csound - music and sound synthesis software

csound [options] orchname scorename

csound [options] csdfilename

csound takes orchestra and score information and generates a sound file. The orchestra and score traditionally have been in separate files (with extension .orc and .sco respectively), but recent versions of csound accept a unified file format (usually carrying the extension .csd ).

Built-in preprocessors translate, sort, and format the score information for "the orchestra." The orchestra then performs (or renders) the music, influenced by command flags.

Flags are processed in the following order:

1.

Defaults: csound -s -otest -b1024 -B1024 -m7

2.

~/.csoundrc

3.

Command line

4.

<CsOptions> tag in a .csd file

5.

Orchestra header (for sr, kr, ksmps, nchnls)

later assignments override eariler ones.

--aiff, -A

set AIFF format

--wave, -W

set WAV format

--ircam, -J

set IRCAM format

--noheader, -h

raw format

--nopeaks

do not write peak information

--nodisplays, -d

suppress all displays

--asciidisplay, -g

suppress graphics, use ASCII displays

--postscriptdisplay, -G

suppress graphics, use Postscript displays

--defer-gen1, -D

defer GEN01 soundfile loads until performance time

--iobufsamps=N, -b N

sample frames (or -kprds) per software sound I/O buffer

--hardwarebufsamps=N, -B N

samples per hardware sound I/O buffer

--cscore, -C

use Cscore processing of scorefile

--midifile=FNAME, -F FNAME

read MIDI file event stream from file FNAME

--midi-device=DNAME, -M DNAME

read MIDI realtime events from device DNAME

--terminate-on-midi, -T

terminate the performance when miditrack is done

--heartbeat= N , -H N

print a heartbeat style 1, 2 or 3 at each soundfile write

--notify, -N

notify (ring the bell) when score or miditrack is done

--rewrite, -R

continually rewrite header while writing soundfile (WAV/AIFF)

--input=FNAME, -i FNAME

sound input filename

--output=FNAME, -o FNAME

sound output filename

--logfile=FNAME, -- FNAME

log output to file FNAME

--nosound, -n

no sound onto disk or device

--tempo=N, -t N

use uninterpreted beats of the score, initially at tempo N

--i-only, -I

I-time only orch run

--control-rate=N, -k N

orchestra krate override

--sample-rate=N, -r N

orchestra srate override

--score-in=DNAME, -L DNAME

read Line-oriented realtime score events from device DNAME

--messagelevel=N, -m N

tty message level. Sum of: 1=note amps, 2=out-of-range msg, 4=warnings

--extract-score=FNAME, -x FNAME

extract from score.srt using extract file FNAME

--keep-sorted-score

--utility=NAME, -U NAME

run utility program

--verbose, -v

verbose orch translation

--list-opcodes, -z

list opcodes in this version

--list-opcodesN

list opcodes in style N in this version

--dither, -Z

dither output

--sched

set real-time priority and lock memory (also requires -d and either -o dac or -o devaudio )

--opcode-lib=NAMES

dynamic libraries to load

--help

long help

--format={alaw,ulaw,schar,uchar,float,short,long,24bit,rescale}

set sound type

-c

8-bit signed_char sound samples

-a

alaw sound samples

-8

8-bit unsigned_char sound samples

-u

ulaw sound samples

-s

short_int sound samples

-l

long_int sound samples

-f

float sound samples

-3

24-bit sound samples

-K

do not generate PEAK chunks

-t 0

use score.srt for sorted score rather than a temporary

-Q DNAME

select MIDI output device

-V N

set realtime audio output volume to N (1 to 100)

cvanal(1), dnoise(1), envext(1), csound-extract(1), extractor(1), hetro(1), lpanal(1), mixer(1), pvanal(1), pvlook(1), scale(1), scot(1), scsort(1), sdif2ad(1), sndinfo(1), srconv(1)

Csound is documented fully by The Public Csound Manual, available at http://www.lakewoodsound.com/csound/

Csound is also documented by The Alternative Csound Reference Manual, available at http://kevindumpscore.com/docs/csound-manual/

This manual page was written by Hans Fugal <hans@fugal.net>, for the Debian project (but may be used by others).