Terra's Theme in Redstone
Posted: 22 Feb 2012, 22:37
Well, I was bored for a bit one day, so I decided to do a little project. Make a "doorbell" for my house. It'd be a song, actually. I was going to go with Ballad of the Goddess from Zelda: Skyward Sword, but due to the limits of note blocks, it wasn't going to work. So I tried think of a good game song that didn't have a wide range of notes, and picked Terra's Theme from Final Fantasy VI (or III for old timers like me). I've decided to post how to make it. Now, it's not the whole song, just the first little bit. Sadly, due to the limited note range, doing the whole song would be impossible without sacrificing a lot of quality. Even then, I haven't worked out if it'd be possible or not.
The song as is actually isn't quite right. The harmony is actually up one note scale from where it's supposed to be due to note range limitation (by ONE note >_<), and the whole song is about a quarter beat or so too fast, which is due to redstone repeater limitations. But hey, it still sounds good.
So, I'm going to break this into two parts. The harmony, and the melody. The harmony is longer, but repeater placement is simple. Each chord is separated by two Redstone Repeaters set at full delay. Simple, yes?
Here's a picture of the first 16 chords as an example. the stone block in the lower left is where the button to start it is.
You might notice in the picture that after the sixteenth chord in the upper left, there's one repeater after it, then the redstone seems to branch off, one branch going staying on the ground, and one going to an upper level. The upper level is the melody, the ground level is the harmony. We're going to stick with the harmony for now.
Below is the chords and what note each of the three blocks have to be. Instead of note scale, I put how many times you have to right click the note blocks from their default position to get it to the proper note. Remember, there are two Redstone Repeaters at -full delay- in between each individual chord. Each chord is played twice, which what the x2 represents.
15-16-20 x2
13-16-20 x2
13-15-18 x2
11-15-18 x2
You're going to repeat this set of chords -four- times. After that, it's:
18-20-23 x2
16-20-23 x2
11-16-18 x2
11-15-18 x2
11-13-16 x2
9-13-16 x2
8-15-16 x2
8-13-16 x2
Now with the melody. Start after the 16th chord. Like in the picture, you're going
to want to branch off after the first repeater after that chord. Make sure that after the branch, you set up the other repeater along the harmony path before the next chord.
The melody is more difficult as far as repeaters go. It's going to be a series of single note blocks. A few played in rapid succession, followed by a pause. For this one, I'm going to list the notes and repeaters. The repeaters are either going to be set a small delay (one right click from the repeater's default position) or full delay (three right clicks from default position). In the list below, small delays will be represented by x's and full delays by o's. Notes will again be represented by the number of right clicks you must make on the note block from its default position.
13 x 15 x 16 x 20 x 16 o o o o o o 15 x 13 x 15 o o 8 o o o o o 13 x 15 x 16 x 20 x 16 o o o o o o 15 x 13 x 15 o o 20 o o o o o 16 x 18 x 20 x 23 x 20 o o o o o o 18 x 16 x 18 o o 11 o o o o o 16 x 15 x 13 o o o o o o o 16 x 15 x 13
As you can see, it should produce 5 notes in quick succession, then a pause, then 3 notes, small pause, one note, pause.
It'll do that pattern three times, then it will do three quick notes, long pause, three quick notes. At that point, if it's timed right, the harmony should be have 4 chords left when the melody is finished.
So now if you did it all right, you should have Terra's Theme to play at your whim. If you need help, you can ask me. I'd let you see my setup online...but...actually, as of right now, it's not set up right. Even with the lag, it didn't seem right after I made it, so I went into single player creative did a cleaned up version. I'll edit the post when I get it corrected online. After which, I'll let folks check it out if they want.
Note that if you weren't aware, lag sucks with redstone, so if you build it in multiplayer, the timing might be (read: will be) off. There's an annoying tendency for the melody and harmony to be off from where they're supposed to be. Nothing really can be done about it, sadly.
And yes, this song will take 177 note blocks, and 162 Redstone Repeaters. Hope you have a lot of Redstone saved up.
The song as is actually isn't quite right. The harmony is actually up one note scale from where it's supposed to be due to note range limitation (by ONE note >_<), and the whole song is about a quarter beat or so too fast, which is due to redstone repeater limitations. But hey, it still sounds good.
So, I'm going to break this into two parts. The harmony, and the melody. The harmony is longer, but repeater placement is simple. Each chord is separated by two Redstone Repeaters set at full delay. Simple, yes?
Here's a picture of the first 16 chords as an example. the stone block in the lower left is where the button to start it is.
You might notice in the picture that after the sixteenth chord in the upper left, there's one repeater after it, then the redstone seems to branch off, one branch going staying on the ground, and one going to an upper level. The upper level is the melody, the ground level is the harmony. We're going to stick with the harmony for now.
Below is the chords and what note each of the three blocks have to be. Instead of note scale, I put how many times you have to right click the note blocks from their default position to get it to the proper note. Remember, there are two Redstone Repeaters at -full delay- in between each individual chord. Each chord is played twice, which what the x2 represents.
15-16-20 x2
13-16-20 x2
13-15-18 x2
11-15-18 x2
You're going to repeat this set of chords -four- times. After that, it's:
18-20-23 x2
16-20-23 x2
11-16-18 x2
11-15-18 x2
11-13-16 x2
9-13-16 x2
8-15-16 x2
8-13-16 x2
Now with the melody. Start after the 16th chord. Like in the picture, you're going
to want to branch off after the first repeater after that chord. Make sure that after the branch, you set up the other repeater along the harmony path before the next chord.
The melody is more difficult as far as repeaters go. It's going to be a series of single note blocks. A few played in rapid succession, followed by a pause. For this one, I'm going to list the notes and repeaters. The repeaters are either going to be set a small delay (one right click from the repeater's default position) or full delay (three right clicks from default position). In the list below, small delays will be represented by x's and full delays by o's. Notes will again be represented by the number of right clicks you must make on the note block from its default position.
13 x 15 x 16 x 20 x 16 o o o o o o 15 x 13 x 15 o o 8 o o o o o 13 x 15 x 16 x 20 x 16 o o o o o o 15 x 13 x 15 o o 20 o o o o o 16 x 18 x 20 x 23 x 20 o o o o o o 18 x 16 x 18 o o 11 o o o o o 16 x 15 x 13 o o o o o o o 16 x 15 x 13
As you can see, it should produce 5 notes in quick succession, then a pause, then 3 notes, small pause, one note, pause.
It'll do that pattern three times, then it will do three quick notes, long pause, three quick notes. At that point, if it's timed right, the harmony should be have 4 chords left when the melody is finished.
So now if you did it all right, you should have Terra's Theme to play at your whim. If you need help, you can ask me. I'd let you see my setup online...but...actually, as of right now, it's not set up right. Even with the lag, it didn't seem right after I made it, so I went into single player creative did a cleaned up version. I'll edit the post when I get it corrected online. After which, I'll let folks check it out if they want.
Note that if you weren't aware, lag sucks with redstone, so if you build it in multiplayer, the timing might be (read: will be) off. There's an annoying tendency for the melody and harmony to be off from where they're supposed to be. Nothing really can be done about it, sadly.
And yes, this song will take 177 note blocks, and 162 Redstone Repeaters. Hope you have a lot of Redstone saved up.
