FAQs

Help - I can't hear any sound!

See Getting Started

How do I assign MIDI controllers to parameters? (MIDI Learn)

Right-click on a parameter controls in amsynth's GUI to show the MIDI Learn dialog.

Move a controller on your MIDI device to automatically select it in the dialog, or use the drop-down selector.

The MIDI controller assignment is saved in a simple text file $HOME/.amSynthControllersrc

Note: this option is not currently available in the plug-in versions.

Why doesn't the "Virtual Keyboard" menu item work?

This menu item launches an external program called vkeybd - please make sure vkeybd is installed.

Additionally, this functionality requires ALSA MIDI, so is not available if configured to use OSS MIDI.

If you can run vkeybd from the command line, amsynth is using ALSA MIDI, but the menu item is still disabled or does nothing; then you have found a bug! Please report it.

Can I run amsynth without the GUI?

Yes!

You can run the amsynth DSSI or LV2 plug-in from a command-line host program like jack-dssi-host or jalv.

With the latest code, you can also run the amsynth application in a GUI-less mode, like so:

$ amsynth -x

or

$ AMSYNTH_NO_GUI=1 amsynth

You can also build amsynth without GUI support with

./configure --without-gui

Qtractor crashes when I try to open the amsynth LV2 plug-in

Please update to the latest version of the suil library