Looper

Source

The project was built using the source files found here: https://github.com/undessens/Entourloop

Overview

What is a looper? A device that records and plays loops.

What is a loop you might then ask?!

From WIKI: In electroacoustic music, a loop is a repeating section of sound material. Short sections of material can be repeated to create ostinato patterns. A loop can be created using a wide range of music technologies including turntables, digital samplers, synthesizers, sequencers, drum machines, tape machines, delay units, or they can be programmed using computer music software.

How do we use a looper?

If you would like to learn more about how to use a looper in a musical way, please check out the wonderful article from Beginner Guitar HQ:

https://beginnerguitarhq.com/looper-pedal/

It is more focused on guitar playing with a looper, but it contains a lot of useful information for musicians in general, including: common looper pedals, looping tips, overdubbing loops, basic beats, chords, rhythms, embellishments and ideas on how to get you started.

Looper

Below you can find some photos of the assembled looper:

Update

Depending on the hardware used, more precisely, the sound card used with the Raspberry Pi (rPi), your looper might not work using the original source software. Below you can find the instructions to remedy such an issue:

Modifications (in case needed)

0) Booting the rPi GUI

• Connect the rPi to an external monitor and connect a mouse and keybord
• connect the rPi to the power supply
• wait for the boot screen to display the command prompt

• type

    startx

• press Enter and wait for the desktop to display

1) Changing the Arduino COM port

• Open the File Manager and navigate to:

  /home/pi/Documents/looper/puredata

• right click on the file main.pd and choose to open the file with Text Editor

• in the menu click on Search and choose Find... (or press the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+F)

• find the only instance of the word "com"

• there is only one line with the word "comport" as seen on the photo below

• change the number 0 to 1 or vice versa
• save the file using the menu (File→Save) or the keyboard shortcut (Ctrl+S)
• Exit the Text Editor and restart the rPi

2) Changing the default audio device

• In the main rPi menu navigate to Preferences and choose Audio Device Settings

• In the drop down menu Sound card choose the audio device you would like to use. In this case we are using a USB sound card, so we select it.

• Click on Make Default button located on the bottom of the Audio Device Settings window
• Make sure the word (default) is displayed next to your selected audio device

Check that the microphone is enabled:

• In the Audio Device Settings window click on the tab Capture
• Make sure the circle below the Microphone Capture is coloured red. If not, click on it. In case you have the microphone and speakers/headphones connected, you should hear the sound captured by the microphone