Free synthesizer software for linux

F Modular Synthesizer (FMS) is basically a tool to generate all kinds of sounds. It should work on any up-to-date Linux system.
Main features:
Playing sounds
- with any frequency and volume
- one after another or at the same time (mixer) or both
- stereo (different sounds on different channels)
- with any balance between the two channels
- with built-in sweep that even follows frequency modulation
- like speech synthesis [listen]
- both on-the-fly playing with direct user access and asynchronous, pre-computed output; also combining the two, taking the best of both
- with all modulation options described below
Making noise
- now although it tends to get noisy in any way, we mean real noise here
- in 4 different ways
- nearly-white noise
- narrow band noise
Modulating
- amplitude (volume)
- frequency
- minima, maxima, amplitude and frequency of the modulation (here the "Fully Modular" comes to existence)
- balance, moving the sound from left to right and back in stereo mode
- narrowness of the noise frequency band in many different ways
Making music
- some-kind-of-midi-mapping mode (sound + envelope => instrument, FMS midi file format)
- auto-converter and player for MUS file format, listen [here] (Musplay)
- auto-composer for those who like a rather modern kind of music
- chords
Displaying
- spectrum of a sound
- oscillogram of a sound
- mixes between different sounds with different volumes / frequencies
Saving
- sounds as oscillograms in FMS file format (mathematical description, not complete wavetables)
- sounds as Fourier overtone amplitudes
- music in FMS midi format
- FMS output in wave format
- wave file sounds in FMS file format (auto-converter) - experimental
GUI
- a somewhat ugly and extremely limited tcl/tk gui
- FROCOR, an installation that connects the FMS sound backend to graphical interfaces and outputs
- a fully modular Qt GUI - experimental, but Ill give you a [screenshot]
Enhancements:
- This release fixes all bugs discovered via user feedback, and should be quite stable.
- Sweep frequency modulation is now implemented, and using both blur and frequency modulation on the same sound at the same time is possible.

SysExxer is a small utility to exchange system exclusive data with MIDI devices like synthesizers or effects processors. It is free software brought to you under terms and conditions of the GPL.

SysExxer is provided as is and in the hope it is useful for you, but without any warranty. If you use it, you use it at your own risk and responsiveness. Be careful to not delete your killer sound you have worked on several hours, or set your device in undefined states. Both is possible using SysExxer!

SysExxer can contain bugs, so when you use SysExxer for doing backups of the contents of your MIDI-devices, ensure that the resulting files have been properly transmitted, e.g. by sending the content back to the device and testing if everything is OK.

SysExxer is based on KDE, so for using it youll need at least KDE 3.1 installed.

FluidSynth is a real-time software synthesizer based on the SoundFont 2 specifications. FluidSynth project can read MIDI events from a MIDI input device and render them to an audio device using SoundFont instruments.
SoundFont files are composed of digital audio "samples" and additional instrument parameters. These files can be created or downloaded off the Internet. FluidSynth also has support for controlling effects in real time and can play MIDI files.
Note: FluidSynth was previously called IIWU Synth.
Enhancements:
- LASH support has been added.
- This release has improved command line argument handling, AMD-64 bugfixes, a few synthesis bugfixes, and other miscellaneous improvements.

Sanetracker is a pattern based MIDI sequencer. In December 2002 it became a part of the KDE project, so SourceForge will only be used for web for now (and not CVS).
The current version of Sanetracker can use raw MIDI devices (OSS/Free) and the ALSA sequencer, thus supporting virtually all sound cards having a driver for Linux. Getting high precision timers to work under Linux (necessary for synchronizing synthesizers) is hard, so currently you need an external clock to use Sanetracker.
Cakewalk Instrument Defintion files are used for instrument definitions. If you dont have such files for all of your synths, patch selection will become difficult. Sanetracker will download instruments from an online database on request, but you might need to use Google to find the ones you need.
Song files are stored in Standard MIDI Format (SMF), also known as .mid-files. SMF is extendable, and almost all MIDI applications support it, so theres no reason not to use it.
Install:
- vim Makefile (edit CONFIG_*, which is your include dirs)
- make dep
- make all
- cp sane
- mkdir ~/.sanetracker/
- cp config.xml ~/.sanetracker/
- vim ~/.sanetracker/config.xml
Usage:
./sane MySong.xml.gz
The file will be created if it doesnt exist.

fastbreeder is an experimental genetic programming synthesiser. This program is free software, developed for linux, using jack for audio.

Fastbreeder is essentially a 4 button synth. The idea is to grow code by choosing from a range of automatically generated variations of functions, you dont have to know how they work, but each function creates a sound which can be selected by you.

The following generation is then created containing mutants of your chosen sound. You can refine and develop the sound just by auditioning and choosing the best one each time.

The interface shows you the code graphically, as a tree. These trees are attempts to clearly represent code structure, giving you some feedback on what is being evolved. Conventional listings are not that informative with GP (genetic programming), as deeply functional code such as this is hard to read linearly (see below).

Spiral Synth Modular is a cool and expandable modular synthesizer.

SpiralSynth Modular is an object orientated music studio with an emphasis on live use. You can use it in a fairly straight forward way to make tracks with, or get very experimental. Audio or control data can be freely passed between the plugins. Data can also be fed back on itself for chaotic effects.

SSM supports LADSPA plugins, which you can use in the same way as any of the native plugins. The JACK audio server is also supported.

SSM is a collaborative open source project, see the AUTHORS file for an extensive list of contributors.

eSpeak is a software speech synthesizer for English, and potentially other languages.
eSpeak produces good quality English speech. It uses a different synthesis method from other open source TTS engines, and sounds quite different. Its perhaps not as natural or "smooth", but I find the articulation clearer and easier to listen to for long periods.
eSpeak project can run as a command line program to speak text from a file or from stdin. It works well as a "Talker" with the KDE text to speech system (KTTS), as an alternative to Festival for example. As such, it can speak text which has been selected into the clipboard, or directly from the Konquerer browser or the Kate editor.
- Includes different Voices, whose characteristics can be altered.
- Can produce speech output as a WAV file.
- Can translate text to phoneme codes, so it could be adapted as a front end for another speech synthesis engine.
- Potential for other languages. Rudimentary (and probably humourous) attempts at German and Esperanto are included.
- Compact size. The program and its data total about 350 kbytes.
- Written in C++.
I regularly use it to listen to blogs and news sites. I prefer the sound through a domestic stereo system rather than my small computer speakers.
INSTALLATION:
- Place the "speak" executable file in the command path, eg in /usr/local/bin
- Place the "speak-data" directory in /usr/share as /usr/share/speak-data.
Alternatively if it is placed in the users home directory (i.e. /home/ /speak-data) then that will be used instead.
- Dependencies.
speak uses the PortAudio sound library, so you will need to have the libportaudio0 library package installed. It may be already, since its used by other software, such as OpenOffice.org and the Audacity sound editor.
COMMAND OPTIONS:
Examples
To use at the command line, type:
speak -f < text file >
Or just type
speak
followed by text on subsequent lines. Each line is spoken when RETURN is pressed. Use speak -p to see the corresponding phonemes codes.
echo "This is a test" | speak
Speaking from a single line command.
Enhancements:
- Roman number translation added for some languages.
- Improvements to languages, including en-r, Hungarian, Romanian.
- Various bug fixes.