New Years Resolution - more midi in my music. Why you ask? Because I want to better understand and better control what is being played. At least I think I do....

I am starting by focusing on Piano and Drums as I feel I have the tools to get a good sound.

Drums I have covered - EZD2 is stepping up to the plate very nice for me. I don't have to rely on any BIAB content for this since I have a pretty good investment in Drum midi.

But Piano is a problem.
Right now I will still have to relay highly on available midi content from BIAB.

I have worked with some SuperMidi Tracks and had a bit of success getting some good arrangements and with a good VST the sound is very musical. But the quantity of SuperMidi is limited in BIAB. And the regular MIDI content is not as musical as the SuperMidi. Does that make sense??

So I am about to invest in a full library of Midi content from EZKeys. From an operations perceptive EZKeys is so very much like BIAB, but different. And in the ways different, BIAB is generally better, But it is simply the quality of the midi content that I am trying to optimize. And EZKeys can interface with Reaper just as easy as BIAB.

So any of you mididots have any advice? Is the standard midi content for pianos in BIAB missing in some standard. Is there some metric to measure the quality of the midi? I seem to remember discussion here in the past but didn't pay much attention. Or am I overthinking this whole thing.

OK, I have determined that the EZKey Library is all "real player" midi which is equivalent to the BIAB super midi.

I know BIAB is 480PPQ - don't know what EZKeys is.

So do you think that is the primary difference I am experiencing here?

Dan -

I think everyone will have their own "answer". It depends on what you are trying to accomplish.

I am a songwriter. First, foremost, always. I need a "piano player" who does the right thing for the song (the lyric and how it is sung, mainly). The MIDI Supertracks are an INCREDIBLE resource. I use them anytime there is one that fits - because I can use the piano VST of my choosing - which allows more control over the sound (compared to RTs). The RTs are incredible, too - but sometimes when they are "naked" there are "effects" in the recording that I would rather not be there. If there is a companion MIDI Supertrack, problem solved... I would guess that any new piano RealTracks will include a companion MST...

I am currently creating tracks for a new song. I started it in EZKeys. It is a SUPER songwriting tool. The basic library of piano phrases is really nice. (I would LOVE to have all the supplemental packs!). It allows some very nice variety for song construction. I built a piano track in EZKeys and exported the MIDI file... took that into BIAB and added all the other stuff... So, it is... one more tool. BUT... you have got to WANT to put that kind of effort into it - and have a reason to. I have that reason because as a songwriter, I sometimes want a certain "piano player style"... if I were doing backing tracks for guitar soloing (for instance...like eric (f.m.m) does, I would wonder if it was really necessary.... RealTrack pianos would be my choice there...

I'm rambling (as I am prone to do), so I'll stop now... I think the real question comes down to "what are you looking to accomplish" and what effort are you (reasonably) willing to expend...

I am a student musician\guitarist. I need to know what the piano player is playing and why he is playing it. If I have control, I want to tell him what to play and how.


Agreed.


I don't know about this "companion MST". I know about the real charts which accompany may RTs, but I thought the midi was not really good for playing. I will look closer at this.


I am looking at a 6 pack for $99.



Like music too my ears (but, hell all your stuff is like that to me). Thanks for the input. Making my decision easier.

OK, what is this? I can find no way to export the midi from a Piano RT. Can this be done?

Here's my 2 cents worth, Dan...
The problem with most of the midi we find online is that it wasn't played by real people. The reason why that matters is that the best synths have many layers so the sound is different when the velocity is harder or softer. Generated MIDI typically has less variation in the velocity, so it lacks the "real" sound.

This is basically why Notes Nortons styles have been so popular: he played the parts, and the artist's nuances were captured as part of the style.

The MIDI supertracks are the same deal (but the artists are all famous performers), and it sounds like this EZKeys package you are looking at is based on the same advantage.

Capturing the nuances in the MIDI itself is only part of the magic. The playback synth has to be layered enough to reproduce that much nuance. So if you are playing Super Midi Tracks through the basic coyote forte synth, it won't sound as good as it would if you send it through one of the many top-notch synths that are currently available.

After looking at the ad for EZKeys, it looks like they provide the whole package of quality MIDI and a top notch playback synth

Regarding PPQ: in Realband you can set that to whatever you want. Unless your project begins and ends with BIAB, it doesn't matter that its PPQ is, because you'll be rendering the MIDI through a synth at whatever PPQ is in your mixing DAW

Dan
This method may be suitable:

OK, that worked. I tried a little different approach with shift-drag and drop but was only getting .wav. This did pull the midi and it was spot on. Thanks

Dan

Does the track have a short or long underline below it? (Short was in my example above)

I understand that it only works with RealTracks that have a corresponding RealChart, in which case the track name is green and underlined with a short line. A long line is used for Guitar tracks that have fret information.

If it is RealTracks, but does not have a corresponding RealCharts information, then the track name is green but with no underline at all.

Trev

OK great! Yes, you must drop it on the MID quadrant of the drop-box

Thanx. I was just going to figure out how to do that and you just saved me a lot of reading the manual and experimenting with this process time.

If you have a good piano sound source now you can get some google/bing MIDI piano loops and you will find a number of them. You would need to use these in a DAW and change the notes to match your chords but that is easy to do in MIDI.

I have taken both the standard and super MIDI tracks from BiaB, brought them into my DAW and modified to do exactly what I wanted them to do.

Both of these examples assumes that you know a little music theory but I think you do have such knowledge.

The one thing I noticed is that the RealTracks I tested with seemed to include the use of Sustain Pedal, while the MIDI output plays more Staccato, as though the Sustain Pedal events have not been captured in the RealCharts (or exported in the MIDI data).

What I meant by "a companion MST" (MIDI SuperTrack) is that as new RealTrack pianos are introduced, they (PGMusic) are capturing the performances both as audio and MIDI and applying the same magic to follow the chords we type in. When we got the RT...

