Drum notation via MIDI keyboard is not working.
Hi there this is my first forum post so sorry for any mistakes. I'm finding the drum notation quite difficult to use, I don't understand having to add notes to my limited pallete and then add them to the score, and some notes are in the wrong voice etc. I saw on the Drum Notation part of the handbook that I could use my MIDI keyboard to add the notation which would make it a whole lot easier. I currently use my MIDI keyboard for adding all my other notes, but I can't get it to add the right drum notation.
I enter note input mode while on the percussion stave and start pressing notes on my keyboard (which has the little symbols of what percussion it's playing) but it only enters the one note I have selected in the drumkit pallete regardless of what keys I press. I have no issues with this on other instrument staves, but percussion only inserts the note I have selected. What do I need to do to let the MIDI input decide the "pitch/note"?
Thanks for any help :).
Comments
I guess first step is to understand the problemn you are having in general, aside from MIDI - adding notes to your drumset should be quite simple, and notes should be added to the correct voice if you enter them correctly. So if something is going wrong with that basic functionality, perhaps you have somehow messed up your drumset definition. Could you attach a score you are having problems with (aside from MIDI) and explain your problem in more detail?
In reply to I guess first step is to by Marc Sabatella
Sure, I'll try and explain. When I first experimented with using the drumset I didn't quite understand that I was supposed to put the notes in the tray at the bottom then select them (other notation software I've used has just been placing the notes on the staff at different pitches for different sounds). I might have messed up my drumset definition as I kept fiddling with the "edit drumset" window to try and access the full range of sounds rather than the dozen or so that are in the tray. To be honest I still don't quite get how I'm supposed to do it. When I edit the drumset and I think I'm adding notes they either don't appear, appear identical to other notes, appear in a different location in the tray, or do appear but make no sound.
Say I want an electric snare in my score for example. It's not in my palette so how do I add it there so I can then place it in the score? It does seem like a lot of effort for one note at a time which is why I preferred to use the keyboard.
Here's a score I'm working on at the moment Project 1.mscz.
In reply to Sure, I'll try and explain. by Sarcastic_Fantastic
Have you read the Handbook section on drum notation? It explains how to customize your drumset. If you wish your drumset definition to include an electric snare, simply add using Edit Drumset. Once it is in the drumset definition, then you can add it normally.
As for MIDI, a drumset definition is still needed to tell MuseScore what staff line and notehead you want to use for each note, so you still need to define your drumset how you want it. Once you have defined the drumset the way you want it, it should be no different - same speed, same results - entering notes via MIDI or any other method. But until you have a drumset definition to tell MuseScore how you want that note displayed, it won't know.
If after re-reading the Handbook article something is still unclear, please let us know at which step specifically you are getting stuck - which step you are trying to follow, what you expect to see happen, what happens instead. But if you follow the instructions, it should work correctly. I had no problems adding an electric snare to your drumset or using that drumset to add electric snare notes to the score.
In reply to Have you read the Handbook by Marc Sabatella
First off thanks for taking the time to help, I appreciate it. This is going to be a long post but I'm trying to cover everything.
I have read the handbook several times but I was still confused. After toying around in Musescore for a bit longer I think I'm starting to get the hang of it, however the MIDI keyboard problem persists. I'll try and break down my problems.
I wasn't sure why some notes in my input palette had letters over them and some hadn't. I assumed from lack of information that going from left to right that some letters had multiple notes bound to them which didn't really make sense. I now understand that this is for the computer keyboard and you can select which notes you want to have a shortcut with the edit drumset button. The rest of the notes without shortcuts are there for mouse input I assume. What I'm not sure of though is if you're going to allow the user to select whatever note they want via the mouse, why not just have a palette of every note available - or just a small palette of shortcut-ed notes - rather than having to first add it to the palette and then select it (which was another source of confusion). The handbook didn't really confuse me on this point, it was more having the shortcut notes in a random order and not "highlighted" in the palette which made them seem not that important.
From using voices in other instruments, I understood that you could basically have two staffs on the same staff, with their own pitches and rhythms. However every note you input is defaulted to voice one, and you click one of the voice numbers before inputting a new note or while you've selected an existing note. Where I was confused with the drumset was that some notes were already in voice 2. I can see why the default drumset has that for simplicity, but it did throw me off initially that notes I were adding weren't in voice 1. Where I was also confused here is that despite having the ability to customise position and note head (and you telling me about that feature), the Handbook had instructions on what to do if you had two notes in the same position and voice. This is probably more my fault as I don't really use voices all that much and just put notes in the same place.
