Staff view (score view)

[Jerry Gerber]

1 hour ago, abacab said:

I just tested the MusicXML export from Cakewalk with 18 tracks, and it got them all.

I had first opened up a classical MIDI score in Notion 6.8, "Haydn - Symphony 104 - I Allegro.mid", that I had obtained from Notion's score library - complete pieces, and exported it as a .mid file.

Then after opening it up in Cakewalk and saving as a .cwp file, I did a select all in track view, opened the staff view, and exported as MusicXML. All 18 selected tracks were included in the MusicXML export file. Opened that up in Notion and tested the playback. All of the expression was gone.

I'm not an expert in this, but it was obvious that while the note and instrument info was still there on the tracks, all the tempo, dynamics, ties, and many other important marking features in the score were lost in the round trip. And if you open up Cakewalk's MusicXML export in a text editor, you can see that it's still on v2.0, and not the latest. I also suppose that much of that score info was lost in the MIDI export translation.

Out of curiosity, I exported the same score from Notion as a MusicXML file, and then imported it into Overture 5. At first glance side by side, the score appears to have remained mostly intact with MusicXML > MusicXML.

That's right. 18 staves is the maximum CW can display at one time. The problem is that if have, say, 25 staves, then 7 will not be able to be exported with XML. MusicXML can only export the staves that CW can display. I would love to be wrong about this but I don't think I am. 

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[mdiemer]

I have also had problems exporting XML from Sonar/Cakewalk. I end up exporting as a midi 1 file. You are definitely right Jerry, Cake only displays so many staves. I get around it by selecting the ones I want, or an entire section, like woodwinds, or strings. A small workaround considering how useful Staff view is.

[abacab]

1 hour ago, jsg said:

That's right. 18 staves is the maximum CW can display at one time. The problem is that if have, say, 25 staves, then 7 will not be able to be exported with XML. MusicXML can only export the staves that CW can display. I would love to be wrong about this but I don't think I am. 

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Well, that was just an ironic coincidence that the score I tested with only had 18 tracks/staves. I wasn't aware that 18 was the apparent limit.

So, I just grabbed another score, this time with 24 staves. Opened the .mid in Cakewalk, viewed all 24 staves in staff view, and then exported the .xml with all 24 staves accounted for. This was using the latest 2021.01 version of Cakewalk.

So I assume that limit was regarding an older version of Cakewalk?

[Maestro]

On 2/5/2021 at 12:18 PM, pbognar said:

No company wants to write notation functionality from scratch - the logical and fashionable thing to do is buy or incorporate existing product functionality -

• Studio One (Notion)
• Pro Tools (Sibelious)
• Cubase (Dorico) - ok, they built their own, but they later assembled former Sibelius folks and built Dorico, but Cubase 11 implemented some Dorico funtionality
• Sonar (Gibson passed on the opportunity to have Overture functionality)

The exceptions are Emagic Notator (Logic) and REAPER (who decided to roll up their sleeve and just write a pretty decent score editor).

Calkwalk's Staff Editor is decent for MIDI composing and editing (see JSG's work).  However, there may be a missed opportunity to be the de facto standard academic Windows music environment by not including improved notation functionality (if anyone feels that's important).

Cubase's Notation Editor has nothing to do with Dorico.  If they ported over a feature or two, that is practically ignorable in the grand scheme of things.  That being said. for a DAW Score Editor, it's fairly complete.

Pro Tools and Studio One both do use the Scoring Engines from their "sister products" (Sibelius and Notion) and have decent round tripping with them (particularly Studio One <-> Notion).  Steinberg hasn't even bothered to integrate Cubase and Dorico, yet.  Their Expression Maps implementations aren't even the same (maybe they'll port this over to Cubase :-P).  The products are quite different.

Digital Performer, Samplitude Pro X, MixCraft, and others have Notation Editors in the DAW that are better than Cakewalk's, but don't own Scoring/Notation Software packages.