2431:Piano, Acoustic, Rhythm NewOrleansMardiGrasKevin Ev16 085

we also got the MIDI SuperTrack:
2469: Piano, Rhythm NewOrleansMardiGrasKevin Ev16 085

...so you can choose to use the RT or you can use the MIDI Supertrack and supply your own piano vst...

Pat Marr said


So, I want to make sure I understand this: If you render to a wave form (such as saving as a wav file in BIAB), the playback synth is going to determine that wave form, correct?

I don't "do" MIDI much, and in fact one of the reasons I love BIAB is that it puts MIDI in a context that I can deal with presently. I have been rendering individual tracks (whether midi or Real) from BIAB to wav, then I deal with the wavs in Reaper. So far I'm loving that approach, and while yes I understand the limitations that approach imposes, it will probably be my main method for a good while. So, I can see that it would benefit me to get the best renders out of BIAB, which brings me to 2 issues being discussed here: having a "top notch" playback synth, and having the highest, or most appropriate, PPQ set properly in BIAB. I understand what PPQ means, it's a measure of resolution, namely quantized duration.

So, I'm asking for advice because I lack confidence in all matters MIDI.
Specifically, how/where can I get a (modestly priced?) "top notch playback synth" (I'm assuming this can be had as software, right?) that will make the most of the likes of what I will be working with (Super MIDI tracks, et al), and what would be the best method of setting the PPQ in BIAB (for those occasions that I want to render the waveforms in BIAB). Not to mention, any other issues or obstacles to High Quality for that workflow that I may have overlooked. Thanks in advance!

Edit: addendum:
Is EZKeys an example of a top notch playback synth? It has been noted that EZKeys is much more than that, and that EZKeys has some redundancy with BIAB in the songwriter -type functions. So, here's my hope: that there is something out there that is simpler (no extra features; I'm happy with the songwriting utility of BIAB), less expensive, but still high quality, "layered", nuance -capturing.

Last time I looked PGmusic sold a great sounding midi synth module. (Not software) I have a friend here who uses that module to play gigs with. The sound is awesome. He plays a sax along with it.

One of the problems I run into using midi are the guitars. Especially the clean guitar, either, a sound font or a Coyote synth. They all sound like gooey, oily, tin being plucked. The synth module PGmusic sells (sold?) the clean guitar sounds like a strat. A real one. For some reason, unless you purchase one of those midi guitar fonts from some mfgr, the clean guitar is awful. If you use the module then you'll have what you want.

All I have at the moment is the Coyote synth. I can get great sounding pianos in BB or RB. If you want nuances then you can use the "piano roll" sections of BB or RB to get them at no extra cost. Midi is simply data. It's not music. The musical sounds come from the synth be it Coyote, GSWavetable synth or whatever you use.

I don't know if that was helpful but I hope it made some kind of sense.

I am a fan of hardware synths.

Why?

1) I think they sound better. I have heard piano synths that emulate the sympathetic vibrations of the non-played strings. There isn't a software synth made that can emulate the nuances of a sax as well as the VL70m - period.

2) They do not tax your computer's CPU which gives you two advantages [1] no latency (actually it's about 5ms or less) [2] you can mix and match as many different synths as you want - some of my backing tracks use a half dozen different synths and more than one channel on each

3) They last forever - when the computer OS changes, the hardware synth still works. My DS8, TX81z, DDD5, and MT32 from the 1980s still work, and although some of the sounds are dated, a few others on each synth are unique and great. So as I gain new synths, I add to the collection instead of replacing them

4) Since they don't use the computer's CPU but store a lot of information in ROM, the sounds can be much more complex and realistic.

For a good, all purpose starter hardware synth, I'd recommend the Ketron SD-2 - I believe they are out of production but they pop up on e-bay all the time. For the money, they are good sounding machines.

Insights and incites by Notes

OK, we are starting to get in the deep end of the pool. That's a good thing. However, I would like to focus us:

Not so much on the Sound Module aspects but more on the Midi Data Itself.

If you are a top notch Talent and you have a quality midi controller or Keyboard, than your midi data can shine (Super Midi Tracks are the case in point). That is not me.

However, when your midi has been generated by a computer program (such as BIAB or countless files available on the web), I think we are all in agreement, there is something missing. Granted, not so much for a rhythm instrument buried in a mix, but for a soloist midi track - something missing indeed.

I want my drums and piano to sparkle as though they are soloists. Midi data can do that, but it has got to be done by Talent. Hence, I got to pay the price. I think the EZKeys material is a source for that material and am about to pull the trigger to find out for sure.

Dan - I don't want to stop you from buying the EZKeys Midi Packs... but... understand, they don't do "soloing". They are generally rhythm phrases... they are very well played - they sound great - and they give you flexibility for different sections... intro, verse, prechorus, chorus outro, etc... generally BIAB pianos have 2 modes (A vs. B), so there is added flexibility.. At a "price" of having to build them yourself (it is not hard, but takes more time than clicking on an RT piano rhythm...)

Understood. I picked up the "Funk" set when it went on sale ($9) a bit ago. So I can see what is typically included. Now I have my eye on the six pack deal ($99).

Jazz Midi
Jazz Ballads
Ballads
Ballads 2
Country
Keys and Stings

This is really a good point to raise. I have always said, "there is nothing faster or easier then using RealDrums." Same goes for much of the RT stuff in BIAB. "Why would anyone want to use anything else?"

I guess it has something to do with a need to have more of me in my music.

jazzmandan,

Concentrating on just one facet of BiaB/RealBand is a good way to learn more about the product while also exercising and entertaining your brain. I think you will enjoy your journey and we all may benefit from your experience.

Good for you! I hope your journey will generate some nice discussions in the forum.

BiaB and RealBand has many ways to create music. RealTracks, UserTracks, audio loops, user recorded audio, programmed generated midi, (RealTracks) midi transcriptions, midiSuperTracks, user recorded midi and by importing standard midi files (SMF) or midi tracks (MID).

