🎼 Ambient Generator TUI

Create lush, generative ambient music with spacey textures in your terminal.

📸 View Screenshots | 🎵 Listen to Examples | 📖 Full Documentation

Features

• 🎼 Multiple scales - Currently featuring Japanese pentatonic scales (Hirajoshi, In Sen, Kumoi, Yo)
• 🎹 Five layered instruments (Pad, Flute, Vibraphone, Strings, Music Box)
• 🎚️ Adjustable tempo and length
• 🎨 Multiple soundfonts (3 high-quality GM soundfonts included)
• 🎛️ Audio effects (Reverb and Paulstretch time-stretching)
• 📦 Export to MIDI and MP3
• 💻 Beautiful terminal user interface (TUI)
• ⚡ Simple setup - one dependency (PortAudio), then pip install!

Installation

macOS

# Install PortAudio first
brew install portaudio

# Install ambient-gen
pip install ambient-gen

Linux (Ubuntu/Debian)

# Install PortAudio development files
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install portaudio19-dev

# Install ambient-gen
pip install ambient-gen

Windows

# No additional dependencies needed on Windows
pip install ambient-gen

Note: If you skip the PortAudio installation, the app will still work for MIDI generation, but MP3 export will be disabled.

Quick Start

Launch the interactive TUI:

ambient-gen

The TUI is fully interactive - use keyboard controls to customize generation!

Keyboard Controls

Generation & Files:

• g - Generate new track (creates MIDI and MP3)
• o - Open output folder
• q - Quit

Scale Selection:

• s - Cycle through scales (Hirajoshi → In Sen → Kumoi → Yo)

Parameters:

• ↑/k or ↓/j - Adjust tempo (30-120 BPM)
• →/l or ←/h - Adjust length (4-32 bars)

Instruments:

• 1 - Toggle Pad layer
• 2 - Toggle Flute layer
• 3 - Toggle Vibraphone layer
• 4 - Toggle Strings layer
• 5 - Toggle Music Box layer

Audio Options:

• a - Toggle audio effects (Reverb + Paulstretch)
• e - Toggle effects only mode (just reverb/paulstretch, no dry signal)
• f - Cycle soundfonts (FluidR3 GM, GeneralUser GS, SGM V2.01)
• p - Toggle Paulstretch time-stretching effect

Visual:

• Ctrl+P - Change color palette

Output Files

Generated files are saved to ~/Desktop/ambient_gen_output/:

• ambient_YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS.mid - MIDI file
• ambient_YYYYMMDD_HHMMSS.mp3 - MP3 audio (192kbps)

How It Works

1. Generates MIDI: Creates generative compositions using Japanese pentatonic scales with intelligent note placement and dynamics
2. Renders Audio: Uses tinysoundfont to synthesize audio with high-quality GM soundfonts (automatically extracted on first run)
3. Applies Effects: Optional reverb and Paulstretch time-stretching for ambient textures
4. Converts to MP3: Automatically uses FFmpeg (via static-ffmpeg) to create compressed audio

All of this happens automatically with zero configuration!

Japanese Scales

• Hirajoshi (平調子): Traditional pentatonic scale (0, 2, 3, 7, 8) - Contemplative and meditative
• In Sen (陰旋): Mystical and contemplative (0, 1, 5, 7, 10) - Dark and mysterious
• Kumoi (雲井): Bright and ethereal (0, 2, 3, 7, 9) - Light and floating
• Yo (陽): Simple and peaceful (0, 2, 5, 7, 9) - Major pentatonic, uplifting

Included Soundfonts

The package includes 3 high-quality, freely-licensed General MIDI soundfonts (compressed to 41MB):

• FluidR3 GM (23MB) - Clean, balanced GM soundfont (MIT License)
• GeneralUser GS (7MB) - Excellent pads and flutes, perfect for ambient (Custom Permissive License)
• SGM V2.01 (27MB) - Rich, warm ambient tones (GPLv3)

Soundfonts are automatically extracted from a compressed archive on first import.

Technical Details

• Audio Quality: 44.1kHz, 16-bit stereo, 192kbps MP3
• MIDI Resolution: 960 ticks per quarter note
• Effects: Freeverb reverb, Paulstretch time-stretching (4x stretch)
• Package Size: ~41MB (soundfonts compressed with xz)
• Python Version: 3.8+

Credits

• Soundfonts:
  • FluidR3 GM - Frank Wen (MIT License)
  • GeneralUser GS - S. Christian Collins (Permissive License)
  • SGM V2.01 - David Shan (GPLv3)
• Audio Synthesis: tinysoundfont
• FFmpeg Integration: static-ffmpeg
• TUI Framework: Textual

Links

• GitHub Repository: https://github.com/beowulf-audio/ambient-gen-tui
• Screenshots & Examples: https://github.com/beowulf-audio/ambient-gen-tui#screenshots
• Issue Tracker: https://github.com/beowulf-audio/ambient-gen-tui/issues

License

MIT License - see LICENSE file for details.