AMB-1 for the M-VAVE FM-1

AMB-1 turns the M-VAVE FM-1 into a generative ambient machine, inspired by Brian Eno's Music for Airports. It plays itself from the moment it's switched on: breathing voices, soft bells on tape loops of unequal length, a gliding bass and quiet Euclidean percussion, all through a tape echo, a long tape loop and a plate reverb. You don't perform it, you tend it: pick a piece and a scale, take notes out, put them back, and let it grow.

AMB-1's screen: the garden Voices Frozen

Try it in your browser (no FM-1 needed): https://charlesvestal.github.io/fm1-amb/emu/
Install it (Chrome or Edge, with the FM-1 plugged in): https://charlesvestal.github.io/fm1-amb/install/
Read the manual: https://charlesvestal.github.io/fm1-amb/manual/ (source: docs/MANUAL.md)
Download the firmware file: releases

Installing it is at your own risk, though it's hard to get stuck: the web installer can put M-VAVE's own firmware back, and an FM-1 that fails to start twice comes up in a safe mode the installer can reach.

In short


Keys	The scale: each key adds its note or takes it out
PLAY · REC · EDIT	Grow / rest · freeze · the next chord
HOME · ENV · ARP · LFO · SEQ · FX · GLO	The pages: Garden, Pad, Bells, Bass, Pulse, Space, Setup; KNOB 1–4 set their values, a layer's level on KNOB 1
SELECT	The previous or next page; with HOME held, the tempo
ALGORITHM · PRESETS	The mode · the piece (eight of them)
OCT− / OCT+	The bells' octave
SAVE	Saves; held, puts the piece back to its recipe

Hold any button for a second and a card says what it does.

The manual has the rest.

Building and testing

The toolchain is the same as X0X's (see BUILDING.md):

tests/run_tests.sh      # the instrument, the platform pieces, the app in a simulator, the web builds
./build.sh              # build/amb.fwsc
python3 tools/fm1_install.py build/amb.fwsc     # install it over USB

build/host/amb_host SCRIPT OUTDIR runs the whole app on a computer from a script (tests/scenarios/*.amb), with audio and screenshots coming out. web/emu/build.sh builds the same code for the browser (the emulator); web/app/build.sh builds the engine alone into a web app for phone and desktop.

Credits

The idea comes from Brian Eno's generative music: Music for Airports' tape loops of unequal length, and the echo chain of Discreet Music. The reverb is Jon Dattorro's plate ("Effect Design, Part 1", JAES 1997), as in FoMni-1; the Euclidean rhythms are Godfried Toussaint's reading of Bjorklund's algorithm. The platform (hardware layer, USB, update loader, storage, installer) is Felucca's by Leo Kuroshita (Hügelton Instruments), by way of X0X and FoMni-1. The idea of running FM-1 firmware in the browser comes from Groove OS. GPL-3.0-only; see LICENSING.md.

M-VAVE and FM-1 are trademarks of their owners. AMB-1 is not affiliated with M-VAVE, Brian Eno or Hügelton Instruments.