I doubt if anyone is truely an expert using all those tools.

I believe the hardware module being referred to is the KETRON SD2. I don't think PG Music currently sell this device, although there are certainly dealers who do sell the product.

Here is a new one. I ordered the 6 pack from Sweetwater. Turns out it is only provided as a shipped box via FedEx. I assume a big box containing 6 access codes to download from ToonTrack on a piece of paper. That's unusual.

Then I get a call from Chris. Turns out the "box with the paper in it" is backordered. And not currently available.

Didn't expect that.

Editing. There are thousands of things you can do with MIDI that you cannot do with RTs or any other audio formats - yet.

Here are just a few:

• The endings on BiaB styles are limited to 2 bars. Some of the endings just don't work right. In MIDI you can create a proper ending or simply copy and paste from one of my MIDI intro/ending disks.
  
• There are no "real" intros in BiaB. You can easily create one in MIDI or simply copy and paste from one of my MIDI intro/ending disks.
  
• Some songs have rhythmic kicks (I was jamming with some Salsa guys and they called them "breaks") -- a section of music where the entire band plays a passage consisting a number of what PG calls Shots and rests in a very definite, rythmic pattern.
  
• Some songs could use volume manipulation on individual drum instruments (bring up the snare, take down the cymbals), this is easy to do in MIDI, next to impossibld to do in Audio Loops
  
• Sometimes you may want to change a drum sound, for example, on a Latin/Rock tune, change the ride cymbal to a cowbell, easy in MIDI, darn near impossible in Audio.
  
• I've often changed instruments on some of the BiaB output parts. (That piano part might sound better on a Rhodes for a particular song, or a nylon string guitar, or a Clavinet and that Clean Guitar might sound good as an Acoustic Guitar on another song.) I have a sound module where I can change the clean guitar to a Tele (front or rear pickup), Strat, LP, 335, and a dozen or more others Again, easy with MIDI, impossible with Audio
  
• crescendo (A directive to a performer to smoothly increase the volume of a particular phrase or passage)
  
• diminuendo (A directive to a performer to smoothly decrease the volume of the specific passage of a composition)
  
• accelerando (Gradually accelerating or getting faster) with no audio artifacts
  
• ritardando (Gradually getting slower) with no audio artifacts
  
• fermata (notation marking directing the performer or ensemble to sustain the note of a composition affecting all parts and lasting as long as the artistic interpretation of the conductor or performer allows)
  
• transposition with no audio artifacts
  
• Composing - you cannot get audio loops to do what you want, but you can change or add anything you want in MIDI format very easily.
  
• Sometimes when changing from an A substyle to a B substyle you might not want a roll. In MIDI it's a simply copy and paste operation.
  You might want to rearrange the drum rolls in a piece or change the roll from a snare to a tom. Again in MIDI it's just copy and paste or a simple transpose command.

Of course if you had the same instruments, studio acoustics, mic and other studio gear of the original recordings, and the skill to match their tone you can do these with audio loops. but that's one giant IF.

With a good MIDI tone module you can get sounds 90-95% as good as 'the real thing' - and believe me, the audience won't know the difference.

Real Tracks are fine, there is real genius in making them work, and I do use them when they are the proper tool for the job. When I need deep editing, MIDI is the only way.

We have both tools. Just because you bought a new pair of "vice grips" there is no reason to throw out your socket wrench set. Use the proper tool for the job you want to do.

That's why we can talk about MIDI here.

Sometimes RealTracks are the proper tool for the job, and sometimes MIDI is the proper tool for the job.



Insights and incites by Notes

Good points indeed.

So for creating and editing midi drums, EZD2 has a very creative and intuitive method. As does JamStix.

Otherwise midi editing in general seems to be restricted to the piano roll in the DAW, except perhaps in a strictly Notation software where the notes and chart can be edited directly.

Or am I missing something? NN, what do you use for midi editing? Is there something else we should know about?

I did some digging and found that PGMusic sells CoyoteForte Dxi. This appears to be exactly what I'm looking for. I used their handy comparisons to judge, and even my ears can hear a huge difference between CoyoteWT and Forte...huge. I'm sold because it's an obvious step up playback synth at a very modest price, that I assume will upgrade all the virtual instruments already found in BIAB. But I do have a question: what does GM2 "support" (in the MIDI?Audio Drivers Set Up Menu) mean?
Specifically, if I assign a GM2 virtual instrument to a track in BIAB, is that also sent to whatever I have selected as the default synth (currently, CoyoteWT, soon to be CoyoteForte)?

In other words, can I expect the GM2 voices will be upgraded by moving to CoyoteForte just as all the others will be? Or, is GM2 handled somehow by a different synth? My MIDI driver is from my Focusrite Saffire Pro soundcard, and it appears to handle GM2 just fine.


I own BIAB 2015, my first and only purchase so far. If a BIAB 2016 upgrade came with Forte I would pull the trigger immediately but I doubt this is the case. I'll just get Forte...I'm really looking forward to much better sounds, and ease of use, from that.

edit: PS. Although, the Cakewalk TTS sounds much better than the Coyote Forte. I went to Cakewalk website and saw that I can buy Sonar Artist for only 99 bucks, but I don't see anything yet that specifies whether this would include the TTS or similar. If anyone knows, that'd be appreciated information, thanks.

oops, duh, sorry. PG sells the Music Creator 7 that includes the TTS for only 49 bucks.

The GM2 standard basically has two banks of 128 instruments (GM1 only has one bank of 128 instruments). So you get the standard 128 General MIDI defined instruments, but you also get another 128 instruments to use from (many of which are variations on the original 128).

To use the GM2 selection, you have to make sure that you have a GM2 synth in use. The selection, I believe, allows you to set it however you want (it doesn't know whether the synth is GM2 or not), so you have to make sure you match it up properly.

The Coyote ForteDXi is GM2 compatible.

