8.- Macrosequences

A macrosequence is an arrangement of any number of instances of a block in time. A block is placed in time according to a given probability and alignment value. The blocks can also be stretched to make them two, four or eight times longer than they are.

Before you edit a macrosequence you must first select its corresponding block. There's a "Save" button to save any changes you make to the parameters. You can also "mute" a sequence for a specific block. Muting only takes place when playing MIDI data from the program. If you export your work as a MIDI file, all the tracks will be present in the file, including muted tracks.


 

Properties


 
Volume: The volume of the MIDI channel corresponding to the selected block.
Probability: Probability of a block appearing at the next aligned measure. Move the fader fully up and the block will appear every aligned measure. Fully down and it will never appear.
Panning: Move this fader to pan the sequence to the left or right side of the stereo field.
Seed: Different seed values result in different sequences with the same probability and stretching properties.

 

Alignment

Sometimes you want a certain block to appear only in even measures, or every fourth measure. This can be achieved by "aligning" the blocks to a certain number of measures. An alignment of 1 measure will place the blocks in any measure. An alignment of 2 measures will place blocks starting only at even measures, and so on.

The Displacement parameter is used to move the whole macrosequence a number of measures forward in time. Using the displacement along with the alignment, you can force the blocks to start at any measure. For example, suppose you have a 1-measure block you want to use as a fill-in every 8 measures. You would align the block to 8 measures so it doesn't appear in the middle. But if you do that, the block will always appear at the first measure of every 8-measure group. If you displace the sequence 7 measures forward, then you will have the "fill-in" block at the last measure of every 8-measure group.

Note: If the displacement is greater or equal than the song length, the whole macrosequence for that block will be displaced out of the song. It is a good idea to set all the displacements to zero until you're ready to arrange a whole song.
 
 

Stretching Probabilities

Here is where you determine the probability of stretching the block in time. It works in a similar way to the Rhythmic Probability Distribution of a block.
 
 

General and MIDI

In the General section you can specify the length of the whole song. Use the "Regenerate" button to redraw the display and see how the blocks are arranged.

The MIDI section is used to play the song and export it as a MIDI file.


 
 

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