Selection of MIDI notes in MIDI editor

[Shooshie]

Thanks for explaining yourself, wtcmusician. There was a moment where I have to admit that I wondered if you were a Logic troll. Yeah, they do exist; they find some feature that works differently between DP and Logic, then they come here and try to get as many people sympathizing as possible, and then they lower the boom: "DP sucks, because it doesn't work like Logic!"

Ok, I didn't think that at first, or I wouldn't have even participated in the thread. So forgive me for having a moment of doubt there a post or two back. Now that you have explained yourself, I can see that it would be in your best interest to have a preference for that. My fear is that the DP project manager would make that the default-and-only way, and that would devastate me.

I think I could explain why that just wouldn't work for me, but it would probably be the most boring post you ever read, and for no particular reason other than "proving" that I have a good point, which I do and which you can trust without such proof.

But let's do take one more example:

• I also work a lot in piano parts that are performed at a Yamaha Disklavier, recorded by others or myself without regard for how they are going to be handled in MIDI. So, when I open them in MIDI, I have to make sense of them. VERY often, the note I want is nested in the middle of other notes sustaining around it. It's very nice to know that I can drag over those notes and NOT get them, while highlighting that little note that may be completely hidden underneath. This is not uncommon in piano performance. The pianist uses the pedal to turn that note into a long sustained note. You've got to be able to drag over a pile of notes to retrieve that one small (but loud and important) note underneath them all.

Maybe that better illustrates my point for you.

The bottom line is that having only the note ON as your pickup point gives you more selection leverage. It's like having the ability to ignore other notes at will, and you learn to use it that way.

I have always thought that Logic and Pro Tools were amateurish in their MIDI approach. That's from someone whose bread & butter was in my ability to stay ahead of everyone else, always getting things done and having the next thing ready to go before anyone else could even think of it. When I worked in other DAWs, I could see that my speed was going to be greatly hampered by their programming. That wasn't the only thing, by any means, but it was an important one.

But having made my case multiple times, I do understand that different people have different ways. While your way would be sloppy to me, it may be comfortable for you. Who am I to say that you shouldn't have your comfort? My only request is that if anyone ever DOES change it to your way, that they please make it a preference option and not override our time-tested DP methods. That would truly be devastating.

Shooshie

[stubbsonic]

Something you might find controversial is that while I understand how Smart Selections work, it never does what I want it to do and I ALWAYS have it turned off because it always selects things I don't want to select.

Same here. I always leave it off. Smart Selections is anything but.

On a drum track I also usually have the note-offs quantized too. The only reason for this is because I like it to look clean. So when everything is quantized like this there is no chance of accidental selection of unwanted notes or non-selecting of desired notes.

There are practical and musical reasons whether or not to quantize note-ons. And most DAWs will let you preserve as much or as little human feel as you want with percentage quantizing and sufficiently high clock resolutions. I have tracks that are not meant to be heard-- that have both note-ons and note-offs quantized strictly for notation purposes. But when I'm sequencing keeper musical performances, quantizing would be done very carefully and only when there is a musical need for it.

You also mentioned how it would be inconvenient for DP to select notes from anywhere in the note when there are chords and sustaining notes that overlap - I honestly don't see this as being an issue unless someone can explain it better to me.

[/quote]

Your method of turning off multiple tracks is a sensible workaround for not being able to see/select the notes you want. I guess my main point is that if I'm looking at a cluster of overlapping notes and overlapping sustains, I don't want it to be easy to select as many notes as possible. I want to be able to see a strategy for how I can "get at" a very specific range of notes. If I see 26 notes that I want to select and their note-ons are right in the center of a 19 of long sustaining notes, I can just rope around the note fronts and be done. Or, at worst, I may have to lasso one group, shift-lasso another group, then shift-click to remove a couple. If the entire note range is fair game for selection, it means I have to do much more shift clicking on individual notes to select or deselect.

[wvandyck]

And if you'd rather see it in action, here's a Video Example. (Best if you watch it Full Screen!)

Shooshie

Your video is a real eye opener.
It clearly illustrates the point of learning how to use DP as it was meant to be used.
I never realized accurate selections could be made in a dense MIDI part in that manner.
Very slick!

[wtcmusician]

Gonna pick all of your brains again...

Things are getting clearer now - the people who strongly oppose the behavior to drag select MIDI notes from anywhere in the note seem to have a common workflow where you look at multiple overlapping MIDI tracks in the MIDI editor simultaneously. I think what I am not understanding here is why you would be looking at so many MIDI tracks in the MIDI editor. Even when I need to pull back the starts of notes on many tracks simultaneously or do something else to notes on multiple MIDI tracks, I will use the Track Selector to view only the tracks I want to edit. That seems logical to me. Shooshie, I think something you said in another thread was that you usually have the MIDI editor as a large floating window pretty much occupying its own screen - do you perpetually have all the tracks showing and take advantage of DP's selection behavior to still select only wanted notes while still viewing all tracks like in the video? In my workflow this doesn't make any sense at all - one reason being that I constantly use DP's solo mode to listen to only the MIDI tracks that are being shown in the MIDI Editor which is in focus as I'm editing. Secondly, it seems like it would be difficult to know (even with color coding) which MIDI notes correspond to which track when there are so many (even in audible mode which even then if there are multiple notes selected it's not clear which notes are playing what sound)? Although there were many MIDI tracks being shown in your window there were only a handful of actual parts with notes during that period - it seemed like it was the string sections of an orchestra with a few woodwinds and brass and maybe percussion in there. I can see how you would be well aware of which colors of notes were the strings but beyond that it seems like it would be difficult to know what was what. Of course if you have been doing it the exact same way for a very long time maybe you would have that down. Third, in most of my sequences there is some kind of bass track and a drum kit track or set of tracks that are the various components. Those two tracks alone will easily occupy the same pitch range and many of the notes will start at exactly the same place, making it impossible to select ONLY notes from the bass track or visa versa. Add to that the left hand content of piano and padding and whatever else. In fact there are a lot of my tracks where the same note #'s and starting places are occupied. Or notes from one track are simply overlapped completely by notes from another track. I guess my music is a lot more vertical and small-ensemble oriented than what maybe you guys do. My music usually has 1-3 melodic instruments, 1-3 vertical chordal instruments 1-2 bass instruments, and rhythmic components. Shooshie's sequence looked extremely horizontal with most every part being melodic. Several parts occasionally hitting a note at the same time to create a chord. I also noticed that there was not very much actual overlapping of notes - and when there was, the note-ons didn't seem to occur at the same time. When notes DID occur at the same time, they were usually different note #'s. Totally different than what my equivalent MIDI editor window would look like. Since so many of my notes across different tracks start at the same time it makes no positive difference to me that it would not inadvertently select the previous note of a different track if I drag select from before the desired note. And if there is an undesired previous note, even with no gap in between, it seems like common sense to drag select the desired note in the middle of the note as opposed to fretting because if I drag from before the note it will select the previous note. Maybe this is a big reason for our difference of opinion, the style of music inherently demands different types of selections.