One thing a number of folks do also is to purchase Cakewalk Music Creator (which you can order from PGMusic for $49, and that gives you a pretty good DAW, but it also gives you the Cakewalk TTS-1 GM2 Softsynth, which is also much better than the CoyoteWT).

Thanks John! It looks like I was typing in my edits and "oops" while I missed your post.

I'm assuming there is some GM2 synth working currently in my system, because I have it set to "support", and I can use the GM2 instruments in BIAB just fine. So, I guess I should assume that these instrument voices will also sound better when routed to a superior synth (which right now looks like pretty much any of these choices will be better than the current synth, CoyoteWT).

I don't know if they're one and the same but I was talking about the Roland SD-50 Mobile Studio Canvas module. It's probably one of the most used hardware synths on the market. The sounds are very real.

Back to nuance. That is something that has to be done by a human. I don't know a thing about EZKeys. They may put those feelings in their fonts for the piano. It's all in who originally recorded the midi and what instrument was used.

My broter in law has several synths. They are the best made at the time he bought them. He's also a pianist and uses cakewalk as his sequencer. The sounds coming from that thing are awesome.

One of his keyboards is a Kurtzweil (spl?) The sounds that keyboard can generate are unbelievable. But the way the music sounds is strictly by the way he plays it.

Again, to get what you want out of midi is going to take work and knowhow. I've created several good pieces using the "Piano Roll" button.

One example was a song I redid a couple of years of ago called, "The Sultans of Swing". Altho' the original midi was created by somebody else I went into it and made the lead guitar do things that weren't put in there by the composer.

Here is that song if you'd like to hear it. I hope you enjy it. Remember, I didn't compose this. I'm good, but not that good.

The Sultans of Swing

I remember when you first did that cover, Russ. Good stuff!

I don't know if they're one and the same but I was talking about the Roland SD-50 Mobile Studio Canvas module. It's probably one of the most used hardware synths on the market. The sounds are very real.

Back to nuance. That is something that has to be done by a human. I don't know a thing about EZKeys. They may put those feelings in their fonts for the piano. It's all in who originally recorded the midi and what instrument was used.

My broter in law has several synths. They are the best made at the time he bought them. He's also a pianist and uses cakewalk as his sequencer. The sounds coming from that thing are awesome.



One of his keyboards is a Kurtzweil (spl?) The sounds that keyboard can generate are unbelievable. But the way the music sounds is strictly by the way he plays it.

Again, to get what you want out of midi is going to take work and knowhow. I've created several good pieces using the "Piano Roll" button.

One example was a song I redid a couple of years of ago called, "The Sultans of Swing". Altho' the original midi was created by somebody else I went into it and made the lead guitar do things that weren't put in there by the composer.

Here is that song if you'd like to hear it. I hope you enjoy it. Remember, I didn't compose this. I'm good, but not that good.

I use an old copy of Master Tracks Pro (no longer available). I prefer it because the interface is no complicated by audio functions, so the work gets done with less time with my hands on the mouse. But any modern sequencer or DAW with good MIDI tolls will do. (Note: When I'm done with MIDI, I'll import to Power Tracks Pro Audio to add audio).

The tools available are Piano Roll (my favorite), event list, and notation. Plus there are dedicated dialog boxes for the editing tools just a double-click away (or drop menu).

Another thing I like about Master Tracks Pro that I wish could be incorporated into Power Tracks Pro (hint-hint) is the change filter. It lets you fine-tune global edits to particular notes or beats. So if I want to push all the 4th beats of every other measure ahead a few tics, I can highlight the entire song and do just that. If I want to increase or decrease the volume of the rid cymbal, I can highlight the drum track and use the filter to only affect the volume changes to the note my ride cymbal is on.

The MTPro change filter:



and a few of the dialog boxes that will activate the change filter with a mouse click (every change box can use the filter)











With tools like this, you can play with your MIDI files and customize them to the point where they express your musical ideas instead of those of someone else.

Band-in-a-Box is [url=bhttp://www.nortonmusic.com/pix/ChangeFilter3.jpgoth][url=bhttp://www.nortonmusic.com/pix/ChangeFilter3.jpgoth][url=bhttp://www.nortonmusic.com/pix/ChangeFilter3.jpgoth]bhttp://www.nortonmusic.com/pix/ChangeFilter3.jpgoth[/url][/url][/url] a tool and a toy, and the MIDI functions let you play with the toy part of BiaB for hours and in the end come up with something you can be proud of because "you did it".

Insights and incites by Notes

I have an old Sound Canvas SC55 that to my ears surpasses any software General MIDI synth I've heard (and I haven't heard them all).

And the Ketron SD-2 leaves it in the dust.

And like I said before, (1) when the computer's OS gets upgraded, your hardware synth will still work (2) because much of the sounds are in ROM they can be more complex than software synth sounds that need to manufacture each note using math and your computer's CPU (3) virtually no latency (4) you can mix and match dozens of hardware synths, picking the best sounds of each, and there is no taxing of the CPU or latency (it's actually about having the musician 5 feet away from you) (5) I've been using hardware synths since the 1980s, have added new ones to my collection, and have never had one crash or lock up my computer.

Insights and incites by Notes

Bob "notes" Norton,
You mentioned Passport Design's Master Tracks Pro above, I haven't heard a reference to that program for decades! I was an early user in the 80's. For me it was the entry into computer music that has continued until today and BIAB.
At one time they were located in Half Moon Bay, CA. and I would go directly to their headquarters to get my updates. The location was about 40 miles away and a brief detour on my way to S.F. to buy band arrangements for my school band.
I rememember in the early 80's I won first place at an Applefest convention by submitting a blues tune, on a floppy, created on Passport's Master Tracks or possibly Encore.
Thanks for triggering great memories.

Midi is very tricky stuff. Yes, the first thing a noob to digital audio says is midi sounds so dry and artificial, how do I make it sound more realistic?

