Latest build

Built from 0aa4a16 on 2026-09-21 07:32 UTC.

Square the phrase up after the consonants move, not before

This is the build of the newest commit on main, replaced every time
something lands. It is not a version: for those, see the
releases page.

Read Me.txt in the zip is the guide: the keys, what a song is made of, the
voices, and what to do if something goes wrong.

It runs as it stands — VocalWriter 2.0.1's dictionary, voices and engine
tables are inside, and the synthesis is VocalWriter's own PowerPC code
recreated in C, which renders a minute of singing in about half a second.

Windows — VocalWriterStudio-win64.zip. Unzip it anywhere and run
VocalWriterStudio.exe from inside the folder, which has to stay together.
It is unsigned, so SmartScreen stops it the first time: "More info", then
"Run anyway".

macOS — VocalWriterStudio-macos-arm64.zip. Apple Silicon. Unzip and put
VocalWriter Studio.app where you like. It is signed only ad-hoc, not
notarised, so macOS refuses to open it until the download flag is cleared:

xattr -c "/Applications/VocalWriter Studio.app"

VocalWriter 2.0.1 and its data files are Copyright (c) 2005 KAE Labs, all
rights reserved, and are not covered by this project's MIT licence. See
NOTICE.

VocalWriter Studio 1.1

VocalWriter 2.0.1's own PowerPC synthesis code, running on Windows and macOS,
with a keyboard-only editor built on top.

macOS -- VocalWriterStudio-macos-arm64.zip. Apple Silicon; unzip and move
VocalWriter Studio.app where you like. It is signed only ad-hoc, not
notarised, so macOS will refuse to open it until the download flag is cleared:

xattr -c "/Applications/VocalWriter Studio.app"

Windows -- VocalWriterStudio-win64.zip. 64-bit; unzip it anywhere and run
VocalWriterStudio.exe from inside the folder, which has to stay together. It
is unsigned, so SmartScreen stops it the first time: "More info", then "Run
anyway".

New in 1.1

• Song settings, on Ctrl+comma -- Command+comma on macOS, where it sits in
  the application menu. Tempo and consonant length moved here off the main
  window: both are set once for a piece and then left alone, and they were
  taking up room between the things used constantly.
• A track can have its own consonant length. A part sung fast wants
  shorter consonants than one held slowly, and that belongs to the part rather
  than the song. A track follows the song's setting until its own box is
  ticked.
• The engine's voice controls, per track -- colour, vibrato depth and rate,
  chorus, breath and detune, in the track dialog. Which of these do anything
  was settled by measuring rather than by reading their names: each was set to
  an extreme and the audio compared against the same phrase sung plainly.
  Portamento is not offered, because it reads a table the application never
  fills and changes the sound by exactly nothing.
• Existing projects sound exactly as they did. A control is sent to the engine
  only when it differs from the engine's own default, so a song that sets none
  of them renders byte-for-byte as before.

Also new on macOS since 1.0

• The lists are readable by VoiceOver. wx.ListCtrl is native on Windows
  but drawn by hand on macOS, where nothing of it reaches the accessibility
  API -- the tracks, the notes and the bend points were empty boxes. They are
  now a control macOS exposes properly.
• Option and Command with the arrow keys no longer do two things at once. A
  macOS table treats those as "go to the end of the list", so transposing a
  note also threw the cursor to the bottom.

The editor

• Multi-track. Each track has its own voice, volume, pan and notes, and can
  be muted or soloed. F6 moves between the tracks list and the notes list.
• Built to be used without seeing it. Every action is on a menu with a
  shortcut, so a screen reader announces the key with the name; editing happens
  in dialogs with ordinary labelled fields; every control states its own
  accessible name rather than leaving the platform to guess it. F1 lists the
  keys.
• Words are looked up in VocalWriter's own dictionary and can be spread over as
  many notes as they have syllables. All 56 phonemes the engine can pronounce
  are offered, not the fifty its own palette showed.
• Pitch bend per note, written as the points it passes through. Rests, time
  signatures, a metronome, copy and paste, transpose, go-to-bar.
• Projects save as .vws; MIDI imports bring in notes, lyrics, tempo, time
  signature and bends, and every part at once as one track each.
• Export the whole song as one WAV, or every track as its own -- stems that add
  back up to the mix.

What is in these files

They contain VocalWriter 2.0.1 itself -- its PowerPC binary, its EnglishLex
dictionary and its GMSpeech voice bank -- so that they run as they stand. That
software is Copyright (c) 2005 KAE Labs, all rights reserved, and is not
covered by this project's MIT licence. See NOTICE.

An assets folder placed beside the executable -- or beside the .app on
macOS -- takes precedence over the built-in copy, so you can substitute your
own.

VocalWriter Studio 1.0

VocalWriter 2.0.1's own PowerPC synthesis code, running on Windows and macOS,
with a keyboard-only editor built on top.

Windows -- VocalWriterStudio-win64.zip. Unzip it anywhere and run
VocalWriterStudio.exe. 64-bit; nothing to install.

macOS -- VocalWriterStudio-macos-arm64.zip. Apple Silicon; unzip and move
VocalWriter Studio.app where you like. It is signed only ad-hoc, not
notarised, so macOS will refuse to open it until the download flag is cleared:

xattr -c "/Applications/VocalWriter Studio.app"

The synthesis runs about 14 times faster than real time on Windows, and about
12 on an M-series Mac.

The editor

• Multi-track. Each track has its own voice, volume, pan and notes, and can
  be muted or soloed. F6 moves between the tracks list and the notes list.
• Built to be used without seeing it. Every action is on a menu with a
  shortcut, so a screen reader announces the key with the name; editing happens
  in dialogs with ordinary labelled fields; every control states its own
  accessible name rather than leaving the platform to guess it. F1 lists the
  keys.
• Words are looked up in VocalWriter's own dictionary and can be spread over as
  many notes as they have syllables. All 56 phonemes the engine can pronounce
  are offered, not the fifty its own palette showed.
• Pitch bend per note, written as the points it passes through. Rests, time
  signatures, a metronome, copy and paste, transpose, go-to-bar.
• Projects save as .vws; MIDI imports bring in notes, lyrics, tempo, time
  signature and bends, and every part at once as one track each.
• Export the whole song as one WAV, or every track as its own -- stems that add
  back up to the mix.

What is in these files

They contain VocalWriter 2.0.1 itself -- its PowerPC binary, its EnglishLex
dictionary and its GMSpeech voice bank -- so that it runs as it stands. That
software is Copyright (c) 2005 KAE Labs, all rights reserved, and is not
covered by this project's MIT licence. See NOTICE.

An assets folder placed beside the executable -- or beside the .app on
macOS -- takes precedence over the built-in copy, so you can substitute your
own.