Piano roll for JANKO musical keyboard

• Apr 28, 2022 - 10:01

Please have a look at my DIY JANKO keyboard with accordion bass MIDI setup. Details are at this address:

https://www.accordionists.info/threads/pleading-for-advice-from-seasone…

I noticed there are lots of young people interested in the advantages of a JANKO keyboard. - Sadly, there exists no notation for it. So I invented a WYSIWYG piano roll notation for which your piano-roll notation would be ideally suited! That would enable JANKO keyboard players to "read music" by visually transferring notes of Midi-files.
I only wished you could draw the notation lines for it. That would encourage many more JANKO enthusiasts and benefit from your software, too.
As you can see my keyboard consists of black and white key rows. In the notation, the notes between the black lines are notes from white keys. This notation enables readers to visually transfer the notes from the screen to their JANKO keyboard and nothing could be easier!
Please let me know whether this can be done? - Besides, it's urgent ...because I'm getting old (80).
Thank you, Joh, from Townsville/North Australia
Here's a picture of the JANKO piano roll: https://app.box.com/s/1yzcknvjacp0vp7fcpdo23dbcrzk1rol


Comments

In reply to by jeetee

Compared to my Janko Kbd the pattern of a traditional piano Kbd is different. - In the latter, only the notes of the black keys are on lines on the piano roll. Whereas for the Janko piano roll the lines should show the notes for black keys on lines and notes for the white keys between the lines.
I think it is easy to understand. It would be wonderful if the lines could be adjusted, but I think t's not possible.

In reply to by abuau2000

Inserted that image here for reference:
331609-kbd-jpg.png

That however still shows a standard piano keyboard on top? How is this different from the MuseScore Piano Roll Editor in your view? (except for the orientation, obviously).

Also keep in mind that the open source notation software does not run on Android at all...

In reply to by jeetee

I left the part of the standard piano keyboard on top as a reference but it serves no purpose at all.
The JANKO orientation allows transferring the notes visibly from the screen to the JANKO Kbd.
That's what I call WYSIWYG !! Advantage: No knowledge of any notation is required!
Some other developers, such as Chordana, and Synthesia are already on that idea, but non-of them offers a piano roll for the JANKO Kbd. - That puts you ahead of the pack! :)
I don't know a thing about "Open Source Apps". - Well your work deserves payment! My aim has always been to create the easiest to learn and play musical instrument and this JANKO piano-roll is going to perfect my ambition and offer young people a faster way to acquire Kbd. proficiency without being hampered by music theory and traditional notation intricacies.

In reply to by SteveBlower

With "No knowledge of any notation is required!" I meant to say that even people, who have never read and studied traditional notation, will be able to immediately visually transfer the piano roll from the screen to the keyboard. (- I think you too knew what I meant...)
On second thought I was thinking: maybe it is technically possible to superimpose my JANKO piano roll pattern over an existing piano roll from a traditional piano roll?

In reply to by abuau2000

It probably is, yes; but if your end goal is an Android app then again; this forum here is all about the Desktop notation software; it doesn't work on Android.
So you're not just looking for a visual customization (in which you loose recognition of position due to everything being alternating without reference points) but also for someone to create(/port this to) an Android app.

In reply to by jeetee

Agreed, I shouldn't ask for too much. -It would already be great to have the first JANKO piano roll that can load and print Midi-files, based on a PC platform. So I can learn to play new/ complicated melodies from the printed JANKO score. Now I don't have even that and am forced to learn and play by ear.

In reply to by abuau2000

There is nothing wrong with playing by ear. Plenty of people do just that,

But consider this: Let's say you grew up in Spain. You learn to speak Spanish by ear. You are good at it and can get through life just fine. And yet, you begin to think that there is more to Spain and Spanish that you could learn. So you learn to read. You learn the theory of how Spanish words fit together to to create such a beautiful language. You read about the history of Spain. And not just Spain. You begin to get a wider appreciation of the world.

Music is like any other language. You can listen to it and play/speak it without ever knowing anything about it. But like any language, you need to be able to read and write it in order to fully communicate. Music theory is not some pointless mystery to be avoided. And you don't need to be an expert at it to read and write music.

In reply to by bobjp

The advantage over traditional notation is that it is WYSIWYG.
Traditional notation with its 5 staves # + b requires academic education and years of sight-reading practice, whereas piano roll is an easy way to read music without knowledge of musical score elements.
In the olden days, this would be a problem. Now, computer technology translates any piano roll notation into whatever notation we fancy... in a flash!
Apropos Spanish: I lived for 15 years in Chile and speak Spanish all day with my wife! :)

In reply to by abuau2000

The Piano Roll from MuseScore is not a printable thing.

So all in all, while the source code for MuseScore is available and you (or someone you find) is welcome to use it for the purpose you wish; the end result as you're looking for in my humble opinion deviates rather far from the end goals of MuseScore.

In reply to by jeetee

What I'm after is more like the Klavarscribo App. It's printable, too.
It would help me greatly to learn new, complicated melodies by simply transferring notes of MIdi-files directly from the JANKO piano roll to my JANKO Kbd. That's what WYSIWYG is all about!
It's all part of my ambition of creating the easiest to learn and play musical instrument.
1) The accordion bass liberates me from chord learning since I already gained some accordion practice.
2) The JANKO Kbd. liberates from learning and practicing 22 additional, irregular scales & chords fingerings.
3) The JANKO piano roll offers WYSIWYG notation.
4) The whole setup is can be connected to any electronic Kbd. via MIDI, offering unlimited sound variations.
Only music teachers think: "why to make it easier when it can be made more complicated" and we know why...

