music
13 messages in this thread
Jeff,
Hello and welcome. Music capabilities played a large part in my
decision to go with the Amiga also. I compose ( when time allows ) for
small choral groups, vocal + (acoustic) instrument ensembles, and
combinations of the two… plus occasionally for brass quartet or trio.
While I do occasionally make submissions to publishers, that aspect is not
particularly important to me.
I'm always on the lookout for good lyrics. Haven't ever actually
collaborated with anyone, but of course there's always a first.
Dr. T's Copyist is real good for production of sheet music, scores, etc.
It is, however, copy-protected, which prevents me from giving it a 100%
endorsement. There are several good sequencer programs available, but they
all require some real-time keyboard performance technique ( not as much as
a tape recorder, however ). Deluxe Music Construction Set from Electrionic
Arts is an acceptable music input + feedback program for those of us who
are notation-oriented; I have had pretty good success composing in DMCS
and exporting the results to Copyist for addition of texts, dynamic
markings, etc, and printing. ( An 8 1/2 x 11 page of music takes about 12
minutes on a Panasonic KXP1091i. I'm saving up for a Laser printer… )
One other program you should definitely check out is Bars & Pipes, from
Blue Ribbon Bakery. I was very impressed by the demo version, which I
tried a while back. If I had more $$$, I'd have got the real version by
now….
Good luck to you in your efforts !
| _ |_>
\_|.<_.|.
What do you think of Sonix?
Can't say I have any opinion as I've never used it. Some folks have, and
have had good success from what I've heard, but maybe one of them will be
able to respond to you….(hint, hint)
| _ |_>
\_|.<_.|.
Sonix is frustrating to use, but can yield some beautiful results compared
to DMCS. It also has a stand-alone player, so you can play Sonix tunes
without buying Sonix (unlike DMCS).
-tc
Terry,
There is a player available for DMCS files that have been saved from DMCS
in SMUS format. (menu option) It's called DPLAY and is here in DL7 as
DPLAY.ZOO. It does a fair job of playing the files – better than
AmigaVision's player, but not as good as DMCS itself. It does trash
location zero, though, in the process.
To the best of my knowledge, you are correct in that there is not a player
that will play DMCS files in native mode.
David
The problem with AmigaVision's player is that they assume that SMUS files
are generated under the concept that each SMUS track is assigned to a
different audio channel, which is the way SMUS was really originally
conceived. (That way you can take advantage of the stereo for effects and
similar things, and the music will generally sound better in stereo
anyway.)
DMCS, on the other hand, doesn't believe in such things, and the concept
of stereo is totally foreign to it. DMCS allocates a play channel on a
note by note basis, so you get voices which shift back and forth (although
when you stick with a four voice score, the shifts are often, but not
always, aligned with instrument changes…) and no stereo effect, and you
can play a score with more than four notes at the same time, and it will
just drop the extras. It pretty much assumes that SMUS players work the
same way, so it creates SMUS files to fit it's own personality, and that is
why most SMUS players don't like DMCS SMUS files that much.
–>Steve Bennett
Steve,
What you say is true, but, since DMCS is such a common program, one would
think that the player could at least make a good effort to handle the
format. With the exception of the shifting notes between channels that's
really a function of the Amiga hardware, most modern multi-timbral
synthesizers use a method similar to DMCS to handle extra notes.
The concept of chorded notes, though, is definitely in the SMUS spec. The
limitation of some SMUS programs to one note/track, while understandable
for the reason that you mention, is not a requirement of the spec.
I'm looking forward to the Bars & Pipes Multi-Media Kit, myself. That way,
I won't be worrying about SMUS and/or implementation problems in AV. 8)
David
The Multi-Media Kit for Bars&Pipes is shipping. The first boxes went out
last week. Call your dealers!
Melissa,
Thanks for the info that the Multi_Media Kit is shipping. I'll be watching
for it. 8)
One question, though. Will the MIDI player be able to play sampled
instruments (i.e. use AmigoPhone)? I know that the name would seem to
indicate otherwise, but, I'm hoping, since there's a real need. The SMUS
players just don't seem to be able to give the consistency and quality
necessary for top notch presentations. If it's not in the package now,
please consider it for the future.
David
At this time, the MIDI player plays only via MIDI. However, don't be
surprised to see a Multi-Media Kit II in the future. We want to keep up to
date with our users' need and the latest multi-media applications.
Yes, chorded notes were indeed included in the SMUS spec, primarily to be
used with MIDI, which is another of the original concepts in SMUS. (Not
that it did MIDI particularly well, IMHO. On the other hand, I don't think
ANYONE has defined a proper score format with MIDI in mind yet.)
–>Steve Bennett
Standard MIDI File Format (sometimes called either SMF or MMF) isn't bad.
Copyist will import from it acceptably, or so they say. I've been hoping
that somebody will write a(n) MFF player for the Amiga. There's a lot of
music available in MFF.
We'll have to see if Blue Ribbon Bakery has any surprises up their sleeve
in Bars & Pipes Professional. 8)
My problem with MFF, and indeed just about any MIDI scoring/sequencing
format, is it doesn't seperate the instrument from the music. So when you
want to play this nice song you downloaded which was created on some Roland
keyboard, and you have a Yamaha keyboard, it doesn't work very well without
a lot of tweaking.
Ideally, a score format should reference different instrument sounds by
their names, or by a number in a lookup table, so that all one needs to do
to *play* the score is describe his own instrument setup to the player,
which need only be done once. SMUS is close in that it handles this kind
of thing properly for internal style instruments, but then they went and
did MIDI all wrong, IMHO.