Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by Ycros on Monday October 12, 2026 @08:23PM
(#50064936)
Mmm, the readme is an impenetrable unorganised wall of text that jumps between broad high level things, and tiny intricate internal technical details.
All in all this feels a bit early to really show off. A recorded demo video would be good. Also, imo, the demo song should be setup in a way that it just plays out of the box.
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by 0gs on Monday October 12, 2026 @08:50PM
(#50065153)
yeeeeahh this is crazy confusing. i guess it's free so i should just try it, but like ... does it only do sequencing of soundfont instruments in its patterns? can it do audio clips? it seems like it ... but then what would i need soundfonts for lol
to me, the readme is not so much impenetrable as it presumes people want to know how the backend works, but it is entirely unclear how the FRONTEND works, to the extent that calling it a DAW seems, like, suspicious
all of that said, i totally want to try and use it and have a feeling i might be able to figure it out
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by dmicah on Monday October 12, 2026 @09:14PM
(#50065316)
Looks interesting, but elements of the README could be improved. Things like "CLAP is a required native plugin format, not a compatibility add-on." sound Claude-written and don't really make a lot of sense. CLAP isn't a "compatibility add-on" in any DAW, it is just one of many plug-in formats that could be supported.
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by Lucasoato on Tuesday October 13, 2026 @04:20AM
(#50068413)
You might not like that AI is getting its way into the art of music, but one thing I really didn’t like is how the whole music software industry has been stagnating for so many years.
Countless hours of work gone, because nobody dared to develop a versioning system for musical projects in any DAW.
Now the game has changed, if you don’t evolve or adapt, people will just develop their own stuff in no time.
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by Lucasoato on Tuesday October 13, 2026 @05:24AM
(#50068939)
I remember when it was released, Splice has definitely been an exception :)
I used it in the past to share projects with others, I had a bit of a mixed experience but anyway their effort was really appreciated at that time.
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by williamdclt on Tuesday October 13, 2026 @08:27AM
(#50070602)
> nobody dared to develop a versioning system for musical projects in any DAW
So pissed about that. 10y ago I was a random young amateur musician in a mediocre local band and I couldn't believe that versioning wasn't a first-class thing, let alone not a thing at all.
10y later I do music again, and I'm daily frustrated that _this is still not a thing_. Also infuriated by DAWs not supporting collaboration, or fckin commenting (taking notes). It's insane to me, there's a dozen DAWs that do mostly the same things and not one of them has differentiated by supporting these _basic_ things (in terms of need, not complexity, although note taking really can't be hard).
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by m_kos on Tuesday October 13, 2026 @10:32AM
(#50072386)
Soundtrap has basic versioning (nothing like Git), comments, and online multiplayer. I don't use it, but I was impressed by the presence of these features.
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by williamdclt on Thursday October 15, 2026 @09:09AM
(#50103145)
thanks but I don't think I'm the audience for your DAW unfortunately. I do grunge/punk/rock, pattern-based DAW is not at all something I need, nor is MCP support as I keep AI out of my music making
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by dbbk on Tuesday October 13, 2026 @06:22PM
(#50079746)
I think there is enormous untapped potential in AI working with MIDI in a DAW. And I don't really get the handwringing about it. Does that make it less creative? What about using synth presets? Or sample packs?
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by Lucasoato on Tuesday October 13, 2026 @06:48PM
(#50080024)
From time to time I like asking AI to give me some suggestions for jazz chord progressions, but so far they haven’t been that incredible. Maybe I need to include a bit more of context, or maybe I shouldn’t mess with that and let that for humans.
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by androsynth89 on Tuesday October 13, 2026 @09:30PM
(#50081289)
I found that by adding all the scales and weird tunings into the system, the agent is more likely to try it. And you can specifically tell it to iterate in your specified direction.
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by patwolf on Tuesday October 13, 2026 @07:47AM
(#50070141)
I've been experimenting with AI powered DAWs. I finally settled on using Pi Durable to embed the prompting directly in the UI.
I've also found AI good at building synths. I now have a bunch of synths, samplers, and drum machines that my DAW can configure through MCP. For example, I can tell it to configure a 303, generate a 4-bar arp pattern, slowly increase the resonance across the pattern, and add it to the song.
Re:Show HN: An experimental pattern-first DAW that supports MCP
by androsynth89 on Tuesday October 13, 2026 @09:31PM
(#50081298)
That seems interesting. yes I basically set up a similar thing. Made a few synths and made them expose via MCP. Originally I tried having the LLM be an embedded feature in the app but MCP works better, although I left the feature in in case it's useful.
All in all this feels a bit early to really show off. A recorded demo video would be good. Also, imo, the demo song should be setup in a way that it just plays out of the box.
Readme looks much better now.
to me, the readme is not so much impenetrable as it presumes people want to know how the backend works, but it is entirely unclear how the FRONTEND works, to the extent that calling it a DAW seems, like, suspicious
all of that said, i totally want to try and use it and have a feeling i might be able to figure it out
Countless hours of work gone, because nobody dared to develop a versioning system for musical projects in any DAW.
Now the game has changed, if you don’t evolve or adapt, people will just develop their own stuff in no time.
So pissed about that. 10y ago I was a random young amateur musician in a mediocre local band and I couldn't believe that versioning wasn't a first-class thing, let alone not a thing at all.
10y later I do music again, and I'm daily frustrated that _this is still not a thing_. Also infuriated by DAWs not supporting collaboration, or fckin commenting (taking notes). It's insane to me, there's a dozen DAWs that do mostly the same things and not one of them has differentiated by supporting these _basic_ things (in terms of need, not complexity, although note taking really can't be hard).
I've also found AI good at building synths. I now have a bunch of synths, samplers, and drum machines that my DAW can configure through MCP. For example, I can tell it to configure a 303, generate a 4-bar arp pattern, slowly increase the resonance across the pattern, and add it to the song.