pbognar

Ah yes - I was an IDMS DBA many moons ago

This makes me sad.

omg - Studio One Pro 5 crossgrade for $169?!? Why do they taunt me? Must. Pick. One. DAW. And. Make. Music.

The thing which impressed me with the free SSD 5.5 is the sound and the nuanced playing in the limited number of MIDI grooves. Are the EZ Drummer Drum MIDI expansions just plain MIDI and with the proper mapping could they be used in SSD? Also, in your opinions, comparing SSD 5.5 @ $59 and EZ Drummer @ $79, which would is your preference for sound, ease of use for assembling human sounding drum parts and importing/mapping 3rd party grooves?

What is typically the lowest price for EZ Drummer? I have the free Steven Slate Drummer 5.5 and I am tempted to get the full version for $59, but then I heard that EZ Drummer has a feature where you can tap in a beat, and it will search its grooves for matches. This would be cool. I'm really impressed with the sound of the free SSD 5.5 and the few grooves that it has. How does EZ Drummer compare with regard to styles and number of grooves? It does look like a bit of a money pit to buy all the style expansions.

Stardate 98541.94

If anyone is on the fence about Scaler, buy it now - there is a pretty stellar upgrade scheduled to drop on December 10th.

Ok, so I upgraded: Essential to Assistant @ everyplugin for $67 Assistant to Editor @ pluginboutique for $149 So $216 to go from Essential to Editor 5 - could have saved $20 with the JRR mistake, but what the hell...

If Mixcraft had even a MIDI chord track, I wouldn't be looking at anything else, as it is very intuitive and satisfies my basic needs. For the price, it's surprisingly good.

You mean it's going to be more in 8 days and that's why we should tell our friends?

Software / gear you need is stuff you really really want. ?

Yeah, I just sat down to upgrade for $43.99 ? He who hesitates...

Right. If I can crack my wallet open, I'd upgrade from my Essential to Assistant at JRR's for $44 and then from Assistant to Editor for $176.34 at EveryPlugin = $220

According to Celemony's FB page, this year's Black Friday Sale items are Essential and Assistant.

So, if it is possible to upgrade from Essential to Assistant $83.84, then to Editor $176.34 = $260.18 vs the prevailing cost of $299 to upgrade from Essential to Editor. Hopefully, there will be direct upgrades from Essential to Editor.

I would use the chord track as a composition / prototyping tool. I'd start by generating chord sequences using some chord assistant tool like Scaler 2, circle of fifths, etc. and import the results into the chord track. Another option might be to record a chord sequence using guitar and have the chords extracted to the chord track. Once the chord track was populated, I would prototype a composition by using tracks with MIDI instruments and perhaps audio loops which would follow the chord track. I could see making adjustments to the chords to fine tune. Also, having the chords display prominently would be great for recording instruments once the chord track was created. I am sensitive to the amount of effort this would take to implement, so an incremental approach would certainly be understandable. IMHO, starting with the chord track itself, having MIDI tracks follow and being able to import chord track data from Scaler, Melodyne, etc. would satisfy many folks. Enhancing ARA 2 support for chord track communication would be a great next step, to parlay Melodyne if it is present.

So you recommend it for that price? Any decent videos showing its capabilities?

Cubase was the pioneer for chord track tools within a DAW. The differences between Cubase and Studio One: Cubase seems to be more musical when it comes to different ways of creating the chord track, with chord pads and a chord assistant. Cubase's affect of chord track on MIDI data is destructive, whereas Studio One, it is not. Studio One's chord track affects polyphonic audio playback! It can also extract chords from polyphonic audio.

I played around with Cubase Elements when it was available to evaluate for free in the spring. You could do a lot worse for prototyping a composition with MIDI. As far as chord track features compared to the PRO version, the only thing missing is the chord assistant proximity function - for the price it's pretty cool.

Thanks for popping in Mark. The chords and symbols in the staff view are for display only with no effect on MIDI and are not visible in other views. Pitch markers are cool, but they only work on the root note of a loop, so they don't affect individual notes in chords, e.g. major to minor chords, etc. But they could be seen as a place holder for where chord track logic / display could go, but as you say, look more like the arranger. The Cakewalk snap to scale track function leads me to believe that the logic to move MIDI notes around based on a parameter (scale or chord) exists and together with the pitch marker logic, could be used as the basis for a global chord track for MIDI. There are also the chord analyzer and transpose MFX. The chord track related functionality can be broken up into chord creation, display, detection from MIDI, affecting MIDI, detection from audio and affecting audio. There are tools, like Scaler, which can do the heavy lifting of generating MIDI chords - but Cakewalk would need a way to import the results into the chord track (MIDI capture is already present). Likewise, Melodyne with ARA 2, can analyze audio and generate a chord track, which could also be imported into a chord track (although working with polyphonic audio comes at a hefty price). I don't want to speak for everyone, but I look at the chord track primarily as a song writing tool, providing a way to prototype compositions and ideally affect song affect song playback. The current capabilities Cubase would be a great start, with the chord track affecting MIDI and monophonic audio. Maybe ARA 2 / Melodyne Essential (or Editor if present) can be leveraged.

