microsoft / pxt-midi

A MIDI interface for MakeCode

MIDI

Emulates a MIDI output controller.

Usage

Setup

You will need to connect a MIDI via serial, radio or bluetooth get it to "talk" to the MIDI output device.

• for Bluetooth, use the bluetooth midi package.

• for bridge applications like Hairless MIDI, call useRawSerial

midi.useRawSerial()

Playing tones

Place a ||midi play tone|| block to play a single note (on channel 1). The frequency is mapped to the nearest note.

midi.playTone(Note.A, music.beat(BeatFraction.Whole))

Tone on / off

Place a ||midi tone on|| block to start a tone (on channel 1). Place a ||midi tone off|| to turn it off.

midi.toneOn(Note.A)
midi.toneOn(Note.B)
basic.pause(music.beat())
midi.toneOff(Note.A)
midi.toneOff(Note.B)

Drums

Place a ||midi play drum|| block to play a drum sound. This blocks plays sounds on channel 10 which is reserved for drums.

midi.playDrum(DrumSound.HandClap)

Pitch bending

Place a ||midi pitch bend|| block to applying a sound bending effect to channel 1.

midi.pitchBend(8192 + input.acceleration(Dimension.X) * 8)

Channels

You can access and manipulate individual channels using the ||midi channel|| block. Channels are indexed from 1 to 16 and mapped internally to 0..15.

let piano = midi.channel(1);

play a note

let piano = midi.channel(1);
piano.note(30, music.beat(BeatFraction.Whole));

play a note on / off

let piano = midi.channel(1);
piano.noteOn(30);
basic.pause(100)
piano.noteOff(30)

change instrument

let trumpet = midi.channel(2);
trumpet.setInstrument(MidiInstrument.Trumpet);

change pitch bend

The pitch bend expects values between 0..16383 where 8192 means no bend.

let piano = midi.channel(1);
piano.pitchBend(8192 + input.acceleration(Dimension.X) * 8)

Radio serial

You can use radio to send MIDI messages from various @boardname@ and play them via Hairless MIDI.

radio.setGroup(10)
// routes all radio messages via radio
midi.setTransport(function (data: Buffer) {
    led.toggle(3, 4)
    radio.sendBuffer(data);
})

// proxies all radio buffers to serial
radio.onReceivedBuffer(function (buffer: Buffer) {
    serial.writeBuffer(buffer);
    led.toggle(4, 4);
})

// test send message
input.onButtonPressed(Button.A, function () {
    led.toggle(0, 0)
    midi.playTone(Note.C, 500)
})

License

MIT

Supported targets

• for PXT/microbit
• for PXT/calliope

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Code of Conduct

This project has adopted the Microsoft Open Source Code of Conduct. For more information see the Code of Conduct FAQ or contact [email protected] with any additional questions or comments.