The biggest issues I have with Cakewalk's Staff View are:

• No MusicXML Import
• No Display of Common Scoring Symbols - Ideally, these would import and display properly with MusicXML import, as they do in many DAWs that have that feature.
• It's very difficult to get the score to display decently.  For example, it's hard to get grace notes to display properly - or at all.
• The score view often does not sync up properly with playback.

That being said, there are a number of DAWs that completely lack a Score Editor/Staff View (FL Studio, Ableton Live, Reason, etc.) so things could be far worse than they are.

I've had too many issues exporting MIDI both from DAWs and Notation Software and then importing into another.  I refuse to work that way, anymore ?

Edited February 7, 2021 by Maestro

[Jerry Gerber]

21 hours ago, Maestro said:

Cubase's Notation Editor has nothing to do with Dorico.  If they ported over a feature or two, that is practically ignorable in the grand scheme of things.  That being said. for a DAW Score Editor, it's fairly complete.

Pro Tools and Studio One both do use the Scoring Engines from their "sister products" (Sibelius and Notion) and have decent round tripping with them (particularly Studio One <-> Notion).  Steinberg hasn't even bothered to integrate Cubase and Dorico, yet.  Their Expression Maps implementations aren't even the same (maybe they'll port this over to Cubase :-P).  The products are quite different.

Digital Performer, Samplitude Pro X, MixCraft, and others have Notation Editors in the DAW that are better than Cakewalk's, but don't own Scoring/Notation Software packages.

The biggest issues I have with Cakewalk's Staff View are:

• No MusicXML Import
• No Display of Common Scoring Symbols - Ideally, these would import and display properly with MusicXML import, as they do in many DAWs that have that feature.
• It's very difficult to get the score to display decently.  For example, it's hard to get grace notes to display properly - or at all.
• The score view often does not sync up properly with playback.

That being said, there are a number of DAWs that completely lack a Score Editor/Staff View (FL Studio, Ableton Live, Reason, etc.) so things could be far worse than they are.

If that is really your experience with CW, you've got audio/computer issues that have nothing to do with Cakewalk.   I've never seen Cakewalk's score not sync up with playback with MIDI, although one older version of Sonar did have VST sync problems with long pieces.  But that problem doesn't exist any more as I  recently completed a 4 movement 30 minute work with lots of VSTs and no issues with sync at all.

Cakewalk's staff editor can show a lot more music than DP on one screen. The other thing that is remarkable about CW's notation are the tabs.  I have all the winds, brass, percussion, synths and strings on 5 different tabs, and switching between them is instantaneous.  With DP there's always a lag time of several seconds to switch screens to see different staves.  And because Cakewalk's editor is laid out more like an arranger's pad rather than an 8.5x11 sheet of paper, it's much better for large orchestral scoring.   I've said this before:  A notation editor in a DAW is for composition and editing, not for creating a final score. For that you need a graphics program like Sibelius or Finale or Dorito.  For MIDI sequencing, CW's notation is more than adequate.  When I am done composing and sequencing a piece, before rendering to wave, I export to Sibelius and create the score.  I wouldn't use any DAWs notation editor to create a score, they're really input and editing tools, nothing more...

 

Edited February 7, 2021 by jsg

[Maestro]

6 minutes ago, jsg said:

Cakewalk's staff editor can show a lot more music than DP on one screen. The other thing that is remarkable about CW's notation is the tabs.  I have all the winds, brass, percussion, synths and strings on 5 different tabs, and switching between them is instantaneous.  With DP there's always a lag time of several seconds to switch screens to see different staves.  And because Cakewalk's editor is laid out more like an arranger's pad rather than an 8.5x11 sheet of paper, it's much better for large orchestral scoring.   I've said this before:  A notation editor in a DAW is for composition and editing, not for creating a final score. For that you need a graphics program like Sibelius or Finale or Dorito.  For MIDI sequencing, CW's notation is more than adequate.  When I am done composing and sequencing a piece, before rendering to wave, I export to Sibelius and create the score.  I wouldn't use any DAWs notation editor to create a score, they're really input and editing tools, nothing more...

