I just have to know...

[Static Strobe Emitter]

Am I the only one here making music (software based) without
a MIDI synth? =/

[seraph]

[elektro80]

Hmm.. you actually mean a synth with no midi? Sure, I have some old crap around I love that does not have midi at all. That said, some of the synths here do have midi too, but I rarely use midi. The softsynths do however all have midi, and it is pretty amazing how my DAW can record midi performance data. Midi is promising technology. One day it will be the next hot thing!

[Kassen]

I use both hardware and software, some of that hardware has midi, some doesn´t. My primary use for midi is the midi clock to sync up Live´s paterns to the Nord´s paterns. Midi has some weaknesses that make it unsuitable for my music most of the time, especially in how it deals with polyphony and controll of notes. Sometimes I´ll work purely on a sample based level for more detailed controll.


What are you using, Static Strobe?

[Ponk]

I don't know if I count as someone making music (), but I don't use MIDI. I use Buzz.

[blue hell]

Depends.

Midi sequencing and cubase & stuff don't work for me - tools like those make me feel bored before I finish anything.

Sometiimes I just use CoolEdit and some sounds which may be as simple as a drawn wave form or as complex as a recording of something.

For noodles I don't really use midi either, midi is used just as an internal communications bus in the G2 then. Sometimes when two G2's are involved some midi might be exchanged through real cables though, controller information mosly.

Softsynths have never worked on any of my computers, except for some trivial models.

Anyway I think it's more sculpturing what I do than making music.

Jan.

[Static Strobe Emitter]

I think i was a little diffuse in my first message,
what I meant was:

Am I the only one sitting and clicking out every single
note on the pattern sheets with my mouse?

I thought most composers sat and played on their synths
right into their composer program instead of just clicking
them out with the mouse

but maybe I was wrong ;D

[elektro80]

That would be the "piano roll" interface?

I often edit small stuff in either the notation editor or in the piano roll editor in Cubase. That is quick and easy and it all depends on what I am actually trying to do. A lot of the voices I just record live, and keep doing so until the performance is OK. some of voices that are supposed to be vintage analog sequencers or digital step sequencer stuff, I just write in using the notation editor and later I edit certain stuff in the piano roll view. I still have the MSQ 100s and the 300s, the MSQ 700, the MMT8 and the MC8.. and then some Formant style sequencers and of course the old Phonosoc. I haven´t used them for years. Cubase is cool.

The notation editor is cool. You can write the sheet music in there.. and then read it while you record. That beats turning those pages manually.

[elektro80]

I mainly record the lot as audio more or less directly, so I am rarely "changing the sounds" on the midi tracks. Cubase is an excellent multitrack taperecorder with built in midi and oldstyle sequencing tools. A tad more advanced than the Waveterm.

[seraph]

[blue hell]

right ... how to write down notes ...

I don't, because writing is too hard and reading back is impossible. Just like programming a computer in C, best to avoid it.

But otoh I gues I do write notes as I do have some concept of numbers that "go together", like twelve and nineteen & some modulo five or seven stuff that will be alright then. Modulo 2, 3 and 9 are ok as well but harder to fit in when going recursive, but can give pleasant tension when not going too deep into recursion.

Sometimes I simply need 6, 8 or 10 for reasons I don't quite understand. 1 and 11 are very very hard (hardder than 4/5 or 5/4I) , 12 and especially 0 is just boring.

Sequences are usefull, like 0, 2, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, this combines with the numbers 3 and 7 ok, less with 5. Other sequences need other combinations, its a bit like a puzzle.

I write numbers and sequences like these out into rulles, in the language the synth understands which is modules and wires & knobs and then I adjust until it works for me - others say I'm out of tune sometimes, but that doesn't really worry me.

This inumber scheme thing is easier and more flexible for me than the "traditional scribble", but I must confess that I don't have a notion of the benifits of the traditional method .... since I was ten or so people have tried to hammer it in, but it doesn't work ... and I don't care about it anymore ...

Jan.

[Kassen]

[Static Strobe Emitter]

I havent used a MIDI synth over the past 7 years,
and sadly enough im getting used to it

I dont even think i can play "twinkle little star" on a synth anymore ;D

the last time i used a synth was at school were they used Cubase,
but when i finished school ive never bothered getting one, and
just continuing my tracking in Protracker, and then getting on to
the sequencers

[elektro80]

This thread is actually touching upon issues we could discuss in the Composition forum. It seems to me that we might need some sort of clarification of current traditions in "serious music". All you guys are actually working and writing music in a way that actually does conform 100% with the serious way of doing things.
Using a term like serious in this context is of course laughable, but it has come to be an accepted term within the academic music circles for "proper music" vs. how the lesser gifted are making their music. Large parts of this is mythology and the truth about how things really are will probably be a good thing.

[Static Strobe Emitter]

Elektro has a good point here

I must say, I dont really know what to define as "unserious" music making :O

If someone clicked on a Button and a Program automatically generated
a music track for you, that might be unserious. but nothing more what
I can think of now.

[mosc]

I guess, stirctly speaking, I use MIDI all of the time. Even when I'm improvising on a keyboard in a blues style, I'm playing with my fingers on one keyboard and making sounds on the other using MIDI as an interconnection. I rarely record MIDI like I did in the 1980s any more.

I never compose clicking notes and events with the mousc. I work almost always in an improvised fashion, whether with notes or straight with electronic sounds from my synths.

[play]

midi is nearly unavoidable. I use buzz too but still use midi to interface with other apps. No hardware synths for me. I do probably about half of my work internally in reaktor manipulating floating point data streams. I'm a big an of reaktors samplers that allow playback by ramp oscillation (or whatever, usually whatever) controlling position in sample in milliseconds. Not a big fan of hardware synths or drum machines. I'd rather use a tracker. I do have a theremin though. Lots of fun.

[diskonext]

I'm really on-offish about actually playing the keys to record stuff.

I do a lot of loop-based stuff which merely requires a lot of tweaking of parameters (in Reaktor, or Live or wherever) until it sounds right. I might add some twiddling of knobs and recording that as well.

On the other hand, to break out of the mold I sometimes improvise with beats and synthsounds via my (MIDI-)keyboard for 2-3 minutes, usually accompanied by a metronome or a simple beat+hat pattern and cut out the most promising parts, and then fine-tune those sounds. It usually ends up as a static x0x-style pattern again, however.

-diskonext

[LoKi]

[Dovdimus Prime]

Wow! I completely missed this thread!

Yes, I write every note with the mouse in piano roll. Other than playing an instrument, which I'm not really able to do, I don't understand what the alternatives are.

I'm perfectly happy with things the way they are. The tunes end up sounding how I want them to. What more could I want?

[Kassen]