MSeq

mseq is a lightweight MIDI sequencer framework written in Rust. It provides a flexible core for building sequencers that can run in standalone, master, or slave mode, with synchronization over standard MIDI clock and transport messages.

Features

• Real-time MIDI clock generation and synchronization
• Master/slave transport control with Start/Stop/Continue handling
• Flexible [Conductor] trait for defining sequencer logic
• Easy-to-implement tracks via the [Track] trait
• Thread-safe, minimal core designed for real-time responsiveness
• Step-based deterministic tracks with [DeteTrack]

Overview

The sequencer is driven by a user-provided [Conductor] implementation, which defines how the sequencer initializes, progresses at each clock tick, and reacts to external MIDI messages.

• No input → runs standalone with its internal clock and transport, generating MIDI clock and transport messages but ignoring external MIDI input.
• Master mode → runs with its internal clock while also processing incoming MIDI events (except for external clock/transport).
• Slave mode → synchronizes playback to an external MIDI clock and responds to Start/Stop/Continue messages, dynamically adjusting BPM to match the clock source.

Conductor Trait

A Conductor defines how your sequencer behaves:

• [Conductor::init] → called once at startup to initialize state and produce initial [Instruction]s (e.g., send program changes or reset messages).
• [Conductor::update] → called at every clock tick to advance the sequencer state and emit the instructions for that tick (e.g., note on/off events).
• [Conductor::handle_input] → called when a new [MidiMessage] arrives, allowing the conductor to react to external inputs in real time.

Tracks

Sequencers can also be built around the [Track] trait, which provides a simple interface for describing step-based musical patterns. Each track produces a set of [Instruction]s at a given step.

The provided [DeteTrack] implements a deterministic looping track:

use mseq::{Track, DeteTrack, Instruction};

let mut track = DeteTrack::default();
// On each tick, play the instructions for the current step
let instructions: Vec<Instruction> = track.play_step(step);

This makes it easy to implement custom track types, from simple step sequencers to more complex algorithmic patterns.

Usage

The entry point of the crate is the [run] function:

use mseq::{run, Conductor, Context, Instruction, MidiMessage};

struct MyConductor;

impl Conductor for MyConductor {
    fn init(&mut self, _ctx: &mut Context) -> Vec<Instruction> {
        vec![]
    }

    fn update(&mut self, _ctx: &mut Context) -> Vec<Instruction> {
        vec![]
    }

    fn handle_input(&mut self, input: MidiMessage, _ctx: &Context) -> Vec<Instruction> {
        vec![]
    }
}

fn main() -> Result<(), mseq::MSeqError> {
    let conductor = MyConductor;
    let out_port = None;
    let midi_in = None;
    run(conductor, out_port, midi_in)
}

Examples

You can find ready-to-run examples in the examples directory. They demonstrate various usage patterns, from simple standalone sequencers to multi-track setups.