I thought I was stupid because I couldn't how to rate this topic on my phone. You must view the desktop site option in your browser. ?

I could see "all things chord track" being implemented incrementally in phases, as there are many facets to be considered, with some features I perceive to be easier to implement than others. My perception of functions, in increasing order of implementation difficulty: Tools to generate chords on the chord track: chord selection/voicing tool circle of fifths tool chord proximity tool chord suggestion tool MIDI keyboard input chord pads (with MIDI mapping for realtime triggering) existing MIDI track data Tool to generate scales as part of the chord track During editing, having option for MIDI notes to snap to the chords and/or scales on the chord track During playback/recording, having the option for existing MIDI tracks to follow the defined chord track and/or scales (should note changes be made destructively or in real-time? - there are pros and cons to each) During recording, transform in coming MIDI notes to snap to the chords and/or scales (never play a "wrong note") (For the following audio related items, I'm assuming that Cakewalk ARA 2 support or the presence of some version of Melodyne could be parlayed) Enhance ARA 2 support to enable bi-directional sharing of chord track data between Cakewalk and Melodyne Extract MIDI from monophonic melodic audio During editing, having option for monophonic audio notes to snap to the chords and/or scales on the chord track During playback/recording, having the option for monophonic audio notes to follow the defined chord track and/or scales Extract MIDI from polyphonic harmonic audio Extract chords from polyphonic harmonic audio During playback/recording, having the option for polyphonic audio notes to follow the defined chord track and/or scales

Whoa!!! Have you created the thread yet?

I have no proof, but it seems that ARA 2 and Studio One's chord track came out about the same time, and since ARA 2 is the result of a collaboration between Celemony and Presonus, the ability for Studio One v4 to have polyphonic audio follow their chord track may be a result of some technology sharing. Wikipedia: "Version 2 of ARA was announced during NAMM in January 2018, introducing new features such as the simultaneous editing of multiple tracks, transfer of chord track information, and undo synchronization with the DAW.[3][4] DAWs which use ARA version 2 are not automatically backwards compatible with plug-ins using version 1.[5] The first DAWs to support ARA version 2 were Logic Pro X (version 10.4, released in January 2018)[6] and Studio One (version 4, released in May 2018).[7]"

Yes it's painful. My heartache is that there is still no polyphonic Variaudio, which would have given Cubase the ability to have polyphonic audio to follow the chord track. If this were possible, I would register my Cubase cross-grade right now. Maybe I'll try a couple of months of Studio One via Sphere. There is however a silver lining for folks with both Cubase 11 and Melodyne Editor / Studio 5.1 (what's the lowest price anyone has seen to upgrade from Essential to Editor? ?) "The chord track Melodyne and Cubase each have their own chord tracks – each with its own advantages: The Cubase chord track can control all the MIDI tracks, whilst the Melodyne chord track can control all the audio files – and even polyphonic instruments. The Cubase chord track can derive its contents from an analysis of previously recorded MIDI tracks but is incapable of analyzing polyphonic audio tracks. With Melodyne, it’s the other way round: Melodyne can recognize the chords in any audio track and generate a lead sheet for it with blinding speed. However Melodyne cannot examine MIDI tracks (unless you have previously converted them to audio signals by bouncing them). What this means for your workflow is that you will probably want to combine the two chord tracks. Thanks to ARA, this is easily done: You can display the chords from Cubase within Melodyne and in this way quasi-control the Melodyne chord track remotely from Cubase. This gives you full access from the Cubase chord track to both MIDI tracks (directly via Cubase) and audio tracks (from Cubase via the remote-controlled Melodyne). The return path – which amounts to the remote control or automated filling-in of the Cubase chords by Melodyne, for example when it comes to discovering the chords contained in polyphonic audio recordings – is not yet realized via ARA in the current Cubase/Nuendo versions. You can get there, however, by exporting the lead sheet generated by Melodyne, importing this into Cubase, and using it to fill in the Cubase chord track." https://helpcenter.celemony.com/M5/doc/melodyneStudio5/en/M5tour_CubaseARA_IntroHub2?env=cubase#chapter-2