path: root/2020/subtitles/emacsconf-2020--04-music-in-plain-text--jonathan-gregory-autogen.sbv

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hello everyone and welcome to the amax

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golf

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I am jonathan and in this talk I'm going

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to demonstrate ways of producing sheet

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music in Emacs

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using lily pond and maybe also convince

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you to use Emacs for writing your scores

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so I'll start with an overview of the

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syntax for those who are new to using

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text based notation

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as a shallow dive into the deep bond of

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lilies and lily pawns

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and move on to showcase some of its

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functionalities using orb mode

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and lily point mode one disclaimer

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however I am not a lillipon developer

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so what is lillipond lillipond is

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a file format and music engraving system

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for producing high quality sheet music

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it translates texture representations of

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music to graphical objects

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so it's similar to latex in that its

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input format describes the visual

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layouts of the score

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using commands to define musical

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expressions

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commands begin with a backslash for

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example

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the formatter command as shown on the

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left yields its graphical equivalents on

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the right

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the fermata symbol over the load b and

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so on and so forth

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it's also fully extensible like Emacs

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allowing users to extend

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and override lilipon's functionalities

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using the scheme

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scripting language it can be used for

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early in contemporary music

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tablature vocal music lead sheets and so

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on

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and above all it works with Emacs in

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fact

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lily pond ships with imax lisp libraries

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including a major mode for editing lily

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pawn files

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so the input files are similar to source

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files

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they contain expressions formed with

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curly braces

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comments that start with the percent

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sign and the code is indented

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nodes are entered using lowercase

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letters and rests with the letter r

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in this case the lowercase r or r4

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is the equivalence of a crotchet or

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quarter note rest

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durations are entered using numbers and

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dots after the note name

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and if you do not specify 1 the previous

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duration is used

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you can also tie notes together using

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the tilde symbol

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in fact you can input chords lyrics

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embellishments and a lot more

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so I encourage you to read the menu for

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more information

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now let's switch to a terminal window

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so with lillipond installed let's create

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a test file with the extension

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ly and open it in Emacs

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at the top of the file is the version

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statement which tells lillipond which

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version to use when compiling the file

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here I'm using version 2.20.0

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I've added the clef and time signature

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so

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let's add some notes

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okay I'm going to close this now and

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compile the file by running

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lily pawns followed by the file name

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okay so now let's view the outputs

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okay so here's a more complex example

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for randomizing node sequences

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the idea is to create new reading

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materials each time the code blocks are

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evaluated

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so as usual we begin with a header I've

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added the title

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and composer then we add the node

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sequences to use in the composition

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in this case s n is a note name just

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like

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a b c d and so on and stands for snare

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drum

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the percussion instruments

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now here's a function that's going to

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shuffle the notes in the table

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and finally we expand the notes inside

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the lillypawn source block

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so whatever the function returns is

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expanded inside the drums block

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now let's press ctrl c ctrl c to view

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the results

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okay and if I run this again it should

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create a new composition

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great you can also audition a piece

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using the midi command

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which creates a midi file of the score

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note also that the ob library

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sorry the ob lillypoint library comes

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with two modes

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the one I'm using now is called arrange

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mode

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and is useful for assembling complete

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scores

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the basic mode on the other hand allows

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you to mix text and music

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by embedding lily pawn snippets and

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export them using typical org mode

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commands

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now to demonstrate the basic mode in

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action I'm going to export this document

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to a pdf

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file in this case the

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filehead argument is required so you

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have to provide one

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and include the file name

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again you can run the code and view the

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results

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here it is so now let's

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export this to pdf file

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and here it is what it generates

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now I'm going to show you the workflow I

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used to produce music books in Emacs

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combining lily pond and latex for a

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perfect marriage

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I begin by sketching first draft of the

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manuscript using pencil and paper

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then I move to Emacs to input the notes

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in a git repository

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this is a typical source file it begins

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with a stylesheet

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where I set variables and layout

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settings although in general there's no

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need for tweaking the layout

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unless you have specific requirements to

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do so

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the easiest way to compile the file from

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max is by pressing ctrl c

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ctrl l so let's do this now

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and the compilation buffer will tell you

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if there were any errors in the file

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now to automate the process of compiling

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several files and building the pdf

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I use gnu make so all I have to do is

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open the shell

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and run the make command and don't worry

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I'll provide a link to the source code

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on the last slide

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as I moved forward with the project I

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found at least two things missing

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one I had no access to a metronome at

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least not from the editor

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so I built one for casual use and made

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it available in the melpa repository

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I also missed bar numbers in the source

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file this

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is useful when going back and forth

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between input and output files without

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getting lost

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so I wrote a command for toggling bar

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numbers which I hope you can see on the

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left

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also some expressions are difficult or

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slow to write on the keyboard

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accents and tuplets for example so I use

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template expansion extensively for this

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purpose

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mainly yes snippets

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so what do I think well I think

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lillypond can be a sharp paradigm shift

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but people used to gui alternatives but

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the results are impressive

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and you don't have to dive too deeply to

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start using lillypod

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likewise the ability to extend the

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software I think is especially appealing

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for music professionals

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enthusiasts composers and the academic

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community

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for example allowing users to create

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alternative notation systems required in

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non-western music traditions

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and other non-conventional requirements

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also lillypod and Emacs both have

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extensive and well-written manuals

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and active communities of users

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but if you're still not sure where to

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start and when to wedge your feet in the

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deep

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but warm pond of lilies lily pawns and

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lily pond users

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I invite you to contribute to my lilly

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pond projects

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which you can do so from the links on

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the screen

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so thank you all I look forward to your

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comments and I hope you enjoy the rest

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of the conference