Skip to main content ↑ ↓
Topic: Problems with recording from MIDI keyboard (Read 3643 times) previous topic - next topic

Problems with recording from MIDI keyboard

Given:
  Windows XP with service pack 2
  NWC version 1.75b
  Casio CTK-601 keyboard
  MidiSport Uno interface

Problems:
  1) If I play a series of, say, quarter notes separated by quarter rests, NWC will record them as dotted quarters with eighth rests, or maybe doubledotted with sixteenth rests.
  2) If I play a chord with a slow arpeggio, NWC will terminate each note when the following note begins, even though the first key is still depressed.
  3) As (2) implies, if I play a composition of say three voices, any time I press a key in any voice, that cuts off any notes being held in other voices.  I end up with a bunch of short notes, not sustained voices.

Any advice out there?  I have searched the site, don't find these things discussed.

More broadly:  Some material I did find suggests that NWC is not good at this sort of recording.  Can anyone suggest an alternative product, especially a free one?  Also point me to any areas I need to read up on; all this is strictly new to me.  In case it helps you visualize what I need, my project is this:  There is an elderly lady here who neither reads nor writes music, but she is a composer and has some good material.  I want to get it down as a written score.

Many thanks.

Re: Problems with recording from MIDI keyboard

Reply #1 –
G'day Joseph,

Quote from: Joseph Mansfield –
<snip>
Problems:
  1) If I play a series of, say, quarter notes separated by quarter rests, NWC will record them as dotted quarters with eighth rests, or maybe doubledotted with sixteenth rests.
  2) If I play a chord with a slow arpeggio, NWC will terminate each note when the following note begins, even though the first key is still depressed.
  3) As (2) implies, if I play a composition of say three voices, any time I press a key in any voice, that cuts off any notes being held in other voices.  I end up with a bunch of short notes, not sustained voices.

<snip>

Not sure if
I can help much but here goes:

  1) When recording "real time" (I assume you're using a "click track") you must be very accurate with your timing.  You do have some control with the sensitivity settings but timing accuracy is the key (no pun intended).  This can be affected by your computers MIDI synth.  I use a Yamaha softsynth most of the time and it has a lot of latency.  If I were to record seriously I'd need to use my sound cards' hardware synth for the process.

  2) I'm finding this too - not sure why.  I could be a) the keyboard (probably not), b) the MIDI interface or c) NWC itself.  Eric is probably the only one who can comment RE NWC.

  3) see 2)
I plays 'Bones, crumpets, coronets, floosgals, youfonymums 'n tubies.

Re: Problems with recording from MIDI keyboard

Reply #2 –
On (2), I note that the Uno adapter appears to be sending all the MIDI events timely.  It has indicator lights which flash when a MIDI event goes through, and these are flashing just like they ought to.

(1):  Yes, I am using click track.

Thanks for your response.

Re: Problems with recording from MIDI keyboard

Reply #3 –
Joseph, you have found firsthand that MIDI recording is quite different from audio recording!  Notation software applications, like computers in general, are notoriously literal in their interpretation of our input!  Having said that, some ideas:

1) If I play a series of, say, quarter notes separated by quarter rests, NWC will record them as dotted quarters with eighth rests, or maybe doubledotted with sixteenth rests.
In NWC with your click track open, go to Options-Import.  There you will find two settings that will "round off" the rhythm values of your keyboard playing to the desired values and should get rid of most or all of the unintentional dotted notes. 
Note Resolution Try setting this to Sixteenth Note or even Eighth Note
Rest Resolution I have found Eighth Rest to be the setting that generally works best in real-time keyboard recording.  This setting also comes into play to prevent unintentional dotted notes.  NWC will still usually record intentional 16th rests correctly with this setting, but ignores Note Off (lifting the keyboard key) events that fall between standard rhythmic values.

2) If I play a chord with a slow arpeggio, NWC will terminate each note when the following note begins, even though the first key is still depressed.
  3) As (2) implies, if I play a composition of say three voices, any time I press a key in any voice, that cuts off any notes being held in other voices.  I end up with a bunch of short notes, not sustained voices.

Again, go to Options-Import in your NWC click track.  Be sure the Notate Pedal Marks box is checked.  If your Casio has a sustain pedal, I would use it while recording and see if that clears up the problems in 2) and 3).  If we're lucky, the sustain pedal will send a MIDI pedal down signal to NWC, preventing Note Off events from being sent until you release the pedal.  This may not work, since I don't know if the sustain pedal sends the MIDI pedal down out the MIDI Out jack or if it only is used internally by the Casio.  If it doesn't work, you can edit the NWC recording by inserting Pedal Down and Pedal Up marks at the appropriate places to get NWC to interpret correctly what the arpeggiated notation implies to a human player, rather than it taking the notation literally and cutting off the successive notes of an arpeggio.

This next technique is a little more complicated.  If your Casio allows you to split your keyboard into 2 or more regions(read the manual!), split it at middle C, where the usual notation split is between treble and bass clefs.  Assign the left keyboard section (bass clef) to one MIDI channel and the right keyboard section (treble clef) to another MIDI channel, being sure to avoid using MIDI channel 10, which would give you an amazing array of percussion noises!  Now in NWC Options-Import under Track Splitting Options, check the box for Separate MIDI channels and set the Maximum single track chord size to, say 24, to give a 2 octave spread to each clef.  If the piece has a large pitch spread high to low, you may want to set this to 36 to give a 3 octave spread to each clef.  If this works as I hope, NWC should automatically split the recording into treble clef-right hand and bass clef-left hand.

Best of luck, let us know if any of that helped!

Re: Problems with recording from MIDI keyboard

Reply #4 –
Milton, thanks.  I am devoting the afternoon to reading the Midi Manufacturer's Association website, lotta good reading there.  Will tinker with your recommendations tomorrow or as soon as I can and report results here.