In reply to by abuau2000

Well, if the scores cannot be directly printed then I can make a Pic of it and then print it.
Just pondering... how about superimposing the JANKO piano roll lines on top of the existing Musescore piano roll? - Of course, the JANKO lines need to be layered so that the Musescore notation appears/ is visible on and between the JANKO lines. In the below picture, I left the traditional piano Kbd for reference. Here's a picture of my idea:

Attachment Size
SupKbd.jpg 42.08 KB

In reply to by jeetee

What a pity I am only able to build this JANKO setup and now depending on others to finish the job, who tell me that it cannot be done, it makes no sense... etc. Sad really that many of us seem already now older than me. :)

In reply to by abuau2000

You are, of course, free to work on any notation method that makes sense to you. I get it.

But let's go back to the language idea for a moment.

Let's say I move to France. I don't speak French. It looks like gibberish to me. Obviously it will take many years of academic education and practice to learn to speak and write it. So, I propose to throw out written French and substitute a different visual method. Great. Not only that, but because my method is easier for me, I'm going to suggest that some 300 million French speakers around the world should dump their version for mine. Even though they would have no good reason to do that.

WYSIWYG only works for computers. Playing music is for humans. These humans already know standard notation. It does not take several years of academic education to learn to read music. I learned most of it in Elementary School as a ten year old. It does, however take many, many years to learn to play an instrument. And that's regardless of the notation system. Or complete lack thereof.
As it is, I can go to most any country on the globe, pick up a music book, and be able to play it. Standard notation is not broken. It may not be perfect. I doubt any system could be.

As to the rest of your medical views.....well, never mind.

In reply to by bobjp

Yes, that's why the JANKO piano layout (albeit much better than the "zebra") was rejected by teachers and thus, never improved and the very same happened to the notation. Yet, I'm all for progress and enjoying its benefit!
The great thing is that now, with the advent of computers, we are able to convert and share our work in whatever format internationally by pressing a button! - Isn't that a wake-up call?
Languages? - "Google translate" does the same thing with languages... too!

In reply to by abuau2000

Think about it. Music teachers are not the bad guy here. They teach what is out there. Much like an algebra teacher. You don't like standard notation and want to use a different system. Great. Please go ahead. It's hard to view a different system as "progress" simply because it seems easier to you.
And yes, right now by pressing a button I can share my work with anyone.

In reply to by bobjp

I happen to call "progress" anything that is proven to better the existing state of achievement. - Of course, there's another factor that comes into play: that people, who gained practice in one system dislike adapting to advances, for it means 'relearning' and nobody likes that; albeit music teachers love it!
So, let's forget those, who already fell victim to the zebra piano layout and think of a hobby musician, seeking the easiest to learn musical instrument: that's how I invented and developed by setup and it really delivers the result I hoped for. It can't get any easier anymore!!
Yet, music teachers try hard to convince hobby musicians that only a conservatorium education on a grossly irregular zebra piano Kbd. will get you there... The question remains: Should we continue to sacrifice technical advances to complacency? Thanks to advances we now enjoy computers, modern airplanes, etc., and these advances apply as well to musical technology.
Well, since complacency is the norm (at least in musical creativity) I have to put up with learning by ear with the help of App for my Android App; "Up Tempo" so far seems the best in this genre, because this App doesn't distort the melody. I would prefer to enjoy the WYSIWYG advantages of my JANKO notation, but for that, I need to find a progressive-thinking programmer.
Undoubtedly, in time to come the JANKO Kbd. is going to gain preference for hobby musicians and that's when they'll be searching for the best piano roll notation. Yet, at this moment most programmers still seem to enjoy the dark ages of technological stagnation.

In reply to by abuau2000

Proven by who? People who aren't interested in gaining meaningful knowledge of standard notation and the corresponding theory? Better in what way? People "relearn" all the time. If your keyboard is "rejected" (your word, not mine. I simply don't need. That doesn't mean I reject it.) it is for lack of purpose. People change to new and better things all the time.
Airplanes and computers are things that were not "advanced" from anything. They were completely new things. Airplanes still use the same principles that they had at first. They need wings to create lift and some kind of propulsion. Computers still rely on groups of on and off signal to represent data.

This software is for standard music notation.
You should get specific software written for the keyboard you are talking about.

And I hope this topic doesn't continue with pointless and troll-ish discussions like "this keyboard is good, yours is useless; this notation is good, yours is difficult", like other deleted (I don't even want to mention the name) alternative keyboard topic.

In reply to by Ziya Mete Demircan

Since I depend on others to design a Piano Roll notation and cannot find someone willing to take it on, I'll have to settle for the next best thing: i.e. forgetting about notation and using a melody slow-down App on my Android PAD to learn complicated melodies.
There's however one only chance to create the elusive JANKO notation: (Help yourself so helps you, God!)
Searching Google PlayStore I found a Piano Roll player, called "Piano Melody Tutorial" that has no lines and this might enable me to create a physical template for the JANKO Kbd notation. Sadly, the piano roll score cannot be printed in its entirety.
Yet, faced with no Janko piano roll at all, this App seems a viable option to learn and play a JANKO notation.
All that I need is to create a template, such as drawing JANKO notation lines onto a transparent plastic, attaching it to the Android TAB screen, and adjusting the Apps Kbd. size to fit.
With Musescore I wouldn't be able to do it, for it can only be used on a PC and its lines fit only zebra piano Kbd.
Here's a picture of it what the transformed JANKO notation layout would look like:
(Notes on the lines are on the dark JANKO keys and notes between the lines are on the white JANKO keys.)

Attachment Size
Piano Melody Tutorial.jpg 140.21 KB

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