Historical notes.
In the late 80's I got myself my
first computer, an Atari ST. It was hyper modern and first choice for
a musician living in Europe. I also bought a couple of synthesizers
and a sequencing software called "Creator" by a German company named
C-Lab (later renamed to Emagic and now owned by Apple).
It opened up a completely new world and I was composing a lot of music
using this stuff. But I also grew curious about how everything worked.
How could a key press be transmitted into the computer, stored, edited
and then eventually sent out to the synthesizer making noise? Hm...
A friend of mine gave me a programming software and I bought a couple
of books. After some tests my first computer software could receive
a MIDI byte and send it out again to the synthesizer. Nine lines of
code written in Motorola 68000 assembler. It worked! From there on I
was hooked and continued with various tests. The "Creator" software
become the model for my experiments and I had no thoughts about that
this could be a software other people could use so I didn't care about
creating something innovatory.
I learnt myself to use the C programming language to create the interface
but because the Atari at the time wasn't as fast as computers are today,
I wrote everything related to MIDI in assembler. I became an expert
in Motorola 68000 assembler! Eventually the program became a useful
tool and some people bought it and started to use it.
Time went on and I got myself a Windows 3.1 PC and decided to port it
over to Windows. I then had to rewrite all assembler code into regular
C code since I didn't want to learn Intel 386 assembler. In fact, this
code is still the heart of all my current MIDI software including "Sweet
MIDI Player" for iOS! The last lines of code written for the Atari version
was sometime during 1997, after that I sold the Atari and bought myself
a Mac.
Below are some old screen shots of the program and a download link to
the freeware version.
Sweet Sixteen MIDI Sequencer for Atari ST
Sweet Sixteen for Atari / Main Screen
- Sweet Sixteen has an impressive resolution of 192 PPQN
(Pulses Per Quarter Note) enabling precise and accurate
editing. Modifying data is easily performed using either
the List or Piano Roll editor screens.
Sweet Sixteen for Atari / List Editor
Sweet Sixteen for Atari / Piano Roll Editor
- Sweet Sixteen includes a handy mixer page to record and
take numerous snapshots of your favourite mixes. Although
designed to work with GM devices, Sweet Sixteen's mixer
page can be used with most other makes of equipment.
Sweet Sixteen for Atari / Mixer Screen
System Requirements:
- Atari ST/STE, Mega ST/STE, TT030 or Falcon
- Colour or Monochrome Monitor (medium or high resolution)
- Min 512 Kbytes RAM
- Also works with special systems as Medusa, Hades 060 etc.
Download
