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Open-Source Music Production Tools
- RikNieu 6y agoThis is awesome, thanks! I wish I had time to play with stuff like this more
- spookybones 6y agoThis is great. Does anyone have an equivalent list for design and illustration software?
- mastazi 6y agoI don’t have a link to a comprehensive list but my personal suggestions are: * GIMP for photo editing * Krita for freehand drawing and for CMYK support * Inkscape for vector images * Scribus for desktop publishing (booklets, flyers etc) * Blender for 3D graphics (modelling/rigging/animation) [1] * Blender for 2D animation [1] * Blender for video editing [1] * Blender for compositing [1] [1] Basically Blender is expanding in fields that are outside of 3D graphics and I believe that over time it became the best alternative in those fields.
- acomjean 6y agothere was a website that was tracking that stuff. Not sure how often its updated, but: https://alternativeto.net https://alternativeto.net So punching in illustrator: https://alternativeto.net/software/adobe-illustrator/ https://alternativeto.net/software/adobe-illustrator/
- auxym 6y agoHere's a decent list centered around photography: https://pixls.us/software/ https://pixls.us/software/
- pabs3 6y agoSynfig for 2D vector animation: https://www.synfig.org/ https://www.synfig.org/
- pmoriarty 6y agoOne of my favorites, not listed there, is qmidiarp. http://qmidiarp.sourceforge.net/ http://qmidiarp.sourceforge.net/
- 3131s 6y agoLooks like this one is in the Arch official repositories as well, I'll have to try it. Two of my favorites are in the list, Hydrogen and ZynSubAddFx.
- ryanmcdonough 6y agoHaving followed the development of one back when I used to listen to LUGRadio: Jokosher hasn’t been updated in over 10 years, yes it’s free and open but doesn’t seem like it’s worth the hassle including in the list.
- sah2ed 6y agoIt’s missing AudioMass https://audiomass.co/ https://audiomass.co/ AudioMass was well received in a recent feature on HN. [0] Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23337091 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23337091
- ris 6y agoComprehensive? No PureData.
- ryan_midi 6y agoHi, author here. I aimed this list at non-technical people who wanted to make music for free. I avoided things like PureData and Sonic-Pi for this reason. Though if I'm honest, the learning curve for something like Sonic Pi isn't necessarily steeper than that for Ardour :)
- ryan_midi 6y agoHello! I'm the author of this page. I realize that a few tools might be missing. Happy to hear all suggestions. In the meantime, if you want this list in Google sheet, you can make a copy of this one: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1YfVyZHy83WHIiZmQJwHhwPTXomc188VcIwhZJB0P8ro/edit?usp=sharing https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1YfVyZHy83WHIiZmQJwHh...
- SeanLuke 6y agoSome notes, hope this is useful. - Why are helm and dexed called "sequencers"? They're synthesizers. You're missing a massive collection of open source synthesizers, effects units, and so on. Indeed you don't even have this as a category, or some common ones are put under "sequencers". - You're also completely lacking open source patch editors, arduino and related MIDI tools, and so on. - And ... you have supercollider but not PD? Not csound? Etc.
- npteljes 6y agoHello Ryan! As long as we're talking open source, can I suggest you Onlyoffice instead of Goggle Sheets? Similar functionality, but with AGPL license, and the personal tier is free as in free beer too. Here's how you doc would look if shared similarly: https://onlyo.co/32FPJAZ https://onlyo.co/32FPJAZ
- narag 6y agoThank you for the list. There something that bothers me a little. LMMS seems very much like commercial DAWs, but Muse was more of a notation+sequencer program. I remember Rosegarden much like that, but it was too long ago. The rest no idea, but it would be useful a brief commentary adding some additional info to the DAW and sequencer categories, since they seem very broad. Of course, if someone can share opinions here, it would also be nice.
- ttctciyf 6y agoIt's a good list! If you haven't visited already, maybe you could take a look at https://github.com/nodiscc/awesome-linuxaudio https://github.com/nodiscc/awesome-linuxaudio
- o-__-o 6y agoPhasex is money and not on this list.
- mastazi 6y agoI can’t speak well enough of qTractor: it has a nice and intuitive UI, it does MIDI and Audio, it supports many different plugin formats, both instruments and effects (VST 2/3, LADSPA, DSSI, LV2), and it supports many forms of audio manipulation including time stretching and pitch shifting. If you’re looking for an open source DAW in my opinion it’s the way to go https://qtractor.sourceforge.io/ https://qtractor.sourceforge.io/
- keeblers_n_bits 6y agoOne of the reasons I haven't been able to fully commit to Linux on the desktop is that I haven't been able to find quality music production tools. I always end up going back to macOS because I miss Logic Pro X and Ableton Live too much. Also the audio routing in macOS is so much easier than any other operating system I've encountered. I would love to hear about music studios using FOSS.
