A Raspberry Pi 4 , a few buttons, LEDs and some patience is all you will need to create this Track Looper. A table with which you can see many users on YouTube who are dedicated to creating music and is used to record sounds and then you can play in a loop creating your own rhythmic bases.
Loop Station
We say it with every new project we show you, one of the funniest things about the Raspberry Pi is that you can create pretty much anything with it. The obvious are devices to emulate retro consoles and arcade machines, but if you look at the different pages where they share projects with this development board you will see that there is everything.
If you are a user who is interested in everything related to music creation, this four-track Track Looper created with a Raspberry Pi will enchant you. Because it is a device with which you can record up to four tracks that you can then play in a loop and thus create a rhythmic base in a simple way.
As you can see in the video, it is true that it does not reach the manufacturing quality of commercial options. In these the pads (buttons) tend to have larger dimensions and a rubbery finish so that it is much easier to press when creating those tracks to play in loop mode, but it is still interesting.
In addition, it must be said that it is a home project and it is up to you how perfect you want it to be. Only you will have to see to what extent a greater investment can compensate you, although this proposal with these elements is more than enough to experiment. And for educational purposes it is simply ideal as it is cheap and will help students understand how a Loop Station works.
How to create your own 4-Track Looper with a Raspberry Pi
The process of creating this loop table is not complex . It is true that you must have certain skills when using the Raspberry Pi, both for the installation and configuration of the operating system and the rest of the components that will allow its use. And of course be familiar with the different connections, especially the GPIO connector of the Raspberry Pi.
If you have this under control, you will see that the whole process is nothing more than following step by step the instructions that are shared through the project page on GitHub, raspi-looper . Although the first thing is to do with the different components that you will need. These materials are as follows:
- Raspberry Pi 4
- USB sound card, those that include many headphones are worth it
- 8 buttons
- 8 LEDs
- Box to integrate all the components and create the table
With everything ready, the installation and configuration process is on GitHub. This basically consists of checking that the Raspberry Pi detects the USB sound card correctly and then connecting buttons and LEDs through the GPIO connector. Once done, the configuration file is executed, the process is launched and that’s it, to create music through the sounds that you can record by using a microphone or connecting an external sound source.
As we said above, the 4 Track Looper is one of those projects with Raspberry Pi that serve to demonstrate the potential of the development board and experiment with products that you would not buy, but if you want to see how they work and what they can contribute.
