Audio production under Linux

[DOlson]

Does anyone here have any experience producing music in Linux?

 

I ask because I don't use Windows at all, and I want to do some music recording with good results...

 

So far, I've recorded a few songs in Linux:

- Sands of Time (totally done in Audacity with a crappy mic)

- Again (partly in Audacity, but mostly done in SoundTracker)

Both of the songs are available here: http://mp3.com/rivir

if you want to see what Audacity and SoundTracker can do so far for me.

 

Now, going from your experience, give me advice on what I should check out, please.

 

Here are my ideal criteria:

 

* I need a MIDI sequencer, similar to Evolution MIDI or CuBase even, which supports some kind of sound font files. I have a SoundBlaster Live! 5.1 card at the moment, and I'm using ALSA 0.9.4 or whatever the versions are (0.9.6 is the latest, I just didn't install it yet).

 

* I need a WAV file editor. Currently I use Audacity 1.2.0-pre1, and it's doing the job well. GoldWave is what I used to use, and it's supposedly being ported, but it's not a free program (which isn't necessarily a bad thing, I just have no cash at the moment) and Audacity seems to be as good or better... Audacity supports plugins, so I have the LADSPA plugin pack installed (apt-get install swh-plugins) and there they are in my Audacity menu. :) If there are other decent editors out there, please let me know. I know of Sweep, but it's not ideal for me, except I may use it for the scratch pad feature, but I'll record that as a poor-man's turntable. :) I use Audacity for recording tracks mainly, and editing them how I like them (ie: noise removal, pitch change, etc).

 

* I need a multitrack-type of program... Multiquence is what I used to use in Windows, and so far I haven't found a decent one in Linux. Instead, I've been using SoundTracker unorthodoxically (is that a word??) basically as a multitrack. I can live with it, but the CPU usage or something is too high, and it skips frequently, which sorta sucks. However, I like how XM files store the sound files in them, so you don't destroy the originals, and you also have a quick record function that sometimes introduces blips into the sound, but it's decent for basic recording when I don't have Audacity handy.

 

* A good drum machine/pattern editor. I was starting to use Hammerhead when I was using Windows, but I didn't get into it much. I relied on MIDI for my drum patterns. I can make due without, if that's how it is.

 

* FREE high-quality samples! The more, the merrier. Specifically: cymbals, hi hats, bass drum, and snare drum.

 

* I wouldn't mind some real-time effects for my recording source, a-la Guitar FX Box for Windows (which I have a registered copy of but doesn't work in Wine either (I had to see if it'd work, heh)). I've tried lots of Linux programs that do similar tasks, but they are either too unintuitive or they didn't work...

 

* A decent guitar tuner, or some WAV/Ogg/MP3 files of exact pitches of a guitar tuning. I was using some tone generator tuner before, but it sucks, so I don't tune my guitars anymore. :)

 

* All programs must be intuitive. If they are all over the place, and don't at least have some good docs, then they are useless to me. I want programs that are going to get the job done quickly and efficiently. I don't want this "learn the interface and you'll get real good with it but it will take you like, four years of 24/7 usage to learn it like Blender" crap, if you understand where I'm coming from.

 

* Features are important. Example, in Windows, sure you could use Sound Recorder to record your guitar parts, but uh... Would you? It's basically a record button, a stop button, and a menu that has Save As... and Exit. That's no good to a musician.

 

* Also, I would hope that the programs are a part of Debian Sid or that there is an active apt repository for them. It just makes my life easier. :) But if I have to compile from CVS source to get the ideal program, I will.

 

Okay, that about sums it up. Probably pretty high criteria, but yeah, I don't believe in "buy a Mac if you're into media."

[Gowator]

I looked into this for a friend BEFORE having to install Windows on his machine.

He's recording professional, if at the lower end of the scale.

 

Anyway, from his point of view (he's making commercial tracks) the SoundBlaster cards don't cut it. He uses a TerraTEC one which I didn't think has Linux drivers....

 

This is probably inaccurate but its what I got from him and his buddies:

Anyway, according to his music buddies who may or may not be computer literate.... what you need is:

Fastest Memory ... he was willing to pay for RAMBUS . Apparently the ability to lay down hundreds of tracks at one is important.

 

Intel not AMD ... Apparently ... less interference ??

 

He even looked into MAC's but apparently Windows was better for the Software.

 

I'd love to know ... or see some linux stuff that approaches though so you musicians out there ....

 

For the guitar tuning ... Is'nt all you need a Occiloscope prog based on a concert pitch A. Personally I have a plugable harmonic tuner, just plugs into the accoustic pickup. At my level it gives me feedback how close my chords are tho...