- 4043D 6y agoRenoise isn't open source but is Linux native. Aducity is good for recording. And hydrogen is an ok drum machine.
- amazing_stories 6y agoI agree, it's difficult to do music on Linux. I almost punched my computer last weekend because it's so hard. However, two things I can say for sure is that the Linux native of Reaper works great and Ubuntu Studio presents a pretty good OOBE with Ardour. Nothing running on Linux compares to Ableton, so if that's your preferred workflow, just stick with that. Now, if someone could just write a good audio editor that works on Linux... (Audacity is complete garbage).
- avhon1 6y agoAs somebody who has only used Audacity and Pure Data, what's an example of a good audio editor?
- tomc1985 6y agoAudacity is a fine editor, but the UI isn't really consistent with platform conventions. A long time ago I learned audio stuff on cracked copies of Sound Forge, which behaved like one would expect a Windows app to behave, then switched to Audacity and hated it because the UI was so weird.
- SyneRyder 6y agoA long time ago Cool Edit Pro was the definitive choice on Windows. It became Adobe Audition and 'disappeared' into their Creative Cloud subscription bundle - it's still actively developed but I no longer hear of people using it. iZotope RX is meant more for audio restoration (and is the industry standard there), but you can also use it for many audio editing tasks. I've personally switched to Acustica by Acon Digital. The GUI isn't perfect, but it's very fast, and has an impressive audio separation tool based on Spleeter. All those tools seem to have taken some influence from that Cool Edit Pro GUI.
- myself248 6y agoVCV Rack, anyone? https://vcvrack.com/ https://vcvrack.com/
- duncanawoods 6y agoSadly running it as a DAW won't be open source.
- ttctciyf 6y agoThough running the FOSS version on linux allows to route audio back and forth between Rack and external recorders, hosts, plugins, etc with ease via JACK.
- deusofnull 6y agoVCV Rack is a titan in the FOSS eurorack modular world. nothing else comes close. I have a physical eurorack as well but i use Rack all the time to sketch out ideas and to explore new kinds of modules before i buy something physical.
- mxmilkb 6y agoSee also LV2/JACK CV: https://linuxmusicians.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=20701 https://linuxmusicians.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=20701
- rogerclark 6y agoOne thing missing from this list -- and pretty much any mention of open source music tools for some reason -- is OpenMPT: an open-source Windows-based tracker with full VST support. It runs great under WINE. It's a tracker, and not a sequencer-style DAW, but unlike every other open source DAW, it is battle-tested, non-beta non-alpha post-1.0 release software, and capable of producing commercial-quality music. https://openmpt.org/ https://openmpt.org/
- bane 6y agoIt also happens to have pretty great compatibility with various tracker music formats like .mod, .s3m, .it and so on.
- spankalee 6y agoI'd love to see more synthesizers on the list, and more open-source synths in general. MIDI controllers and SBCs are plentiful and cheap enough that you can do some really amazing custom rigs, but the sound generations options aren't there yet.
- lioeters 6y ago> MIDI controllers and SBCs I recently discovered this niche, of building/using portable "digital instruments" with a heart of Linux, in my case running on Raspberry Pi with audio interface. It's so exciting how affordable and practical this is, I feel like it's an area of exploration worth more attention. A couple of related open-source/open-hardware projects: Pisound - https://www.blokas.io/pisound/docs/ https://www.blokas.io/pisound/docs/ Zynthian - https://github.com/zynthian https://github.com/zynthian In the latter's wiki/documentation, there's a big list of open-source synths bundled with their Linux distro. http://wiki.zynthian.org/index.php/Zynthian_Supported_Synth_Engines http://wiki.zynthian.org/index.php/Zynthian_Supported_Synth_... The above link is down at the moment, I think they may be switching CMS backend. Here's an archived page: https://web.archive.org/web/20191020093102/http://wiki.zynthian.org/index.php/Zynthian_Supported_Synth_Engines https://web.archive.org/web/20191020093102/http://wiki.zynth... --- Edit: Here's a good one, from another comment: https://github.com/nodiscc/awesome-linuxaudio#synthesizers https://github.com/nodiscc/awesome-linuxaudio#synthesizers
- rzzzt 6y agoSchism Tracker is an SDL-based reimagination of Impulse Tracker [1]. Jeffrey Lim also made the sources of the original project available [2]. [1] https://github.com/schismtracker/schismtracker https://github.com/schismtracker/schismtracker [2] https://bitbucket.org/jthlim/impulsetracker https://bitbucket.org/jthlim/impulsetracker
- tony 6y agoI witnessed a supposed open source music app "in the wild" on YT recently: https://youtu.be/U6Og9wtO9jE?t=640 https://youtu.be/U6Og9wtO9jE?t=640 Context: Someone was using fiverr to get people to play a tune on bass guitar. The supposed "pro" player was hooked directly into Ubuntu (it looks like Unity) Anyone know what app in the background?
