pmy@vivaldi.acc.virginia.edu (Pete Yadlowsky) (02/10/89)
In article <90@ssibbs.UUCP> afraser@ssibbs.UUCP (Alex Fraser) writes: >Will Music-X ever appear? [ stuff about quest for the Ideal Sequencer ] >Perhaps I should look in the direction of HMSL (which I have heard has been >ported to the amiga)? Ported to? Practically developed for! Actually, HMSL (Hierarchical Music Specification Language, by some guys at Mills College) slightly predates the Amiga, and was initially developed on a home-brew 68000 box. Now, though, HMSL rides on an excellent Amiga forth called JForth (authored in part by one of the authors of HMSL). Yes, you really should look in the direction of HMSL. Nobody's canned sequencer will ever have the flexibility this system provides, because HMSL is an interactive, object-oriented, forth-based, >extensible< *language*, not an application. HMSL certainly supports, but is not limited to, MIDI. You can use it to drive any sort of hardware that can be plugged into your computer. I've heard of one person using it to drive kinetic sculpture. Some of us here at UVa's music dept. use HMSL extensively, and will be featuring it this spring in a piece for treated violin, keyboard controller, computer and synthesizers. Anyway, I can't recommend HMSL highly enough to those who want to use their computers (Amiga, Mac) as something other than MIDI tape decks. Usual disclaimer: I'm not affiliated. Peter M. Yadlowsky Academic Computing Center University of Virginia pmy@Virginia.EDU