gminorcoles
New member
Hi,
I am going to attempt a teensy 4.1 MIDI project. I make music, and while I like using the editing abilities of the DAW software that exists, I prefer to track my compositions through hardware sequencers. There is no approach that I have been happy with that allows me to bridge between the ease of editing MIDI in software, with the simplicity and reliability of hardware for midi playback. N.B. - I have lots of hardware synths which is why I dont just do everything on one computer.
So, sufficiently motivated, I am hoping that enough people have gone before me at this point, that I can cobble something together leveraging my existing software development skills and my non-existing hardware skills. Teensy seems like a good platform. I found an 8 in / 8 out MIDI breakout board for sale:
https://www.tindie.com/products/deftaudio/teensy-41-midi-breakout-board-8in-8out-usb-host/
This is huge, because it solve a lot of issues for me off the shelf, if it has the connections and features I need. "USB Host", I am hoping, means that I can hook my computer up to this and the Teensy over USB, and push MIDI files from my PC to the Teensy, and store the files on the Teensy SD card. I have done some due diligence on this forum and I am aware that code exists that would allow me to write to the SD card over USB from an external device, I hope I am correct about that.
And I know that there is at least rudimentary MIDI playback code that exists on github.
The workflow I hope to enable is for a user to save a MIDI composition from their software of choice, in SMF 0 or SMF 1 format, which itself is blessedly out of scope, to the Teensy, via USB, and then hit "play" in their MIDI software, connecting to the Teensy via MIDI, on one of its many MIDI DIN ports.
For the MVP of this idea, I dont really even need a display. I was thinking that a very minimal display could just display a number, which by convention would represent the current patch selected over MIDI via standard MIDI "program change".
I ordered a bread board from pjrc, just to be prepared, but I dont know what other electronics tools or parts I will need. The bill of materials, not including any case, includes the Teensy, the MIDI Breakout board, both en-route, and maybe a display?
Any suggestions about what I could do for a toolkit for soldering and wiring? Any suggestions on an adequate display? How do I write to the display? Is anyone aware of better than barebones MIDI playback code? Does anyone want to help me with this as a consultant? Am I missing anything? Am I wrong that this can work as I envision?
thanks
george
I am going to attempt a teensy 4.1 MIDI project. I make music, and while I like using the editing abilities of the DAW software that exists, I prefer to track my compositions through hardware sequencers. There is no approach that I have been happy with that allows me to bridge between the ease of editing MIDI in software, with the simplicity and reliability of hardware for midi playback. N.B. - I have lots of hardware synths which is why I dont just do everything on one computer.
So, sufficiently motivated, I am hoping that enough people have gone before me at this point, that I can cobble something together leveraging my existing software development skills and my non-existing hardware skills. Teensy seems like a good platform. I found an 8 in / 8 out MIDI breakout board for sale:
https://www.tindie.com/products/deftaudio/teensy-41-midi-breakout-board-8in-8out-usb-host/
This is huge, because it solve a lot of issues for me off the shelf, if it has the connections and features I need. "USB Host", I am hoping, means that I can hook my computer up to this and the Teensy over USB, and push MIDI files from my PC to the Teensy, and store the files on the Teensy SD card. I have done some due diligence on this forum and I am aware that code exists that would allow me to write to the SD card over USB from an external device, I hope I am correct about that.
And I know that there is at least rudimentary MIDI playback code that exists on github.
The workflow I hope to enable is for a user to save a MIDI composition from their software of choice, in SMF 0 or SMF 1 format, which itself is blessedly out of scope, to the Teensy, via USB, and then hit "play" in their MIDI software, connecting to the Teensy via MIDI, on one of its many MIDI DIN ports.
For the MVP of this idea, I dont really even need a display. I was thinking that a very minimal display could just display a number, which by convention would represent the current patch selected over MIDI via standard MIDI "program change".
I ordered a bread board from pjrc, just to be prepared, but I dont know what other electronics tools or parts I will need. The bill of materials, not including any case, includes the Teensy, the MIDI Breakout board, both en-route, and maybe a display?
Any suggestions about what I could do for a toolkit for soldering and wiring? Any suggestions on an adequate display? How do I write to the display? Is anyone aware of better than barebones MIDI playback code? Does anyone want to help me with this as a consultant? Am I missing anything? Am I wrong that this can work as I envision?
thanks
george