THE BLACK MAGIC COMPOSER
------------------------

Reviewed by Mr.Havinga

Before I begin, I'd like to warn you that this won't be a normal review. For
example, I will tell you the conclusion that this composer should be bought by
everyone not at the end, but at the beginning:

THIS COMPOSER SHOULD BE BOUGHT BY EVERYONE!

You may wonder why this review is different from all the others. The answer is
simple: now I don't have to worry about following certain rules for writing a
review, and can do with this piece of text whatever I want. For example, have
you ever found a question like the one you are reading now in another review?

Ok, about the Black Magic Composer now. It is, like the smart ones amongst you
already might have guessed, a tool for making music. And not just a tool, it is
THE tool for making music on your atari.

But, the title is wrong. It is not a music composer, unless you have a perfect
hearing. It is a tool for converting 'sheet music', or music of which you
already know the frequencies and lengths. Don't expect (unless you are really
good) to make a good music in the Black Magic 'composer' if you have only got a
nice tune in your head.

The reason why is that the notes are entered by means of the keyboard. If you
want a C, then you press C. If you want a D, you press a D. If you think 'would
this sound correct?' you have a problem. The only way to listen to what you have
entered is to put the piece of music in a channel, and then play the whole song.
A weak point.

Another weak point is that the chance (and not a little one) to get some
complete crap exist. For using some special sounds like e.g. a filter, you must
follow a number of rules, and if you don't, it just doesn't work. At this point
the manual is very weak. It is very technical (there even is a reference to the
XL/XE BASIC manual for the distortions!) and for persons that don't know
anything about music on the Atari very difficult to understand. You have to try
every feature to know what you get.

Also the program is weak at this point; it doesn't spot any mistake you make,
except for disk failures. You will only hear you did something wrong while
playing the whole song.

Except for knowing a bit about music on the Atari, the user must also know
something about music in general. The manual only tells you how to do something,
not what that something means. But once you've tried every option, you know what
the capabilities of the Black Magic Composer are, and will be able to use the
BMC to its limits.

And hereby I come to the strong point of the BMC: It's limits are the limits of
your Atari! Really no other program enables you to get an almost magical (for an
old bitch like Pokey) sound than the Black MAGIC 'composer'! Filters, 16-bit
channels, sample drums (on the disk are some very good ones!), name it, and the
Black MAGIC 'composer' is the solution to our sound problems on the Atari
8-bitter. Very nice is the transpose option, which allows you to play a piece of
music a bit higher or lower.

If you own an Atari or an Amiga mouse, the selection of the options (icons and
drop down menu's) works very nice. Unfortunately you must still enter a lot of
things with the keyboard, so it comes to switching between the keyboard and the
mouse very often. A good alternative for the mouse is using some special
key-combinations for the specific selections. A very, very unadvisable
alternative for the mouse is the joystick.

When you think the music is finished, the work of the Black Magic Composer
doesn't end. You don't need to rip the play routine from the editor. Just choose
an option and it will ask you with which starting address the music should be
saved. It also gives you the length, which usually is very short for the quality
you get. The music is saved in binary format. The manual gives good information
of how to integrate the music in a BASIC or Turbo BASIC program, and even has an
example program in assembler of how to get access to the music! You will for
sure not encounter any problems here!

You already know the conclusion: Buy this program. Also for the ones that don't
know a fuck of making music, the disk contains 8 very good music's, so you can
learn a lot of it.

Now a message to the makers of the Black Magic Composer, Sven Tegethoff and
Thorsten Winkler: You have made a very good music editor! But, a little
expansion to the manual can only do good. How about some more information about
the options for making an instrument. Not only which options are possible, but
also their effect on the tone. An offset indicator (a number) in 'der sequencer'
would also be nice. (Though the bar at the right of the screen works very nice.)
Something what would also increase the user- friendlyness are test options like
the one in the sample arrange menu. What about testing an instrument, testing a
takt and testing a channel? And how about a little option that turns the
keyboard in a little keyboard? (But then like one with those white and black
bars..)

Finally there's still one important weak point of BMC: the time the play routine
takes from the processor! So, if you plan to include a BMC music into your PTE
(processor time eating) program it's wise to check the BMC time first!

Special thanx to the TOP crew who gave us a free original copy. Thanx guys!