What constitutes a musical score ?

[Øyvind Skald]

I can open midi files in MuseScore 3, you have to work on them but you can do it.

[abacab]

13 hours ago, Toddskins said:

This post is 100% irrelevant to what is being suggested to the OP, who is wishing to create a score from his MIDI tracks that he already made.

Read my post, and you will understand.

I don't think you understand at all. The need to export your MIDI to another application to create a "score" is exactly what is required.

On 3/13/2019 at 10:09 AM, molly townsend said:

Hi, I have been composing music via cakewalk for  20+ years but I can’t read/write music, I work exclusively with the piano roll and my ears.

I doubt that MIDI files created with the Cakewalk piano roll would potentially have the same issues as MIDI recorded live. And for that there is quantize.

I thought that was a sarcastic joke you were making about Finale. Seriously!

And referring me to another post, which refers to yet another post is annoying. Please just say what you gotta say!

 

Edited March 23, 2019 by abacab

[Toddskins]

8 hours ago, ØSkald said:

I can open midi files in MuseScore 3, you have to work on them but you can do it.

Yeah, right.  I'd like to see you do it.  Make a video while you try to turn the OP's MIDI file into a score.  It would be amusing (if we had several hours to waste).

Saying you can use MuseScore to make a score out of a MIDI file created by a person playing in his MIDI keyboard in real time, and then trying to fix it so that all the notes read correctly on the staff (since that is EXACTLY what we are discussing here), is like all the allegories of using the wrong tool for the job, i.e. a hammer when you need to use a screwdriver, etc.

Yes, the other score softwares can and will open a MIDI file.  But that's where the success story ends.

[Toddskins]

19 minutes ago, abacab said:

I don't think you understand at all. The need to export your MIDI to another application to create a "score" is exactly what is required.

I thought that was a sarcastic joke you were making about Finale. Seriously!

And referring me to another post, which refers to yet another post is annoying. Please just say what you gotta say!

 

Really?  You cannot click the link and see exactly the several paragraphs, and the post by Star Krupa, and read them without my having to import both mine and his into this thread?  Aren't hyperlinks the whole point of simplicity and making our lives easier?

[abacab]

3 minutes ago, Toddskins said:

Yeah, right.  I'd like to see you do it.  Make a video while you try to turn the OP's MIDI file into a score.  It would be amusing (if we had several hours to waste).

Saying you can use MuseScore to make a score out of a MIDI file created by a person playing in his MIDI keyboard in real time, and then trying to fix it so that all the notes read correctly on the staff (since that is EXACTLY what we are discussing here), is like all the allegories of using the wrong tool for the job, i.e. a hammer when you need to use a screwdriver, etc.

Yes, the other score softwares can and will open a MIDI file.  But that's where the success story ends.

Ever heard of quantize? It should snap your notes to the grid before you export your MIDI version for score creation. You could retain an un-quantized version for playback in Cakewalk if you prefer the un-quantized live feel of the performance.

[Toddskins]

Of course we know what quantize is.   And we still write and state what we have already.

If you would bother to read the issue at hand, you would realize how quantize is not a solution in any way, shape, or form.

[Toddskins]

Y'know, myself and Star Krupa, are two guys who put a lot of hours into trying to do, what is being suggested to the OP.  We have experience.

It's plain as day that you and the other guy, have not EVER attempted to do what you suggest 'off the cuff', because you read a report that the other software programs should be able to do the task, even though we are telling you that they cannot.

 

Edited March 23, 2019 by Toddskins

[abacab]

16 minutes ago, Toddskins said:

Y'know, myself and Star Krupa, are two guys who put a lot of hours into trying to do, what is being suggested to the OP.  We have experience.

It's plain as day that you and the other guy, have not EVER attempted to do what you suggest 'off the cuff', because you read a report that the other software programs should be able to do the task, even though we are telling you that they cannot.

When you get around to getting some experience on the matter, then you can post and add something of value, on this issue. 

With all that experience, surely you two can figure out a workaround for the issue.

 

Edited March 23, 2019 by abacab

[mdiemer]

This has almost become a coffee house thread. Hopefully the OP has moved on, and is having success with her project.

Wait a minute, this is a coffee house thread...

Edited March 23, 2019 by mdiemer

[Toddskins]

I think perhaps you guys might be correct in saying Musescore and others might work for what the OP has done.  

His song was done by his using the Piano Roll View, so more than likely, he put notes perfectly onto the timeline and if he did not move the notes to the side of the beat, to give it some swing and phrasing, then those other software programs should be able to work just fine.   Of course, his song would feel rather "mechanical" or robotic, as we musicians have spoken about in the use of computer music for decades. 

But what I have been writing about is if the MIDI file was a person recording a song on his MIDI keyboard, playing it as he felt it should sound.  Then of course, a myriad of complications are introduced that those software score programs are incapable to handling, except for Finale'.

So, if the MIDI file by the songwriter is one created with PRV and not complicated at all, then you can use anything.  But if the MIDI file created is like a person using his MIDI keyboard to record a composition on piano and play it as he likes, then the notes will not be lined up perfectly, and attempting to move the notes to look proper on the staff inside a software score program, will not work (except for Finale') because those other programs FORCE each measure to add up to 1 (all the notes in the measure must add up to 1), and that will cause havoc galore. 

