MIDI notation entry questions from a bona fide sixty-five year old newbie :-)

• Aug 1, 2017 - 16:28

I apologize in advance if this is a double post. About one month ago I jumped on the MuseScore bandwagon after being somewhat intimidated by Finale and, to a lesser extent, Sibelius. Since I have no aspirations to be the next John Williams :-) I find that MuseScore is a great vehicle for me to create some nice-looking viola parts for both classical music and sacred arrangements. The "problem" is that it takes far too long for me to execute the parts with a computer keyboard and mouse. I realize that the learning curve would improve if I keep at it but I think a MIDI input device would help even more. The cost of buying a five-string MIDI violin with a controller such as the Roland GR-55 was prohibitive compared to a MIDI keyboard. To that end I just ordered a Nektar LX-49 controller that should arrive tomorrow. My version of MuseScore is 2.1 and I am running it on Windows 10.

So here are my questions: Is it possible to create shortcuts on the Nektar with the eight mapping buttons for note values, time signatures, etc. and, if so, what is the procedure for doing that? Sweetwater did not have an answer for that, which is why I am posting this on the Forum.

Thanks in advance for your reply!


Comments

Try keyboard entry, it is much faster than mouse input.

https://musescore.org/en/handbook/note-input#keyboard

As far as time signatures and the like are concerned, those are seldom inserted into a score once it is made. Of course there are scores with time signature changes every measure, but these are not common. Those are available on the palettes and can be rather quickly entered by double clicking them. There is work being done for a future version to allow for shortcuts for all palette items but it will be a while before this is implemented.

Yes, you can create shortcuts (under "Preferences...>>Note Input>>MIDI Remote Control).
In that dialog you can see what's currently possible - midi mappings most convenient for note values. But beware: MuseScore's midi mappings currently have a bug/shortcoming:
Those big "buttons" on the right side of the Nektar are actually trigger-/drum pads who
send midi note-on events on midi channel 10. Since MuseScore ignores the channel info, as
soon as you map those buttons to shortcuts the corresponding notes on channel 1 will be
unavailable for note input.
As a workaround you might be able to reconfigure the Nektar to send control events (I don't
have access to a user manual for the Nektar).

Do you still have an unanswered question? Please log in first to post your question.