First thing is the sound quality itself. It seems like every month there's a new thread asking "What's the best synth to use for midi? Here's the latest one:

http://www.pgmusic.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=283968#Post283968

Please read all the different opinions on this question.

The next thing about midi is what Notes just explained. It takes serious work backed up by years of experience to take a raw midi track and make it sound real.

The easiest way is if you're a good player already and you record the part yourself as midi, not audio, using a midi controller. Then you go into the piano roll and other editing tools to massage it.

Midi controllers can be a keyboard, guitar, wind and sometimes more esoteric things. If you're not a good player and don't have a controller then you're stuck doing it manually and that gets tedious beyond belief.

I'm not trying to burst anybody's bubble here but you really can't simply load in a midi file and then tweak it to create some killer solo that sounds like a real big name player did it. Is it possible? Sure, IF you're already a killer player but maybe it's on guitar and you need a trumpet solo, then using what you already know you could do it. But, even then it's not easy if you're not already a midi expert.

There are lots of really excellent players who will show up on forums I frequent asking rookie questions about midi and it's hard to know where to begin because it's so complicated to explain.

Bob

Master Tracks Pro's parent company, Passport Designs was purchased by Microsoft to use their video technology in Power Point. They abandoned MTPro, G-Vox bought the program and ruined it. Bugs introduced in 2005 never got resolved.

When G-Vox went down, one of the owners bought it and renamed the company Passport Designs with the intention of bringing the products back. They re-built Encore, but haven't done a thing with MTPro except promise. I think they are under-capitalized for that.

MTPro still has some global editing features that I haven't found anywhere else. With the 'change filter' I can highlight a song or a track and then fine tune just what parts/notes/beats/velocities/etc. of that track I want the changes to apply to. It's a real time saver.

MIDI gets a bad name because it's easy to do a bad job - step enter a tune and you are asking for something sterile. But yet, it's really easy to step enter a tune.

Play it into the sequencer, and you get a live sounding performance as long as your synth can reproduce the nuances that were put into the original.

That makes a good MIDI track that a musician recorded in real time very similar to a Real Track - with the exception that you can edit the MIDI track in thousands of ways that are yet unavailable with recorded audio.

So if you cannot play well, and are reliant on downloading what others play, you can choose a MIDI track as well as a Real Track - you just have to find a MIDI track created by a decent musician.

Then you can change the instrument, transpose with no artifacts, change the speed with no artifacts, change the timing, change notes, change the groove, and play with it to your heart's content.

Don't dis MIDI simply because there are a lot of bad MIDI files out there. It's like dissing all singers because you heard a lousy one at karaoke.

Insights and incites by Notes

Yes, this is exactly what I am hearing now. As soon as I realized this was what I was hearing I searched for your comment as I remembered reading it, but not sure at the time what the consequence was. I think you are spot on here and this is not a good thing. The full midi with its controls from BIAB is not what is output via the drag and drop. OR perhaps it is there but EZKeys is not using this control feature. This is a big disappointment, as I don't think I will be able to resolve this and will have to just deal with it. Don't know if I can add the sustain.

I have another big issue with the fact that the chord chart is not agreeing between BIAB and EZKeys. I am trying to work thru this one now.

No, this is not the issue since other midi players confirm the issue with the exported midi file.

I am now thinkin we knew the midi files associated with the RTs had an issue long ago . But thought the midi which accompanied the piano RT was full loaded with all controls. Guess not. Gonna have to work thru this one.

OK, we still talkin BIAB midi right?

So the MIDI Supertrack transfer to EZKeys and sound great. No difference in the couple I have now worked with. However, the associated MIDI with the RT piano is NO Supertrack.

So I feel better about dropping $99 for the EZK midi 6 pak. By combining those with the available MIDI Supertracks from BIAB I have the start of a good library to work with going forward.

I have an SD-20 Studio canvas. Is that considered a superior midi unit compared to the built in Coyote Softsynth or the impenetrable Sampletank which I've given up on? Just wondering...

It is better than the Coyote that uses the built in Windows sounds. (Coyote WT).
About on par with Coyote Forte in my opinion.
The SD20 wasn't one of the better Sound Canvas units.

I have an SD-90, I don't know if they share the same sounds or not, but my SD-90 is one of my favorite sound modules.

I also find different sound modules have different 'strong' sounds. The acoustic bass on my Korg i3 is the best I have, while the clean guitars on the SD-90 are my favorites. The Yamaha VL70m gets the best sax sounds, and the Ketron SD2 has the best all around General MIDI set.

The nice thing about hardware synths is they all have about the same latency (5ms - or for all practical purposes, none) and they don't tax the CPU of the computer. So you can pick the best sound for the song you are working on from many different synths (if your sequencer or DAW can take more than one).

Another good thing is that they don't get orphaned when the computer OS upgrades. The TX81z I bought in the 1980s still works today and has a couple of sounds that are still better than newer synths (FM synthesis doesn't do everything, but what it does well, it does better than a "ROMpler").

I've mixed over a half dozen synths on one mix before.

Every hardware synth I have with a GM set sounds better than the MS, VSC, Coyote, or any other GM soft synth I've ever heard.

But I guess that's my personal taste showing. There are others who disagree, and they are probably right for the way they make music - and there is more than one right way to make music.

Insights and incites by Notes

The only hardware synth with GM capabilities that I have is an old Kawai GMega: http://www.synthark.org/Kawai/GMega.html

There is one on EBay that is listing at $78:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/KAWAI-GMega-Synthesizer-Sound-Module-General-MIDI-Used-/131687395666?hash=item1ea92e3152

I'm hanging on to mine just in case the TTS-1 from Cakewalk ever gets lost in an OS upgrade. It has been off line now for a few years but if I remember correctly it was one of the best sounding GM synths at that time.

I got this exact unit in a box in the closet. Check out that MSRP at the time or release. I added this to an early version of BIAB.

