Klangfarbenmelodie (German for tone color melody) and the synonymous French term mélodie de timbres distributes a melody over several instruments rather than assigning it to just one, the listener's focus becomes timbre rather than pitch.
In a similar way, the algorithmic composition patch we'll build today outputs series of overlapping randomly chosen timbres to create an interesting musical texture.
Jump to the end of the post to hear some sample algorithmic music output from this patch.
Algorithmic Composition with MIDI Timbres
Firstly we'll get a simple MIDI note to play in Max and PureData: add a toggle, a metronome object, a message and makenote and noteout objects. If you're not sure how to do this, work through some of the earlier algorithmic composition tutorials here:
Your Max or PureData patch should now look like this, you should also hear a MIDI note when you turn the toggle on. If not, check you have a MIDI output device selected.
