Midi files in Logic

[kenrob2037]

Hi All,

I'm running Logic 10.7.6. When I drop a midi file into Logic, it assigns the instruments and its associated plugins. See attached. Is there any to drop a midi file into Logic and have no instruments of plugins assigned?

Also, does anyone know how to strip away all articulations, velocity and such and just leave the notes from a midi file?

My midi files come from Sibelius.

Best

 

Rob

Edited January 28, 2023 by kenrob2037

[des99]

13 minutes ago, kenrob2037 said:

Is there any to drop a midi file into Logic and have no instruments of plugins assigned?

Maybe if you turn Core Audio off before hand, so plugins aren't available?

I haven't checked, but the behaviour used to differ if you load/import midifiles, over just dragging them into the arrange, but I'm not sure what the current situation is.

14 minutes ago, kenrob2037 said:

Also, does anyone know how to strip away all articulations, velocity and such and just leave the notes from a midi file?

You can create your own MIDI transform set to select and delete all the MIDI data you want, then you can just select all the regions and run that process to delete everything you don't want.

[kenrob2037]

30 minutes ago, des99 said:

Maybe if you turn Core Audio off before hand, so plugins aren't available?

I haven't checked, but the behaviour used to differ if you load/import midifiles, over just dragging them into the arrange, but I'm not sure what the current situation is.

You can create your own MIDI transform set to select and delete all the MIDI data you want, then you can just select all the regions and run that process to delete everything you don't want.

Hi,
I have tried to remove all the velocity and such data in midi transform, it does not work with a Sibelius midi file for some reason. The only way to get rid of the midi velocity is to go into the List Editor and one by one remove the velocity values in there. And that's not practical.

Never thought about core audio in Sibelius; I'll give it a go and see what happens.

Thanks,
Rob

[des99]

No, turn off Core Audio in Logic before you import the files.

I don’t know what you mean by “remove all velocity”, which is not a thing you can do. Did you mean you want to flatten out the velocity of all notes to a fixed value, like 100? This is easily done in MIDI Transform and is exactly the right tool for this task.

It will work fine, but if you’re not sure how to do this, or how to use this window, then I can go into more details if you can clearly specify exactly what you want to do.

Edited January 29, 2023 by des99

[Jordi Torres]

1 hour ago, des99 said:

Maybe if you turn Core Audio off before hand, so plugins aren't available?

Apparently with Core Audio disabled it will fall back to placing the content on External MIDI tracks, and in that case might as well just hold down the Option key while drag and dropping the MIDI file into Logic.

As for removing unwanted MIDI data from multiple regions at once, 100% agree with @des99 that the MIDI Transform window is the best tool for that task.

J. 

Edited January 29, 2023 by Jordi Torres

[des99]

9 minutes ago, Jordi Torres said:

Apparently with Core Audio disabled it will fall back to placing the content on External MIDI tracks, and in that case might as well just hold down the Option key while drag and dropping the MIDI file into Logic.

Yes, both solutions for stopping Logic from loading plugins when importing MIDIfiles. Thanks for the memory jog about the use of the Option key in this case too... 👍

[kenrob2037]

19 minutes ago, des99 said:

No, turn off Core Audio in Logic before you import the files.

I don’t know what you mean by “remove all velocity”, which is not a thing you can do. Did you mean you want to flatten out the velocity of all notes to a fixed value, like 100? This is easily done in MIDI Transform and is exactly the right tool for this task.

It will work fine, but if you’re not sure how to do this, or use this window, then I can go into more details if you can clearly specify exactly what you want to do.

Ah, core audio in Logic, not Sibelius, OK, I'll try that. 

I've tried it many times, A Sibelius midi file can not have the velocities changed in Logic through Midi Transform. If I select all notes and adjust them to 1, it says it is at 1, the colour has changed to purple, but it makes no difference to the velocity when any note is played, they all sound at the original volume. I have not tried this with another midi file, only one from Sibelius.

[des99]

8 minutes ago, kenrob2037 said:

A Sibelius midi file can not have the velocities changed in Logic through Midi Transform.

