BassoonTracker is a free online music creation app that follows the long tradition of music trackers. If you’ve ever heard of Protracker or Fasttracker, you know how it works. If not, you’re probably too young 🙂
But if the words “Trackers,” “Samples,” “MOD,” and “XM” don’t mean anything to you but you’re still interested in the origins of computer music, I strongly invite you to watch this video:
BassoonTracker is, therefore, an old-school Amiga music tracker that has been coded entirely in pure JavaScript. It is capable of playing and modifying Amiga Module (MOD) files and FastTracker 2 XM files.
If you want to give it a try, click here.
Here is the list of features of BassoonTracker:
- 100% pure JavaScript – no dependencies!
- Open Source (license MIT)
- Compatible with Protracker and FastTracker: upload, edit, and save .mod and .xm files
- Supports up to 32 channels
- Has a built-in sample editor
- MIDI support
- Imports 8-bit WAV files, 8-bit Sampling Voice (8SVX) files, and RAW samples (as well as any other format that the AudioContext interface can play, such as .mp3 and .ogg)
- Export possible to .wav and .mp3 formats
- Includes historical sample discs ST-01 and ST-02, released in 1987 (as well as a bunch of others)
- Uses the modarchive API to access thousands of music files
- Uses the modules.pl API to access even more music files
- Can connect to your Dropbox account to directly read and write your own files
- Includes a lightweight player library that you can use in your own projects
Excellent, isn’t it? In any case, if you’re feeling creative right now, this might be a good way to experience what your ancestors felt in 1987 when they started teasing the keyboard to write their first 8-bit songs. There’s even a little Snake game in it:
Seriously, who has the time to do a super good JavaScript port like that, while I don’t even have time to go pee?!
In any case, if you’re a fan of trackers or if you’re just curious about this way of making music, BassoonTracker is a great way to get started.
The sources of the project are here.
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