TinySequencer

TinySequencer is a small music/sound effect sequencer made using the Web Audio API. It was created by Donitzo and used for js13kgames 2020. TinySequencer was inspired by TinyMusic, a similiar sequencer. TinySequencer has additional support for ADSR envelopes and a compression-friendly data format.

Usage

// Create a new AudioContext (and an optional compressor node for a more level sound)
const ac = new AudioContext();
const compressor = ac.createDynamicsCompressor();
compressor.connect(ac.destination);

// Create a sequence data structure
const data = {
  bpm: 120,
  ppqn: 96,
  gaps: [0, 0.1],
  tracks: [
    {
      data: [
        0, 32, 32, 32, 32, 16, 16, 16, 16, 16, 60, 58, 56, 54, 52, 127, 127,
        127, 127, 127,
      ],
      wave: "triangle",
      mixer: [0.1, 0, 1, 1, 1],
      adsr: [0.001, 0.1, 0.3, 0.5],
      portamento: 0.9,
      cutoffDuration: 0.01,
    },
  ],
};

// Create an instance of TinySequencer
const sequencer = new TinySequencer(ac, data, compressor);

// Play the sequence
const loop = true;
sequencer.play(loop);

// Get the elapsed time of the current loop
setTimeout(
  () => console.log(sequencer.currentTime() + "/" + sequencer.duration),
  2000
);

// Is it playing?
console.log(sequencer.isPlaying());

// Stop the sequencer
setTimeout(sequencer.stop, 10000);

Data format

The data format is a single unmangled Javascript object. The object can be parsed from JSON. The object has the following properties:

 data (unmangled) = {
     bpm: beats per minute,
     ppqn: pulses per quarter note,
     gaps: [silence before the first note, silence after the final release],
     tracks: [{
         wave: "sine" / "square" / "sawtooth" / "triangle" / "noise",
         mixer: [track volume (0-1), velocity volume attenuation (0-1), bass (100 Hz) gain dB, mid (1000 Hz) gain dB, treble (2500 Hz) gain dB],
         adsr: [attack duration in seconds, decay duration in seconds, sustain level (0-1), release duration in seconds],
         portamento: fraction of duration between notes to start frequency slide (0-1),
         cutoffDuration: duration in seconds,
         data: [
             note 0+n*0 - pulses since previous note
             note 0+n*1 - duration in pulses
             note 0+n*2 - MIDI number
             note 0+n*3 - velocity (0-127)
             note 1+n*0 - pulses since previous note
             ...
         ],
 }

For optimal compression, note properties are aligned by type, not by note index:

1. The first 1/4 of track.data contains pulses since previous note.
2. The second 1/4 of track.data contains the note duration in pulses.
3. The third 1/4 of the track.data contains the MIDI number.
4. The final 1/4 of the track.data contains note velocity (optionally used for attenuation).

Editor

You can start the editor by running the command npm run editor.

Or you can run it directly from GitHub: Online TinySequencer.