For a while now, I’ve had an idea to try and make some music using only white noise (and filters/effects). This week we had a (online) music night at work so I decided to give it a go. I borrowed some ideas (like Sam’s Ocean example in Sonic Pi), played around a bit, and came up with this: https://vimeo.com/443175085 (the code is below).
I decided to name it Tropical Island after one of the comments (“I feel I’ve been on a choppy journey through space and ended up on a tropical island”). There are quite a few mistakes, and the audio gets a bit crackly at one point, but I was running late so didn’t have time to redo it.
Please do comment if you have any ideas for other sounds that might sound good and can be made from white noise.
Hope you enjoy it.
Here’s the code:
# I set myself a challenge to code a piece using only white noise.
# White noise contains equal amounts of energy at every (audible) frequency.
# It sounds like this:
#synth :noise
# Not very musical.
# But... it contains every frequency, so every possible sound or piece of music
# is hidden in there somewhere... you just have to filter out the parts you don't want.
# I will use no source of sound other than "synth :noise", passing it through different
# filters and effects to try to create something that sounds a bit less like noise...
# To run this, progressively comment out the "stop"s in each live_loop, hitting run each time...
use_bpm 96
with_fx :reverb, room: 0.8 do
live_loop :waves do
stop
s = synth :noise, cutoff: rrand(50, 110), amp: rrand(0.03, 0.1), attack: rrand(1, 4), sustain: rrand(0, 2), release: rrand(1, 5), slide: rrand(1, 5)
control s, cutoff: rrand(50, 110)
sleep rrand(2,4)
end
end
live_loop :tick, delay: 0.01 do
sleep 4
end
live_loop :bd, sync: :tick do
stop
with_fx :reverb, room: 0.4, amp: 0.3 do
with_fx :rlpf, cutoff: 35 do
2.times do
synth :noise, release: 0.1, amp: 0.5, amp: 150
sleep 1
synth :noise, release: 0.1, amp: 0.5, amp: 50
sleep 1
synth :noise, release: 0.1, amp: 0.5, amp: 100
sleep 1.5
synth :noise, release: 0.1, amp: 0.5, amp: 100
sleep 0.5
end
end
end
end
live_loop :hats, sync: :tick do
stop
with_fx :reverb, room: 0.3, amp: 0.3 do
with_fx :hpf, cutoff: 90 do
16.times do
synth :noise, release: 0.05, amp: 0.5, on: spread(9, 16).tick
sleep 0.25
end
end
end
end
live_loop :hi, sync: :tick do
stop
with_fx :reverb, room: 0.6, amp: 0.3 do
with_fx :hpf, cutoff: 110 do
16.times do
synth :noise, release: 0.02, amp: 0.5, on: spread(11, 16).tick
sleep 0.25
end
end
end
end
live_loop :mid, sync: :tick do
stop
with_fx :reverb, room: 0.3, amp: 0.3 do
with_fx :bpf, centre: 60, res: 0.9 do
8.times do
synth :noise, release: 0.1, amp: 30, on: spread(3, 8).tick
sleep 0.5
end
end
end
end
live_loop :rhythm, sync: :tick do
stop
c = [(chord :c3, :maj),
(chord :a3, :min),
(chord :f3, :maj),
(chord :g3, :maj)].tick
p = (ring 1, 0.5, 0.25).stretch(4).look
with_fx :reverb, room: 0.8, amp: 0.5 do
with_fx :slicer, phase: p, smooth: 0.01 do
with_fx :octaver, mix: 0.2 do
c.each do |n|
with_fx :rbpf, centre: n, res: 0.992 do
synth :noise, sustain: 2, release: 2, amp: 25
end
end
end
end
end
sleep 4
end
live_loop :melody, sync: :tick do
stop
use_random_seed [2000, 88000, 7000, 9000].tick(:x)
16.times do
n = scale(:c, :major_pentatonic).choose
with_fx :octaver, mix: 0.2 do
with_fx :rbpf, centre: n, res: 0.995 do
synth :noise, release: 0.5, amp: 12, on: bools(1,1,1,0).choose
sleep 0.5
end
end
end
end
live_loop :melody2, sync: :tick do
stop
use_random_seed [260000, 810000, 920000, 47000].tick(:x)
16.times do
n = scale(:c6, :major_pentatonic).choose
with_fx :octaver, mix: 0.2 do
with_fx :rbpf, centre: n, res: 0.995 do
synth :noise, release: 0.25, amp: 3 if one_in(2)
sleep 0.25
end
end
end
end
)
