Alexander Schubert - Black Out Software
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Software to black out any midi file.
2018


Description
For the composition "Black Out BRD" I wrote a small computer program to invert / black out the German National Anthem. The result would include all notes and pitches that were not in the original piece. Here you can find all information on the piece.
A common reaction to this piece was, that people would like to apply this technique to their country's anthem (or possibly other music material). The idea behind this piece originally was to overwrite right-wing music - not just the anthem of Germany. So we came up with a generalized implementation of the software, which can load any music piece and black it out.
The software was programmed by Martin von Frantzius


How does it work
You download the patch or app.
Then you chose a midi file (to get best results, please choose a quantized MIDI file with fixed tempo).
Then you generate the inverted score of the file.
This will create a score with a staff for each pitch in the octave. Here you will see all inverted pitches.
You can export the result and create your personal voicing / score based on it.

There are two modes of operation:
Either the resulting pitches can be in the rhythm of the original piece or they can be produced as long sustained notes


Screenshot


Download
Max Patch
Standalone App (OSX)

Additional Information
For the Max Patch you need to install the Bach Framework in the Package Manager.


License
The software is distributed under the creative common license "CC BY".
Feel free to do whatever you want with it.
If you create a piece with it, drop a line, so we can link it here!