Installing and Starting FluidSynth on Mac

  1. The installation method here requires Homebrew. If you have not installed it yet, please install Homebrew first.

  2. Install FluidSynth as follows:

    % brew install fluid-synth

(Depending on the version, ‘fluid-synth’ might be listed as ‘fluidsynth’.)

  1. Find the sound-font file named ‘FluidR3_GM.sf2’ on the Internet and download it (For example, from here).

  2. Start FluidSynth in the background as follows:

    % fluidsynth -s -i -m coremidi -o midi.autoconnect=1 ~/Downloads/FluidR3_GM/FluidR3_GM.sf2 &

Change the last argument appropriately depending on the location of the sound-font file.


Last update: Jan 19 2026 12:18 JST     Copyright (C) 2026 Satoshi Nishimura