[DOlson]

Okay, but I'm not going to use Windows. I'm not going to use Mac either.

 

And by the way, most real studios that I've heard of do use Mac, not Windows.

 

I want Linux stuff, and if I need to continue using what I have been using, then I will.

 

I can't afford more or faster RAM, especially given that my hard drive is the bottleneck, not the RAM or CPU, though CPU is next in line.

 

I know my songs aren't that high-quality, but they sound alright to me and compared to a lot of the local talent here. I am just hoping that someone out there knows of some real gems that don't get exposure for some reason.

[Gowator]

Thats really what I told my friend ....

Actually, what I told him was if your looking to get noticed then IMHO any decent 'entity' that knows what theyre doing looking for new talent isn't looking for a professional mix so much as something they can work on.

 

I did stick a post on here a while ago asking ... but no answers.

I wasn't convinced over the RAMBUS thing either, thats just what he seems to have picked up from various music boards :D

 

He recorded the first album with pretty minimal equipment and although their are one or two (literally) places hit shows through briefly I don't think anyone would notice if it was played over analogue radio...

 

I had a reasonable scratch around at the time ... It was an extra special favour from me to even touch a windows PC, let alone build it for him. Yuck... but I honestly didn't find anything that seemed viable.

 

Like you say rec <filename> will record a wav but thats not really what your looking for.

 

I think the big pro's use MAC's but a lot of smaller and home studio's use PC's. The arguamnet for this though is probably software. Its like when Mac used SGI's to do their technical designs.... or the recent switch to linux clusters for 3D animiation ... their is no reason why not ... its just a matter of someone writing the software that does it in a nice integrated way.

 

Good luck, and I'm definately interested with what you might find ...

[phunni]

This is probably inaccurate but its what I got from him and his buddies:

Anyway, according to his music buddies who may or may not be computer literate.... what you need is:

Fastest Memory ... he was willing to pay for RAMBUS .  Apparently the ability to lay down hundreds of tracks at one is important.  

 

Intel not AMD ... Apparently ... less interference ??

 

I used to do computer music before i switched to Linux - haven't gotten round to doing it in linux yet...

 

All of the above is accurate regardless of which OS you use - you need the biggest, baddest PC you can get. It doesn't mean that you can't make music on a lower spec machine - it just means you'll be more limited in what you can do - less tracks etc...

 

Another problem for linux musicians is simpy that there aren't really the effect plugins - no VST plugins. The set of plugins that does exist (as far as I have been able to see) is too small really. I expect that this will change, however, given some time

[Gowator]

Hmmm.

I wasn't sure.

Its the old 2GB of PC333 RAM or 512MB of RAMBUS paradigm ????

Which is better ???

 

erm ... unless you got way more money than me then why not just buy the best MAC you can .... ??

 

When I built the PC I made it minimal. The more stuff on the PCI bus the more noise. No modems/TV cards/DXR-3 stuff ... just the VERY expensive Tarratec card.... its tiny... about the same size as those mini ethernet cards... just the length of the slot and perhaps 1" high....

 

Anyway, it seems to be working well....

[DOlson]

Well, I'm not looking to sign to a label. When I spoke of gems needing exposure, I meant Linux apps.

 

I guess I'll continue with what I have unless I stumble upon something better, since no one else knows of anything either.

 

As far as effects and plugins go, Audacity has 19 of it's own, and then I have 88 other LADSPA plugins. There are more out there probably, but I don't care. These take care of what I need.

[DOlson]

Update:

 

I now discovered a cool drum machine called Hydrogen thanks to AdamW from the Sudhian forums.

[emh]

Have you looked at this site?

 

http://www.linux-sound.org

 

* I need a MIDI sequencer, similar to Evolution MIDI or CuBase even, which supports some kind of sound font files. I have a SoundBlaster Live! 5.1 card at the moment, and I'm using ALSA 0.9.4 or whatever the versions are (0.9.6 is the latest, I just didn't install it yet).  

 

I'm a fan of MuSe myself, and there's also Rosegarden.

 

* I need a WAV file editor. Currently I use Audacity 1.2.0-pre1, and it's doing the job well. GoldWave is what I used to use, and it's supposedly being ported, but it's not a free program (which isn't necessarily a bad thing, I just have no cash at the moment) and Audacity seems to be as good or better... Audacity supports plugins, so I have the LADSPA plugin pack installed (apt-get install swh-plugins) and there they are in my Audacity menu. If there are other decent editors out there, please let me know. I know of Sweep, but it's not ideal for me, except I may use it for the scratch pad feature, but I'll record that as a poor-man's turntable.  I use Audacity for recording tracks mainly, and editing them how I like them (ie: noise removal, pitch change, etc).  