 

How much music it can show on one screen is really of no concern.

How accurately it can display the music and notation (notes, symbols, articulations, etc.) is most important.

If I want to view tons of music on a screen, I'll just use the piano roll.

DP has one of the best in-DAW score editors on the market.

Edited February 7, 2021 by Maestro

[Jerry Gerber]

12 minutes ago, abacab said:

Well, that was just an ironic coincidence that the score I tested with only had 18 tracks/staves. I wasn't aware that 18 was the apparent limit.

So, I just grabbed another score, this time with 24 staves. Opened the .mid in Cakewalk, viewed all 24 staves in staff view, and then exported the .xml with all 24 staves accounted for. This was using the latest 2021.01 version of Cakewalk.

So I assume that limit was regarding an older version of Cakewalk?

Wow!  I hope you're right.  I'll check in a few minutes.  Last time I checked, 18 staves was the max.  But maybe it depends upon screen size?

[Jerry Gerber]

7 minutes ago, Maestro said:

How much music it can show on one screen is really of no concern.

How accurately it can display the music and notation (symbols, articulations, etc.) is most important.

If I want to view tons of music on a screen, I'll just use the piano roll.

DP has one of the best in-DAW score editors on the market.

Maybe it's of no concern to you, but when a piece has 45 tracks, the more staves I can see on one screen and the more measures I can see on one screen the faster I can work.  DP's notation editor is slow.   Very slow.  And it cannot display nested or tied triplets (or maybe it's dotted triplets?) correctly.  CW cannot display tied or dotted triplets correctly either, but again, it plays them back flawlessly and correcting those kinds of things in Sibelius is easy.  I don't go by "reputation".  I go by my own personal experience in the studio.   Of course I don't expect that what works for one musician will work for another, we're all different.  So I'll bow out of a pissing contest and just say I prefer CW's notation to DPs any day.  That's why I went back to Cakewalk. 

Have you tried using or comparing CW's tabs to DP's clumsy switching between various groups of staves?   The tabs are instantaneous, so I can go from winds to strings to brass in a fraction of a second, there's no lag time.  I really appreciate that. 

Jerry

www.jerrygerber.com

 

Edited February 7, 2021 by jsg

[Maestro]

20 minutes ago, jsg said:

Maybe it's of no concern to you, but when a piece has 45 tracks, the more staves I can see on one screen and the more measures I can see on one screen the faster I can work. 

Even when the display of the score is wildly inaccurate?  An accurate score is needed for productive work.  No one is asking for press-ready output out of a DAW score editor.  I'm asking for a more accurate representation of the music.  DP delivers that to a far greater extent than Cakewalk.  You're free to prefer one DAW to another, you're not free to pretend objective differences in the quality of this feature are "personal preference."

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DP's notation editor is slow.   Very slow. 

Never had this issue on my machine, and the issue with Cakewalk's isn't performance per se.  It's that the playback is often not in sync with the audio, and the Staff View doesn't display tons of notes accurately.  This is awkward when looking at the score while paying things back.  This may be due to other components of the pipeline, but I've not done tests THAT extensive.  However, the PRV does play in time... so I'm doubtful of that.

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And it cannot displayed nested or tied triplets (or maybe it's dotted triplets?) correctly.  CW cannot display tied or dotted triplets correctly either, but again, it plays them back flawlessly and correcting those kinds of things in Sibelius is easy.  I don't go by "reputation".  I go by my own personal experience in the studio.

I only speak to things I've used.  Touche. 

I don't care what DAW you use, or why.  I am not here to convert or convince you.  I'm giving feedback.  My reply had nothing to do with that; your reply did.  My reply had to do with the issues I saw in the Cakewalk Staff View - all of which are fairy objective and easy to test and verify (and, indeed, longstanding).

