Norns: ideas

[GoneCaving]

Not that I’m aware of, but you’ve got me thinking about what I’d want from such a thing. Must get off my ass and start trying Norns development.

[P1505]

If I owned an Arc…

[bradfromraleigh]

Well, here are two variations of an Arc-centric sequencer that I was pondering this week complete with potential names (although, I am terrible at choosing names for things). Nothing really groundbreaking, but seems like an interesting way to use Arc.

EDIT: reversed the order of scripts in order of which one I think is better

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TERN
// Play Kria with an Arc. Works with Grid.

• POSITION - [single track-mode] encoder 1 or 4 generates a global trigger and advances a Kria sequence either forwards or backwards for a single track (the remaining encoders can be mapped to the following parameters…); [multi-track mode] each encoder steps through Kria tracks 1-4 respectively (all other parameters are available in Parameter screen)
• DIVISIONS - same as above (would override or possibly be in addition to Kria division/speed controls)
• SCALE - rotates through Kria scales
• PATTERN - rotates through Kria user saved patterns
• TRACK - (for single-track mode) changes the track being controlled by Arc
• FRICTION - from Ansible Cycles for position encoder
• STEP SPEED - sensitivity or speed of the position encoder
• TRACK SYNC - tracks are stepped through in-sync or asynchronously

Use case: I think is fairly self-explanatory but basically you can “play” through a Kria track by manually rotating an encoder on Arc. Works with Grid to program a sequence in the traditional Kria style and “scroll” through with Arc meandering in different directions at whatever pace is appropriate. Clock sync enables you to skip sequence steps without turning them off, ratcheting. Friction allows you to “keep the plates spinning” to whatever degree you want for the individual sequences in single-track or multi-track mode.

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SWEEP
// An Arc controlled arpeggiator where triads and chords are played in a “sweep-picking” approach

• POSITION - encoder 1 or 4 on the Arc; specifies which note in the scale is played; bidirectional(remaining encoders can be user defined to any of the below parameters)
• LENGTH - controls the resolution or number of notes triggered in a full rotation of the POSITION encoder
• SCALE - major, minor, etc. and USER SCALE; the scale defines the triad/chord structure of various degrees in the scale
• DEGREE - I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII and beyond
• KEY - chromatic and detonable
• DIVISIONS - option to sync note triggers to internal/external clock divisions with user ability to mask certain divisions (i.e., mask anything with repeats too fast or too slow for the piece, mask triplets, etc.); allows certain notes to be skipped over, ratchetting * USER SCALE - user defined scale via pitch or chromatic scale and note masking… open to ideas here
• FRICTION - friction function from Ansible Cycles
• TRIANGLE/SAW - wave function from Ansible Cycles
• PRESETS - implementation of rudimentary preset saving and recall for Grid (i.e., one Grid button equals one preset)

Use case: player sweeps through various triad or chord notes in a scale while simultaneously being able to control which scale DEGREE they are playing, the octave range of the sweeps through LENGTH, the DIVISION of triggers for a clock, and the amount of FRICTION applied to the POSITION encoder.

[junklight]

I’m torn between keeping the norns and grid and building my own sequencer to control Eurorack throw crow, or selling up and buying a Polyend Seq.

So sadly no idea about Crow - waiting for it as patiently as I can…

however I went the other way - I had a Seq, it made me realise the possibilities of a grid as a control and I sold it and bought Norns and a Grid. I’ve been using Fh-1 to control the eurorack from my Norns.

Obviously your millage may vary - I really liked the Seq but it’s very ‘traditional’ in terms of its sequencing whereas the Norns is very open ended which suits me better. I tend to make a lot more generative kind of systems with my sequencers.

[SimonKirby]

Can you say a little more about how you’re using Norns and FH-1 to sequence? I’m also interested in this. I have ansible and teletype so it might be a bit ridiculous to add a norns for yet more grid based generative sequencing. But… it’s kind of addictive!

I’d also like to use norns as an external audio processor for the modular but am unclear on things like audio levels in and out and syncing.

[junklight]

Can you say a little more about how you’re using Norns and FH-1 to sequence

so like you I have teletype and sensible too so they are my usual routes

However - iConnectMidi2 routing from Norns to FH1 - it can be a bit fiddly with USB so I normally just use my usb midi interface on the Norns - which is an Emu midi 1x1 (the main downside of which is that it looks so much like an ordinary midi cable I can never find it when it’s not plugged into something). FH-1 is stupid powerful and like all expert-sleepers stuff needs the full manual every time you change something so most of the time I just figure out channels and CCs that give me what I want and use the defaults. So you’ve got 4 channels of cv/gate or a couple of cv/gate and a 4 cc -> cv kind of thing.

