Hidden as an extra, Mario Paint Composer was one of the first software creations to meld music creation with game. It’s been a novelty favorite among 8-bit fans — not really a serious tool, but a curiosity nonetheless. But that requires a copy of Mario Paint. Now you can get the Mario-infected goodness on your Mac or Windows machine, free. (Thanks, Wally!)

Mario Paint Composer [unFun Games]

The Mac software link is broken, so here’s a direct Mac download link (thanks, Hunter!)

It’s not really about Mario Paint Composer the tool, though. For some strange reason, this creation has inspired endless musical oddities, uploaded to YouTube. Witness, for instance, a somewhat randomly-chosen musical cue from the TV show Lost. (Composer Michael Giacchino’s work is lush and brilliant, missing out on the Oscar this year for Ratatouille. Here, however, in 8-bit glory it sounds like a theme from a B-grade action adventure game for SNES. I’m fairly sure I was lost in a jungle playing that at one point.)

The pièce de résistance?

Mario’s rendition of John Cage’s 4′33".

If you have any source of stress this weekend, any difficulty sleeping just keep watching … Mario … run …

All is well.

I wonder which compression codec they used to upload the sound to YouTube? The silence is really pristine — almost sounds analog.

Hardware sequencers were a fantastic idea: you had a box that did nothing but sequence other gear. Then along came the computer, then the idea of trying to make the computer do absolutely everything all the time, and the standalone MIDI sequencer disappeared. In a bizarre twist of fate, it’s back — on Nintendo DS.

Jed (beatsnbleeps.com) writes to let us know about his DS sequencer, DStep. It’s partly an “homage to the KP3″ from Korg, though unless your fingertip is the size of a DS stylus point, it should be a bit more accurate touch-wise. It’s a very elegant little step sequencer, shown here controlling a Nord Micro Modular. (The modular patch you see on the computer screen is the Nord editing software.) Hardware MIDI support gets hacked into the DS via Collin Meyer’s DS MIDI cable hardware/code solution.

It’s funny, because to me this brings the way you integrate a computer into a studio back full circle. It’s not that you dump the computer — on the contrary, you simply use it as a component in a set of gear.

As for mobile gadgets to work with, this also illustrates some advantages of the DS over the iPhone — well, aside from the obvious facts that it’s far cheaper, you’re not saving up battery life to make calls, and you can play Mario Kart. The old-fashioned game hardware buttons actually come in handy, and they’re ergonomically placed, you get the added precision of a stylus, and the DS hardware is more hackable. Multi-touch would be nice on those faders, though.

If you’re ready to give this a go, here’s what you need:

DS MIDI hack

Tob’s DS MIDI Website

DStep details and ROM download

It’s still in development, so we’ll be watching.

Previously: GrooveStep step sequencer / pattern maker for DS

The DS’ stylus and touchscreen make an ideal pocket-able interface: they’re coupled with friendly, conventional arcade buttons, but provide precise control of visual interfaces without using a mouse. (Touch with fingertips is not nearly as accurate, especially on tiny screens.) That’s already inspired quite a bit of music software, but GrooveStep earns extra points for employing a friendly interface for easy, quick pattern sequencing.

Gibson Guitar may require a new column here on CDM, titled something like “what the $&*((*&$ can you possibly be thinking??!”

Sure, it was strange enough when Gibson started a patent dispute with Guitar Hero game developer Activision because it claimed to own the patent for anything “simulating a musical concert experience.” (Jeez, I’m glad Gibson hasn’t been to a couple of my gigs.) Never mind that their patent involved pre-recorded concert footage and a head-mounted virtual reality apparatus and had no similarity whatsoever to Guitar Hero. Never mind that they’ve waited years into this franchise, almost a decade into their patent, and over a decade into music games to both to notice.

Now things get weirder.

Gibson is suing Harmonix, developer of Rock Band. (Unlike Guitar Hero, Rock Band appears to lack a Gibson instrument license — but the suit covers Gibson’s supposed game patents, not Gibson’s guitars.)

And they’re suing Viacom, because Viacom is Harmonix’s corporate parent.

And they’re suing Electronic Arts, the publisher.

And they’re suing GameStop. And Amazon.com. And Toys ‘R Us. And Target. And Kmart.

And they’re suing Wal-Mart. (Oh, I’m sure that will end well. I can’t imagine Wal-Mart is a big outfit with armies of lawyers or anything like that.)

The revelation of a Korg synth for Nintendo DS was big news for modern-style soft synths on mobile Nintendo game systems. But what about some good, oldskool 8-bit Game Boy sounds? Most cartridges have focused on sequencers, not synths and performance — that is, not playing your Game Boy like an instrument. The Pixelh8 project got our attention last summer by attempting to do just that. Now, project creator Matthew (Pixelh8 himself) lets us know his Music Tech Pro Performer, a complete remake of his original project, is available:

Pro Performer Project Page

V1+ brings new features, including nineteen (count ‘em!) pitch sweep options and seven volume envelopes. It maps to scales (major, natural and harmonic minor, whole tone, pentatonic), so you can keep your playing on the right notes. And with intervals/chords, performances modes (porta., tremolo, vibrato, arpeggio), sound effects, unison, and other features, you can get a decent range of sounds. If you’re looking to make your Game Boy into a synth, it’d be hard to go wrong with this one.

Compatible hardware: GBA, GBA SP, & DS Lite (in slot two).

Cost: £30.00 GBP + £5.00 International Recorded 1st Class Shipping for an actual physical cart. No ROM will be made available.

