Sonic Pi Explained

Sonic Pi is a live coding environment based on Ruby, originally designed to support both computing and music lessons in schools, developed by Sam Aaron in the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory^[1] in collaboration with Raspberry Pi Foundation.^{[2] [3]}

Uses

Thanks to its use of the SuperCollider synthesis engine and accurate timing model,^[4] it is also used for live coding and other forms of algorithmic music performance and production, including at algoraves. Its research and development has been supported by Nesta, via the Sonic PI: Live & Coding project.^[5]

See also

• Pure Data
• Algorithmic composition
• List of MIDI editors and sequencers
• List of music software

Further reading

• Aaron . Samuel . Blackwell . Alan F. . Burnard . Pamela . The development of Sonic Pi and its use in educational partnerships: Co-creating pedagogies for learning computer programming . Journal of Music, Technology & Education . 2016 . 9 . 1 . 75–94 . 10.1386/jmte.9.1.75_1 . 11 December 2019.
• Aaron . Sam. . Sonic Pi–performance in education, technology and art. . International Journal of Performance Arts and Digital Media . 2016 . 12 . 2 . 17–178 . 10.1080/14794713.2016.1227593 . 193662552 .
• Sinclair . Arabella . Educational Programming Languages: The Motivation to Learn with Sonic Pi. . PPIG . 2014 . 10 . 11 December 2019.
• Book: Aaron . Samuel . Blackwell . Alan F. . Proceedings of the first ACM SIGPLAN workshop on Functional art, music, modeling & design . From sonic Pi to overtone . Farm '13 . 2013 . 35–46 . https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2505346 . 11 December 2019 . ACM. 10.1145/2505341.2505346 . 9781450323864 . 18633884 .
• Aaron . Samuel . Blackwell . Alan F. . Hoadley . Richard . Regan . Tim . A principled approach to developing new languages for live coding . International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression (NIME) . 2011 . Oslo, Norway . 16 September 2021.
• Aaron . Samuel . Blackwell . Alan F. . From sonic Pi to overtone: creative musical experiences with domain-specific and functional languages . Proceedings of the First ACM SIGPLAN Workshop on Functional Art, Music, Modeling & Design . 2013 . 35–46 . 10.1145/2505341.2505346. 18633884 .

Notes and References

1. DROPS - Collaboration and learning through live coding (Dagstuhl Seminar 13382) . Dagstuhl Reports . 2014 . 10.4230/DagRep.3.9.130. 2015-05-02. Blackwell. Alan. McLean. Alex. Noble. James. Rohrhuber. Julian. 3 . 9 . 130–168 . free .
2. News: Baked in Britain, the millionth Raspberry Pi. 2015-05-02. Rory . Cellan-Jones. BBC News. 7 October 2013.
3. News: Making music with Raspberry Pi - CBBC Newsround. www.bbc.co.uk. 2015-05-02.
4. Book: ACM. 2014. 978-1-4503-3039-8. 37–47. 10.1145/2633638.2633648. Samuel. Aaron. Dominic. Orchard. Alan F.. Blackwell. Temporal semantics for a live coding language. Proceedings of the 2nd ACM SIGPLAN international workshop on Functional art, music, modeling & design - FARM '14. 3227057 . https://kar.kent.ac.uk/57489/1/sonicpi.pdf.
5. Web site: Sonic Pi - The Live Coding Music Synth for Everyone. SONIC PI. 2019-10-05.