[PlanetCCRMA] Help with Midi - no sound from Delta 1010 LT

[Fernando Pablo Lopez-Lezcano]

> I have a system with a Delta 1010 LT card, a midiman Radium keyboard.  I 
> believe I have not configured things correctly and have exhausted the 
> HOWTOs.  Please note that this is my first experience with MIDI, so it 
> is no doubt my own damn fault.  Thanks in advance for pointing me in the 
> right direction.
> 
> I have the ccrma audio package installed and most things seem to work as 
> expected, (jack, ardour) but I can't hear midi files.  When playing midi 
> files with Muse or Rosegarden, I can see activity but can't hear 
> anything.  Hydrogen produces sound and I can trigger the various drum 
> sounds with the Radium which will also play sounds using ZynAddSubFX. It 
> doesn't seem like I can play a synth with the Delta 1010.  It seems to 
> have the instrument banks - but where to go from there?

You have both a Delta 1010 and a Midisport 2x2 in your setup. None of
them has a built in hardware synthesizer you can use. The midi ports you
see in your setup are just that, connections to potential midi synths,
if you don't have an external synth connected then you will hear
nothing...

Not everything is lost. You need to use a software synthesizer. Options
in Planet CCRMA currently are timidity++ and fluidsynth. There a couple
of soundfonts for timidity++ but you will have to get your own for
fluidsynth. For fluidsynth, for example:

  fluidsynth -a alsa -m alsa_seq SOUNDFONTFILENAME

will start fluidsynth connected to the alsa sound output driver and
listening for midi commands in the alsa seuquencer. 

Or:
  fluidsynth -a jack -m alsa_seq SOUNDFONTFILENAME
for jack audio output. 

-- Fernando