Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by Prime Mover »

Call me ignorant, but I never knew you could change the numbering of the first bar! I'd love to start at -3, so the tune begins on bar 1. How do I change that?
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by Schweats »

Pull down on the 'Project' menu > choose 'Set Chunk Start' and type in your desired
bar ,real time, and Smpte time preferences… and of course, save to any or all of your templates and tunes/files in progress. Also, when starting from a negative number, take in to account that when choosing the number of free bars prior to Bar 1, remember bar 0 should be included…


HTH - Schweats
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by zuul-studios »

Very cool to read that I'm not alone in using the first couple of measures for CC#s. It's been a habit of mine since I've been MIDI-sequencing (since the late 1980s). I guess old habits are hard to die.

(By the way, you all share a wealth of information. I do mostly lurking here. I lurk, read and learn. Just want to say, "thanks". )
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by Armageddon »

I honestly can't remember when the last time I dedicated a blank bar to a CC#, certainly not since going 100 percent VI and no longer using outboard gear. Before that, though, my main concern was patch changes -- something that always seemed to happen without glitches and therefore not necessary with DP (even back in the days of DP 3) -- or beat clocks, which was almost ALWAYS an issue with DP and my various drum machines for one reason or another, it seemed. I recall adding a blank bar to my projects using earlier sequencers and non-MOTU MIDI interfaces (specifically, anything going in through the dreaded Apple serial port), but it hasn't been an issue for years.
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by rhythm_kitchen »

We were programming the DX Drum machine to FSK pulses back in 82-83? I'm trying to recall. The FSK pulse was recorded onto the 16 track and the DX sequence started immediately.

But you had to rewind for each drum edit. (Now I remember. 1 bar for nothing and we recorded the click to tape. If there was flam between the DX MIDI click and the track we could suck or add ticks)

Song Position pointer arrives (what a relief) then MTC. DX-7. Casio CZ-1, Roland JX-10. JL Cooper hardware. Memory lane.

So there was a bar for nothing prior to the countoff (click track) because you could not suck out ticks, only add the other way. Then later, if you were locking to S/MPTE usually the 1st bar was the sync up, bar 2 the actual countoff began.

What if you have to send sysex data to a Waldorf Synth for example prior to first chord? Retuning a synth that doesn't support alternate tunings? Probably a good idea to continue.

Also for archival purposes later, sysex ID# & data, track notes. Even with ADATs and a BRC is what a good idea to print a 2 pop to adjust MIDI-Audio flam.

But now with MIDI note following enabled, probably S/MPTE-MTC lag would occur in mS rather than ticks, so beat 1/1/-2 of the countoff is still audible.

What I'd like to know is how to deal with a coda mid song without tempo & meter changes in song mode? Chunk mode back in 2.7.2 wasn't the place to do this as you couldn't butt subsequences up against one another without glitching the audio.

In Vision, we gave up watching the transport bar or Big Clock. We cued to the event list editor after edits were made. You had to be right on the CRT and for guitarists the pickup hum made this very difficult.

Hey thanks for the tip on setting the start point.
Last edited by rhythm_kitchen on Wed Jul 04, 2012 12:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by James Steele »

Kubi wrote:Yeah, at least 4 bars empty for me, if not more. For the most part I work on film, and have each sequence be the full length of the reel. So I'll often have literally hundreds of measures empty before music start. This way I can accommodate changes easily like starting the music earlier, or extending, or repeating, without having to resort to major math. I set the sequence to the general tempo of the cue, and if I need to fine-tune start times in relation to meter and tempo, I'll insert meter changes or tempo changes as needed into the academy leader at the top of the reel, so that the music and picture start on the beat I want them to.
Yeah... after reading these posts I decided I need at least one more empty bar. Also, I know a lot of local bands that are playing to backing tracks and they start with a recorded vocal count with a voice saying "one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight." Drummer wears earbuds and starts stick count off on 5, 6, 7, 8. The vocal guide assures that if the backing tracks are cued less than perfectly, beat 2 of a measure isn't mistake for beat 1.

Scares the hell out of me playing along with pre-recorded keyboard parts, but when you have only 3-4 out of 10 songs with keys, do you hire a keyboard player to go sit down on 7 out of 10 songs or so?
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by rickorick »

You get somebody like me. I play keys and a little
guitar,CAGED, to cover some rhythm parts.
To bad I live on the East Coast I'd help you out.
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by Buzzy »

Thanks a lot rhythm kitchen, I've been trying to put all that out of my head for a decade. :banghead:

About the only thing you missed was the recording of test tones. My first analog tape deck had a capstan motor problem very soon after I bought it and as luck would have it I had recorded a test tone at the beginning of one song. With that tone I was able to pitch change that reel on the replacement deck without issue. It then became standard practice to record a test tone before every song! I'm glad to say THAT practice ended once I abandoned tape recording.
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by James Steele »

rickorick wrote:You get somebody like me. I play keys and a little
guitar,CAGED, to cover some rhythm parts.
To bad I live on the East Coast I'd help you out.
Appreciated! :) Only problem is I need keys and the rhythm parts at the same time! How many arms do you have? LOL
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by James Steele »

rhythm_kitchen wrote:We were programming the DX Drum machine to FSK pulses back in 82-83? I'm trying to recall. The FSK pulse was recorded onto the 16 track and the DX sequence started immediately.

