In Chapter 12: Working with Audio from VJ Manzo's book  Max/MSP/Jitter for Music, we get to start working with the MSP part of Max/MSP, which allows audio signals (you know, actual sound waves and recordings) to be used in addition to MIDI notes or mathematical equations. The chapter shows how to:

• Get sound into Max with a microphone, at first with the adc~ object (that is, "audio-to-digital converter," where the tilde ~ means that it is an MSP audio object) and later with the more intuitive ezadc~ object.
• Create gain~ controls to keep the speakers from exploding
• Create audio meters with the meter~ object
• Output sound, at first with the dac~ object (i.e., "digital-to-audio converter") and later with the ezdac~ object
• Create sine waves with the cycle~ object and combine waves for more complex sounds
• Create a virtual oscilloscope with the scope~ object, thus creating a visual display of the sound wave
• Create a monophonic synthesizer with the ddg.mono object
• Convert MIDI to audio frequencies with the mtof object
• Use pack and unpack to combine or separate MIDI data, as well as midiparse
• Create a polyphonic synthesizer with the poly~ object

Lots of good stuff. I plan on using several of these in my final project.

Completed:

• Max/MSP/Jitter for Music, Ch. 12: Working with Audio (17 exercises)
• Patches can be downloaded from http://db.tt/GBYLb0vY (Dead Link)
• UPDATED LINK: Patches can now be downloaded from http://j.mp/1iy19Xl