[junklight]

I’d also like to use norns as an external audio processor for the modular but am unclear on things like audio levels in and out and syncing.

audio levels - all my modular audio runs out of the modular straight into my audio interfaces with headphone adapters - it’s kind of a hot signal so better to input it into something with a level control or a pad but it’s fine. (note: I tend to route everything via either Ableton or AUM on the iPad - just because it’s more flexible. I keep pondering getting a proper mixer again but they are big and are basically exactly what I have but need more space)

For my Norns audio in - my current setup (see video in latest tracks) - I’ve got a Komplete Audio 6 setup so two channels are a ‘send’ to my Norns and 2 are a return - in this case running from my iPad - works really nicely

Syncing - I either use midi or midi -> cv via something or other. Sometimes just have a midi loop playing 8ths (or some other more interesting pattern) into one channel of FH-1. but one of these days I’m going to build a little box around a teensy that just handles midi/gates Cvs and nothing else - basically a clock mult!

[P1505]

How do you find ansible? I want to keep the grid, or the grid style controls, but have decided to keep as much in the rack as I can. For a drone/texture box for example can ansible play itself, keep playing back pre composed sequences?

The Seq interests me because of the size of the grid. But it is less elegant than the Monome grid, and aesthetic is very important to me. I’m massively shallow.

If ansible can allow me to keep the grid for sequencing I’d go that route.

[junklight]

How do you find ansible? I want to keep the grid, or the grid style controls, but have decided to keep as much in the rack as I can. For a drone/texture box for example can ansible play itself, keep playing back pre composed sequences?

I really like Ansible - I bought it after I bought the Grid. The penny dropped that meadow physics was much more flexible than the Make Noise Tempi which I kind of had my eye on at that time. However Kria wormed its way into my heart (so much so that I ported it to the Norns) - I really like sequencers with meta features like Kria. Kria is an amazing and very deep sequencer

The Seq interests me because of the size of the grid. But it is less elegant than the Monome grid, and aesthetic is very important to me. I’m massively shallow.

It is definitely a very beautiful object - nice to play and if I had more money I would own it as well as the monome gear

If ansible can allow me to keep the grid for sequencing I’d go that route.

obviously I can’t say which is better for you - because I’m me :-). I only commented because I went in the exact opposite direction than you which I found interesting. If you like pre-composed stuff then the Seq is going to be good for you for sure. I’m very much into generative and improvised kind of stuff and much as I love listening to sequenced stuff it’s not a big part of my music making - I like weird sequencers that evolve and change

[P1505]

Evolve and change, for the texture aspect of what I’m trying to do, is what I want. I’ll try that. I can buy another sequencer for precomposed percussion stuff later.

Done! Ansible will be ordered. Thanks

[junklight]

Kria works beautifully for that - there is a second note page for each main note page (you say you have Norns? have you played with Awake? that’s the same idea in a much simpler context) - you can also set what is essentially a clock divider for every separate element of the sequencer (it turns out porting code is the best way to learn something inside out ;-)) and you can have everything running with different phases. If you slow it right down you can get some lovely shifting ambiences

(the best percussion sequencer device I’ve got is still the digitakt - again very very playable and with all the trigger condition stuff you can get some very organic sounding rhythms going on)

[doomglue]

+100

I am currently exploring tunings, intervals with sine tones in the ER301 but wonder if this couldn’t be done more efficiently and focussed as a Norns patch as the recipe is rather simple.

If the usage of Scala scales is hard to implement I think a bank of freely sine waves could be nice, maybe 8, 12 or 16 voices to be able to integrate the grid, a few envelopes and LFOs.

Maybe I am even missing something and a script like that or with parts of this idea exists by now?

[mimetaur]

As far as a bunch of sine waves to use any way you like, check out this script and the associated engine:

catfact/zebra/blob/master/crowns.lua

It’s straightforward and gives you 64 sine waves. (You do have to manage the voice allocation yourself in your lua script.)

[ess]

I have this dumb idea of squeezing in a 4ch tracker into norns.

[mimetaur]

Are people finding generative sketches for Norns fun? (I’m thinking about libraries like Rebound and Circles)

I’ve got a collection of generative music studies on GitHub based on algorithms and simulations that I made in my final semester of grad school. I’m calling them “worldlets” — micro-simulations using say, physics or particle systems. Some are purely generative, and others are playable (steerable?) with an Arc or midi controller.

Putting them in the library would feel more like releasing an “EP that only plays on a Norns” than a “musical instrument.” But if there’s interest I’ll clean them up and release them in the library.

[Jonny]

That would be great. The more, the merrier. They may also lead to new ideas for other scripts.

[mimetaur]

Cool! That gets me thinking… maybe we should do a compilation of generative music for Norns. Like each “track” is a lua file.

[mimetaur]

(Or with this new exploration into engine switching at runtime that @neauoire has been doing, we could do it all in one file with a slick interface!)

[neauoire]

I was just making @tehn’s SpaceTime generative patch into a 2D sequencing language.

neauoire/paradox

[neauoire]

I spend an unreasonable amount of time making silly scripts that have nothing to do with music. How about we make a thread for these small experiments?

Etch N’ Sketch

cough

I have an actual idea for the Maiden tool. I would love it if cmd . would stop the currently running script. I have no idea how to implement this, but it would be really nice to have.