I don't care about reputation.  DP's scoring display is far more accurate than Cakewalk's.  That is fact.  I want to look at a score view and get the most accurate representation of the music as possible.  That is why it exists, otherwise, why bother?

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Of course I don't expect that what works for one musician will work for another, we're all different.

No one made that insinuation.

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So I'll bow out of a pissing contest and just say I prefer CW's notation to DPs any day.  That's why I went back to Cakewalk.  

This is only a pissing contest insofar as your reply was pissy.  That's the extent of that.  What you prefer has nothing to do with what you were responding to, so I really don't care.

Edited February 7, 2021 by Maestro

[Jerry Gerber]

15 hours ago, Maestro said:

Even when the display of the score is wildly inaccurate?  An accurate score is needed for productive work.  No one is asking for press-ready output out of a DAW score editor.  I'm asking for a more accurate representation of the music.  DP delivers that to a far greater extent than Cakewalk.  You're free to prefer one DAW to another, you're not free to pretend objective differences in the quality of this feature are "personal preference."

Never had this issue on my machine, and the issue with Cakewalk's isn't performance per se.  It's that the playback is often not in sync with the audio, and the Staff View doesn't display tons of notes accurately.  This is awkward when looking at the score while paying things back.  This may be due to other components of the pipeline, but I've not done tests THAT extensive.  However, the PRV does play in time... so I'm doubtful of that.

I only speak to things I've used.  Touche. 

I don't care what DAW you use, or why.  I am not here to convert or convince you.  I'm giving feedback.  My reply had nothing to do with that; your reply did.  My reply had to do with the issues I saw in the Cakewalk Staff View - all of which are fairy objective and easy to test and verify (and, indeed, longstanding).

I don't care about reputation.  DP's scoring display is far more accurate than Cakewalk's.  That is fact.  I want to look at a score view and get the most accurate representation of the music as possible.  That is why it exists, otherwise, why bother?

No one made that insinuation.

This is only a pissing contest insofar as your reply was pissy.  That's the extent of that.  What you prefer has nothing to do with what you were responding to, so I really don't care.

Give an example of "wildly inaccurate", other than the tied and dotted triplets, which is common knowledge.  Why waste your time on a CW forum, why not spend time on the DP forum telling everyone how great the notation editor is, when in fact it's no  better, and in some cases, much worse, that CWs?   Your feedback is not as objective or as fact-based as you pretend it is.  I've used both programs extensively and CW is better in countless ways, including text size, handling of VSTs, the ability to customize CC and instrument names, the simplicity and power of audio envelopes, and of course the notation editor's speed and visibility of more information. I can go on.   CW is without doubt the most underrated DAW on the market.  And speaking of markets--CW is free.   You don't know a great value when it's staring you in the face!

JG

www.jerrygerber.com

 

 

Edited February 7, 2021 by jsg

[mdiemer]

Ok guys, shake hands and make up. This is not worth fighting about. We all look for different things in our software. what Maestro considers a strength, Jerry may see as unimportant. And vice versa. We are individuals. There is no objective, factual truth at stake here. Use what works for you. your workflow is yours and yours alone, we all use the tools differently. 

I happen to agree with Jerry that Cakewalk's staff view fits my particular workflow well. but I understand that another DAW may have a staff view that works better for Maestro, or Bitflipper, or Sid Vicious (if he's still alive). We're all just relating our own unique experiences here. Arguing about who's right or wrong is like arguing about whether the Beatles or the Stones are the greatest rock group of all time. Or if Beethoven was greater than Mozart. It's who you like best. And with DAWS, it's what works best for you.

[Jerry Gerber]

My mistake.  CW can display up to 23 staves at one time, regardless of screen size.   I wrote 18, but that's not correct.  What I'd love to see is MusicXML being able to export all tracks that contain staff view data at once.  Exporting using MIDI type 1 files works OK but it would be nice to have XML as a choice...

 

 

[InstrEd]

2 hours ago, mdiemer said:

Ok guys, shake hands and make up.