 

Stick with Audacity.

 

* I need a multitrack-type of program... Multiquence is what I used to use in Windows, and so far I haven't found a decent one in Linux. Instead, I've been using SoundTracker unorthodoxically (is that a word??) basically as a multitrack. I can live with it, but the CPU usage or something is too high, and it skips frequently, which sorta sucks. However, I like how XM files store the sound files in them, so you don't destroy the originals, and you also have a quick record function that sometimes introduces blips into the sound, but it's decent for basic recording when I don't have Audacity handy.  

 

I'm a fan of Ecasound myself. At its base, it's a command-line program, but there's also a GUI for it. There's also Ardour, which looks more powerful, but I found it too confusing to use.

 

* FREE high-quality samples! The more, the merrier. Specifically: cymbals, hi hats, bass drum, and snare drum.  

 

You could start by looking at http://www.hitsquad.com but I don't really know the answer to this one.

 

* I wouldn't mind some real-time effects for my recording source, a-la Guitar FX Box for Windows (which I have a registered copy of but doesn't work in Wine either (I had to see if it'd work, heh)). I've tried lots of Linux programs that do similar tasks, but they are either too unintuitive or they didn't work...  

 

I have Ecamegapedal installed, but I haven't had the time to try it out. I tried ExEf, but I couldn't figure the darn thing out.

 

* All programs must be intuitive. If they are all over the place, and don't at least have some good docs, then they are useless to me. I want programs that are going to get the job done quickly and efficiently. I don't want this "learn the interface and you'll get real good with it but it will take you like, four years of 24/7 usage to learn it like Blender" crap, if you understand where I'm coming from.

 

All the programs I use I've found to be very intuitive, with the exception of MuSe. I had to set a few more functions to get it to work the way I wanted, but it's not too bad. Ecasound, using the command line interface by itself, is not intuitive, but if you use the tkeca front-end, it's very straightforward.

 

Hardware:

Don't use onboard sound. It uses too much CPU and memory. For consumer grade sound cards for recording, probably the best kind you can get is a Soundblaster Live (which I'm guessing you already have). As far as CPU and RAM requirements go, when I had a 500 MHz AMD K6-2 processor and 192 MB of RAM and Windows 98SE, I was able to record and play back 16 tracks at a time in stereo without a problem. However, I couldn't add real-time effects to more than four or five tracks at a time. That should give you an idea as to what kind of hardware you should need.

 

I'm sorry I'm not more helpful. I've been so busy lately that I really haven't had the time to do a whole lot of audio recording (which sucks because I also have a mixing board, effects module, compressor, and a new faster computer to do it with). Anyway, I hope this helps a bit.

[DOlson]

Thanks. I'll look into those things. I think I need to get a different kernel.

[emh]

Forgot to mention, in the MIDI sequencer area, soundfonts are supported via software sequencers like fluidsynth or timidity, or via the SBLive MIDI howto that was written by you. :wink:

 

By the way, I'm interested in where you found the 88 LADSPA plugins for Audacity. I already have the swh-plugins installed.

[phunni]

I found a sequencer called ardour - not sure what it's like yet though...

[DOlson]

I didn't write any MIDI tutorials!

 

Ardour looks like a great multitrack program. I gotta get Jack and stuff going nicely... I should get a new kernel going too.

 

Here's what I did for the 88 plugins:

 

1) close Audacity.

2) apt-get install swh-plugins

3) start Audacity.

 

That's it. They're all there now. If you're using Mandrake, and you urpmi'd swh-plugins, perhaps the RPM for either it or Audacity isn't configured properly to work the way it does on Debian, I don't know. All I know is that the Audacity developers told me that the LADSPA plugins would work with Audacity when I inquired about a reverb effect, and Steve Harris (not Maiden's bass player) told me that his plugins would work with any LADSPA-supporting program... So, I decided what the hey, I'll apt-get install it, and bam, there's the plugins. And there is a reverb effect too. :)

[phunni]

I didn't write any MIDI tutorials!

 

Ardour looks like a great multitrack program. I gotta get Jack and stuff going nicely... I should get a new kernel going too.

 

I also need to figure out how to get Jack going - installed it last night (along with ardour and hydrogen and audacity) but couldn't start it this morning. I did only spend five minutes before leaving for work though...

[emh]

To start Jack use either this command:

 

jackstart -d alsa -d hw:0

 

(assuming you're using the multimedia kernel)

 

Or this one:

 

jackd -d alsa -d hw:0

 

I didn't write any MIDI tutorials!  

 

Sorry, I thought it was you that wrote that tutorial. My mistake. :wink:

 

And it turns out I did actually already have the plugins available to Mandrake's Audacity, just never noticed before. :P