Now to add Fx's to MIDI tracks?

[tdehan]

Hopefully I am asking this question so it's not confusing.  I have a MIDI file of a jazz piece I composed many years ago on one of my Kawai hardware sequencer.  I've imported the .mid file into Cakewalk to work on.  I've assigned all the midi tracks to Cakewalk TTS-1 for instruments and everything plays just fine.  My question however is, how do I add affects to the individual instrument tracks?  I want to add some Reverb to the drums and horn section tracks however, there is no option to allow me to do this.  Do I need to separate out the audio to individual tracks from the MIDI in order to do this? And if so, how?

Thanks

Edited October 11, 2020 by tdehan

[reginaldStjohn]

Yes, You would need to route each instrument to a separate audio output to add Audio Effects to the individual instruments. If you don't need or want to tweak the midi any more then you can freeze or bounce the instrument tracks so that they are audio.

In either case, you need an separate audio track for each sound you want to apply a different effect to.

[user 905133]

Footnote: With TTS-1 you can assign audio from the 16 midi channels to any of four outputs as shown here and here. 

 

[tdehan]

21 hours ago, reginaldStjohn said:

Yes, You would need to route each instrument to a separate audio output to add Audio Effects to the individual instruments. If you don't need or want to tweak the midi any more then you can freeze or bounce the instrument tracks so that they are audio.

In either case, you need an separate audio track for each sound you want to apply a different effect to.

How do you accomplish this?

Thanks!

 

[57Gregy]

The TTS-1 mixer has controls for reverb and chorus. Have you tried that?

 

 

Edited October 12, 2020 by 57Gregy

[Hillmy]

Well, you can add regular FX to instrument tracks. Even if the tracks are midi. For example if you added a TTS-1 track, you can add any audio FX to it. If you are talking about the MIDI track itself, that's a different story.

Edited October 13, 2020 by Hillmy

[reginaldStjohn]

23 hours ago, tdehan said:

How do you accomplish this?

Thanks!

 

Well, the Reference guide gives some options. See pp 323

"Instrument Track Per Output. This option pairs a MIDI track with a separate audio output track (mono or stereo) for each
synth output, assigning sequential MIDI channels. This allows you to have multiple Instrument tracks for a single instance of
a synth."

It depends on the synth but you have to find the setting to route the audio out of the instrument to a separate channel. Then in Cakewalk you set the input of an audio channel to that output. Or you can instantiate multiple instances of the same softsynth and load different sounds in each. Then you have a simple instrument track per sound to which you can apply effects.

[tdehan]

On 10/12/2020 at 10:16 PM, Hillmy said:

Well, you can add regular FX to instrument tracks. Even if the tracks are midi. For example if you added a TTS-1 track, you can add any audio FX to it. If you are talking about the MIDI track itself, that's a different story.

Correct.  However, the audio track is not separated from the MIDI track.  How do I move the audio track to a separate track from the MIDI track?

[tdehan]

Ok, I read and re-read the section in the Guide regarding Splitting Instrument Tracks.  Greek to me!!!

When I split the MIDI track, it creates another track right below it which is blank.  I was expecting the audio from the MIDI track instrument to be there?  How do I get the audio from the MIDI instrument tracks to show on a separate track?

Thanks 

[reginaldStjohn]

The audio track is for routing the audio from the virtual instrument through the mixing system. You can freeze the synth or bounce the synth and that will create audio on the audio track. But then then changes to the midi will have no effect on the audio output because the audio has already been captured.  

Think of it like routing an external sound device/synth into your DAW. You would only see a waveform if you record the audio to a track. With VSTi's you are using the DAW as a mixer to route the Synths audio to the audio mix system. If you want to see audio then you have to record the synth output to an audio track by Freezing, bouncing or recording.

[tdehan]

Ok thanks.  I applied the FREEZE button to each MIDI track and now see AUDIO.  Is there a way when recording a virtual instrument MIDI track that 2 tracks get created at the same time?  One of just the MIDI events and the other of the instrument audio?

[Bristol_Jonesey]

Not really, but then again you don't need to, provided you've chosen the relevant options when inserting TTS-1 or any other soft synth

Inserting the synth like this will expose all the audio tracks (24 - 31) for you and you can insert Fx directly into the track FX bin or use the Pro Channel

The one thing you cannot do is  apply clip Fx, not until you freeze the synth

[user 905133]

On 10/14/2020 at 2:00 PM, tdehan said:

When I split the MIDI track, it creates another track right below it which is blank.  I was expecting the audio from the MIDI track instrument to be there?  How do I get the audio from the MIDI instrument tracks to show on a separate track?

On 10/14/2020 at 3:38 PM, tdehan said:

Is there a way when recording a virtual instrument MIDI track that 2 tracks get created at the same time?  One of just the MIDI events and the other of the instrument audio?

  Try recording both the midi track and the audio track at the same time.**  If you did not insert them as a split track, split them.  Note: This is old school; there might be newer, better ways to do it. I just tested this quickly and it seems to still work, but I did not test it thoroughly in CbB.  If someone with more recent knowledge/experience points out there are problems with this method, don't follow it.

**Addendum (10/16/2020): (1) Old school method works. (2) Pressing record [aka arm] button in folder containing the non-combined midi and audio track arms both.

Edited October 17, 2020 by User 905133
to add an addendum

[tdehan]

55 minutes ago, Bristol_Jonesey said:

Not really, but then again you don't need to, provided you've chosen the relevant options when inserting TTS-1 or any other soft synth

Inserting the synth like this will expose all the audio tracks (24 - 31) for you and you can insert Fx directly into the track FX bin or use the Pro Channel

The one thing you cannot do is  apply clip Fx, not until you freeze the synth

Got it!  Thanks

[John Vere]

This is the reason that I would never choose the TTS-1 for customizing midi tracks into realistic tracks with full processing applied. Much easier to separate midi tracks from the instruments and treat the VST track like any other audio track.  

Simply open the midi file in Cakewalk which will lay out all your midi tracks from channel 1-16 and assign them to the TTS-1. ( if you have everything unchecked in the midi output options in preferences) 

Now if it was me!! I'd track by track assign  my instruments to better sounding VST's. A lot of them are already included with CbB. And you can then either purchase or dig around for the many free VST's. You can use some of the sounds of the TTS_1 if you cannot find a replacement but here's an example of working with free and cheap. 

Insert the SI drums with only the " First synth Audio output" checked. Don't check any other boxes. This will create a instrument track for the VST.  Now choose a kit you like the sound of. Bonus- you now have a compressor and reverb which are pretty decent. Now simply change the output of the TTS-1 drum track to go to the SI drums instead and you will instantly see what I'm talking about.. . 

Now for the bass you can try the SI bass and repeat above steps. If you had Dim Pro there is a killer acoustic bass in there which might be what your after for Jazz. Many multi instrument VST's have basses. 

For Piano you can grab the demo of Addictive Keys from XLN audio. https://www.xlnaudio.com/products/addictive_keys 

If you have $14 to spare Xpand!2 from air is stellar at things like woodwinds and brass. It's always on sale at vendors like Plugin Boutique Check out the free section here while you shopping,,- I have a lot of this stuff and it's top notch.   https://www.pluginboutique.com/products/1560

 

 

Edited October 14, 2020 by John Vere