Sonic Pi - Lesson 3

Lesson Objectives 

• Be able to add effects to your track.
• Modify Effects and set parameters that the computer can work between

Modern synthesizers have the ability to add effects to sounds. Sonic Pi is no different: you are able to add studio effects such as reverb, echo and distortion. Of course you have to use code to add the effects!

1. In a new worksheet find a sample that you like, for example sample :guit_e_fifths
   
   
2. Wrap the sample in an effects block like this:
   
   with_fx :reverb do sample :guit_e_fifths end
   
   
3. You can add effects on top of effects like this:
   
   with_fx :reverb do with_fx :distortion do sample :guit_e_fifths end end
   
   
4. Play around with some effects and add them to your music. Remember that a complete list of effects can be found in the help section of Sonic Pi under FX.

MODIFYING PARAMETERS

On occasion, you might like to make sounds play for a longer time or at a different rate. This can be achieved easily by modifying the parameters of the code you are using.

Take play 60, for example.

1. Click on help to open the help documents, then select lang on the left hand side, and scroll down toplay. You will see some examples of its use. So far you have used play without any parameters; let's use some now.
2. In a new worksheet type:
   
   play 60, attack: 1, release: 3
   
   
3. Press the play button to hear how that one note sounds. Attack and release control the amplitude of a note over time.
   
   
4. Now change the values for attack and release to see how those parameters affect the note.

There are lots of parameters that can also change the way samples or synths sound. Try changing the values for cutoff:, pan:, rate: or amp:.

For a full list of parameters for each sample, click on the Help icon, followed by Samples. Select a sample and scroll down to see a full explanation for each type of parameter that can be used with that sample. The same applies for synths!

USING RRAND

Sonic Pi includes a number of functions that can add more interesting elements to your music. A really fun function is rrand, which will return a value between two specified numbers. For a cool effect, use rrand to make the cutoff bounce around.

1. In a blank worksheet type:
   
   loop do play chord(:a3, :minor).choose, attack: 0, release: 0.3, cutoff: 80 sleep 0.2 end
   
   
2. Instead of passing a number like 80 to the cutoff value, try rrand(40, 120) like this:
   
   loop do play chord(:a3, :minor).choose, attack: 0, release: 0.3, cutoff: rrand(40, 120) sleep 0.2 end
   
   
3. Then you can start to experiment using rrand with other parameters. For example, add pan: rrand(-1, 1) to the play chord line and then press play.

Homework 

Electronic Music Analysis

Find an electronic music track of your choosing.

You can find some Electronic music here. http://www.last.fm/tag/electronic

Answer the Questions here

http://goo.gl/forms/ULIOwzgtXS