Live Coding in a Score

Every score has a live console: the language of Oscilla Live -- its synths, scopes, shapes and screen -- run line by line over the score, beside its cues. You write a line, run it, and it sounds; the sound draws itself (a scope, a phase portrait), shapes turn and scale with it, and the screen can fold, mirror and tint the lot, the score included. Nothing is compiled or restarted: every line changes what is already playing.

The Oscilla Live docs are the whole of the language and of playing it; this page is where it meets a score.

Start here

Open a project made for it: the live-coding demo opens with the console showing. In any project, Ctrl+Shift+L shows or hides the console.

Type these, one at a time, running each with Ctrl+Enter:

synth(uid:bass, wave:saw, freq:Pwhite(40, 90), dur:0.25, amp:0.15, sub:0.6)
gui(bass, size:1, view:xy, trail:1, palette:neon)
bass > rotate(follow(bass.t, 0, 360))
level(bass, 0.3, 8, exp3)
gate(bass, 0, 4)

A bass line and its octave below; it draws itself across the screen; the drawing turns with the pitch; it sinks to a third of its level over eight beats; then it lets go, and its sound dies away. gate(bass, 1) brings it back. Ctrl+. stops everything.

Every time in a line is in beats, a second each at the default 60 bpm: see Time is counted in beats.

The section


Shaping a sound live	level, gate, hush, hold -- turning a sound down, letting it go, stopping it, freezing its pattern
Sound	fuzz, sub, reverb, moving parameters, envelopes, patterns, microtones, random values you can keep
Seeing what is happening	meters, the machine's load, drawings that fade with the sound, recording
Visuals	the screen folded, mirrored, tiled, tinted -- and shapes thrown about
Keys	the console's keys, and the cheatsheet
Without Oscilla, and in rooms	`live.html` on any web host, and performers together through a relay

And the longer pages:

Live coding -- the whole tour: sound, image, linking them, the projector, a set in practice
The live console -- the console itself: buffers, stashes, the cue browser, perform mode

A few habits

Name every sound -- synth(uid:bass, ...). The name is how you reach it afterwards: level(bass, ...), gate(bass, 0), bass > rotate(...). The console names an unnamed one for you.
Run a line again to change it. A sound with the same name changes in place -- except a poly: one: Ctrl+Enter adds a voice, Ctrl+Alt+Enter gives the line to every voice (see Shaping).
Blocks. A line starting #$ heads a block; Ctrl+Enter on it runs the block, Tab folds it away.
Comment a line out and run it (Ctrl+Shift+/, then Ctrl+Enter): what it started stops.

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