Music Roll Editing Programs
By David Wasson
Hi Mark,
This is in response to your asking for input for features to include in your music roll editing program. First let me say that I will look forward with much enthusiasm to a release of a first version.
I hope the roll will be viewed with the notes displayed vertically instead of horizontally and that the time would likewise go from top to bottom of the screen like a real music roll. This would also allow the screen to be used more effectively so that a maximum of holes could be displayed at once.
Some of the "snap" features in programs like Cakewalk's roll view would be a good feature.
It would be nice to be able to assign any MIDI note name to any hole position.
An adjustable grid that is in the background to indicate bars and beats for time reference. This "time grid" must be able to follow meter changes. The grid should also reflect tempo changes so that beats become closer together as the tempo increases.
Another grid, maybe using colors to allow identification of note names more intuitively. Maybe naturals white and sharps grey. Or playing note areas in groups of eight positions to represent naturals and the sharps falling in their respective positions. Having twelve equally spaced positions shows only relative pitch, and makes actual note name identification difficult. I have a program that does this well, I can send you a printout of it's roll view.
Play back should scroll like a real music roll. It must be able to properly follow tempo maps.
A small keyboard displayed at the top would avoid or augment the use of an external keyboard. I do almost all of my arrangements in step record. I use my left hand to pick note durations from the computer keyboard and my right hand with the mouse to pick the pitch from the miniature keyboard at the top of the screen.
Some of the hole positions need to have the ability to assign a textual identification to it instead of a note name. For instance "Snare Drum" instead of C#3 or "Violins On" instead of D4.
It would be nice to have a program that I could custom tailor to my specific needs. I have a sequencer program that does most of this but certainly not all. It was originally written for the Atari. The program's name is The Final Cut. It was finally ported for MSDOS but has not been upgraded since 1992 and the programmer is not interested in doing any more upgrades. I continue to use it because of it's great "roll view". All my arrangements are done using this software. Complicated editing I do with Cakewalk for DOS, Cakewalk for Windows and Opcode's Vision. I need to use all four of these programs because each has something the other does not. I long for the single program that will do it all. Most of the problems stem from the fact that most of the people that write these programs have never even seen a tracker bar. My first 150 tunes were all done on a "silent" drafting board that I built and then the holes were all cut out by hand. I, and many others, have doing music in "step time" long before MIDI was invented. MIDI has a lot of good things to offer for the "draftsman" music arranger and composer. All we need to find is a sympathetic programmer (like Jody Kravitz) who will listen long enough to help us out. Hope this helps.
Sincerely,
David F. Wasson
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(Message sent Thu 11 Apr 1996, 03:14:17 GMT, from time zone GMT-0700.) |
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