Music sequencer

The music sequencer (or simply sequencer) is a device or computer software to record, edit, play back the music, by handling note and performance information in several forms, typically : MIDI, CV/Gate, and possibly audio and automation data for Plug-ins and DAWs. ^{[note 1][note 2]}

• MIDI data        (on MIDI sequencers)
• CV/Gate data  (on analog sequencers and others)

And also possibly includes :

• Automation data for Plug-ins and DAWs

  (software sequencers with DAW feature and software instrument/effect Plug-ins on them)

• Audio data      

  (on audio sequencers^{[note 3]} including DAWs, loop-based music software, or on phrase samplers including groove machine, etc)

Note that computer software (or dedicated systems) mainly handle digital audio are traditionally called “Digital audio workstation” (DAW). Also note that normally, bare music sequencer doesn't directly handle audio; instead, musical instruments/effects devices controlled by sequencers, or audio engines/DAWs integrated with software sequencers, are used to handle audio.

Overview

Modern sequencers

With the advent of MIDI and particularly Atari ST in 1980s, programmers were able to write software that could record and play back the notes played by a musician. Unlike the early sequencers used to play mechanical sounding sequence with exactly equal length, the new ones recorded and played back expressive performances by real musicians. These were typically used to control external synthesizers, especially rackmounted sound modules as it was no longer necessary for each synthesizer to have its own keyboard.

As the technology matured, sequencers gained more features, and integrated the ability to record multitrack audio. Sequencers mainly used for audio are often called digital audio workstations (or DAWs).

Many modern sequencers can also control virtual instruments implemented as software plug-ins, allowing musicians to replace separate synthesizers with software equivalents.

In today, the term "sequencer" is often used for software, however, also hardwares sequencers are remained. Workstation keyboards have their own proprietary built-in MIDI sequencers. Drum machines and some older synthesizers have their own step sequencer built in. There are still also standalone hardware MIDI sequencers, although the market demand for those has diminished greatly due to the greater feature set of their software counterparts.

See #Software sequencers / DAWs with sequencing features for detail listing.

Type of music sequencers

Music sequencers can be categorized with its sequence mode (or record mode):

Realtime mode: On the realtime sequencer, musical notes are recorded in realtime as on audio recorder, and played back with designated pitch, tempo and quantization. For realtime editing, "punch in/punch out" features are often supported, however, to edit details, another editing mode may be needed. Built-in sequencers on electronic keyboards often support realtime mode.

Step mode: On the step sequencer, musical notes are divided into steps, and each steps are recorded without exact timing. Instead, timing of each step are separately designated by order of entering steps (on bass machines), or selection of column buttons (on drum machines). Analog drum machines and bass machines often utilize this mode, along with semi-realtime mode.

Analog sequencers are sometimes confused with step sequencers, however, concepts of realtimeness and tempo are significantly different. Typical analog sequencers were designed for realtime composition and performance using multiple knobs/sliders, so, notes on sequence are always changeable without entering record mode. In addition, time between each notes (steps) are also adjustable independently.

• Software sequencers, in general, tend to support various sequence modes. Modern software sequencers with DAW features often support: piano rolls, strip charts, score edit, numerical edit, and also audio sequencing including rearrangement of sample loops, beat slicing, and pitch manipulation. Several sequencers are specialized to particular sequence mode: for example, loop-based music software specializing audio sequencer, software drum machines specializing step sequencer, etc.

History

Barrel with pins on large stationary barrel-organ (1615)			Music roll on barrel organ
Player piano (1920) controlled by piano rolls	RCA Mark II (1957), controlled via punch tape
Buchla 250e (2004), seems to be influenced from Circle Machine		Drawn sound  films on Oramics (1957) resembles strip chart
	xx	x

Earlier sequencers

The earlier music sequencers had appeared in the form of various automatic musical instruments, including music boxes, mechanical organs, player pianos, etc. For example, authoring of piano roll resemble the definition of music sequencer. Several composers recorded their composition on piano rolls, then specialists edited rolls for the preparation of mass duplication, and finally consumers played back music on their player piano.

