Can't open a MIDI file with triplets
Is this true? Every time I try to open a MIDI file with 8th-note triplets, the file crashes if I choose a value smaller than the 8th note during the import. If I choose the 8th note value, then all my triplets are lost.
Is this really not possible in MuseScore?
Thanks
Comments
Please attach an example MIDI file so we can test.
In reply to Please attach an example MIDI by ChurchOrganist
It shouldn't crash but there is no such a thing as tuplet in a MIDI file, just events that could be detected as a tuplet because of the particular pattern of 3 in the time of 2. MuseScore currently doesn't guess anything about tuplet in MIDI import. Any coding help is welcome in this area. Take a look to importmidi.cpp if you are interested.
In reply to Please attach an example MIDI by ChurchOrganist
Here you go. As you can see, not being able to import all these triplets is quite frustrating! :o)
In reply to Here you go. As you can see, by famous beagle
I could recreate the crash. MuseScore (latest sstable 1.2) simply couldn't import your file. So I opened it in another midi editor. I couldn't see anything wrong, but the midi note lengths seemed to overlap. Or at least they were so long that there were no gaps between the notes. So I shortened them a bit and saved a new midi. After that, MuseScore managed to open it. But no triplets! Attached is the modified file. Try to open it using different shortest note values. Probably 1/16 will crash, but other values won't. If you use 1/64, you get an ugly score, but the notes are there and the playback is almost perfect triplets.
I tested the latest nightly build of MuseScore. It could open your file, but all triplets were changed into two quavers (8th notes) and the playback played them with a swing feel. But no triplets there either. The strange thing is that the middle note in each triplet kind of disappeared totally.
My guess is that MuseScore simply can't detect triplets while opening midi files, which is a great shame. When opening midi, you can select the shortest note value to use (1/8, 1/16 etc). I think it wouldn't be that much to add an option for triplets. Since MuseScore doesn't do midi recording in real time from a midi device, I bet I'm not the only one that does the midi recording with other software and then try to import the midi file into MuseScore. Triplets are very important in that case. Other tuplets not that important.
In reply to I could recreate the crash. by jotti
Yeah that's what I do too. I record MIDI versions of things and then when I want to get a score, instead of having to hand-write it, I can just open the MIDI file in MuseScore. I didn't realize it wouldn't be able to open triplets. In a normal song, it might not be a huge deal, but in a song that's based entirely on triplets (like "Beck's Bolero"), it's a total pain!
Thanks for the help!
In reply to Yeah that's what I do too. I by famous beagle
Have you thought of working in compound time in your sequencer?
I'm about to try and work out an algorithm for recognising triplets in a MIDI file, but I suspect it's gonna be a long and fraught process!
In reply to Have you thought of working by ChurchOrganist
I remeber Encore had a nice feature, where you could set the "resolution" of how midi data was interpreted. 8th, 16th, 32nd notes as the smallest notes. And a checkbox for checking triplets. The good thing was that the exact midi ticks remained in the imported data in the score, while the score could have shown only quarter notes and 8ths. Then you could alter the "resolution", mark some bars that had errors and do a re-valuation of it. After that, when everything looked ok, you could set all note lengths to the visual appearance, which corrected the playback (while you of course lost the original tick values for note down and note up). This could be a good approach. There's no way a program can make it right from the beginning to an end. You may want to change the settings for different parts of a midi file.
Recognising triplets shouldn't be that hard in a single melody line. But as soon as it's piano music, it gets harder. But as I see it, the same problems are there even if you just look for 8ths, 16ths and 32nds and you have chords. You might have chords on every quarter beat and a melody in 8th notes. Should it be like the chords are quarter notes in one voice and the melody runs as 8ths in another voice? Or everything in one voice and the chord notes are just 8th notes?