Really??? Uh, it's probably my fault but as a hobbyist composer (day job software engineer) I can personally say that tools I use absolutely and utterly suck. They're immensely buggy. My workflow includes:
- LilyPond for writing the final notation
- MuseScore 4 for playing around, MuseScore 3 for playing MIDI
- REAPER as DAW, SFZ plugin for midi soundfonts
- Audacity for processing WAV files
- music21 python lib if I need to programmatically process MIDI (which I commonly do). My scripts using this lib.
- Kdenlive for video processing
- Most importantly: my piano Roland FP-30X
Now among these the only one I don't hate is FP-30X. That piano is fucking amazing, it sounds and feels great.
Kdenlive is also not terrible but I don't do a lot of video processing. Just basic notation videos for YouTube.
Everything else is incredibly, incredibly buggy. MuseScore 4 is thrash, almost every interaction I have with it exposes some bug. REAPER is usually fine but there are pretty annoying bugs when it comes to MIDI import/export that involves time signature change.
My workflow is so dogshit that last month I decided either I'll write my minimalist tiny notation/DAW tool or reconsider this hobby. So far haven't been able to do anything major but I'm confident I'll invest some time into developing my own tools in late 2023 or early 2024.
I'm glad people like their workflow. Unfortunately my own experience with Linux audio processing has been nothing other than encountering one bug after the other one.
EDIT: Whoops, don't know why I said Ardour. I never used it, I actually meant REAPER. Fixed now.
"To the man who has only a hammer, everything looks like a nail."
Imagine, expecting Linux to provide a productive, frictionless music creation workflow, using programs that aren't exactly torture-tested for usability on the platform. I think you're supposed to be grateful/amazed that they work at all. (Not that the UX would be dramatically better or trouble-free on Windows or a Mac, using the same suite of apps.)
Just use Windows and all of these problems go away. When I make music my stack is basically Ableton Live, NI Komplete and Spitfire Audio and I have exactly 0 of these issues.
This doesn't work for me because I do a lot of algorithmic composition and a huge part of my music making involves programming and it's very hard to write code anywhere that's not linux.
Okay, this is a matter of opinion, and yes I do agree that it being hard to write code anywhere that's not Linux is hyperbolic. But Windows is _truly_ a terrible OS for DX. I dread every single time I have to do any kind of development on it.
I don't have this problem. Reaper, microphone + sax, occasional other woodwind and occasional keyboard. If I write code for music it'll probably be in puredata or perl (day job). Puredata for (generative)? sequencing and audio effects. Lilypond for notation which I'll consume with reaper or timidity. I tried windows - it confused the crap out of me. I don't mind OSx but do all my real work on a debian workstation.
I kind of just use reaper as a dumb recording reel - I don't use much of it's timing features.
At the moment I'm mostly just writing up exercises to fit my current goal of learning everything in any key.
My music involves a lot of time sig changes. When I export REAPER project to midi and consume in Python, there are bugs such as note duration being wrong exactly where there is a time sig change.
If you have the money I'd recommend a monome Norns or Teleype. You also may look into 100r Orca and Midinous both of which run fine on Windows and abstract out the pain of developing an Windows
I really like Logic, especially on my M1 mac mini. The latency is really low, external midi works great, very intuitive interface. Years past I've fought with audio interface and latency issues. Now it all just works so I can focus on my marginal song writing and intrument playing.
I'm pretty content with FLStudio (with various VST plugins) and Sound Forge, and Audacity when I need to work with something in a weird format. Sometimes the plugins can get crashy but I just bounce to WAV and unload the offending plugin.
In fact FL just added a python integration that I haven't even begun to explore yet, but you can use it to generate piano roll scores (among other things?)
foobar2000 handles tagging and DaVinci Resolve/Blender/ZGameEditor handles video.
Every time I've tried to do anything in Linux for music its been a headache. Granted its been a while now. But I'm a little too invested in the Windows audio ecosystem to switch.
give any mature, non-Linux DAW a try. it’s cool to try to keep it all open source but with music software you get what you pay for. I recommend Logic Pro
Nothing too major except I'm about 99% sure \after is buggy. I love LilyPond enough that I'll soon file a bug report. It's possible I'm missing something but I have ample evidence that \after in certain contexts mess up stuff.
- LilyPond for writing the final notation
- MuseScore 4 for playing around, MuseScore 3 for playing MIDI
- REAPER as DAW, SFZ plugin for midi soundfonts
- Audacity for processing WAV files
- music21 python lib if I need to programmatically process MIDI (which I commonly do). My scripts using this lib.
- Kdenlive for video processing
- Most importantly: my piano Roland FP-30X
Now among these the only one I don't hate is FP-30X. That piano is fucking amazing, it sounds and feels great.
Kdenlive is also not terrible but I don't do a lot of video processing. Just basic notation videos for YouTube.
Everything else is incredibly, incredibly buggy. MuseScore 4 is thrash, almost every interaction I have with it exposes some bug. REAPER is usually fine but there are pretty annoying bugs when it comes to MIDI import/export that involves time signature change.
My workflow is so dogshit that last month I decided either I'll write my minimalist tiny notation/DAW tool or reconsider this hobby. So far haven't been able to do anything major but I'm confident I'll invest some time into developing my own tools in late 2023 or early 2024.
I'm glad people like their workflow. Unfortunately my own experience with Linux audio processing has been nothing other than encountering one bug after the other one.
EDIT: Whoops, don't know why I said Ardour. I never used it, I actually meant REAPER. Fixed now.