Viktor NV-1 Synthesiser

Nikolay Tsenkov’s Viktor NV-1 Synthesiser is a full-featured multi-oscillator analogue synthesiser simulation powered by Web Audio. It uses the familiar Moog-inspired architecture for the patching of modules, and also supports the Web MIDI API, so connecting a keyboard should work out of the box in the latest Chrome. I like how the synth comes with a selection of great-sounding presets, and changing any of the parameters allows you to save the changes as your own custom patch.

Learning how to read sheet music using the Web MIDI API

Philipp Otto wanted to improve his sheet music sight-reading, so he built an application called Piano Trainer. It generates random pieces of sheet music, and then records the time it takes him to play them back accurately using a real digital piano connected to the browser using the Web MIDI API. The blog post has some of the technical details, and some analysis Philip did on how much the application has improved his skills.

BeatSketch

BeatSketch from Sebastian Zimmer is a collaborative music production tool that Sebastian developed for his Master’s degree in Computer Science. A song consists of multiple tracks, and each track is backed by a grid-based sequencer. Any changes you make are synchronised between connected collaborators immediately. It also supports mixing the final song down to a WAV file for downloading. An impressive set of features and a very useful exploration of possible methods of implementing collaborative working.

Beautiful Audio Editor

The Beautiful Audio Editor is a audio editor for that works online or offline, and allows saving of edits to Google Drive. You can perform most of the operations you’d expect from an audio editor - such volume normalisation, sample-accurate editing of the recording and fading in and out using custom envelopes. The use of Web Audio and getUserMedia APIs means no additional plugins are required. I can see this being a very useful tool for someone who wants to make basic audio edits on any computer they can get access to.

Exploring the HTML5 Web Audio API: Filters

This article looks at the filtering features provided by the Web Audio API. It discusses how a filter works, the different types, and the code you need to use to use them in your application. The demo application allows you to adjust the parameters of the Web Audio’s BiquadFilter and see and hear the effects.

Keith McMillen: Making music in the browser

A new post from Andrej Hronco at MIDI controller manufacturer Keith McMillen Instruments. This time Andrej introduces the Web Audio API. There’s a lot of introductory articles to the Web Audio API out there, but this one is up-to-date with the latest API changes, and includes a selection of JSFiddle embedded applications to illustrate how different features of the API work.

Inside Synthesis: FM Synthesis

This video from Inside Synthesis really helps to demystify FM synthesis and make it understandable if you’re more familiar with analogue subtractive synths. I really enjoyed the explanations of how changing the parameters of the synth changes the sound. If you’d like to play with FM synthesis using the Web Audio API, take a look at my FM synthesis code samples from a recent talk I gave on the history of synthesis.