More vids:

St. Patrick’s Day always warms my half-Irish heart. The YouTubers are celebrating by watching user PJ TinWhistler doing his best to bang out Irish Jigs on his Nintendo DS. Give him a few moments to warm up, and it’s actually relatively impressive. (As it happens, the DS gamepad isn’t exactly the most ergonomic musical interface, but he makes do. And he is actually a Celtic musician, not just a DSer.) He diffuses any potential criticism by saying: “This video is boring and sucks. So I don’t need you to tell me.”

He writes in the description:

I finally found an instrument I can play at night without waking up the neighbours. It’s the DS game “Daigasso Band Brothers”.  And here I try to play some jigs before messing up. I think they are:
The Lark on the Strand / Killavil Jig / Jim Ward’s / Geese in the Bog.
Many mistakes but it’s quite hard with all the ornaments and the speed so I guess it’s good enough for a few days of practice. (Damn, I failed the F# attempt…)(By the way, I was holding the camera with my neck.)

Stomp along, everybody!

Now, anyone got Bulgarian folks songs performed on a PSP?

They’ve gone about as fer as they can go …

Yes, just when you thought you’d seen every conceivable take on mods, customizations, clones, homages, robots, artistic reinterpretations, and other cultural artifacts inspired by Guitar Hero, there’s this — a Guitar Hero clone on Commodore 64.

There’s a lot of chatting at the beginning, but jump about five minutes in for the payoff: the Legend of Zelda Overworld theme with deliciously low-fi graphics. (All due respects to Harmonix and new Guitar Hero developers Activision, but I might point out the interface actually doesn’t need an Xbox 360.)

We’re mixing 8-bit systems here (Nintendo and Commodore), but clearly a full 8-bit collection is due. And there’s still further evidence that the Commodore 64 is the digital music platform that will outlive all the rest. Have to boot up my machine and do a C64 feature month or something one of these days.

Details, downloads at creator Toni Westbrook’s site. Toni’s no one-hit wonder, either — dig philosophical musings on adventure gaming and programming, SQL tricks (seriously), and a do-everything interface for PlayStation controllers that allows them to be used with a variety of classic hardware.

Thanks to Josh Randall (who works for some company called Harmonix — hey, when are you guys finally going to release a C64 version?) and Yarnivore for the tip.

The idea of Game Day this week was simple: a bunch of you sent a bunch of game-related links all at nearly the same time. If this kind of convergence happens again, we’ll do it again. In the wake of all this game-y music goodness are quite a lot of additional resources. So here we go. In case you missed it:

• Hacking a Wii Guitar Hero guitar to work with a synth
• Two free software solutions for making music with your Wiimote on your PC
• Free software and DIY hardware makes your Game Boy Color a real MIDI instrument (with jacks and all)
• If you don’t have friends, get friends, or in my case, find a friend who can afford an Xbox 360 and Rock Band. Sigh.
• When that Rock Band purchase makes you too poor to buy other drum pads, use your Rock Band pads

What’s that? Surely you don’t think I’ve become one of those blogs that does big link round-ups just to distract you. No, there’s still more to tell.

All this Wii waggling could be pretty useful for visuals. So on Create Digital Motion, we’ve got a few more tips, including a library that lets your Wiimote talk to Flash apps on Mac. (Now, Windows, anyone? Or even Linux?)

Still not enough Wiigling about? Be sure you see our coverage of a WiiWiiWiiWii instrument, Wii with Deckadance for DJs, and OSCulator for sending OpenSoundControl and MIDI on Mac.

Patryk Laurent was so inspired, he put together his own Wii strumming app, free for Mac (uses Java). And heck, he’s a Neuroscientist, which I find impressive. Neuroscientists must not have a fight song or theme tune or whatever, because he does what everyone else does and plays Mario. Patryk: I challenge you to write “Neuroscience: The Original Soundtrack” and get back to us.

Lastly, Chris O’Shea points us to Beats, a new PSP game that plays on the idea of interactive music listening. The results aren’t so exciting — so far this field has a lot more potential than it does realization, so far. But I think no one’s quite figured out what interactive music should be yet, which is kind of exciting.

Just so long as we’ve advanced from Simon. Ah, what a game that was.

Bless Nintendo for making the Wii controller: inexpensive, lots of internal sensor data (motion sensing, tilt sensing, buttons), elegant design, and standard Bluetooth support allowing it to be used with Mac, Windows, and Linux.

Now there’s free and open source software for making the most of your Wiimote as a musical instrument. First up: Wiinstrument, a multi-purpose percussion instrument, now available for all three operating systems (a Windows version was recently added).

• Plays percussion / drums with gestures
• Use an (in-development) internal sampler with WAV files, or trigger other software via MIDI
• Use tilt for control changes
• Supports tilt, velocity (how much force you use when you move your Wiimote), with acceleration from both the Wiimote and nunchuk
• It works with Mac, Windows, and Linux, via a standard OpenGL-based interface, thanks to the awesome 2D OpenGL library Gosu. (Programmers, take note.)

Of course, drums are just the beginning — you could use this to trigger clips, grooves, visualist videos and animations, whatever. And it comes with demos, tutorials, source code, the lot.

Wiinstrument Release Information
GarageBand tutorial (relevant to other apps, too)
Support information for Windows, Mac OS X Leopard, Linux
Via thread with the creator on our forums

Here is in action.

But, you say, that’s all well and good, but it’s not … air guitar. Today is your lucky day: