[HN Gopher] Show HN: AETHRA - Writing Music as Code
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Show HN: AETHRA - Writing Music as Code
Hi HN I'm building AETHRA -- a programming language designed
specifically for composing music and emotional soundscapes.
Instead of focusing on general-purpose programming, AETHRA is a
pure DSL where code directly represents musical intent: tempo,
mood, chords, progression, dynamics, and instruments. The goal is
to make music composition feel closer to writing a story or
emotion, rather than manipulating low-level audio APIs. Key ideas:
- Text-based music composition - Chords and progressions as first-
class concepts - Time, tempo, and structure handled by the language
- Designed for ambient, cinematic, emotional, and minimal music -
Interpreter written in C# (.NET) Example AETHRA code (simplified):
tempo 60 instrument guitar chord Am for 4 chord F for 4 chord C
for 4 chord G for 4 This generates a slow, melancholic progression
suitable for ambient or cinematic scenes. AETHRA currently: -
Generates WAV audio - Supports notes, chords, tempo, duration,
velocity - Uses a simple interpreter (no external DAWs or MIDI
tools) - Is intentionally minimal and readable What it is NOT: -
Not a DAW replacement - Not MIDI-focused Why I made it: I wanted a
language where music is the primary output -- not an afterthought.
Something between code, emotion, and sound design. The project is
open-source and early-stage (v0.8). I'm mainly looking for: -
Feedback on the language design - Ideas for musical features worth
adding - Thoughts from people into PL design, audio, or generative
art Repo: <https://github.com/TanmayCzax/AETHRA> Thanks for
reading -- happy to answer questions or discuss ideas.
Author : CzaxTanmay
Score : 49 points
Date : 2026-01-30 04:59 UTC (2 days ago)
| acron0 wrote:
| Please can you link to a video of it being used?
| CzaxTanmay wrote:
| Yes. I will upload after some days
| worik wrote:
| How does this relate to existing systems?
|
| E.g. Csound
| Apreche wrote:
| How does this compare to https://strudel.cc/ ?
| riedel wrote:
| This is very much fun. Since I do not know what I am doing I
| simply ran Gemini on it to add a beat to pyramid song demo [0].
| Is there music repls with LLM assistants built-in?
|
| [0]
| https://strudel.cc/#Ci8vICJQeXJhbWlkIFNvbmcgKFJhdyBBYnN0cmFj...
| eddyg wrote:
| Have you heard of Switch-Angel? If not, check out
| https://www.youtube.com/shorts/hbZb1Q0mM7k (to pick one) for
| a taste of what Strudel is capable of in "real time".
| sumul wrote:
| Thanks for sharing. I'm a musician and programmer, so I'm
| squarely in what I'd expect is your target audience. Since you're
| posting an early version for feedback, here are some of my
| broadest initial thoughts.
|
| From your README's philosophy section: "You describe what you
| want to feel -- AETHRA handles how it sounds." But the rest of
| the documentation doesn't yet feel aligned to that vision. The
| closest you get to that is when you describe your example chord
| progression as melancholic, but you as the composer already
| happened to know that this particular progression provides the
| feeling you have in mind.
|
| I love the idea of a high level way to programmatically or
| idiomatically describe how music should feel, especially how the
| composition should evolve over time (perhaps even in surprising
| ways that are beyond current tools). I hope as you progress that
| you're able to find innovative ways to build toward that vision.
|
| The current feature set feels like it would be considerably more
| convenient in a GUI environment. Again, I hope that as you
| continue to build, it becomes more obvious why this is a language
| and not a visual synthesis/composition tool.
|
| A little audio output demo would go a very long way in
| potentially getting me interested in playing around with this.
|
| Good luck!
| jesuslop wrote:
| I loved to build backing tracks for guitar in Band-in-a-box, just
| from the chord progression and some settings. Leveraged little
| effort to interesting results. And the idea of a DSL is super.
| But I dunno how would you stand comparisons with audio rendered
| by pro DAW software loaded with a production quality sound
| library such as Hollywood Strings or similar if you render the
| audio yourself.
| ako wrote:
| DSL for backing tracks: https://github.com/ako/backing-tracks
| ssttoo wrote:
| Ha, I was just playing with making a simple pad in webaudio and
| it evolved into a progression-playing backing track tool
| (vanilla html/js/css page). It would appear there are a lot of
| us in the Venn intersection of programmer/guitarist/practice
| time alone enjoyers.
| Nekorosu wrote:
| I clicked the link but missed the show. I'd like to revisit the
| project when there is something to look at and listen to.
| mellosouls wrote:
| Cool project. There are people making a living streaming live-
| coded music, eg:
|
| DJ Dave
|
| _Making dance music with code_
|
| https://youtube.com/shorts/5OYiOGxHxTQ
|
| Perhaps you could reach out to some of them if you feel yours
| adds something they might find useful.
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