How to Play MIDI files in Ubuntu

Copy-pasta!

Howto: Easy MIDI

I was trying to play scummvm with alsa, and I coudlnt get it to play midis.. So I did a Little research, and found this. He did an excellent job at adding midi in hoary, so this is kind of a translation and a bit of fix.

1. Install timidity & pmidi:
   

   
   

   
   sudo apt-get install timidity pmidi
   

   
   

   
   


2. 
   

   
   

   
   sudo gedit /etc/modules
   

   
   and add the following lines:
   

   
   snd-seq-device
   snd-seq-midi
   snd-seq-oss
   snd-seq-midi-event
   snd-seq
   

   
   

   
   


3. Download the Unison Soundfont:
   

   
   

   
   wget ftp://ftp.personalcopy.net/pub/Unison.sf2.gz
   

   
   

   
   


4. Extract it to /etc/sounds:
   

   
   

   
   sudo mkdir /etc/sounds/
   tar -xzf Unison.sf2.gz
   mv Unison.SF2 Unison.sf2
   sudo mv Unison.sf2 /etc/sounds/
   

   
   

   
   


5. 
   

   
   

   
   sudo gedit /etc/timidity/timidity.cfg
   

   
   It should look like this (No more, no less):
   

   
   soundfont /etc/sounds/Unison.sf2
   

   
   

   
   


6. 
   

   
   

   
   sudo gedit /etc/init.d/timidity
   

   
   variable TIM_ALSASEQPARAMS (variable 22 I think), should look like this:
   

   
   TIM_ALSASEQPARAMS="-iA -B2,8 -Os1l -s 44100"
   

   
   

   
   


7. 
   

   
   

   
   sudo gedit /etc/default/timidity
   

   
   Uncomment the two TIM variables. It should look like this:
   

   
   # Defaults for TiMidity++ scripts
   # sourced by /etc/init.d/timidity
   # installed at /etc/default/timidity by the maintainer scripts
   # $Id: timidity.default,v 1.3 2004/08/07 14:33:26 hmh Exp $
   
   #
   # This is a POSIX shell fragment
   #
   
   # Enable MIDI sequencer (ALSA), default is disabled
   TIM_ALSASEQ=true
   
   # Setting overrides (of /etc/timidity.conf) for the ALSA sequencer daemon
   TIM_ALSASEQPARAMS="-iA -B2,8 -Os1l -s 44100"
   

   
   

   
   


8. 
   

   
   

   
   gedit ~/.bashrc
   

   
   Add the following line (A good idea is to add it after line 9):
   

   
   export ALSA_OUTPUT_PORTS="128:0"
   

   
   

   
   


9. Done! Now you can play midis with pmidi. Like this:
   

   
   

   
   pmidi Song.mid
   

   
   

   
   If it doesnt work, reboot (just to be sure... Damn windows tick!)
   

Bonus: SCUMMVM
Now you can play scumm vm through alsa! Just follow these steps:

1. 
   

   
   

   
   gedit ~/.bashrc
   

   
   Add the following line (Again, after line 9 is a good idea):
   

   
   export SCUMMVM_PORT=128:0
   

   
   

   
   


2. (If you want to create a launcher)
   

   
   

   
   gedit ~/.gnomerc
   

   
   Add the folowing lines:
   

   
   export ALSA_OUTPUT_PORTS="128:0"
   export SCUMMVM_PORT=128:0
   

   
   

   
   


3. In scummvm, go to options, audio, music driver: ALSA

Good luck.

PD: Thanks to:

• http://www.ubuntu-es.org/node/3777


• http://www.ubuntulinux.org/wiki/Midi...SynthesisHowTo


• http://www.personalcopy.com/home.htm


• http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...light=timidity

Note: I think Ubuntu should have MIDI support by default

Last edited by RastaMahata; August 21st, 2005 at 08:52 PM..