Here’s a little blast from the past – I just realized that I composed and programmed this “NES classical” piece for a composition class almost exactly 10 years ago. I had recently discovered MML, a music programming language that an increasingly vibrant community of chiptune musicians were using to make NES music. I was also studying music composition at UNC at the time. So, this piece represented a lot of things I was learning at the time about both classical music theory and programming NES music with MML.
To give you a flavor of MML, here’s a little excerpt of the MML code for Pixel Rain:
#TITLE Pixel Rain
#COMPOSER Quitasol
#PROGRAMER 2005 Dave Yarwood
#BANK-CHANGE 0,1
#BANK-CHANGE 2,2
@v2 = { 15 12 10 8 6 3 2 1 0 }
@v3 = { 15 15 14 14 13 13 12 12 11 11 10 10 9 9 8 8 7 7 6 6 5 }
@v0 = { 11 8 6 4 2 1 0 }
@v1 = { 11 11 10 10 9 9 8 8 7 7 6 6 5 5 4 4 3 3 2 2 1 }
@v4 = { 13 13 12 12 11 11 10 10 9 9 8 8 8 7 7 7 5 5 4 4 3 }
@v5 = { 15 15 14 14 13 13 12 12 11 11 10 10 10 9 9 9 7 7 6 6 5 4 3 }
@MP0 = { 8 4 3 }
@MP1 = { 8 4 1 }
@DPCM0 = { "samples\kick2.dmc",15 }
A l8 o4 @01 v8 q8 MP0
B l8 o4 @01 v8 q8 MP0
C l8 o4 q8 MP0
D l16
E o0 l4
ABCDE t125
A g2f+2g1>c<b>ced+2e4^16. r32^8^2 c<b>ced+d4.c4^32 r64 r2 <f+4
B d2d+2e2^8ec<gag+a>c<b4.ag4^16. r32^8^2 ag+a>c<a4.g+a4^32 r64 r4 >c2
C b2>c2<b>e<bge2<a4.^16..r64ab>d+f+ MPOF e4d4c4<b4 MP0 a2b>dfe<a4^32 r64 >a2.
DE r1^1^1^1^2.^8^64^1
A g2f+2g1 MPOF gf+gb-a2 MP0 g4^16. r32^8^2 t110 gf+gb- t95 ab->c<a
B d2d2e-2^8b-ge- MPOF ed+egf+2 MP0 g4^16. r32^8^2 t110 e-de-g t95 f+2
C b-2>c2<b->e-<b-ge-2c2<a>cdf+ MPOF g4f4e-4d4 MP0 t110 c2 t95 d2
DE r1^1^1^1 t110 r2 t95 r2You can take a look at the complete MML file here, if you’re so inclined.