SunVox Tracker Basics

Published on Mar 18, 2020 boxoftextures

"SunVox has been around for a long time on practically every platform. Heck, they even have a Palm Pilot version if that's what you need. I did this video on my iPad Pro but I could have just as easily done it with the Mac version, say, as they're basically identical.

This is a First Contact™ video. The app's not at all new but this is the first time I've really delved into it. In other words, please forgive me if I missed something truly obvious. Definitely looking forward to digging in deeper.

I really only touched the tracker parts of the app, and only one pattern, but there's a lot more to it than that. There are several synthesizer modules, and you can also make complex arrangements on the fly by making multiple patterns. You can add bits of randomness and uncertainty as well in order to make things perhaps more organic or maybe even self-playing possibly, although to be honest I've only barely scratched the surface and not gotten anywhere near those things yet.

I made this video mostly as a very basic demo for folks who've never seen a tracker before, or were wondering how one might be different from a sequencer. The simple answer is that a tracker is perhaps "lighter" than a sequencer in that you can do everything in it just by typing things in on your keyboard. You could just as easily do what I did on an iPhone while waiting for a bus rather than at home on an iPad or a computer, and that's kind of the point. Heck, you could probably do it just as easily on a Game Boy maybe. Not going to give up my laptop or my regular software, but I can actually do music on the fly on my phone at a moment's notice, and that definitely has value.

You can find me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/selgart
I also have a Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/boxoftextures

SunVox is at https://www.warmplace.ru/soft/sunvox/
The SunVox iPad/iPhone app is at https://apps.apple.com/app/sunvox/id3..."