Remember when I made the comment about how complex midi is?

Think about this question for a couple seconds then read my answer.

How do you think the midi file was created from a Real Track?

Done? Ok.

The RT is recorded in a studio on a regular acoustic instrument, in this case a grand or upright piano. This is a standard piano, NOT a midi controller. The midi file was created by a couple of folks right here on this forum who listen to the performance and MANUALLY TRANSCRIBE BY EAR the notes into a DAW. There are NO controllers including velocity, sustain, volume or anything else. These transcriptions are ONLY there to create a Real Chart so a user can read the notation and see what the performer played. That's it and is a classic example of not all midi files are what you think they are.

There are tons of absolutely brilliant commercial midi's that you have to pay for. You can listen to demos, read all about how they were created and figure out if they're right for you or not. The key here is PAY FOR. You can do that or...

Turn yourself into Notes Norton and spend 20 years making yourself a world class expert in this stuff. The problem with all of us here including me is we're cheap. We're also nerds to one extent or another and want to do it ourselves. We see all these websites with hundreds, thousands of free midi files and go ha, great here we go I'm gonna have some fun. We go into this thinking I'm smarter than the average bear, I can figure it out.

Not so fast Grasshopper.

Bob

I get all that. And for a Horn or Guitar or Cello that makes perfect sense. State of the technology and all. But for a piano??? Could they not just as easily had the artist sitting or a midi piano keyboard? Would that not have crated exactly the same performance RT's and simultaneously created the corresponding midi - with all the controller data nuances captured simultaneously? If the answer to this question is - Dan, you still don't get it. Than you are correct, I don't get it.

I think the acoustic grand used is a Yamaha Disklavier (it does have MIDI but may not be used that way). It's referred to in this post.

I might be way off base here (because what Peter and his people do is actually some kind of MAGIC, I think), but I would guess that the early piano RTs did not capture the MIDI performance - since they were concentrating on the audio part - but since they figured out how to do BOTH - create audio RTs and capture the MIDI to create the MIDI Supertracks of the same performance - that that is what they have been doing....

At least I hope that is the case and they continue to do that - I LOVE the MIDI Supertracks (I love the RTs, too).

Thanks Floyd
Yes, I imagined that they also captured the MIDI from the piano. Even though they have used the recorded Audio for the RT's, the MIDI would be ideal for the Notation. Saves double-handling.

VT, would (or could) the outputted midi have all the control nuances to capture the artists playing? Like the foot pedals? Or would it just be good for notation?

Good find. I remember this. That is why I felt the piano RT's would have the full midi data - not just notation but full playing controls.

You don't get it. What's the stated purpose of the Real Tracks? It's to capture the performance of a live human playing what again? A REAL PIANO, not some stupid controller. I have a room full of those already. You don't get the full ambient sound out of a controller because all the guy is doing is triggering a stupid synth. I feel like screaming here. Why don't people get that?? We're triggering synths right now and people complain the track has no life which is why the RT's are so popular. There's no synths involved yet you're asking for a midi file of the RT so you can go and trigger a synth with it. After you do that you'll be asking how do I make this sound more real because right now it's lifeless. This turns into a circular discussion real fast. RT's are Real, synths are not but I want to change the RT so I can use a synth but I want it to sound Real but that's what the RT is for but, but...

I said earlier this stuff is complicated. It's difficult to explain it without writing a book but here's some highlights:

1. Biab is a GM program.

2. GM has very limited controller functionality.

3. If you use a really good synth that last thing the developer of that synth wants to do is cripple it by using GM controllers so they develop their own proprietary system of controlling it. This is why most of the major synths both software and hardware don't even include a GM soundset. Pro's could care less about GM anything. This is also why the really big well known ones have a package deal. You buy their software PLUS their specific controller to use with it.

4. If you load in a beautiful midi file that was done using a $3,000 software synth with another $3,000 controller and yes expensive ones like that exist in major studios, Biab will ignore all the good stuff and all you get are the basic midi notes and a few basic controllers because it doesn't know from someone else's controller scheme.

5. Unless you're planning on buying all that stuff and taking a four year course in digital audio production, all you're going to be working with are GM midi files or tracks using Biab which is a GM program. Yes, you can set up a killer VST synth like Kontakt or something in Biab so you can play the much better non GM patches but even though you're getting a great basic sound you're still missing all the controllers that Kontakt is capable of using because Biab can't use them. Plus if you do that Biab is no longer a simple load the song and hit Play thing. No, you have to go into each track of the song and manually set up the instrument patch you want to use which gets old fast.

This is the reason PGM invented the Real Tracks. It's understandable when people listen to a great instrument RT they think, hey if I had a midi file of that RT all I need to do is change a few notes and I can make that RT fit exactly what I'm trying to do. Except you're not using the RT, at that point it's just another GM midi file we've all been using and basically hating for years.

I understand your frustration but you need to so some serious reading about midi and how it works. There's lots of YT vids out there, check some out.

Bob

OK Bob - don't get upset. I am reading and learning. I am not frustrated, I'm just a little naïve and a bit ignorant on the depth and detail of the topic. I appreciate your insight.

The MIDI Supertracks piano tracks played using even a half-decent piano vst are STUNNING. As good - and often better than - the RT of the same name. (and the RTs are great)

You should try one out.

Let me be clear.
BIAB MIDI Supertracks are working great for my new foray into using more MIDI. I wish there were more of them.

The couple of RT'S I have used to EXTRACT the associated MIDI have not worked out. The transcriptions do not always match the chord charts and the real issue for me is the timing does not match what is heard in the RT.

Right and they never will either. The reason is a chart taken from midi notation cannot capture all the fine nuance of the performer's playing plus of course maybe the person doing the transcription missed something. Think of this in the reverse. You give the score of the 9th Symphony to two world class orchestras. You might think they both would play it exactly the same because after all here's the original score, everything is precisely written out with all the expression marks, timing marks, crescendo, decrescendo all of it. Yet there are very famous recordings of that piece done by the most famous orchestras in the world with big name conductors and they're all different. Why? Because those orchestras and conductors are all human beings not computers reading the score.

