MIDI implementation of a kulintang modal synthesizer using the VST2.4 standard

Abstract

Philippine Indigenous Music is slowly disappearing partly because of insufficient accessibility to Philippine indigenous musical instruments. This project aims to give musicians access to the sounds of the Philippine instrument known as the kulintang through a synthesizer plug-in. This paper ventures into the implementation of a Virtual Studio Technology Instrument (VSTi) plug-in containing kulintang sounds analyzed using the Modal Distribution and synthesized using Sum of Sinusoid (SOS) Synthesis. The VSTi plug-in was implemented in C++ using the VST2.4 SDK (Software Development Kit). The plug-in is controlled by Musical Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI) events. The Filipino Kulintang MIDI (FKM1.0) was proposed as an initial MIDI mapping standard for Filipino kulintang instruments. A VST Dynamic Link Library (DLL) containing the kulintang synthesizer was successfully ported and controlled by a Digital Audio Workstation (DAW). Twenty three tuning presets with eight gongs each were included in the library.