MCP MIDI Bridge

Overview

MCP MIDI Bridge is an Electron-based desktop application that acts as a bridge between LLM-driven music generation (via the Model Context Protocol, MCP) and any DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) that accepts MIDI input. It enables AI-generated or AI-edited musical content (in Magenta NoteSequence JSON format) to be easily played, recorded, and manipulated in a DAW via a virtual MIDI device.

This project has been recently refactored to use a modern technology stack, including Next.js for the user interface and TypeScript for the entire codebase.

Features

• MCP API Server: An Express-based server that receives and updates musical content (NoteSequence JSON) from LLMs via HTTP.
• Virtual MIDI Output: Creates a virtual MIDI device that any DAW can connect to, powered by easymidi.
• Multi-Channel Support: Full support for all 16 MIDI channels with General MIDI instruments.
• Configurable Port: Run multiple instances on different ports for parallel workflows.
• Song Cache: Stores song data for persistence between sessions.
• User Dashboard: A modern, responsive UI built with Next.js and React, for viewing and playing songs.
• MIDI Import/Export: Support for importing and exporting MIDI files (coming soon).
• TypeScript Codebase: The entire project is written in TypeScript for improved type safety and maintainability.

Technology Stack

• Electron: Cross-platform desktop application framework.
• Next.js: React framework for building the user interface.
• TypeScript: Superset of JavaScript that adds static types.
• Express: Web framework for creating the MCP API server.
• EasyMIDI: Library for creating virtual MIDI devices.
• Tailwind CSS: Utility-first CSS framework for styling the UI.
• Magenta: Python library for music generation (used in the Python backend).

Development

Prerequisites

• Node.js 18+
• Python 3.8+ (for Magenta features)
• npm or yarn

Setup

1. Clone the repository:

   git clone https://github.com/your-username/mcp-midi.git
   cd mcp-midi
   

2. Install dependencies:

   npm install
   

3. Start the development server: This command will concurrently start the Next.js development server and the Electron application.

   npm run dev
   

Build

To build the application for production, run the following command:

npm run build

This will create a distributable package in the dist directory.

License

Apache 2.0