Midi 2.0 export + Xenharmonic playback
Midi 2.0 is becoming available on OS's, and one of its features is support for microtuning of each note separately, for example in a chord.
This will finally bring some standard for encoding xenharmonic music (without pitchbending or MPE).
So my wish for the feature in MuseScore is to be able to set arbitrary tunings per note (using accidentals), and export generated compositions in MIDI 2.0 so I could use them in a capable DAW.
Also it would be so nice to have playback using Muse Sounds with this kind of feature.
I know it is still early for this right now, I am just curious about your opinions and if this is something you are aiming at.
Comments
MIDI 2.0 support is on the roadmap, yes.
And you can still set tuning for individual notes with a
0.5accuracy using the "playback" popover from the Properties panel.In reply to MIDI 2.0 support is on the… by jeetee
I am happy to hear about MIDI 2.0.
But when it comes to playback microtones + Muse Sounds (not MS basic soundfont), there is no microtonal playback. As you can see, what is written (1. row) and what I hear (2. row) are two utterly unrelated things:
xen.mscz
Notice how 1/4 flat sounds natural in playback.
Playing this with MS basic soundfont doesn't cause this problem.
This however does not surprise me. It seems it is hard to program VST to reproduce microtonal playback. Almost none of the popular commercial sample based VSTi's are capable of microtonal playback.
I don't know why is it so? Is it because VST would have to resample underlying sample at detuned frequency? And such processing would be computationally costly? (Samples need to be preloaded? i.e. lacking samples in detuned frequences).
No one has yet achieved this even for the simplest 24EDO, let alone arbitrary xenharmony.
My only hope is that when MIDI 2.0 will be prevalent, that it would become somehow easier.
Other very important thing is, that although per note detuning is excellent workaround,
what is desirable is to define detuning per accidental (graphical representation).
Since MS4 has already wonderful support for accidentals, we need now user-defined "templates" for accidentals which will detune notes they precede and produce correct playback.
In reply to I am happy to hear about… by Arahant
I was just about to make a post asking about microtones myself; wanted to hear a string quartet of mine with MuseSounds but unfortunately the microtones in it don't playback at all.
Really looking forward to see if microtones compatibility/arbitrary detuning of MuseSound pitches will be available later on.