But you had to rewind for each drum edit. (Now I remember. 1 bar for nothing and we recorded the click to tape. If there was flam between the DX MIDI click and the track we could suck or add ticks)

Song Position pointer arrives (what a relief) then MTC. DX-7. Casio CZ-1, Roland JX-10. JL Cooper hardware. Memory lane.
Right there with you. I started out with a Roland MPU-401 interface and an IBM PC clone running DOS 1.0 and a text based app called Robert Keller's 48 track PC. Later I got Cakewalk 1.0. And yep... you had a pilot tone and then the sync tone with FSK. You had to rewind and start from the beginning each time! :( I think I switched over to a Mac SE with 20MG hard drive that set me back $2500 back then. I took out a loan. Had a JamBox 4+ interface with the modded chip that Glenn Workman sold so I could get 4 independent MIDI outputs. Also SMPTE... hooray! No more rewinding to the beginning of the song.

That's also when I first tried Vision and really liked it. Performer was great too, but if you were playing back MIDI while sync'd to tape with SMPTE, opening an edit window during playback on the Mac SE could cause playback to lurch. Vision back then was much more efficent.

You guys all know me as a diehard DP guy, but Studio Vision Pro really came close to tempting me away. I had them both for a while. Then Gibson... :(
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by buzzsmith »

James Steele wrote: Scares the hell out of me playing along with pre-recorded keyboard parts, but when you have only 3-4 out of 10 songs with keys, do you hire a keyboard player to go sit down on 7 out of 10 songs or so?
Sounds like my kind of gig! :woohoo:

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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by mhschmieder »

I had the same dilemma in my 80's band (which has yet again had a last-minute cancellation, so now it's been 2 years since we last gigged, but I am gigging 6-10 times a month with my jazz combo so am quite busy).

I tried to do as much live keyboard playing as possible while also holding down the fort on bass. We never found a reliable/available person who could cover both guitar and keys. So I did backing tracks for up to 25% of our songs.

As these were for live playback of a stereo mixdown vs. film or production work, or live multi-track playback, an odd count-off didn't matter. All that mattered was that the drummer was confident when to start and/or when to cue anyone for the intro (e.g. a song that leads with a guitar part).

We ended up having an initial empty bar to avoid cut-off on iPod-based playback systems, one bar of vocal announcement of the song title to avoid screw-ups with that non-ergonomic "dial" on the iPod's "control surface", and either two or three bars of count-off (which I have described in other posts regarding beat divisions and sound sources).

If a guitar or other instrument comes in on a pickup note, I generally give an additional count-off bar, as we found that most players need at least two FULL bars to internalize the tempo and play cleanly when they come in (especially if the drums come in later).

That's not really relevant to the main discussion, of course, which is more about how DP performs regarding tempo stability and avoiding audio and VI glitches, but since it came up, I'm just mentioning our own best Practices in the context of Backing Tracks.

I think I am going to bump up my count-in length on regular projects based on this discussion, as I have indeed noticed occasional glitches that can only be explained by needing a certain amount of time for stabilization of audio.
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by James Steele »

I'm eager to get pointers from those who have done it. I hear of bands doing this with iPods, but lacking a special audio interface, I'm assuming you're having to just use "stereo" and have a mono mix on one channel and then click on the other channel, yes? I suppose stereo isn't going to buy much in a PA application anyway.
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Re: Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by mhschmieder »

Yeah, the only dedicated device I know of that has multiple outs is the Roland/Edirol R4, and stereo doesn't buy you much in most venues anyway since most people will experience phase issues unless they're in an ideal spot.

The "dream" is four channels of output on playback, with an ideal stereo setup at the gig. Two channels for stereo backing track audio; one channel for the drummer's click and mono cue track, and a slightly more specialized mono cue track for the lead singer.

The "reality" is two channels: one channel for the drummer's cue and click (and the song title announcement to prevent the wrong song starting unawares), and one channel for a mono fold-down of the audio backing tracks.

Although this is way OT, I also found early on that it is best to avoid, as much as possible, sounds with low frequency content in the backing tracks and prioritize those for live playing, as low frequencies use the most energy and cause the most imbalances from song to song or venue to venue.
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Do you still dedicate the first measure to CC# etc?

Post by James Steele »

Yes... I should open another topic for this. Thanks for the info.
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