PLN's "merge of stems": the best vocal isolation cascaded into the best 4-way split.
There is no 4-stem Roformer, so MultiModelBackend orchestrates a cascade —
1. Roformer (audio-separator, py3.12 venv) isolates vocals + instrumental;
2. demucs runs on the INSTRUMENTAL (vocals already gone → cleaner) for drums/bass/other;
3. merge = Roformer vocals ⊕ demucs drums/bass/other in the standard 4-stem contract.
Refactored separate.py for composite backends: a backend declares what it `produces`
and (for composites) a `run_composite` hook; the subprocess runner is factored into
_run_cmd so the cascade can drive several sub-separations. RoformerBackend is now wired
(was a stub): audio-separator CLI, 2-stem (vocals/instrumental), normalize() globs the
"(Vocals)"/"(Instrumental)" output names. The default normalizer maps by produces[].
Verified end to end on the Loituma source: merge → vocals (Roformer) + drums/bass/other
(demucs-on-instrumental), 4 clean PCM_16/44.1k stems. All three backends report
available on this box. GUI renders whatever stems a backend emits (demucs/merge 4,
roformer 2 incl. instrumental), canonical roles first. 53 tests (added: registry has the
three engines, roformer produces 2 + builds its cmd, merge is composite/4-stem).
Keeps the 2-stem Roformer door open as its own backend (vocal isolation), and the merge
as the flagship. Foundry's engine registry now showcases the pluggable design PLN wants
to grow into a product/API/service.
