For those who do not know about Fruity Loops, it is a top notch music production software, and widely used by musicians over the world. Of course, it is quite pricey. Here is a free alternative to FruityLoops (or FL Studio): LMMS.
LMMS is an open source software, and still in its infancy, but it packs a punch. It runs on both Windows as well as Linux (even though the name itself is Linux Multimedia Studio).
LMMS lets you produce music from your computer. You can create melodies and beats, synthesise and mix sounds. One of the most useful feature of LMMS is that it is compatible with lots of standards, which make it very easy to use plugins and open files created on other software.
Here are a few of the standards that LMMS is compatible with:
- SoundFont2
- VST
- LADSPA
- GUS Patches
Because of compatibility with all these standards, LMMS lets you import MIDI and FLP (FruityLoops Project Files).
Here is a brief feature overview of LMMS free Music production sotware:
- Includes a song editor for composing songs.
- An FX mixer with 64 FX channels allow unlimited mixing possibilities.
- Lot of plugins available to extend the possibilities.
- Includes Beat + Baseline editor to create baselines and beats.
- Includes a Piano-Roll for editing patterns and melodies.
If you are a novice music creator, or are just looking for alternative to expensive programs like FL Studio or Ableton Live, then this might be a good start. As I mentioned above, this is still in its infancy, but it’s absolutely free and definitely worth a try.
Download links and Video Tutorials at the end.