- rzzzt 6y agoThe application icon is Ardour's.
- racl101 6y agoHere's a chance for a content maker to make a YouTube channel to show people how to use these tools. I know that a lot of people's apprehension with these kinds of open source tools is they're afraid of investing their time into a tool that might not be widely supported because if they get stuck there will be little to no support in figuring out the software. And also, if the project is not popular enough then it won't get updated enough and, thus, remain not competitive with commercial software.
- ttctciyf 6y agoThere are a couple of yt channels out there, for example https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAYKj_peyESIMDp5LtHlH2A https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAYKj_peyESIMDp5LtHlH2A But nothing like you might expect compared to FOSS creative software in other fields, like Blender or Gimp.
- grawprog 6y agoI've never thought of making a youtube channel about it but I have started and stopped a few articles in a series I was planning on creating a song from start to finish with open source tools. I've just never really had the time, or to be honest motivation to sit down and work on it.
- ryan_midi 6y agoThat's where I'm going towards next. I'm going to create a song from scratch using just Ardour and Zyn synth. I actually find Ardour's CPU usage to be more efficient than Ableton or Logic. And honestly, the learning curve isn't any steeper
- mxmilkb 6y agoCarla, LV2 etc host, LV2/JACK patchbay, sound bank support, etc., by falkTX, maintainer of JACK and MOD Devices developer. https://kx.studio/Applications:Carla https://kx.studio/Applications:Carla https://github.com/falkTX/Carla https://github.com/falkTX/Carla https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/108225/87578308-26837980-c6cc-11ea-8ca8-3a7f684567ab.png https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/108225/87578308-26...
- pabs3 6y agoAnother DAW: https://www.zrythm.org/ https://www.zrythm.org/
- pabs3 6y agoThis is a list of different multimedia related tasks that you can do with Debian, from DAWs to animation: https://blends.debian.org/multimedia/tasks/ https://blends.debian.org/multimedia/tasks/
- exikyut 6y agoNaive, under-researched :) question: what Linux-native program lets me import a bunch of audio tracks, arrange them in a timeline with subsample-level resolution, apply nondestructive edits such as crossfades... ...with a fast, simple UI? :) So far I've poked at Ardour, but a) I was pretty sure it was absolute overkill for my simple purposes, b) The program felt kinda clunky, like if I moved wrong it would crash, and c) I wasn't sure the program was subsample-accurate. -- I've pretty much never pursued playing around with audio or music because all the software out there is either undiscoverably obscure, or firmly out of my price range (which is $0, since I a) have no idea if audio editing will even be interesting, and b) don't know what program would be the most appropriate). After throwing my hands up in the air for the 20th time at Audacity's remarkable sluggishness I stumbled on ReZound (http://rezound.sourceforge.net/ss.shtml http://rezound.sourceforge.net/ss.shtml) a few years ago and discovered a refreshingly fast tool with VUs that would happily run at 60fps on the ~20 year old machine I was using at the time. (2014 was interesting. I was using an 800MHz AMD Duron with 320MB RAM. And to reiterate, ReZound was completely usable on that machine.) Sadly, while the most-recent SVN of ReZound does compile on modern Linux, project saving has been broken since the paleolithic era so you have to (re-)export as FLAC to save... and sometimes the edit process subtly injects single-sample gaps of silence which sound like clicks/pops (!), making the program unusable. Not to mention it uses the destructive edit model. Wish it was in better shape, it's a fairly excellent program.
- iotku 6y ago> Ardour felt kinda clunky, like if I moved wrong it would crash I'd say Ardour is one of the more mature(re: stable) open-source solutions on linux and has a fair bit of development effort behind it. Personally usability wise I never quite figured it out, although it seems fairly feature packed (if you can figure it out) Apparently Qtractor also supports non-destructive audio editing but I haven't really tried it yet. Aside from that I know this is a thread on open-source, but I will point out Reaper has experimental native Linux builds which I've found to work quite well and Reaper (not $0, but minor nag screen) is also non-destructive.
- codemusings 6y agoAudacity works well for that purpose. But not all things are intuitive and the interface looks quite dated to be honest.
- geff82 6y agoI have only experience with Propellerheads Reason and what I like there that lots of instruments and synthesizer settings are available. Where do I go for instruments when using open source software? How is this topic being handled?
- ordrumbox 6y agohttps://ordrumbox.com https://ordrumbox.com Gpl2 free open source drum machine
- richrichardsson 6y agoSurge Synth[1] has been FOSS for a while now and is being actively developed. It's very good to boot! [1] https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/ https://surge-synthesizer.github.io/