Back to the RT's. AFAIK the best consumer level software available cannot capture the fine nuances of a pianist playing an acoustic piano even if it's a Disclavier. The performance is being converted to the midi language and no way will it match perfectly. The finest schooled musicians in the world can notate that RT performance to the best of their abilities, give it to another great player and that player is going to interpret it their way. Will they hit all the notes exactly as written, yes. But the overall feel is different in many subtle ways. You might not be able to describe it but you sure can hear it.

Now some of the Supertracks are really good. The problem comes when you go to edit one. As soon as you start changing something you lose some of the original feel because you're not the player, you're sitting at a computer looking at a piece of software trying to make your changes fit and you think something is missing because it is.

I'm starting to ramble again because this is such a deep subject. The point is you can realistically only go so far with a midi version of a Real Track. The better player you are, the better you know how this all works the better your results will be.

Bob

I see where Bob's coming from, but I don't totally agree with all that has been said.

I have a great fully weighted piano with MIDI output - a Roland RD-1000. I connect it to Synthogy Ivory VST (an 80 GB sampled set). The keyboard produces a massive amount of information. Synthogy Ivory reproduces every nuance of a Grand Piano, including Sustain Resonance, Sympathetic Resonance, even Pedal Noise.

I also own a Yamaha C5 Concert Grand. The 'C series' is the specially produced Conservatorium model, the Rolls-Royce of their Grand Piano range - Good, and definitely not cheap.

If you asked me which is the better instrument to play, it would usually be my RD-1000 coupled up to Synthogy Ivory. Both of these are much, much cheaper than my beautiful grand. The sound output is sensational. The nuances unbelievably real.

I'm not dismissing RealTracks for a second, or saying one is better than the other. The point I am making is that exceptional results can be obtained from MIDI in some circumstances. I've proven it.

However, use MIDI generated from playing a keyboard to produce a trumpet, flute, trombone or similar instrument and you probably won't get the same success story.

I don't like to think of my Roland RD-1000 as "some stupid controller" and I don't like to think of playing Synthogy Ivory with my Piano as "triggering a stupid synth".

Let's all take a step back here and look at how we can broaden our experiences eh? After all, we're all on the same team.

We're "talking MIDI here", so we can all offer some real-world experiences to the conversation. This is one of mine, and it needs mentioning.

No one has to agree. YMMV

Trevor

Yes, if the MIDI data was recorded from the performance, it should include Note On, Note Off, Note velocity, sustain pedal, all other controllers, Sostenuto, Soft Pedal, Polyphonic Key Pressure, Pitch bend changes and much more.

If the MIDI data was transcribed by hand though, then expect all notes to probably have the same velocity, and few if any other events to be included. That's not a limitation with MIDI, mind you. That's just a limitation in the manual transcription method.

HTH some.
Trev

Thanks guys. Great comments - on topic. I do believed I get it - at least pretty much for a guitar player!

The RT-Pianos could have been delivered as both Audio and SuperMidi - but they weren't. Simple as that. Well, at least the great majority weren't.

So riddle me this. Given that the RT-midi was manually transcribed for notation, then how did velocity get coded? I suspect some degree of midi-recording for piano was done, some of the time, for some of the RTs.

It's possible that they took the raw MIDI, and applied filters to selectively filter out everything except note-on / note-off events. This would significantly reduce the storage size of the MIDI data. This is only a hunch mind you, I'm not sure what methods were actually used, but this would deliver such results.
Trev

I must respectfully disagree with your assessment Bob. 25 years ago that may have been true, but definitely not today.

A good MIDI just like a good RT captures a players performance. And like live players, you have good performances and bad ones. It is not right to compare bad MIDI performances to good live ones or vice versa.

I record everything live with an appropriate MIDI controller so what you get from me and many others is a capture of a players performance. It doesn't take 20 years of learning how to work MIDI, like the Real Tracks it just takes learning how to play a musical instrument.

Because the performance is captured by MIDI instead of an analog to digital controller, it isn't any less of a performance than one captured by an acoustic instrument.

The acoustic controllers on a piano are pedals soft, sostenuto, and sustain. Also available on a good electronic piano, except they are electronic switches.

An acoustic piano changes the volume and timbre with how hard you hit the keys. An electronic piano measures how hard you hit the keys (by how fast it goes from open to closed - velocity) and a decent playback synth changes the volume and timbre according to the velocity.

A lot of the live pianos you hear on modern recordings from Nashville, New York, LA and elsewhere were done with electronic pianos. Between the keys and pedals and the sound generation of the piano there is MIDI data.

My saxophone controls pitch and timbre with a reed. My wind controller sends out pitch and timbre messages to my VL70-m synth with a 'reed'. My sax controls volume and timbre with the force of the air across the reed. My wind controller has a breath pressure sensor that controls the volume and timbre with the force of the air stream.

If you haven't done so already, go to http://www.pgmusic.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=330647&page=1 and watch me play the wind synth. If I put a MIDI sequencer on the end of the synth, it would record the performance in MIDI and generate it exactly as it was played, providing the synth was good enough to do so (cheap sound card soft synths cannot).

Recording the MIDI data and playing it back would sound identical to the live performance.

The fact that there are MIDI performances in virtually every pop record made in the last 25 or so years should be enough to convince you that MIDI captures live performance just as much as an audio recording does, just in a different way.

Anyone who can play a RT piano part can do the same thing with a MIDI piano and record his/her performance as MIDI data. When played back with a good synth, it will sound like he played it live.

He/she doesn't need 20 years or 20 seconds to learn MIDI, just start the recorder, sit down at the keys and play.