The origin of automatic musical instruments seems considerably old. As early as 9th century, Persian inventors Banū Mūsā brothers invented hydropowered organ using exchangeable cylinders with pins,^[2] and also automatic flute player using steam power,^[3][4] as described on their Book of Ingenious Devices. In 14th century, rotating cylinder with pins were used to play carillon in Flanders, and at least in 15th century, barrel organs were seen in the Netherlands.^[5] In 19th century, as the result of the Industrial Revolution, various automatic musical instruments were invented, includes music box, barrel organ and barrel piano using barrel / cylinder / metal disc with pins, or mechanical organ, orchestrion and player piano using book music / music rolls (piano rolls) with punched holes, etc. These instruments widely spread as the popular entertainment devices, before the invention of phonograph and radio.

Also in 20th century, earliest programmable music synthesizers , RCA Mark II Sound Synthesizer in 1957, and Siemens Synthesizer in 1959, were controlled via punch tapes similar to piano rolls. ^[6][7]

On the other hand, Raymond Scott, an American composer of electronic music, invented various music sequencers during 1940s–1960s for his electric compositions. The Wall of Sound, once covered on the wall of his studio in 1940s, was a electro-mechanical sequencer to produce rhythmic patterns, consisted with stepping relays (used on dial pulse telephone exchange), solenoids, control switches, and tone circuits with 16 individual oscillators. ^[8] Later, Robert Moog explained it “the whole room would go 'clack - clack - clack', and the sounds would come out all over the place”.^[9] The Circle Machine, developed in 1959, had dimmer bulbs arranged in a ring, and a rotating arm with photocell scanning over the ring, to generate arbitrary waveform.^[10] And relatively well known Clavivox, developed since 1952, was a kind of keyboard synthesizer with sequencer. On its prototype, theremin manufactured by young Robert Moog was utilized to enable portamento over 3-octave range, and on later version, instead photographic film and photocell were utilized to control pitch by voltage. ^[9]

With the relation to the photographic films, the drawn sound technique that appeared in the late 1920s, may be also important as a precursor of today's intuitive graphical user interfaces. On this technique, notes and various sound parameters were controlled by hand-drawn waves on the films, resembling piano rolls or strip charts on the modern sequencers/DAWs. It was often utilized on early experiments of electronic music, including "Variophone" developed by Yevgeny Sholpo in 1930, and Oramics designed by Daphne Oram in 1957, etc.

Analog sequencers

Step sequencers

The step sequencers played rigid patterns of notes using a grid of (usually) 16 buttons, or steps, each step being 1/16 of a measure. These patterns of notes were then chained together to form longer compositions. Sequencers of this kind are still in use, mostly built into drum machines and grooveboxes. They are monophonic by nature, although some are multi-timbral, meaning that they can control several different sounds but only play one note on each of those sounds.

Computer music

CSIRAC played earliest computer music in 1951

Max Mathews playing a violin connected to the GROOVE system(c.1970)

On the other hand, software sequencers were continuously utilized since 1950s, in the context of computer music, including computer played music (software sequencer), computer composed music (music synthesis), and computer sound generation (sound synthesis). In June 1951, first computer music Colonel Bogey was played on CSIRAC, Australia's first digital computer.^[16][17] In 1956, Lejaren Hiller at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign wrote an earliest program for computer music composition on ILLIAC, and collaborated on the first piece, Illiac Suite for String Quartet, with Leonard Issaction.^[18] In 1957, Max Mathews at Bell Labs wrote MUSIC, a first widely-used program for sound generation, and 17 second composition was performed by the IBM 704 computer. Since then, computer music were mainly researched on the expensive mainframe computers at the computer centers, until minicomputers and later microcomputers went into practice on this field in 1970s.

Digital sequencers

In 1971, Electronic Music Studios (EMS) released one of the first digital sequencer products as a module of Synthi 100, and separated products Synthi Sequencer series.^[19][20] After then, Oberheim released DS-2 Digital Sequencer in 1974,^[21], and Sequential Circuits released Model 800 in 1977 ^[22]

Also in 1977, Roland Corporation released their first microcomputer-based digital sequencer, MC-8 Microcomposer, also called computer music composer by Roland. ^[23] It equipped keypad to enter note in numeric code, 16KB RAM for maximum 5200 notes (large enough at that time), and polyphony function which allocates multiple pitch CV into single Gate. ^[24] The earliest known user was Yellow Magic Orchestra, an electronic music group in 1978, ^[25] they created new sounds not possible until then.^[26]

Software sequencers

In 1975, New England Digital (NED) released ABLE computer (microcomputer)^[27] as a dedicated data processing unit for Dartmouth Digital Synthesizer (1973), and based on it, later Synclavier series were developed. Synclavier I, released in September 1977,^[28] was one of the earlier digital music workstation product with multitrack sequencer. Synclavier series evolved throughout late 1970s–mid 1980s, and they integrated digital-audio and music-sequencer, on the Direct-to-Disk option in 1984, and later Tapeless Studio system.

