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As a person with no knowledge of music theory, I am amazed how the music produced here, even with completely random mouse movements, still sounds decent—even a

As a person with no knowledge of music theory, I am amazed how the music produced here, even with completely random mouse movements, still sounds decent—even a bit pleasing, if I may. Certainly better than hitting keys randomly on a piano as an amateur. How does that happen? Is it just about the tempo, and how space between two notes has been programmatically defined?

exitb 4y ago
It does keep the tempo, but also limits you to a single scale. So it does sound nice for a bit, but the song doesn't really go anywhere. There are some physical instruments that typically limit you to a single scale too, like a harmonica.
- coldtea 4y ago
  You don't need modulation (going to more than one scale/key) for the song to "go somewhere" or be hella interesting, catchy and touching/emotional. Tens of thousands of the most known rock and pop songs and hits, from rockers to tearful ballads, are single scale diatonic as well. You don't even need off-scale passing notes... The reason this doesn't go anywhere, is not because it's single-scale, but because the melody has no direction and purpose. It's just a "random" pick based on the mouse movements.
rkachowski 4y ago
when you first open the page it will only use the white keys, this essentially puts everything in the key of C major and prevents clashing of notes. If you change the setting from "diatonic" to "chromatic" on the top left you'll get the random hitting of keys effect you mention :)
- coldtea 4y ago
  How do you know it's not in A minor? :-)
  - reikonomusha 4y ago
    (Somewhat of a half-serious/half-joke answer:) Because it doesn't have any G#, of course!
  - rkachowski 4y ago
    plot twist: it was E Phrygian
ChadNauseam 4y ago
Music theory is an amazing subject. You can actually make random notes sound reasonably musical by constraining them to just a few simple rules. Copy/pasting from Dmitri Tymoczko's Music 105 lecture notes: 1. Conjunct melodic motion. Melodies tend to move by short distances from note to note. Large leaps sound inherently unmelodic. 2. Harmonic consistency. The chords in a passage of music, whatever they may be, tend to be structurally similar to one another. 3. Acoustic consonance. Some chords sound intrinsically good or pleasing. These are said to be consonant. 4. Scales. Over small spans of musical time (say 30 seconds or so), most musical styles tend to use just a few types of notes, between 5 to 8. 5. Centricity. Over moderate spans of musical time, one tonic note is heard as being more prominent than the others, appearing more frequently and serving as a goal of musical motion. (Not to say that everything that sounds musical follows these rules, just that if you follow these rules the output is likely to sound musical.)

exitb 4y ago

It does keep the tempo, but also limits you to a single scale. So it does sound nice for a bit, but the song doesn't really go anywhere. There are some physical instruments that typically limit you to a single scale too, like a harmonica.

coldtea 4y ago
You don't need modulation (going to more than one scale/key) for the song to "go somewhere" or be hella interesting, catchy and touching/emotional. Tens of thousands of the most known rock and pop songs and hits, from rockers to tearful ballads, are single scale diatonic as well. You don't even need off-scale passing notes... The reason this doesn't go anywhere, is not because it's single-scale, but because the melody has no direction and purpose. It's just a "random" pick based on the mouse movements.

rkachowski 4y ago

when you first open the page it will only use the white keys, this essentially puts everything in the key of C major and prevents clashing of notes. If you change the setting from "diatonic" to "chromatic" on the top left you'll get the random hitting of keys effect you mention :)

coldtea 4y ago
How do you know it's not in A minor? :-)
- reikonomusha 4y ago
  (Somewhat of a half-serious/half-joke answer:) Because it doesn't have any G#, of course!
- rkachowski 4y ago
  plot twist: it was E Phrygian

ChadNauseam 4y ago

Music theory is an amazing subject. You can actually make random notes sound reasonably musical by constraining them to just a few simple rules. Copy/pasting from Dmitri Tymoczko's Music 105 lecture notes: 1. Conjunct melodic motion. Melodies tend to move by short distances from note to note. Large leaps sound inherently unmelodic. 2. Harmonic consistency. The chords in a passage of music, whatever they may be, tend to be structurally similar to one another. 3. Acoustic consonance. Some chords sound intrinsically good or pleasing. These are said to be consonant. 4. Scales. Over small spans of musical time (say 30 seconds or so), most musical styles tend to use just a few types of notes, between 5 to 8. 5. Centricity. Over moderate spans of musical time, one tonic note is heard as being more prominent than the others, appearing more frequently and serving as a goal of musical motion. (Not to say that everything that sounds musical follows these rules, just that if you follow these rules the output is likely to sound musical.)