
Microscale – turn random Wikipedia articles into music - alestsurko
http://alestsurko.by/microscale/
======
smoe
I love how the results sounds, so I wanted to now how it works.

Very briefly glancing over the code and listening to the audio files in the
samples folder:

The six articles correspond two six different voices or "instruments" which
are pre-recorded samples of drone like sound and sequences of notes varying in
pitch and speed. The letters in the article then trigger play and stop events
for the samples according to a mapping.

Example for 'u':

[https://raw.githubusercontent.com/AlesTsurko/microscale/gh-p...](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/AlesTsurko/microscale/gh-
pages/samples/grusha/voice-1/u.mp3)

[https://raw.githubusercontent.com/AlesTsurko/microscale/gh-p...](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/AlesTsurko/microscale/gh-
pages/samples/grusha/voice-6/u.mp3)

As the description indicates, there doesn't seem to be any tone generation or
modulation going on in the browser.

~~~
alestsurko
Exactly. There is a farther explanation in the interview:
[http://www.preservedsound.com/news/ales-tsurko-microscale-
ge...](http://www.preservedsound.com/news/ales-tsurko-microscale-generating-
music-from-random-wikipedia-articles)

~~~
smoe
Great work, fitting everything together so well!

How did you go about deciding on the mapping setting like
"shouldPauseEventOnMatch", "isLoop" and "eventLength"? Is there a logic behind
it or more testing and listing what works together?

~~~
alestsurko
Thanks!

I started with the composition (the music one). So these have been dictated by
composition techniques: some samples should play in a loop, others should be
played fully before the sequencer's cursor increments etc.

------
fredley
It has been a long-term ambition of mine to someday build an electronic
aeolian harp[1], powered by weather data. This, I must say, is an even better
idea.

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeolian_harp](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeolian_harp)

------
have_faith
No idea how the text relates to the music, but beautifully haunting none the
less.

~~~
shakna
> Each article functions as a step sequencer, where the letters are the
> sequencer steps and the track titles are regular expressions that switch the
> steps on and off.

The mapping is here. [0] (So far as I can tell)

[0] [https://github.com/AlesTsurko/microscale/blob/gh-
pages/scrip...](https://github.com/AlesTsurko/microscale/blob/gh-
pages/scripts/songs-data.json)

~~~
alestsurko
...and you can change the mapping file to use it as an instrument for your own
music, btw.

~~~
shakna
Now that's the modularity that really appeals to me. Nicely done.

------
Ezku
You might be interested in Wikirock, a Finnish group who _also_ turn random
Wikipedia articles into music. They're on Spotify:
[https://open.spotify.com/artist/3c7rymM4Z143IeZiTJJbQ6](https://open.spotify.com/artist/3c7rymM4Z143IeZiTJJbQ6)

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pault
I know we're not supposed to post low-effort comments like "this is lovely",
but this is lovely.

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alestsurko
Thank you guys! I glad that you liked microscale.

~~~
shakna
It's a great mix of artistic talent (sampling can be hard), and creative
programming (the sequencer is kinda beautiful).

You should be proud.

~~~
alestsurko
Thanks!

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eurticket
Is there something to read me a wikipedia article?

~~~
Ryel
Working on it. Send me an email if you want to try an early version.

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dt_rsp
A bit like Anthem in Dirk Gently.

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lbill
This is superb! The concept is brilliant!

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jslakro
How can I play the articles I choose?

~~~
alestsurko
Due to the album's concept there is no such a feature, sorry. But you can fork
the project on github and try to set attribute contenteditable to "true" for
the div, which you'd like to fill up with your text. The buffers have ids
"buffer-1", "buffer-2" etc.

------
Kenji
Wow! That sounds fantastic, actually. This is the first case of completely
computer-generated music I like listening to.

