (specifically for Pauls driver?)

Yes. Several people have worked on such editors, including a friend of mine who made the sound for this intro : http://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=13900. That editor has never really reached a usable state. First of all it doesn't optimize the tune (it allows you to enter duplicated patterns, which is ok, but it should optimize them away) and second it needs an emulator to play the sound, which is inconvenient.

 

My idea was to use a standard MIDI editor that I already have (such as Steinburg Cubasis) and then write a tool to convert to 2600 format...  hmmm I just had an interesting thought. How about a TIA synth VST instrument for steinburg. I seem to recall that someone has already done one for the SID....

 

It's neither hard to write a VST plugin nor is it hard to rip out the sound emulation part out of a 2600/7800 emulator (at least Stella and emu7800 are kept fairly modular), so that could probably be done quickly, although I think an editor that is tailored to Paul's music driver would be more useful.

Edited January 5, 2006 by Tom

[rasty]

I think there were several people working on trackers for Paul Slocum's Music Kit 2. Did any of these projects ever reach a state where it was usable ?

Bringing back an old topic...

 

Well, I was searching around whether there have been any progresses on music players for the 2600 after Paul's Music Kit 2 (either a new player or an editor)... and it doesn't seem to be the case! (feel free to correct me thou )

 

I'm actually one of those who've started an editor/tracker for MK2 but never got it in a usable state. I've actually used it to compose the few seconds of music in Bounce!'s demo version.

 

I don't think that I'll ever manage to get my editor in a decent state since, as I recall it, it was quite a mess.. but I may think about some sort of a mod converter. Gotta look back into it!

 

Would that interest anyone besides me?

 

Ciao!

Rasty.-

 

EDIT: now I recall why I haven't tried a mod2MusicKit converter before... it's really a too different approach!

So, that probably won't happen for now...!

Edited April 16, 2009 by rasty

[B00daW]

A tracker resembling RMT or Raster Music Tracker for the two channels would be nice; since we'd need to create custom table-based instruments utilizing all the different TIA waveform "instruments". I think standard music notation wouldn't be very helpful since much of the frequencies are detuned. A vertical tracker would be better with named instruments for the two vertical channels. 01 .. 01 .. 01 .. 0F .. 0F .. 12 (vertically) and so on; hex values referencing a tracker instrument. However within the instrument editor the notation cheatsheet could apply to the creation of instruments to give the user a little edge knowing what notes are available for each instrument in the instrument making process. When the frequency value is selected it could be moused-over or displayed elsewhere that it equates to the frequency.

 

But furthermore... What about the other couple TIA music engines that don't have open source yet? Where are they and why aren't they released already for great music justice?

[miker]

Agreed! - something like RMT (or such) for TIA-chip is way to go.

[doctorclu]

Pardon my ignorance, I've heard of trackers before but I've forgotten what they are. Are you talking about an editor on a PC to edit music for the 2600 (specifically for Pauls driver?)

 

My idea was to use a standard MIDI editor that I already have (such as Steinburg Cubasis) and then write a tool to convert to 2600 format... hmmm I just had an interesting thought. How about a TIA synth VST instrument for steinburg. I seem to recall that someone has already done one for the SID....

 

Supercat mentioned some idea about automatically 'arranging' tunes for the 2600's limited frequency set.

 

Currently tinkering with the Atari Flashback Portable and wondered if anything ever became of the audio tracker or music makers for the Atari 2600? Did any of the ideas ever happen in the last seven years?

[Kylearan]

 

Currently tinkering with the Atari Flashback Portable and wondered if anything ever became of the audio tracker or music makers for the Atari 2600? Did any of the ideas ever happen in the last seven years?

 

I have made a new sound routine and accompanying PC tracker for the Atari 2600: http://atariage.com/forums/topic/250014-tiatracker-a-new-sound-routine-and-sequencer-application/

 

Several musicians and demo creators have used it successfully already.