PiicoDev Buzzer Module - Raspberry Pi Guide

Download the Example Script

Download this example script: main.py (right-click, "save link as")

Save this file wherever you like to keep your programming projects. For this tutorial, I'll save mine in /home/pi/PiicoDev. You might like to change the name of your script for some context eg.buzzer.py

Open Thonny, navigate to your working directory and open the script.

Click Run (Keyboard shortcut, Ctrl+R) and you should hear some tones play from your Buzzer Module.

This script initialises the Buzzer at the loudest volume and plays two tones. Then, the volume is reduced to the lowest setting, and the two tones repeat. tone() accepts up to two arguments - the first is the frequency in Hz, and the second is tone-duration in milliseconds. If no duration argument is given, the tone will sound continuously. This is the case for the second pair of tones, which omit the duration argument: In this case the tone will play continuously until buzz.noTone() is called. Here, the duration is set by the delay, sleep_ms(). buzz.volume() accepts a 0, 1 or 2 - 0 is the quietest and 2 is the loudest.

Melodies

It's possible to play simple melodies on a Buzzer Module. In the following example a Python Dictionary notes defines musical-note names with their corresponding frequencies (Hz). Then, a 2-dimensional list melody defines the sequence of notes to play in note-duration pairs. For example, the first note is E, played for 500ms. The 10th note is an F, played for 250ms.

Finally, a loop steps through the melody list, extracts the note/duration data, and plays that tone.

Take this example for a spin! Replace the code in main.py with the following and run the script.

# PiicoDev Buzzer melody example. Define a melody as a combination of notes and durations.

from PiicoDev_Buzzer import PiicoDev_Buzzer
from PiicoDev_Unified import sleep_ms

# Define some note-frequency pairs
notes = {'C4':262,
         'Db':277,
         'D' :294,
         'Eb':311,
         'E' :330,
         'F' :349,
         'Gb':370,
         'G' :392,
         'Ab':415,
         'A' :440,
         'Bb':466,
         'B' :494,
         'C5':523,
         'rest':0, # zero Hertz is the same as no tone at all
         }

# define a melody - two-dimensional list of notes and note-duration (ms)
melody = [['E',    500],
          ['D',    500],
          ['C4',   500],
          ['rest', 500],
          ['E',    500],
          ['D',    500],
          ['C4',   500],
          ['rest', 500],
          ['G',    500],
          ['F',    250],
          ['F',    250],
          ['E',    500],
          ['rest', 500],
          ['G',    500],
          ['F',    250],
          ['F',    250],
          ['E',    500],
          ['rest', 500],
          ]

buzz = PiicoDev_Buzzer(volume=2)

# play the melody
for x in melody:
    noteName = x[0] # extract the note name
    duration = x[1] # extract the duration
    buzz.tone(notes[noteName], duration)
    sleep_ms(duration)