Hi Steven - Forgot to reply to this - Sorry and thanks again for your reply. I'll give it a go - keep in mind I use CM-1.4, not 2.0. I always assumed the ItemStream concept was based on set theory. You have a series (here called an ItemStream) - it has some qualifying keywords which modify how the stream is read. There are a few different types of Items defined in CM - pitch, rhythm, and a few others, which have some special behavior. You can nest the streams for musically interesting results, which is really where they get interesting. There is more functionality to them, but I use them basically for these reasons. An ItemStream gives an item every time it is evaluated, it's best illustrated by some examples: (item (items 1 2 3 4 5))would yield '1 2 3 4 5' if evaluated five times, (item (items 1 2 3 4 5 in random)) would yield some random set contain any of '1 2 3 4 5' if evaluated five times, (item (items 1 2 3 4 5 in heap)) would yield some random set contain some combination of '1 2 3 4 5' if evaluated five times, without repeating any of the members more than once, as in basic 12-tone composition. (item (items 1 2 3 4 5)(items 1 2 3 4 5)) would yield '1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5' etc (item (rhythms s s e) tempo (tempo 60)) would yield startimes for your notes based on a 16th-16th-8th rhythmic pattern at 60 bpm. There are a handful of these modifiers which, combined with some programming knowledge, can yield some interesting musical results. The full docs for ItemStreams is still mirrored online here: http://www.notam02.no/internt/cm-sys/cm-1.4/doc/dict/item_streams.tpc.html The entire CM Dictionary for 1.4 is here http://www.notam02.no/internt/cm-sys/cm-1.4/doc/dict/index.html I use it very often - for everything from generating dense textures and crowd sounds to programming beats, chord progressions, and melodic ideas for pop songs (and lots in between). I do a lot of music for films, and often I want quick sketches of elaborate ideas so it comes in handy there. I usually take the results from CM and vary them by hand, rather than just take the result of the algorithm blindly. I'd like to automate _some_ of that variation-by-hand, and extend the framework, so I am porting this to a language I'm more comfy with. Thanks for asking! b PS - there was a book on CM that was due to be published by MIT press, and I think the author was Mary Simony. Anyone know what ever became of it? On 12/21/05, Steven Yi wrote: > > > > BTW: I'm not sure if you have time but could you explain the > ItemStream concept from Common Music? The last time I had a working > common music system on my computer was a couple years ago and when I > got into it I remember having problems with the way it abstracted some > ideas about time and music; it'd be great to hear your thoughts on it. > > Thanks and also Happy Holidays to all! > steven > > > > On 12/21/05, Ben McAllister wrote: > > Hi all, > > > > I've been lurking since 1996, but rarely write - so, first, THANK YOU > to > > you devs for csound5 - I'm a software dev myself during the day and > > understand the investment you are making. Thanks so much! > > > > My question: > > In an effort to reinvigorate my Python skills, I'm going to port my > > favorite bits of Common Music 1.x to Python, particularly the ItemStream > > concept and a few other things I frequently use. As many of you know, > it's > > a good fit within Steven Yi's excellent program blue, and the last drop > of > > csound5 included a python wrapper for the Csound API. I'm excited as > well > > about the GUI-building possibilities between this wrapper and the Python > > ugens Maurizio Umberto Puxeddu contributed. But I digress... > > > > Looking for starting points within the csound world, I've found the > > following: athenaCl, Steven's Orchestra Library in the last drop of > blue, > > and some in csoundVST. I'm playing catchup to a certain degree. There > are > > a few examples in the last release of csoundVST which I saw, and I > > understand there is more in Silence, but it appears to no longer be > hosted > > at csounds.com. Is it still available anywhere? Someone is using the > name > > at sourceforge :( I noticed that Michael Gogin's site is down due to > it's > > popularity, so perhaps it's there waiting to be downloaded. > > > > So, csound community, do you know of any other > > algorithmic-composition-related python resources which I might find > useful > > in this endeavor? I'm wondering if someone hasn't already invented this > > wheel. I'd much rather get back to building instruments and making > music ;) > > Seriously, I'd rather build on something others are using than reinvent > the > > wheel. > > > > Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from Seattle, > > Ben McAllister > > http://www.listenfaster.com > > > > > -- > Send bugs reports to this list. > To unsubscribe, send email to csound-unsubscribe@lists.bath.ac.uk >