In 1980, renewed Fairlight CMI Series II with its sequencer, “Page R”, combined step sequencing with sample playback. In 1987, this led to the development of similar software sequencers of this kind, called Trackers, which became popular in the 1980s and 1990s as simple sequencers for creating computer game music, and are yet popular in the Demoscene and Chiptunes.

Short timeline of rhythm sequencers

Hardware sequencers

Many synthesizers, and by definition all workstations and drum machines, contain their own sequencers.

Following are specifically designed to function primarily as sequencers:

Rotating object with pins

• Barrel or cylinder with pins (since 9th or 14th century) utilized on barrel organs, carillons, music boxes
• Disc with pins — utilized on several barrel organs

Punched paper

• Book music (since 1890) utilized on several mechanical organs
• Music roll utilized on player pianos (using piano rolls), Orchestrions, several mechanical organs, etc.
• Punch tape system for earlier studio synthesizers
  • RCA Mark II Sound Synthesizer (1957)

    Room-filling device built in 1957 for half a million dollars. Included a 4-polyphony synth with 12 oscillators, a sequencer fed with wide paper tape, and output were recorded on a shellac record lathe.

  • Siemens Synthesizer (1959)^[7]

Sound-on-film

• Variophone (1930) — on earlier version, hand drawn waves on film or disc were used to synthesize sound, and later versions were promised to experiment on musical intonations and temporal characteristics of live music performance, however not finished. Variophone is often referred as a forerunner of drawn sound system including ANS synthesizer and Oramics.
• Composer-Tron (1953) — rhythmical sequences were controlled via marking cue on film, while timbre of note or envelope shape of sound were defined via shapes hand drawn with a grease pencil on a surface of CRT input device.^[29]
• ANS synthesizer (1957) — An earliest realtime additive synthesizer using 720 microtonal sine waves (1/6 semitones × 10 octaves) generated by five glas discs. Composers could control time evolution of amplitudes of each microtones via scratches on glass plate user interface covered with black mastic.
• Oramics (1957) — hand drawn contours on a set of ten sprocketed synchronized strips of 35 film were used to control various parameters of monophonic sound generator (frequency, timbre, amplitude and duration).^[30] Polyphonic sounds were obtained using multitrack recording technique.

Electro-mechanical sequencers

• Wall of Sound (mid 1940s–1950s) — earlier electro-mechanical sequencer developed by Raymond Scott to produce rhythmic patterns, consistead with stepping relays, solenoids, and tone generators.^[8]
• Circle Machine (1959) — electro-optical rotary sequencer developed by Raymond Scott to generate arbitrary waveforms, consisted with dimmer bulbs arranged in a ring, and a rotating arm with photocell scanning over the ring.^[10]

Analog sequencers

Analog sequencers with CV/Gate interface

• Sequencers on Buchla 100 (1964/1966–) — One of the earliest analog sequencer in the modular synthesizer era since 1960. Later, Robert Moog admired Buchla's unique works including it.^[11][12]
• Moog 960 Sequential Controller^[31] / 961 Interface ^[32] / 962 Sequential Switch^[33] (c.1968)^[34]

  modules for the Moog modular synthesizer system, a popular analog sequencer following earlier Buchla sequencer.

Analog-style MIDI step sequencers

Since the analog synthesizer revivals in 1990s, newly designed MIDI sequencers were released. These equip multiple knobs or sliders similar to analog sequencer, CV/Gate and DIN sync interface, and even patch memory for sequence patterns. These analog-digital hybrid machines are often called Analog-style MIDI step sequencer or MIDI analog sequencer, etc.

