h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

You may be interested in this little 'gizmo' I've been dabbling with.
There's been a video on YouTube for a couple of years:-

Original: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gR66Lk2x4UM

but I've finally got round to producing a set of tutorials which give more of an idea of what it can do:-

Recording: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8y0tOGMCAW4
Pitch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Z4PZ-0FP1k
Metronome: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxeDKSft3Cc
A Little Ditty: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puPvedHNZ2w

Phil.

If only I could view YouTube videos at work...

I'll try to look when I get home.

Well I've finally ported it into the 21st century - it's no longer a DOS-based/assembler program driving a MIDI card which is no longer made. It's now Windows-compatible and should drive any MIDI interface!

I've checked it out on a Windows XP system running a MidiSport 4x4 MIDI-USB adapter, but it should handle others. Would be interested to see if you can get it going on your PCs.

You can download it from my web site (www.philizound.co.uk).

It's not fully functional yet, but you can record, play, loop and pitch-shift sequences. There is no quantise command yet, so it's pretty impossible to synchronise sequences, hence not very practical, but at least it will give you a feel for what it can do!

Have fun, and please let me know if you get it working so I can keep you posted re. developments.
Many thanks,
Phil.

Hi again, just to let you know it's fully working now.

All you need is a PC and a MIDI keyboard. Once it's running, you never need to touch the PC keyboard or mouse - you control everything from the music keyboard (play, record, loop, overdub etc.), leaving you to concentrate on the music and not the PC, as with conventional sequencers. The PC is only used as a display device.

Would be very grateful for some feedback of any sort - good or bad!

Need to know if it's the coolest thing for creating catchy rhythms and generally having fun with a keyboard ...
... or just one of 'phil's follies'

Just to wet your appetite, here's some videos showing a Korg microKORG synthesiser driving, and being driven by, the new MkII Sequetron.

There are 3 demos showing how a few random doodlings can turn my rubbish playing into something promising:-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmAFele3HnY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5RPkizlG9E
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHoIvHy9uUI

and one showing how to configure the MIDI ports:-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0TXuUmJT2g

Hope you like them.
Phil.

Oh I seeeeee.... it's like a mega-flexible eight-track that can als manipulate the sounds too.

Yes, although it will go up to 16 tracks currently. There's no reason it can't go higher with the speed of modern PCs, but it's more a practical limit on how far your fingers can stretch to press the seq select keys.... and also how many your brain can juggle as it's all live
The Mk 1 only had 7 and that was plenty for me, although it wasn't able to drive multiple devices like this one can, so I can now see a use for dedicating a few tracks for a drum machine, say, and the rest driving a synth, etc.

Anyway, it's always been a problem explaining what the thing actually does, so many thanks for giving it some time

The new demos would have been better with a video of the actual music keyboard to show that I wasn't touching the PC, but murphy's law - the camcorder broke so had to rely on just the screen-capture video.

Phil.

Here's a new video with some better examples of what it can do, and how you drive it by *only* using the music keyboard:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzXlWUWEc0g