 

[bayoubill]

Molly, ask your contact at the drama company what instrumentation they need on the score. Don't be afraid of asking them questions. 

[craigb]

 

?

[abacab]

6 hours ago, Toddskins said:

I think perhaps you guys might be correct in saying Musescore and others might work for what the OP has done.  

His song was done by his using the Piano Roll View, so more than likely, he put notes perfectly onto the timeline and if he did not move the notes to the side of the beat, to give it some swing and phrasing, then those other software programs should be able to work just fine.   Of course, his song would feel rather "mechanical" or robotic, as we musicians have spoken about in the use of computer music for decades. 

But what I have been writing about is if the MIDI file was a person recording a song on his MIDI keyboard, playing it as he felt it should sound.  Then of course, a myriad of complications are introduced that those software score programs are incapable to handling, except for Finale'.

So, if the MIDI file by the songwriter is one created with PRV and not complicated at all, then you can use anything.  But if the MIDI file created is like a person using his MIDI keyboard to record a composition on piano and play it as he likes, then the notes will not be lined up perfectly, and attempting to move the notes to look proper on the staff inside a software score program, will not work (except for Finale') because those other programs FORCE each measure to add up to 1 (all the notes in the measure must add up to 1), and that will cause havoc galore. 

 

This issue sounds similar in a way to when a guitar player records a live take without a click track or a metronome to keep him locked to a tempo. Then when he imports the audio take into a DAW project, the guitar tempo doesn't line up with the beats on the grid due to the rigid default tempo map in the DAW.

Sure, the guitar player may sound great with his relaxed timing, and have more swing or human feel. But when you want to arrange things later in the DAW, you have your work cut out for you to create a variable tempo map so that your MIDI instrument tracks can sync to the guitar, and stay on the beat with the grid.

So I think it is design intent  that software has to make certain assumptions, like the number of beats in a measure adding up consistently, or that all tracks in a DAW project must follow a common tempo map. Maybe software can be improved some day so that we don't have to tell it everything, but it seems at this point we still may have to create content that it can interpret correctly according to the assumptions it follows.

 

[Toddskins]

Finale' allows you the option of inserting notes and moving the remainder to the right, without affecting the notes prior, like a word processor.   So while you're looking at the notes on the staff, with gaps and whatever, you have control over the product so that it will look like how you want it.  You can also change the value of the notes or chords, without affecting contiguous notes and chords.   And you are able to tie notes into the next measure without the software doing weird things to the notes involved.

When handled in this manner, it's up to the composer to make sure that everything adds up correctly, which is not an issue for a musician with some formal training.

[Starship Krupa]

•   On 12/25/2018 at 6:48 PM, Toddskins said:
• Sibelius and others (not Finale'), force all the notes in a measure to add up to one (1).  Therefore, when you import the song you played as a MIDI file into these
• programs, it will force all your notes to be strange values because the measure must add up to one.

Quote

 

 Then I replied:

Oh holy mother, really? Still?

When I was notation-shopping I settled on Finale Note Pad, which is freeware, like our CbB, so I guess I missed out on how prevalent this still is, but I've encountered it in other programs.

It's like there was a Procrustes Bach (Procrustes was the serial killer/blacksmith in Greek paganism who had an iron bed; he would invite travelers in to stay the night and if they didn't fit the bed perfectly he would either chop off anything that stuck out, or stretch them until their limbs "fit.") who came up with this. You try to tidy things up a little bit, or decide that you want that note to sustain just a bit longer and BLEAHHH suddenly your measure and the one next to it are littered with little dots and rests and hemidemisemiquavers to make up for it. Which makes it worse, it looks like a caterpillar stepped in some ink and walked across scoring paper.

Heaven help you if you play a chord and your finger slips, or if you decide you want to voice the chord a bit differently and then throw the timing off with the slip of a mouse. The results look worse than having "slide over to make room" turned on in CbB (sorry).

Every time I tried to get "serious" about producing sheet music of my stuff for other musicians to use and tried one of these programs, it made me just drop the project entirely until I started working with Finale and then Mixcraft (which also seems more forgiving).

I am very happy to hear that Cakewalk doesn't do this. It made me feel like I was in some horrible Dickensian math class, had made a mistake, and was being punished by a Snape-like instructor. Or like that movie I saw the trailer for that seemed to be about having The Great Santini for a drum teacher.

 

My reply was more like a stand-up comedy routine, but represents of the frustration I feel when trying to use most notation software.

It's notation software. When I start getting into editing with it, which is something that I will usually need to do if I've imported a MIDI file, things go sideways very quickly.

I do get that for heavy duty editing, it's not the right tool for the job, but except for Finale, every one that I've tried has resulted in the explosion of tiny notes when I try to make changes. Yes, I'm doing something wrong. But why is it so easy to get into trouble in all these other programs and not in this one?

The OP doesn't even know what the term "musical score" means. I'm for getting them the program that has fewer pitfalls for the clueless noob.

https://www.finalemusic.com/products/notepad/