• Doepfer MAQ 16/3 — MIDI analog sequencer, designed in cooperation with Kraftwerk
• Doepfer Regelwerk — MIDI analog sequencer with MIDI controller
• Frostwave Fat Controller
• Infection Music Phaedra
• Infection Music Zeit
• Latronic Notron
• Manikin Schrittmacher
• Sequentix P3

MIDI pattern sequencers

Several machines have also song mode to play sequence patterns on patch memory in specified order, as on drum machine.

• Doepfer Schaltwerk —MIDI pattern sequencer

Step sequencers (supported on)

Typical step sequencers are integrated on drum machines, bass machines, groove machines, music production machines, and these software versions. And also these often support (semi-)realtime mode.

Several machines have white & black chromatic keypads, to enter musical scale of bass lines, etc.

embedded CV/Gate step sequencers

• Multivox / Firstman SQ-01 (1980) — a forerunner of TB-303
• Roland MC-202 (1983)
• Roland SH-101 (1982) — monophonic keytar synthesizer with sequencer, similar to MC-202
• Roland TB-303 (1981)

embedded MIDI step sequencers

Other groovebox-type machines (including several music production machines) also often support step sequence mode, of course. :

Recently emerging button-grid-style interfaces/instruments are naturally support step sequence. On these machines, one axis on grid means musical scale, and another axis means timing of notes.

• Akai APC40 — interface for Ableton Live
• Arduinome — interface
• Bliptronics 5000 — instrument
• Monome — interface
• Novation Novation Launchpad — interface for Ableton Live
• Yamaha Tenori-on — instrument

In addition, newly designed hardware MIDI sequencers equipping series of knobs/sliders similar to analog sequencers, are sometimes called "MIDI step sequencer", etc. For details, see #Analog-style MIDI step sequencers.

Digital sequencers

CV/Gate

Also often support Gate clock and DIN sync interfaces.

Proprietary digital interface (pre MIDI)

• NED Synclavier series — CV/Gate interface and MIDI retrofit kit were available on Synclavier II. Also MIDI became standard feature on Synclavier PSMT. ^[36][37]
• Fairlight CMI series — CV/Gate interface was optionally available on Series II, and MIDI was supported on Series IIx and later models.
• Oberheim DSX (Oberheim Parallel Bus)
• PPG Wave family (PPG Bus)
• Roland JSQ-60 (Roland Digital Control Bus (DCB))
• Sequential Circuits PolySequencer 1005 (SCI Serial Bus)

Also Yamaha used proprietary digital interface on their earlier digital products. For example, YIS PU-I-20/PU-I-10 ca. 1981, a home automation computer system before MSX, enabled integration of home electronics including player piano, Electone (electronic organ), and remote music keyboard.^[38][39]

MIDI sequencers

Embedded MIDI sequencers

• Philips Micro Composer PMC100
• Yamaha Walkstation series: MU5/MU10/MU15/QY8/QY10/QY20/QY22/QY70/QY100 — (palmtop sequencer with sound module)

  Accompaniment machines

• Yamaha QR10

See also #embedded MIDI step sequencers.

Standalone MIDI sequencers

See also: #Analog-style MIDI step sequencers

MIDI phrase sequencers

• Zyklus MPS

Uncategorized sequencers

(not yet)

Software sequencers / DAWs with sequencing features

Free/Open Source

Not categorized yet

DAWs/HD recorders

• Ardour - Linux, Mac OS X, FreeBSD (Note: No sequence feature found)

Others

Commercial

Not categorized yet

Realtime orchestral accompaniments

• Sinfonia , from Realtime Music Solutions (Note: It seems not the sequencer)

Hard Disk recorder solutions for MIDI sequencers

• WinAudio from Zadok Audio & Media Products

Others

See also

• Drum machine
• Groovebox
• Music workstation
• Digital audio workstation
• Tracker (music software)
• Scorewriter
• Electronic music

Notes

References

External links

• A list of software DAWs, Sequencers, Hosts, etc.
• Audio Sequencers on Shareware Music Machine
• MIDI Sequencers on Shareware Music Machine
• Early sequencer controllers from the Vintage Synth Explorer
  • The sequencer comparison chart
• Early Roland sequencers (1977–1984)
• 1974 newspaper article about digital sequencer