[chuck-users] minimizing load time for tons of audio

[Michael Hammond]

hello chuckists!

i have a quick question for all you audio programmers out there.  so  
i'm looking for the quickest, cheapest way possible to play large  
quantities of audio (preferably wav or aif files).  i have a project  
where i need to be able to have up to 20 five minute audio files  
loaded and ready to play at once (though only 5-8 of those will  
actually play at any one time).  i looked into using the SndBuf object  
(perhaps naively) but quickly realized that the initial load time  
would be prohibitive.  is there a way to incrementally load a file  
into SndBuf without causing unwanted stutters?  or would WvIn be a  
better choice?

also, i don't really need to load the file for editing or  
manipulation.  all i am looking to do is to play the files  
simultaneously.  if there's not a quick, cheap way to do this in  
ChucK, i'm open to using other languages.  unfortunately, i'm not as  
experienced at accomplishing audio tasks in other languages as i am in  
chuck, so i'm not sure how this would be done.  any help at all would  
be greatly appreciated.

thanks!

michael