No, this is not a thing. MIDI data is just MIDI data, and you can manipulate it in Logic without problems. Maybe if you want to document what you are doing, with screenshots, we can point out what's going on...

But "A Sibelius midi file can not have the velocities changed in Logic through Midi Transform" is not a valid statement. There is nothing special about MIDI notes generated in Sibelius, over MIDI notes generatd by any other method - it's all just MIDI note data, with a time, a note value, and a note-on velocity.

8 minutes ago, kenrob2037 said:

If I select all notes and adjust them to 1, it says it is at 1, the colour has changed to purple, but it makes no difference to the velocity when any note is played, they all sound at the original volume.

How it *sounds* depends on what the velocity is actually doing on the playback instruments. If you change a notes velocity to 1, it's velocity will be 1. There could of course be realtime MIDI region parameters additionally being applied on playback (check your MIDI region parameters). But how it *sounds* will depend on how the instrument *responds* to velocity. Eg, an organ is not typically an instrument that is touch-sensitive, so it doesn't matter what velocities you change the notes to, all the notes will *sound* at the same volume, by default.

Edited January 29, 2023 by des99

[kenrob2037]

5 minutes ago, des99 said:

No, this is not a thing. MIDI data is just MIDI data, and you can manipulate it in Logic without problems. Maybe if you want to document what you are doing, with screenshots, we can point out what's going on...

But "A Sibelius midi file can not have the velocities changed in Logic through Midi Transform" is not a valid statement. There is nothing special about MIDI notes generated in Sibelius, over MIDI notes generatd by any other method - it's all just MIDI note data, with a time, a note value, and a note-on velocity.

How it *sounds* depends on what the velocity is actually doing on the playback instruments. If you change a notes velocity to 1, it's velocity will be 1. There could of course be realtime MIDI region parameters additionally being applied on playback (check your MIDI region parameters). But how it *sounds* will depend on how the instrument *responds* to velocity. Eg, an organ is not typically an instrument that is touch-sensitive, so it doesn't matter what velocities you change the notes to, all the notes will *sound* at the same volume, by default.

OK. I export a midi file from Sibelius. It does not matter what export option I select; there are more than 50 different options, I've even tried general midi, it makes no difference.

But here's the thing I didn't say, If I use a Logic instrument, changing the velocity works, but if I use a third party vst, changing the velocity does nothing. Is this normal?

[des99]

9 minutes ago, kenrob2037 said:

If I use a Logic instrument, changing the velocity works, but if I use a third party vst, changing the velocity does nothing.

You need to separate some things - changing the velocity is simply changing the data. This will always work.

The audible effect of what happens when you change the velocity is solely dependent on the instrument that is playing back the notes. If that instrument ignores velocity, then it doesn't matter what the velocity of the notes is, it will just be ignored. See again my organ example.

So *which* third-party instrument isn't responding to velocity, and what sound are you using? When you play on a keyboard, does that same instrument/sound respond to velocity as you play?

Edited January 29, 2023 by des99

[kenrob2037]

1 minute ago, des99 said:

You need to separate some things - changing the velocity is simply changing the data. This will always work.

The audible effect of what happens when you change the velocity is solely dependent on the instrument that is playing back the notes. If that instrument ignores velocity, then it doesn't matter what the velocity of the notes is, it will just be ignored. See again my organ example.

So *which* third-party instrument isn't responding to velocity, and what sound are you using? When you play on a keyboard, does that same instrument/sound respond to velocity as you play?

I have tried this with PianoTeq, Vienna Instruments, all Kontakt instruments and many others. When I use a third party VST, I cannot change the velocity via midi transform on any instrument. 

I can change the velocity if I draw a curve in (MIDI VOLUME) via automation through a midi controller. That's how I get around the issue.

Cheers,

Rob

[des99]

5 minutes ago, kenrob2037 said:

I cannot change the velocity via midi transform on any instrument. 

