Digital Arabic Maqām Archive and open-source MIDI plug-in

Digital Arabic Maqām Archive and open-source MIDI plug-in provides a free, open archive containing hundreds of tuning systems, ajnās, and maqāmāt. It is accompanied by a free MIDI plug-in that lets users apply those tunings across all major software tuning formats. The plug-in supports Oddsound MTS-ESP, MIDI Polyphonic Expression (MPE), and monophonic pitch bend. The project also bundles a PE Receiver and a Mono Pitch Bend Receiver as Max for Live devices.

Tanghīm addresses a major limitation of existing tuning interfaces for MTS-ESP, MPE, Ableton’s Tuning Systems, and Scala. Tanghīm is described as an Arabic maṣdar denoting the act of intoning or setting pitch, and the term dūzān refers to mechanical tuning borrowed from Ottoman Turkish düzen. The project aims to restore intonation as live musical practice and not just the colonialist, 20th-century idea of standardization. The presentation took place in Beirut and the long-term research project was presented by Khyam Allami. Documentation of the archive and plug-in appears on the CDM Create Digital Music site dated July 22, 2026, and the GitHub repository for the DiArMaqAr project is Music-Intelligence-Lab/DiArMaqAr.

The Digital Arabic Maqām Archive, part of the DiArMaqAr project, comprises hundreds of tuning systems, ajnās, and maqāmāt. These resources are available as a free, open archive accessible without charge. The archive is released alongside a free MIDI plug-in that lets users apply those tunings across major software tuning formats, and the plug-in supports Oddsound MTS-ESP, MIDI Polyphonic Expression (MPE), and monophonic pitch bend. The project also provides bundled Max for Live devices including a PE Receiver and a Mono Pitch Bend Receiver.

Documentation of the archive and plug-in appears on the CDM Create Digital Music site dated July 22, 2026. The GitHub repository for the DiArMaqAr project is Music-Intelligence-Lab/DiArMaqAr. The long-term research project was presented in Beirut by Khyam Allami. The project describes Tanghīm as an Arabic maṣdar denoting the act of intoning or setting pitch and states that dūzān is an Arabic term for mechanical tuning borrowed from Ottoman Turkish düzen.

The open-source MIDI plug-in distributed with the Digital Arabic Maqām Archive enables application of the archive’s tunings within major software tuning formats. It supports Oddsound MTS-ESP, MIDI Polyphonic Expression (MPE), and monophonic pitch bend, allowing those tuning systems to be used across different MIDI expression modes. The plug-in is provided free and as part of the project’s software release, and it is positioned to work with common tuning workflows used in digital audio environments. Bundled Max for Live devices accompany the plug-in, including a PE Receiver and a Mono Pitch Bend Receiver, to facilitate integration with Ableton Live setups that use Max for Live.

The project describes Tanghīm as addressing a limitation of existing tuning interfaces for MTS-ESP, MPE, Ableton’s Tuning Systems, and Scala, framing the plug-in as part of that response. Documentation for the plug-in and archive appears on the CDM Create Digital Music site dated July 22, 2026, and the project’s code and materials are hosted in the Music-Intelligence-Lab/DiArMaqAr GitHub repository. The plug-in is released alongside the archive of hundreds of tuning systems, ajnās, and maqāmāt, forming the software component of the DiArMaqAr project.

Tanghīm is an Arabic maṣdar, or verbal noun, denoting the act of intoning or setting pitch.

In linguistics it is the standard equivalent of intonation, the melodic contour of speech.

The project documentation also notes that dūzān is the Arabic term for mechanical tuning borrowed from Ottoman Turkish düzen. These linguistic definitions are presented as part of the project’s description of Tanghīm.

The project was presented in Beirut. Khyam Allami is named as the presenter of the long-term research project.

Sure enough, even the name is related to the idea of intonation — restoring this as live musical practice, and not just the colonialist, 20th-century idea of standardization.

The project documentation states that Tanghīm addresses a limitation of existing tuning interfaces for MTS-ESP, MPE, Ableton’s Tuning Systems, and Scala. Documentation of these statements appears on the CDM Create Digital Music site dated July 22, 2026.

The Tanghīm MIDI plug-in is released as open-source software and is provided free alongside the Digital Arabic Maqām Archive. The plug-in enables the application of the archive’s tunings across major software tuning formats and explicitly supports Oddsound MTS-ESP, MIDI Polyphonic Expression (MPE), and monophonic pitch bend. The software release is positioned to integrate with common digital audio workflows and to make the archive’s hundreds of tuning systems, ajnās, and maqāmāt available to producers and performers in those tuning formats.

The project documentation states that Tanghīm addresses a limitation of existing tuning interfaces for MTS-ESP, MPE, Ableton’s Tuning Systems, and Scala, framing the plug-in as part of this response. To facilitate integration with Ableton Live, the release includes Max for Live modules: a PE Receiver and a Mono Pitch Bend Receiver. The plug-in and these Max for Live devices are distributed as part of the DiArMaqAr project’s software package.

CONCLUSION

The Digital Arabic Maqām Archive and the Tanghīm open-source MIDI plug-in were released together as part of the DiArMaqAr project, providing access to a free, open archive containing hundreds of tuning systems, ajnās, and maqāmāt and a free software tool to apply those tunings.

Documentation for the archive and plug-in is published on the CDM Create Digital Music site with a noted date of July 22, 2026. The project’s code and materials are hosted in the Music-Intelligence-Lab/DiArMaqAr GitHub repository.

The release package includes the Tanghīm plug-in and bundled Max for Live modules—a PE Receiver and a Mono Pitch Bend Receiver—to support integration with Oddsound MTS-ESP, MIDI Polyphonic Expression (MPE), monophonic pitch bend, and Ableton Live workflows.