More efficient MIDI input ...
MIDI input is a terrific productivity enhancement. Thanks so much for adding this feature.
My experience entering notes via MIDI is that in additional to entering the 'notes' themselves, the following keyboard shortcuts are used constantly:
'1'-'7' - length of note
'.' - dot for creating dotted note
'space' - entering a rest
CTRL-3 - enter triplet
I would like to suggest the 'option' of assigning these input keys to MIDI entry keys (e.g. keys on a 'musical' keyboard) that are rarely used--say the upper or lower octave. Doing so would allow the entry of the majority of note sequences without having to take your hands off the 'musical' keyboard.
In particular, it would be nice to have a general purpose keyboard shortcut 'mapper' for MIDI input which allows one to assign 'any' keyboard shortcut to any key on the 'musical' keyboard.
I could envision assigning the highest or lowest tone to the purpose of enabling or disabling the mapping of 'musical' keyboard keys to keyboard shortcuts, thus allowing the entire keyboard (except for one note) to be used when needed.
Thanks for considering my idea.
Ken Parrish
Lowell, MA
Comments
I love your suggestions for remote keyboard (piano) control and 'puter keyboard input. I have some suggestions for input and midi control as well. I use a Toshiba Duo core laptop running windows XP. I have attempted to set up the Bach score for more play back so far with out success except for the default piano play back.
It would be nice to have some sort of menu or menu item (direct access via right click/ drop down menu) for MIDI access and control in version 1.0
I am NOT sure wether I have a hardware limitation or not. ie. Does anyone know if I will need a sound card for my lap Top? How much might it free up memory/ ram? (have 1GB) I suspect i will need one to use larger GM sound fonts but perhaps not... I am going to try the programs external midi i/o and see how that works with my old Roland u20 / u220 keyboard/ sound module. I use midi over/ via Firewire 1384 with my Ozonic 37 controller keyboard. My goal is to be able to write and play back orchestral scores such as I did back in my Atari 1040 st days - I miss my old Notator program.. but my monitor died and that was the end of my Notator days. It would be nice to be able to do this with out external modules but I'm guessing that means getting a sound card for my lap top. I have been looking on line at the sound blaster X fi and Audigy cards but I am not sure thats what I might need.
What I'd really like to see is a way to access midi channel assignments and voice control information from the lines of the staff. P.S. do dynamic marking changes control volume (forte / piano) having these markings dynamically linked to sound fonts and midi voices would be very cool.
Andrew Morgan morgamusic@hotmail.com
In reply to Midi Input and control (Midi i/o) and volume control ideas f by morgamusic
The midi remote control feature is "work in progress". Mostly the GUI is missing.
You do not need a special sound card if you use a SoundFont. The sound font is not loaded into a soundcard so it also would not free any memory. The soundfont is used by a software synthesizer ("fluid").
The test file "articulation.msc" demonstrates the current implementation of articulation marks switching midi channels. In the instruments definition file you can define arbitrary articulations which are then referenced in the score. The test file switches between normal string sound and pizzicato. The articulation keywords are "pizz." and "arco". Right click on these elements and select "properties" to see the available articulations for the current instrument.
Might I suggest using the 'controllers' for the note lengths, either the buttons at the top of the keyboard or using the pitch bend or modulation wheels (like noteworthy composer)
In reply to Using The Controllers by maestro_hanson
I didn't try it (yet) but on Mac, one could use MidiStroke.
I didn't find a free software on windows to do this one seems to do it.
Of course, I agree that having something in MuseScore is better and as Werner said, it's mainly a matter of UI and write the recording code.
I support better MIDI input, but do not like the idea of using the nether octaves as controllers. Some of us use the whole keyboard.