So does this mean that the note data's velocity doesn't change (ie, you're doing something wrong using MIDI Transform), or the note's velocity *does* change, but your playback instruments don't seem to recognise the different note velocities?

One thing at a time - use MIDI Transform to set all note velocities to 1. Now look at those regions in the event editor. Are the notes all set to a velocity of 1, or any they unchanged?

It sounds to me like you're not using MIDI Transform succesfully, and thus are probably not changing the notes at all - hence when you use a different tool to change the note velocities, it works.

As I said above, I'm happy to go through the MIDI Transform window with you if you're specific about what you are trying to do.

Edited January 29, 2023 by des99

[kenrob2037]

3 minutes ago, des99 said:

So does this mean that the note data's velocity doesn't change (ie, you're doing something wrong using MIDI Transform), or the note's velocity *does* change, but your playback instruments don't seem to recognise the different note velocities?

One thing at a time - use MIDI Transform to set all note velocities to 1. Now look at those regions in the event editor. Are the notes all set to a velocity of 1, or any they unchanged?

It sounds to me like you're not using MIDI Transform succesfully, and thus are probably not changing the notes at all - hence when you use a different tool to change the note velocities, it works.

As I said above, I'm happy to go through the MIDI Transform window with you if you're specific about what you are trying to do.

I checked the note velocities in the piano roll, it says they are set to 1. But sound at around 75. It is simply the third party VSTs I use that do not work, but as mentioned, I get around that through volume automation. 

In screenshot 1. You can see how I have adjusted the velocity to 1, all notes are coloured purple. The event list in screenshot 2, it shows the selected note is at 1, but it sounds at 75.

 

Any thoughts?

Best
Rob

[des99]

16 minutes ago, kenrob2037 said:

I checked the note velocities in the piano roll, it says they are set to 1.

Ok, great. Looks good, so the data is being changed, so we know that's working. Sibelius-exported data can be changed without problems, just as any MIDI data can.

Just to make sure, check you're not adding, compressing or changing the velocities in the MIDI region playback parameters; for example, if you have +74 set for velocity, then 74 will be added to the velocities of the notes as they are played back.

16 minutes ago, kenrob2037 said:

But sound at around 75.

Ok, how they *sound* is down to those instruments' response to velocity, and the volume they are set at. Remember, the audio effect of velocity changes is entirely down to the playback instrument. There is no absolute "it sounds like 75". For example, if you turn down the Kontakt volume really quiet, a velocity of 127 will sound very quiet. Consequently, if we turn up the volume of Kontakt way up, a velocity of 1 will sound super loud. It's up to you to adjust the balance on instruments as required.

(If you use some other tool to turn the velocities down, they won't go lower than 1, so their effect is no different - it's just different ways of changing the data to the same values.)

Also, you may have an instrument loaded into Kontakt that has no velocity modulators, and so doesn't change in response to note velocities? I asked you if this particular instrument plays as you expect when you play via the keyboard.

If you have an expectation that "velocity" is some absolute thing that always controls "volume" and always in the same way across different instruments, that's not what velocity is, or does. It's *typically* used to control volume, but doesn't necessarily control volume (it could control the filter, or play different layers of sounds etc), and there are a range of processes that affect the resultant sound for any note played with a given velocity. MIDI says "this note was played at a velocity of 40", but what the instrument does with that is not an absolute - it could vary patch by patch sound by sound, library by library, and instrument by instrument.

Or if you are saying that with a velocity of 1, the instrument is not quiet enough, then turn the instrument down so 1 *is* roughly the same volume you want it to be.

Edited January 29, 2023 by des99

[Dewdman42]

The sibelius file must have CC7 data in it and you are conflating velocity with CC7 midi volume.

 

[rAC]

I think that OP needs to give us screen shot or two of the inspector view of instrument that is loaded on the track, and (as Kontact has been mentioned) the Kontact settings (or the pianoteq ones) something odd seems to be happening. I’m alsó looking at the initial screenshot which shows a number of effect slots filled on the instrument there. AFAIK importing a MIDI file won’t add them so those may be doing something to the sound.