Melody Master Tom Baker makes beautiful music on a Spectrum! [ A word of warning to begin with: because the machine code key polling in the Rhythm routine uses IN to read the keyboard, this program will only work on an Issue 2 Spectrum. On an Issue 3 machine, it simply waits until the cows come home, or until you press Break. ] Melody Master is a music utility program written in Basic and machine code for the 48K Spectrum. Tunes are entered in two parts, the notes and the rhythm. To demonstrate the features of the program, I will take you through the entering and editing of a simple tune - "Oh when the Saints". If you haven't already typed Run, do so now. Notes may be entered by ear - using a screen keyboard - or from music sheets - using a screen stave display. First, I shall describe how to use the screen keyboard - a summary of all the keys used to enter and edit a tune can be dis- played on the screen at any time by pressing and holding down key H. After typing Run and clearing the opening display, you should see a big keyboard at the top of the screen with an arrow beneath it. This arrow is used to select notes from the keyboard and is moved left and right with the cursor keys, 5 and 8. The first note of the tune is a C, so move the arrow using the cursor keys - so it points to note C in the middle of the screen - i.e. key 13 in the diagram. Now, press Enter. This enters the note into memory. Underneath the keyboard there should now be a line reading: NOTE 002 TUNE 1. Note is the note in the tune you are currently working on (1-199) and Tune is the tune you are working on (1-5). The next note is an E, so move the arrow up the keyboard to the E key (key 17 in the diagram) and press Enter. Now enter the rest of the notes using the table in diagram 1. [The diagram, by the way, can be found at the end of this text file.] You will have noticed a stave in the bottom left hand corner of the screen. This allows you, if you wish, to enter the tune from written music sheets rather than by ear. To turn the stave on and off, press 1. When you've finished entering the notes in diagram 1, you should be on Note 34. If you're familiar with the tune, you may have noticed that Note 19 is wrong. This was deliberate to provide an example of the editing facilities. It should have been a D - key 15 in the diagram. To correct this you must get Note to equal 19. This is done with the cursor keys 6 and 7. Key 7 will increase Note; 6 will decrease Note. So, using key 6, backstep Note to equal 19. Now, to change the wrong note to a D, just move the arrow up the keyboard the keyboard to the D key - 15 in diagram - and press Enter. You should now have a good idea of how to correct a known mistake. Now, try experimenting by changing a note and changing it back. You will have noticed that each time you press 6, the arrow jumps about. This is because whenever you change Note, the arrow will point to the current contents of that Note. You can also delete and insert notes. If you press D, the current note will be deleted and all the other notes above it will be moved down. If you press I, then the note the arrow is pointing to will be inserted and become the current note. For example, move Note to 12 using keys 6 and 7 and the arrow should be pointing at G. Now press D. The G will have been deleted and the arrow will be pointing at E which was the old Note 13. To get the G back, move the arrow to G and press I. If you press 3, then Note will equal the last note in the current tune. If you press 9, then you will hear the note the arrow is pointing to. Pressing 4 will make Note equal 1. Pressing 2 will clear the current Tune and 0 will clear all the tunes - a safety prompt is included with 2 and 0 in case you press them by mistake. Pressing Q will increase Tune and A will decrease Tune. If at any time you wish to save a tune to tape, just press 9 and follow the screen prompts. To load your saved tune, press L and start the tape. The rhythm routine is begun by pressing R, but first press 4 to make Note equal 1 as the rhythm is entered from the current Note. At any time during the rhythm routine you may press space to exit. When you press R you are asked - 'Y'/'N' - if you wish to hear the notes as you enter the rhythm. However, listening to the tune slows the routine and is only recommended for practising. Once you have pressed Y or N you will be asked to enter the rhythm. This is done by tapping the rhythm on any key - except space. The last note has to be held down for the right length of time. If you are entering the rhythm from the keyboard make sure you first disconnect the cassette lead and other periferals like a printer. There is another way of entering the rhythm that was intended mainly for fun but, as it uses a tape recorder and as not all makes of recorder are suitable, I can't guarantee its success with your equipment. Set up your tape recorder as follows: connect a lead from the ear socket of the computer to the ear socket of your tape recorder, insert a blank tape and set it to record. Some tape recorders output what they are recording through their 'ear' socket so, when set up like this, your tape recorder can effectively listen to any noise in the room and pass information about it to your Spectrum. Now you can clap or whistle the rhythm into the computer. When you've entered the rhythm, you can hear the complete tune by pressing P. At the bottom right of the screen is a message "Playback speed 01". this is the speed at which the tune is played back and can be altered with keys T and G. Speed 1 is the slowest; 10 the fastest. If you find that the rhythm routine is not as responsive as it should be, change line 2140 to read: 2140 GOTO 2130. ___________________________________________________________ 2 4 7 9 11 14 16 19 21 23 | # # | # # # | # # | # # # | | | # # | # # # | # # | # # # | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |C |D |E |F |G |A |B |C |D |E |F |G |A |B |C | +--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+ 1 3 5 6 8 10 12 13 15 17 18 20 22 24 25 +-------------+ +-------------+ +-------------+ | Note Key | | | | | +------+------+ +------+------+ +------+------+ | 1 | 13 C | | 12 | 20 G | | 23 | 20 G | | 2 | 17 E | | 13 | 17 E | | 24 | 20 G | | 3 | 18 F | | 14 | 13 C | | 25 | 18 F | | 4 | 20 G | | 15 | 17 E | | 26 | 18 F | | 5 | 13 C | | 16 | 15 D | | 27 | 17 E | | 6 | 17 E | | 17 | 17 E | | 28 | 18 F | | 7 | 18 F | | 18 | 17 E | | 29 | 20 G | | 8 | 20 G | | 19 | 12 B | | 30 | 17 E | | 9 | 13 C | | 20 | 13 C | | 31 | 13 C | | 10 | 17 E | | 21 | 13 C | | 32 | 15 D | | 11 | 18 F | | 22 | 17 E | | 33 | 13 C | +------+------+ +------+------+ +------+------+