Ragas in Hindustani classical music are characterized by certain structures. The most obvious one is the set of frequencies allowed in a certain raga. Assuming 12 basic frequencies, each raga uses a subset (not necessarily proper subset) of these 12 frequencies. We shall refer to a frequency as a ‘note’. Further, when composing tunes in a raga, there are certain notes that are allowed when notes are increasing in their frequencies (aaroha) and certain other notes when they are decreasing in frequency (avroha). Some ragas are more complicated in that when notes are increasing in frequency there are certain notes from which one must ‘descend’, i.e., use lower frequency notes and then continue the ‘ascent’ of increasing frequency notes. This last structure is also called the ‘chalan’ of the raga. Further, some notes are granted greater relative time than others, often called ‘nyas’ notes.
Given the above structures, an interesting question is the following: are these structures sufficiently well defined for a computer to ‘compose’ tunes in a certain raga?
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- Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/vikipedia/ragabot.git - Create virtual Environment at convenient location using
python3 -mvenv ragabotvenv - Activate virtual Environment using
source ragabotvenv/bin/activate - Install packages using pip and requirements.txt
pip install -r requirements.txt - on ubuntu/debian lunux install freepats and timidity for midi playing. on windows it is not required. windows media player can play midi files as it is.
sudo apt-get install freepats timidity
- You can make use of scripts in ragabot/ folder inside repo
python train.py bhooptraining.csv --output bhoopmodel.yaml
python bot.py bhoopmodel.yaml bhooptune.csv
python midiconvert.py bhooptune.csv
python midiplay.py bhooptune.mid #on windows use windows media player
- Alternatively given set of notations you can directly play the music generated by bot using
python botplayer.py tilakkamod*.csv