But with MIDI you can play it back on different pianos. If he/she played it on a Steinway, you can choose to have the performance on a Yamaha. You can get more radical and play the very same performance back on a Rhodes, Clav, Guitar, Celeste, Vibraphone, or whatever you have in your synth.

Sure you can step-enter MIDI and massage it to sound better, and plenty of people do, which is why MIDI gets a bad name.

Or you can play the parts live and with a good controller and playback synth end up with a musically nuanced recording of a live performance - every bit as nuanced as an acoustic instrumet - but thousands of times more editable.



The following recordings were made with MIDI instruments, recorded either on the gig or a home studio, and would sound exactly the same played back with the same MIDI data on the same synth.

Clip 1 Clip 2 Clip 3 Clip 4

When recording these, I did not even think about MIDI. I just put the instrument in my hands and played. I used the same sax playing skills I've had since junior high school. Just like the RT performer used his/her instrumental skills.

They are MIDI performances and they are LIVE performances as well.

There is no significant difference - except with MIDI you can edit the result.



I'm not dissing RTs, there are uses for both RTs and MIDIs. Different tools.

That's why carpenters have more than one tool in their tool chest. A crescent wrench will drive a nail, but a hammer does that better. Sometimes a socket wrench will do, for other applications a pair of pliers is the right tool. Sometimes RTs work perfectly, other times MIDI will do the job better.

Insights and incites by Notes

This is all true but lets get this back to the real world we're talking about here. We're talking about a Biab user use knows nothing about midi and is probably not interested in spending thousands on top level synths.

Also I have to make a point that Trevor made about his Roland RD keyboard. I know all about that stuff, I have a Kurzweil PC3, a Hammond SK1, a Roland FA06, A Korg Pa1xPro, plus several more. I also have a Knabe antique parlor grand I completely rebuilt myself 10 years ago. Yes, you can capture a pretty good midi performance on a midi piano but when you talk about pedaling, only a few keyboards allow for half pedaling for example. Some synths will read that data, some won't.

Of course midi is all over the place. It's in movie soundtracks and in lots of other studio performances. We're not talking about that here. Again we're talking to some noob Biab users who know squat about all that.

It's so easy for a bunch of experienced musician nerds like us to get sidetracked into the high level technical details of this as soon as someone like me tries to put it into simple enough terms so a noob can understand it.

I can't speak for some of the posters in this thread, I'm simply making assumptions based on what they posted. I "get the impression" they're not interested in spending lots of cash on this stuff. They're using the basic GM synths and maybe they might step up to getting a little bit deeper in SampleTank or something but that's about it. That makes all this high level midi stuff that is certainly being done a lot on a professional level completely irrelevant to them.

Bob

You are correct, most posters don't want to spend a lot of cash.

With one decent synth you can have a nuanced MIDI performance by another musician as easily as you can have a nuanced RT performance by another musician.

There's an SD2 on in Ebay right now at $102.50 current bid, a Roland Sound Canvas for $60 buy it now, and a much better SC-88 for $189.95 buy it now. We're not talking 'break the bank' money. Many people spend more than that a month on Cable TV.

And these are consumer level synths and don't cost nearly as much as a Kurzweil or SD90 pro level piece of gear.

And unlike the digital audio file, when you get MIDI performances on your computer you can transpose, speed up, slow down without artifacts, change the instrument, and do hundreds of other things you cannot do with the Audio recordings.

For most of us, computer music is a toy, and with MIDI as one of my toys, I get to do a lot more playing.

The investment of a good MIDI synth will last for years and years and years. It will improve your BiaB listening experience and allow you to enjoy the thousands of MIDI styles and songs as much as you do the RTs.

Plus it's a new toy and can inspire some on a new adventure in music.

Notes

You got to give me a little more credit than that Bob.
And by the way, I do have a pretty penny invested in gear.

While I do appreciate your point, the problem is you present the impression that it takes not only a talented piano player with a good set of keys, but also two stage hands to pull levels and throw valves, a producer to coordinate the whole thing and a sound engineer in order to "record" a performance in midi. In fact the required controllers for a piano appear to be built into any setup keyboard and follow the artist. No all that complex. So I do feel I get it now.

The real issue at hand is how does BIAB implement and provide the midi. That is where this started and I think I got it now. While they could have done it in different ways, they did what they did.

Let's also not forget what the purpose of RealCharts is (was?). It was to allow you to "see" what the person was playing. A side benefit was that you could (in many, but not all) cases take the notation and use it as MIDI. But the original intent was so that for those that read music, you could see (while hearing) what the artist was doing.

I think it's great that you can use that MIDI/notation to assign other instruments, change some notes, etc., but it was never advertised as "the performance" to allow you to change a few notes and still recreate that performance with those changes. It purpose is to serve as the fakebook version of the performance.

It's great that you can use it (albeit limited) for a few other things, but that was never the intent (as I understand it).

That's exactly correct John and I mentioned that earlier.

Dan,I wasn't just referring to you, there were a couple of others earlier who seem to have dropped out. It's good you have an idea about how this works.

Concerning the half pedaling I mentioned above I just did a quick search on that and found tons of people asking about it. Very tricky and without that option a piano midi track can sound pretty stiff. To do partial pedaling you need a proper pedal first of all that sends continuous sustain controller messages, not just the much more common sustain on/off. Trevor's Roland has that built in but when you're talking about using other midi controllers like a guitar controller and using that to trigger a softsynth you're diving into a minefield as to whether you can get proper pedaling to sound on a piano midi track or not and it makes a huge difference in the sound.

Bob

If a guitarist or a MIDI keyboard without a programmable expression pedal wants to achieve half pedaling they would need two things. One a softsynth that has that capability and an programmable expression pedal that sends 0 through 127, not one that only send 0 and 127 - off and on. One like this would work nicely for half pedaling:

http://www.amazon.com/Behringer-FCB1010-BEHRINGER/dp/B000CZ0RK6/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1452557501&sr=8-7&keywords=midi+expression+pedal