Harmonic colour
Lumière
Explore seven modes with evolving harmonic colour. Build a piece around luminous musical textures, then shape its sections, keys and movement to make it your own.
Fishtail
Generative MIDI instrument for iPhone, iPad, and Mac.
Compose, arrange and perform complete musical forms. Fishtail generates MIDI; you choose the instruments that receive it.
Now on the App Store
US App Store prices: iPhone & iPad US$14.99 · Mac US$29.99.
Follow the App Store links for your local price.
On Mac, use Fishtail as an AUv3 instrument in Logic Pro or open the standalone app to publish eight named CoreMIDI sources with optional 24 PPQN clock and Link-aware transport.
Fishtail does not use AI to generate music. Its musical output is produced by algorithmic rules grounded in music theory.
Fishtail 1.1
New colours. New momentum.
Out now for iPhone, iPad and Mac
Meet Lumière and Ritual Engine: two new composers to explore with your own instruments. Fishtail creates the MIDI; you shape the piece and choose its sound.
Rhythmic energy
Ritual Engine
Create rhythmic momentum with repeating musical cells and shifting accents. Explore the arrangement, change its sections and let your chosen instruments bring the pattern to life.
Roll, generate, make it your own.
Roll D7 for a shaped musical recipe, or choose a composer yourself. Press Generate to create a Take, then explore and edit the arrangement. Keep and reorder the Takes you like, and route the MIDI to your favourite instruments.
A welcome you can revisit.
A new welcome introduces the composers and Vesper, Fishtail’s expressive companion synthesiser. It appears once for this update. Choose Continue to go straight into Fishtail, or revisit it from Settings → What’s new.
Fishtail capabilities
Structure
Sections, keys, modes, meters, cadences and compositional character.
Takes
Retain, reorder and hand off exact generations at whole-piece boundaries.
Intonation
Seven tuning systems with normal MIDI, pitch bend and MPE output.
Interchange
AUv3 and standalone CoreMIDI routing, Ableton Link, .fishtail projects, Standard MIDI export and experimental analogue CV file packages.
Watch
See Fishtail in action.
Watch Fishtail generate MIDI on iPhone and iPad, then see the AUv3 instrument running inside Logic Pro on Mac.
Visit FishtailMIDI on YouTubeiPhone & iPad
Fishtail MIDI Generator on iOS
See Fishtail’s generative MIDI workflow on iPhone and iPad.
Mac + Logic Pro
Fishtail in Logic
Watch Fishtail work as an AUv3 MIDI instrument inside Logic Pro on Mac.
Listen
A window into sound.
Music made with Fishtail by StarLight.
Open the player to hear complete pieces composed with Fishtail. The SoundCloud player is loaded only when you choose to open it.
Visit StarLight on SoundCloudSupport
Write to Fishtail.
For support, documentation questions or product feedback, email Write2Fishtail@icloud.com.
Read the User GuidePrivacy
Local by design.
Fishtail does not include user accounts, advertising, analytics or tracking. Its current privacy manifests declare that the app and AUv3 extension collect no data. Projects, preferences and exports are handled on-device or through files and sharing actions you choose.
If you enable Ableton Link, Fishtail uses local-network access to synchronize tempo, beat, phase and optional transport with compatible music apps. This local synchronization is not used for analytics or advertising.
Opening the User Manual checks this website for the current PDF and keeps a validated copy on the device for offline use. Fishtail does not use that request for accounts, advertising or in-app analytics.
The listening window does not contact SoundCloud until you choose to open it. Once opened, SoundCloud may collect usage data and use cookies or similar technologies under its own Cookie Policy.
The video players use YouTube's Privacy-Enhanced Mode. YouTube may still receive technical information when a player loads and may collect usage data under Google's Privacy Policy.
Optional support
Koha welcome. Never required.
If Fishtail is useful to you, you may leave a voluntary tip to support its continued development. Tips do not unlock features, content, access, or support.
Leave a tip