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119 lines
5.1 KiB
Markdown
119 lines
5.1 KiB
Markdown
# Poly
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Polyrhythmically-inclinded drum generator.
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# Motivation
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I'm a guitar player, and I use tablature notation editors such as Guitar Pro a lot. However, it gets complicated fast to write a polyrhythmic/polymetric drum parts as shifts tend to go over the bar lines. The other property of such parts is: it tend to unfold in a simple way from simple ideas such as "I want to create a drum part that will have a 3 against 4 feel with a kick drum against a snare drum". The other way to think about it is that it has a simple blueprint, but it's tricky to express in the western musical notation. This is why `Poly` exists. I wanted to have a simple tool to workshop/brainstorm rhythmic ideas and evaluate them by having a MIDI playback. I'm into modern progressive rock/metal music, fusion, so it all applies very well. I have an impression it may be useful for indian carnatic music as well, but I would like to get some insightful confirmation on that.
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# Usage
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Poly runs as an executable with the desired command line options. The available options are as follows:
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```
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Usage: poly [OPTIONS]
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Options:
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-K, --kick <KICK>
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Kick drum pattern
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-S, --snare <SNARE>
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Snare drum pattern
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-H, --hi-hat <HIHAT>
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Hi-Hat pattern
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-C, --crash <CRASH>
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Crash cymbal pattern
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-t, --tempo <TEMPO>
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Tempo value [default: 120]
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-s, --time-signature <TIME_SIGNATURE>
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Time signature [default: 4/4]
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-o, --output-file <OUTPUT>
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Output file path, make a dry run if omitted
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-B, --follow-kick-drum-with-bass
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Generate a second MIDI track for the bass following the kick drum
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-h, --help
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Print help
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-V, --version
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Print version
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```
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Poly uses a simple DSL (Domain-specific language) for drum patterns. For a more detailed explanation, go to [DSL Overview](#dsl-overview).
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Let's say you want to tell if two patterns will converge and how soon. We'll start with a 3 against 4. The first pattern would be a series of 8th notes on the kick drum
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```
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poly --kick '8x--x--' --snare '4-x'
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```
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Output
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```
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No output file path was supplied, running a dry run...
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Converges over 3 bars
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```
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We haven't provided an `--output-file` / `-o` parameter, so `poly` made a dry run. It tells us it will converge in 3 bars. Let's see how it will look in the MIDI file by adding an output.
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```
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poly --kick '8x--x--' --snare '4-x' -o out.mid
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```
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Output
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Converges over 3 bars
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out.mid was written successfully
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```
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Poly operates under an assumption, that it's easy to replicate a pattern that converges over a finite number of bars in the DAW or tablature editor, so it only generates 3 bars of drums in this case. On Mac OS, I usually do something in lines of `poly <OPTIONS> -o out.mid && open out.mid` or `poly <OPTIONS> -o out.mid && open -a 'Guitar Pro 7' out.mid`.
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This way it defaults to 4/4 as a time signature, but we may want to interpret this rhythmic pattern in 3/4 for example. Let's try it:
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```
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poly --time-signature '3/4' --kick '8x--x--' --snare '4-x' -o out.mid && open -a 'Guitar Pro 7' out.mid
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```
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Output:
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```
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Converges over 2 bars
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out.mid was written successfully
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```
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Now we can see it converges in 2 bars, not 3. Honestly, I like the 4/4 host time signature better. Let's get back to it. Also, we can add a crash cymbal and hi-hat patterns too, also we can make it just a bit livelier by increasing the tempo:
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```
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poly --time-signature '4/4' --tempo 138 --crash '4x---' --hi-hat '8-xxx' --kick '8x--x--' --snare '4-x' -o out.mid
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```
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That's cool, but let's make it even more useful by adding a blueprint for the bass track. Simple way of doing that is to make bass follow the kick drum. `Poly` has an option to do this called `-B`/`--follow-kick-drum-with-bass`. Let's add it to the previous command to add the bass track to the output file:
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```
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poly --time-signature '4/4' --tempo 138 --crash '4x---' --hi-hat '8.t-xxx' --kick '8x--x--' --snare '4-x' -o out.mid -B
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```
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Now we have two tracks in the output file and you can change the bass notes to create an expected harmonic context.
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# DSL overview
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Any pattern can be described by a series of note groups. All note in the note group have the same length. Possible lengths are:
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* `1` - Whole note
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* `2` - Half note
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* `4` - Fourth note
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* `8` - Eighth note
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* `16` - Sixteenth note
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* `32` - Thirty secondth note
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* `64` - Sixty Fourth note
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* `.` - dotted note (meaning it has 1.5 length of the unmodified duration). Dot should be applied after the basic length like this: `8.`
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* `t` - Triplet notes, should be applied after basic lengths and dots. e.g. `4.t` means triplets of dotted fourth notes.
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Now let's talk about the drums. `Poly` has a logic similar to a drum machine, so we only concern ourselves with drum hits and rests:
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* `x` - Hit
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* `-` - Rest
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Let's compose a few simple note groups:
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* `4x` - a group of one fourth note.
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* `8.-x` a group of a rest and a drum hit. Both rest and hit have a length of 8th dotted note each.
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...
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## Guitar pro remarks
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Don't forget to quantize MIDI imports to 64th notes as it gets increasingly crazier as we get into the wilder note groupings:
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