Description

A Music Thing-style Turing Machine for MIDI. A shift register cycles between perfect repeat and pure noise, and emits notes from the pattern as it evolves.

Demo: https://youtu.be/bdMobzYie6g

Stencil emits MIDI notes from a shift register. On each host step it reads the register as an integer and maps the value into a user-set MIDI note range. The register's lowest bit acts as the step's gate — if it's 1 the note fires with probability density, if it's 0 the step is silent. Then it shifts one position — the bit cycling out is flipped with probability 1 − lock before being reinserted at the head. Lock at 1.0 freezes the register into a perfect loop; at 0.0 every bit flips and the register becomes pure noise. Intermediate values gradually mutate the loop, and 0.95 is the classic slowly-evolving-pattern setting.

Stencil isn't a sequencer you draw notes into. The pattern emerges from initial randomness, and you shape it by holding lock high when a section you like comes around. The trigger mode selects how steps advance: auto follows the host transport, gate advances only while a key is held, and seed lets incoming note-on / note-off events write the head bit so the player becomes the bit source. Stencil emits unquantized chromatic notes; chain a Pointsman device downstream for scale-locked output.

What you control:

Lock (locked loop ↔ pure noise), Density

NOTE range (Ableton note names, e.g. C2..C4), Seed

Trigger mode (auto / gate / seed)

Output velocity, Gate length

Currently-playing note readout in the register ring

Pairs downstream with Pointsman for scale-locked harmony

Named after Herbert Stencil from Thomas Pynchon's V.

Product page: https://im9.fm/ja/products/stencil/

Direct download (latest .amxd): https://github.com/im9/stencil/releases/tag/m4l-v0.1.1