Linux fun composer for 8 year old?

October 26, 2009 8:14 AM

Does anyone know any simple Ubuntu music software for me to have fun composing with my eight year old son?

A few years ago there seemed to be lots of simple generative and quasi random music sequencer programmes around (admittedly I'm thinking mac and PC and I've since switched to linux) But now my son is old enough to play and create I can't find anything :(

Browser based ones would be fine, but what I've found seems a bit buggy.

Thanks in advance!

S

posted by Sch01ar to Computers & Internet (4 answers total)

Have you tried Rosegarden? It's not designed for a kid, but it has music notation editing and can both print sheet music and drive MIDI synths. You might also look into Pure Data, a Max/MSP-like dataflow sound synthesizer. PureData is low-level (you connect oscillators, filters, etc) to make sounds, but there's a lot of good tutorials. Also, if you don't mind some more traditional programming tools, try Archaeopteryx, a Ruby library for generating MIDI, which supports realtime editing/feedback.
posted by Alterscape at 8:31 AM on October 26, 2009

Are you looking to record music or generate it? If the former, Jokosher is along the lines of Garageband, though younger and less full featured.
posted by chrisamiller at 10:04 AM on October 26, 2009

You might want to take a look at Scratch. It's not specifically for music, though you can certainly use it for that, but it is aimed at kids, and is fun and easy to pick up if my experience with my 8 year old nephew is anything to go by.
posted by tallus at 12:08 PM on October 26, 2009

LMMS is a DAW quite similar to Fruity Loops.
posted by I_Am_Batman at 5:37 PM on October 26, 2009