Musical compositions can be written in Books.
Punching a jukebox with a book will play the musical composition written inside it. You can stop the playback of a music book by sneaking and punching the jukebox with the book in your hand.
¶ Notes
There are 7 musical notes: A, B, C, D, E, F and G.
Notes can be natural (e.g. A), sharp (e.g. A#) or flat (e.g. Ab).
Notes that are separated by spaces are played after each other. Notes that are not separated by spaces are played at the same time. This is useful for chords. For example, GBD plays the G major chord.
¶ Octaves
There are two octaves: 0 and 1. Notes can be played on a specific octave by adding the octave number to them, e.g. A1. By default, notes will play on the zeroth octave.
Writing o<number of octave>, i.e. o0 or o1, will change the default octave of subsequent notes to that number.
There is actually a third octave: 2. But because of a Minecraft limitation, it can only be used for the note F#.
¶ Beats
Notes are played every beat. Beats last for 50 milliseconds (1 Minecraft tick) by default. You can change the duration of beats by writing d<beat duration in milliseconds>, e.g. d200 for 200 millisecond beats.
To pause for a beat, type -. Every - pauses for an extra beat, e.g. --- pauses for three beats.
¶ Quickly Shortening Beats
- Halving: Every
\written after a note's letter will halve the beat duration. For example,F#\will play the next note two times more quickly thanF#. - Quartering: Every
/written after a note's letter will quarter the beat duration. For example,F#/will play the next note four times more quickly thanF#.
¶ Instruments
Change instrument by writing the instrument's code, e.g. i7 for the guitar.
| Instrument Code | Instrument |
|---|---|
i0 |
Piano (default) |
i1 |
Bass Drum |
i2 |
Snare Drum |
i3 |
Sticks |
i4 |
Bass |
i5 |
Flute |
i6 |
Bell |
i7 |
Guitar |
i8 |
Chime |
i9 |
Xylophone |
i10 |
Iron Xylophone |
i11 |
Cow Bell |
i12 |
Didgeridoo |
i13 |
Bit |
i14 |
Banjo |
i15 |
Pling |
¶ Labels
Labels are named collections of notes that play simultaneously with the main beat. This allows multiple instruments to be played at the same time.
A label is defined by writing notes between labelname: and :labelname. The label name can be anything, as long as it isn't used by another label.
In the example below, we create a label called example_label with the notes A A A.
example_label: A A A :example_label
:example_label marks the end of the label. It also plays the notes inside the label. The notes will be played at the same time as whatever comes after the label.
In the example below, example_label (A A A) will be played simultaneously with B B B.
example_label: A A A :example_label B B B
Creating multiple labels lets you play multiple sets of notes at the same time.
In the example below, the labels guitar_label, piano_label and bass_label are all played at the same time as D D D.
guitar_label: i7 A A A :guitar_label
piano_label: i0 B B B :piano_label
bass_label: i4 C C C :bass_label
D D DTo repeat a label, just write :labelname again.
¶ Example
This is a basic composition based on the folk song Kâtibim.
d225 i7
E F E D C B C D
E F E D C B A
E F E D C B C D E
----
E F E D C B C D
E F E D C B A
B D C B B A A G# A
A - E E E F E F G1 E E
D D D C D E
---
A - E E E F E F G1 E E
D D D C D E
---
A - B C D E F E D C B A
B D C B B A G# A B
----
A - B C D E F E D C B A
B D C B B A B A G# A