So you want to generate interesting melodies. 1. Make a fi…

So you want to generate interesting melodies.

1. Make a file called 1235.txt containing, one per line, all 24 unique permutations of the elements 1 2 3 5.

Claude Shannon made this machine to play the hex board game.

It is literally just a mesh of resistors and some light bulbs. No logic gates, no programming, nothing at all resembling AI.

Check it out: https://t.co/Zoyc9TmBcN pic.twitter.com/EANeMosPhT
— Anosognosiogenesis (@pookleblinky) January 21, 2021

2. Cp 1235.txt to D.txt

3. Use sed to convert the numbers in D.txt to notes. Now you have 24 permutations of the major tetrachord in D.

4. Play them each. If it sounds like it increases tension, mark the beginning of that cell in 1235.txt with a +. If it sounds like it decreases tension, mark with a -.

Now those 24 melodic cells are divided into two groups: tension increasers and resolvers.

5. Rinse and repeat for all 12 keys.

You now have 13 plaintext files, filled with stuff like + 1 2 5 3 and - D E F# A

6. Figuratively roll dice to decide, given a +/- cell, what the next cell should be.

33% chance a + follows a +, etc.

Now you're outputting a stream of dynamic tensions: ++-+++-+-+---+ etc

7. Already this sounds good. It's got tension and release baked right into it.

Zero AI, it's literally just some plaintext files.

8. Return to step 6, except add in a separate dice roll for whether the next cell is to stay on the same scale, or move an interval above.

9. Now a cell like E D A F# has a chance to be followed by a tension-increasing cell a tritone higher. Or a tension resolving cell one chromatic step lower:

E D A F#
G# C# E D#

Etc.

10. Now the magic part: do the exact same thing you just did, except with those above pairs of cells instead of individual cells. Listen, mark as +/- if they increase or decrease tension.

And voila. Without any AI, not a single bit of fancy machine learning involved, literally just plaintext files and a text editor and utilities like rand and shuf, you're generating complex melodic lines with dynamic tension and release. Just a bunch of dice under the hood.

You can get fancier. Make a d.a.txt where you gsub the fifth to a flatted fifth, and toss that into the mix. Make a d.b.txt where you toss in a wild flatted seventh instead of a second. Add it to the mix.

You can, literally using just plaintext and rolling imaginary dice, generate basically infinite melodies that sound interesting, that have a dynamic flow that randomly selecting individual notes does not.

This is what I'm playing with at the moment.

Try it. Like it? Reward my incredible laziness.

https://t.co/aHjAaZYHrw

Try it.

Like it? Send me some rice or coffee.

Rice: https://t.co/TRTsg6UUwh

Coffee: https://t.co/1qrALS85xo
— Anosognosiogenesis (@pookleblinky) January 13, 2021

So you want to generate interesting melodies.

1. Make a file called 1235.txt containing, one per line, all 24 unique permutations of the elements 1 2 3 5.

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So you want to generate interesting melodies.1. Make a file called 1235.txt containing, one per line, all 24 unique permutations of the elements 1 2 3 5.

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So you want to generate interesting melodies.

1. Make a file called 1235.txt containing, one per line, all 24 unique permutations of the elements 1 2 3 5.