Suggestion for a New Entry System & Changes to Current Ones

[mactechinfo]

I have an idea for a system of entry that could be added to Logic that isn’t currently available in any software that I have used. And I have some general ideas about how to think differently about entry in Logic - to unify entry in Logic instead of having separate forms of entry such as the current real time or step time entry.

 

Before I explain my system let me explain what an ideal entry system should seek to achieve. To be effective in the modern context it should enter MIDI information that plays back well and it should also cater to the varying abilities of the performer (often keyboardist). With this goal in mind, I think that the common entry systems have significant weaknesses. Step entry deals with any weakness of the performer, but unless there is a corresponding means of recording velocity separately (and in some quasi real time way), the entered data does not play back well. Real time entry, if done at a high standard, will play back well, but even if the data to be entered in is split into smaller segments, it can still be too difficult for a non-keyboardist to create an effective performance.

 

I want to suggest that there be an entry system which is somewhere in between these systems (which I guess are at different ends of a spectrum). It seems to me that we would benefit from a type of real time entry which waits for the user. Before the user enters data there would be a visual flashing of the tempo in some form (hearing the metronome before the recording can clutter the composer's "inner music" - it does mine). The user could press a key to make the metronome sound if desired (some may find the metronome sounding to be helpful). The user can start recording at any point in their score although it would need to be at the start of a beat (not really the start of a beat but I will make things clear after I explain more). There would be no count in. Recording would commence by hitting the first note to be recorded (if the first beat being recorded started with a note) or if the first part of the first beat being entered starts with a rest the user could hit a designated MIDI note (a note out of sensible entry range) to indicate that recording should commence. Since recording had commenced the metronome would then sound each beat (although not the first beat). Recording automatically ceases when the user stops playing for a whole beat (and by that I mean a beat that has no music within it - so if the rhythm to be entered at the start of a 4/4 bar was quaver, quaver rest, quaver, quaver rest, the recording would only cease after the entire third beat of the bar was not completed, not just half of the third beat going without entry. (Logic would need to be listening right to the end of the third beat in case the performer is slower than they ought to be in striking a note). But once recording ceased it wouldn’t mean that the cursor was in the example just outlined at the start of beat 4. It would instead return to the start of beat 3 ready for further input. And what if the user wants to have a rest for beat 3 and begin entry at the start of beat 4? No work would be needed to make the playhead move to the start of beat 4 because the user could just press the “designated MIDI note”, repeatedly if necessary to enter one or more “minimum record length” rests.

 

The result of one take could be as little as one note lasting a beat or many lines of music, depending on whether the musical passage was interrupted by whole beat rests or not. Since the recording would cease wherever there was a rest for a complete beat it becomes important to consider what length a beat should be. Up to this point for the sake of making myself more easily understood I have used the term 'beat' instead of the term that is nearer - "minimum record length". If a user was recording a passage in 6/8 at a faster tempo the program could determine automatically that the minimum record length was a dotted crotchet or in the case of a very slow tempo it could choose to make it a quaver. The program could automatically set it based on assessment of the time signature and the tempo and it could be displayed on the transport bar. Now, returning to the issue I mentioned right at the beginning of explaining my entry system, if the minimum record length was determined by the program to be a dotted crotchet in 6/8 time, it would not be possible to start recording on quaver two, three, five or six of the bar, only quavers 1 and 4. If however a 4/4 bar was so slow that Logic set the minimum record length to quavers you could start recording on quaver 2, 4, 6 or 8 in addition to quavers 1, 3, 5 and 7. If Logic automatically enters rest wherever necessary it isn’t necessary to enter rests in a traditional step time way (with numeric keyboard rhythmic values).

 

The advantage as I see it of my system is it would allow the performer to record segments of music that were beyond their skills in smaller segments (and at varying tempos) without the difficulties of setting up punch in and out as with regular real time recording. It would also provide better velocity values and note lengths for playback than step time and doesn't require the entry of rhythm values.

 

To assist in entry being notated as wished for, a quantize value could be used or/and a palette could allow the user to indicate which rhythm values won't be entered at any point. Interpretation could be used as it currently is to ensure small rests are not notated when not desired.