Almost agree with you here but with Covid-19 maybe they should do a virtual elbow bump

 

[InstrEd]

It would be nice if CbB did update MusicXML to version 3 support and  have both import and export.

[mdiemer]

23 minutes ago, InstrEd said:

It would be nice if CbB did update MusicXML to version 3 support and  have both import and export.

That would be great. I'm not sure though about bundling something like Muse Score with Cakewalk. If it replaced staff view, definitely not. As an additional tool, it would be wonderful. Once again, this gets at the difference between notation software and and a score editor. What Staff view is, is another way to edit, for those who prefer working with notes. for us, it's easier than PRV. But to expect it to compare favorably to true notation software is to misconstrue its purpose. Once you accept it as an editor for people who read music, all the problems go away. The fact that it doesn't always display notes correctly doesn't really matter if you're not going to print it out and send it to musicians to play. What matters is that it allows you to quickly select, cut, copy and paste any number of notes/measures. and adjust velocity, length, transpose, etc. I do all that is staff view. I also use Event List a lot. that's my workflow. It isn't right or wrong. It's just what works for me. 

I applaud the bakers for the incremental improvements they make to Staff View. mostly though, I just pray that they don't remove it. If they want to bundle muse Score, that's great. but please don't do so at the expense of one of the best (for me, the best) score editors of any DAW.

[msmcleod]

On 2/4/2021 at 12:58 PM, Frank D. Baere said:

For now I use Presonus Notion 6 and connect it to Cakewalk with Rewire. So I can work on my piano roll and follow the music position on my score in Notion.

Notion 6, Finale (v25 and above) and Sibelius all support Rewire, which I think are the top 3 scoring packages out there.
 

[Jerry Gerber]

5 hours ago, mdiemer said:

That would be great. I'm not sure though about bundling something like Muse Score with Cakewalk. If it replaced staff view, definitely not. As an additional tool, it would be wonderful. Once again, this gets at the difference between notation software and and a score editor. What Staff view is, is another way to edit, for those who prefer working with notes. for us, it's easier than PRV. But to expect it to compare favorably to true notation software is to misconstrue its purpose. Once you accept it as an editor for people who read music, all the problems go away. The fact that it doesn't always display notes correctly doesn't really matter if you're not going to print it out and send it to musicians to play. What matters is that it allows you to quickly select, cut, copy and paste any number of notes/measures. and adjust velocity, length, transpose, etc. I do all that is staff view. I also use Event List a lot. that's my workflow. It isn't right or wrong. It's just what works for me. 

I applaud the bakers for the incremental improvements they make to Staff View. mostly though, I just pray that they don't remove it. If they want to bundle muse Score, that's great. but please don't do so at the expense of one of the best (for me, the best) score editors of any DAW.

Do you have any reason to suspect that the developers would remove the staff view?  Especially after updating it and fixing longstanding bugs? 

[mdiemer]

33 minutes ago, jsg said:

Do you have any reason to suspect that the developers would remove the staff view?  Especially after updating it and fixing longstanding bugs? 

Not as long as those of us who use it who continue to be vocal about its value. I guess I'm just trying to make sure they know how much it means to those of us who consider it an indispensable part of our workflow.

[Jerry Gerber]

34 minutes ago, mdiemer said:

Not as long as those of us who use it who continue to be vocal about its value. I guess I'm just trying to make sure they know how much it means to those of us who consider it an indispensable part of our workflow.

I strongly doubt they will get rid of it. 

[Peter C]

Just putting my oar in......you know what I like about Cakewalk's score editor? It's dead easy to use and for composition/arranging it does what I want it do, i.e. put notes on score on screen and on that old-fashioned stuff they call paper. And it has worked seamlessly within the program for me.  I found Dorico too complicated and frustrating, the Cubase score editor I found a nightmare, didn't even integrate with Cubase properly, and far too complex for what I needed.  Just saying.