With the MIDI keyboard, I can see what you're saying now, I need to map the notes to the keys. If I'm reading it correctly in the end I should be able to input different notes of the drumset like any other instrument once the setup is done. What confused me in the handbook is the line:
"if you press the key for high hat, then MuseScore will add the correct notation to the score. MuseScore automatically takes care of the stem direction and type of note head."
But you're telling me I have to set up all the note styles and positions myself? Do I have to do this for every single key then before I can start using it? Some are given positions and heads when you first open Musescore, but none of my keys are giving the desired effect or different notes (currently only inputting the one note selected in the palette). I'm using the "standard" drumset in the mixer.
Along with this, when I do add notes to the palette, I can see you can reorder them. However whenever I edit the drumset again or close and re-open the software, the order has gone back to whatever the mad default is. It'd be really nice if it could save my order, particularly so the shortcut instruments are first and in alphabetical order, it's a little strange why they aren't already.
When it comes to notes I'm adding to the palette and not making any sound, I get that is because the drumsets don't have all of those notes' sounds, there's a limited range. However the edit drumset window gives zero indication of what the range of the drumset in the mixer is, or even what sound each pitch makes (which makes finding out the sounds a drum instrument-set has, a task in-of-itself). Only some of them are labelled which makes is a bit bizarre when other notes make sounds. I suspect this is where I stepped wrong, I could edit the drumset but I assumed only the labelled pitches would make any sound. I love the software but honestly the whole drum notation system just has me thinking "why would you do it that way".
But back to my main issue, apparently I need to make a drumset definition by giving sounds/pitches note heads, positions and voices. Is this for every note in the edit drumset window? Just the notes on my MIDI keyboard? Do I need to bind any of the notes to letters? As far as I can tell the handbook doesn't cover this so some help would be greatly appreciated.
I'm sure you're shouting at your screen right now at my ignorance but the design really doesn't make it easy to just jump in to and start creating, which the software has achieved fairly well for everything else. I hope you don't mind the criticism, thank you for your help :).
In reply to First off thanks for taking by Sarcastic_Fantastic
I'll try to answer as many questions as I can :-)
- The letters that show in the drum palette window are indeed keybaord shortcuts. These shortcuts are customized in that same "edit drumset" dialog. The notes that don't have shortcuts can be entered via the mouse
- You only have to set up notes int he drum set for drums that are not already set up. The vats majority of drum music can be entered with no customization, because the most common drusm that people actually notate music for are already set up for you, using pretty standard conventions for the position on the staff and the notehead. Only if youwish to use less standard notation systems, or wish to use relatively uncommon drums, should you need to customize things. But if that is the cas,e then yes, you need to set it up firs.t Once you've set it up, note entry becomes extremely efficient; far more so than if you constantly had to choose the line and space and voice for every single note one at a time.
- The drumset definition doens't go away when you close MuseScore - it remains attached the score you were editing. Each score can have its own drumset definition. If you create a drumset you wish to use for multiple pieces, you can save that drumset definition to a file and load it into another score. I think it also works to save that as a template, night also work to save it as a style and make it the default style, although I haven't tried that recently enough to remember for sure.
- The edit drumset dialog has no way of knowing what sounds your soundfont provides. So it provides definitions for the common General MIDI standard drums. If you wish to use General MIDI standard drums not on the list, you could look up the the General MIDI standard to see what else exists, or consult the documentation for whatever soundfont you are using to see what it provides.
- You need to provude a definition for each note you intend to use, Again, the default drumset already provides definitions for all the drums in a standard drum kit and then some, but if you wish to add some less standard drums, then yes, you need to set them up first, so MuseScore knows which line and notehead to use for which sound, thus saving you the trouble of doing it voer and over for each note you enter.
- You don't need to assign keybaord shortcuts if you don't need to use them. If you want to use them, and you don't like the defaults, then sure, you need to customzie that too. But again, for most users, the defaults should work well.
In general, the point of the drum notation system is to make things as easy as possible in the long run. That means we provide reaosnably defaults that work right out of the box for 90% of users. For those few users who require more specialized drum notation, simply spending a few minutes up front setting it up the way you like allows your favorite notation style to be entered extremely simply - as I said, far more so than if you kept having to tell MuseScore over asnd over and over each time you entered a note which line and notehead you wanted to correspond to which sound. Do it once, get it over with, then reap the benefits.
In reply to Sure, I'll try and explain. by Sarcastic_Fantastic
(accidental double post)