 

I know that other programs have provided additional systems, like for example Finale’s Hyperscribe, where the user indicates where each beat comes with some kind of tempo tapping (MIDI key or sustain pedal) but the problem with these systems is they add more burdens to the performer and to be effective require some performers to vary the tempo from beat to beat which in my opinion is not easy for a musical person to do!

 

One quick aside - a couple of suggestions for how step entry should be altered to be more useful. Why not make it possible to enter rhythm values with just two keys (perhaps the up and down arrow keys). The default rhythmic value when beginning entry would be a quarter note (or crotchet for us non-Americans) and then if you want a sixteenth note (semiquaver) you would press the up arrow twice (to move from crotchet to quaver and from quaver to semiquaver) etc. Even though there would be some more key presses it wouldn’t be many more because so much music contains rhythmic values which are ‘neighbours’ of each other. Said another way, it’s more likely that if you have just entered a crotchet that the next note will if different be a quaver than a hemidemisemiquaver. And with two keys I think it would prove faster once mastered. Step entry also needs to have the ability to have velocity values retrospectively added to entered data (and real time performances should be able to have just their velocities edited as an overdub). If the numeric keypad was optionally not used for step entry rhythm values it could used to instead enter symbols during step entry - imagine a single palette of symbols from the part box being able to be entered by hitting a two digit number, the first digit being the symbol’s position on the X-axis of the palette value and the second it’s position on the Y-axis within the palette if that makes sense. While we are on the subject of symbol entry, imagine a ‘user palette’ within the part box which showed the five last used symbols from each of the current palettes within the part box. Why? Because with many pieces only a few of the symbols from palettes are being used over and over again. One final suggestion for step entry (and consistent with introducing the entry of symbols during step entry)- it would be better when, as an example, the user was entering music in 4/4 time and the first bar had been entered with say four quarter notes, that the cursor then move to the bar line between bars one and two to allow any symbols that attach to that bar line to be entered. If there are none required to be entered, no additional keystroke would be necessary to move into bar two as the entry cursor would leap to beat two of bar two if a fifth quarter note was then entered. And if in step entry Logic paused at bar lines it would, with the addition of bar forward and bar backward commands, make it possible to quickly enter all bar aligned symbols such as time signatures, key signatures, alternative bar lines (like double bars and repeat start and end bars, to be entered without using the mouse and whilst entering notes.

 

I suggest that if you include symbol entry during step entry that the user first enter a rhythm value (if it has changed) and then a pitch or pitches followed by symbol(s), with the opportunity of enter multiple symbols until the next pitch is entered (so even if a new rhythmic value was chosen symbols could be entered until the next pitch was entered).

 

I mentioned that I have thoughts on unifying entry systems. I think it would be better if music software did not present entry systems as separate entities. Instead imagine a single entry setup dialog with multiple tabs, one for metronome/rhythm, one for pitch, one for velocity, one for symbols and finally a tab for choosing record options such as replace or overdub etc. In this way all entry could be presented to the user in a unified way instead of under the traditional names and limited to the traditional user options.

 

I have mock ups for both the unified entry tabs and the symbol entry which I will send through when I get a chance.

 

All comments welcome. And anyone who has power to make change who is reading this, please feel free to use these ideas without payment or credit. I am quite sure that I won’t be making a music software program any time in the near future which would benefit from these ideas.

[musicphotosvideotech]

Well better late than never.

 

Please find a video which attempts to visualise some of my entry ideas at:

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ds9ksp826o0hqq2/Unified%20Music%20Entry%20Demo.mov

 

The video has one mistake in it. I said at one point that the Velocity tab would only appear if you choose to have No Metronome in the Metronome/Rhythm tab. Of course it should still appear when you are using a metronome because even if you are doing a kind of real time recording you still need to be able to set how sensitively Logic would react to your striking of the keys or whether all notes you enter should have the same velocity or be derived from a template etc.

[musicphotosvideotech]

And please also find a video which visualises my ideas for symbol entry at:

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/x9uaegzml7x0hg3/Symbol%20Entry.mov

 

By the way, I mention that it would be able to enter information at each bar line point in step entry. As part of this capability it would be good to be able to jump a bar forward and a bar backward from bar line to bar line to enable fast entry of symbols at the bar line points.