I think that it is just a force of habit as to whether you are used to beginning your drag select from the middle or from before the beginning of a note. If all of you almost exclusively use DP then I can definitely understand that being second nature. Once again since 2/3 of the DAWs I use do it the other way I am used to being able to drag select a note from anywhere. Since most of the arguments for why DP's behavior is preferable don't seem very applicable to my particular workflow I think it would be nice to have an option here. I saw in Shooshie's video how it would definitely be a problem in his environment if my wish came true but my MIDI editor window never looks like that, and the differences between the two in my opinion would actually make a difference on this.

Having said all this, I definitely see everybody's point on why DP should stay the way it is and why it was designed that way. At least for what I saw Shooshie doing I think I would prefer it that way as well. I think if there WAS an option I would rather it default to the way you guys like it too.

Shooshie, I think one thing we might have in common is that we both record MIDI piano parts. But I am confused as to your method of recording it. Are you going so far as to say that you don't even record it to a click? If you don't, do you at least use adjust beats on it after the fact? Sorry if I am jumping to conclusions on this or claiming you said things that you didn't. I am interested in hearing more about this. When I record piano, I have pretty much already worked out exactly what is going to be played and record it to a click. Most of the MIDI note editing I do after that will be minor - quantizing, maybe a little tweaking of note starts and endings, definitely compressing of velocities. But I often record the RH and LH separately onto different tracks so that I can view them independently in the MIDI editor! A big reason for this is also that at least with my music, the right and left hands will not be playing two different halves of one musical part - they will be doing independent things that appropriately should be edited separately. Like left hand chords and right hand melody, or right hand comping and left hand arpeggios, etc. The notes rarely overlap. Yes, I usually perform them in real time on a keyboard controller. And also I guess I don't like clutter. And also instead of having to rely on velocities of dominant parts in the piano performance I would rather just be able to LOOK at that part without having to see the parts that I don't want to edit.

Tell me where I'm wrong. I feel like I'm from a different planet from you guys, but be assured that I am a trained musician and also not a Logic troller.

wtcmusician

[Shooshie]

Gonna pick all of your brains again...

Things are getting clearer now - the people who strongly oppose the behavior to drag select MIDI notes from anywhere in the note seem to have a common workflow where you look at multiple overlapping MIDI tracks in the MIDI editor simultaneously. I think what I am not understanding here is why you would be looking at so many MIDI tracks in the MIDI editor.

If I want to work on an ensemble, as in the video example, I do it that way so that I can see where all the attacks are. I can hear them, but I want to see them, too. I can usually get my ensemble cleaned up pretty much by sight and not have to play it very often to do so.

I use color coding to better utilize the MIDI Graphic Editor. When a particular part does not stand out, I instantly change the color set, and I've done it so much that I kind of know which sets work for various things. I've got that set up in QuicKeys so that I can quickly find any of about 24 color sets, utilizing the numeric keypad and some modifier keys. If you want more on that, here's a video from a while back. It shows audio rather than MIDI, but the principle is the same. It's all about contrast and brightness.

It would be hard to explain all that I do. I don't have a single workflow, but many, depending on the circumstances and desired results. It's always been my goal to utilize as much of the app as possible, and to be able to judge quickly how to work on a given problem. That said, I do 99% of my MIDI work in the MIDI Graphic Editor, but with lots of visits to the Tracks Overview Window, and occasionally the Event List or the Sequence Editor. (the SE is almost essential for lining up MIDI with audio, and for adjusting beats with the Conductor Track as a guide.

Even when I need to pull back the starts of notes on many tracks simultaneously or do something else to notes on multiple MIDI tracks, I will use the Track Selector to view only the tracks I want to edit. That seems logical to me. Shooshie, I think something you said in another thread was that you usually have the MIDI editor as a large floating window pretty much occupying its own screen - do you perpetually have all the tracks showing and take advantage of DP's selection behavior to still select only wanted notes while still viewing all tracks like in the video?

I keep my MIDI Graphic Editor at full screen 100% of the time, in its own "Space," in Mission Control. If you're interested in learning about that, here is a video about setting up DP in Spaces using Mission Control. Setup goes very fast each time you open a file, thanks to the way Mission Control works. I wish Apple would make it possible to save windows in their respective Spaces, but it probably won't happen. I feel lucky that they have made even this much possible.

As for showing all tracks at once, again that depends on what I'm working on. I may want to tighten up the strings' attacks, so I'll quickly zoom in on a beat, drag the notes so that they are closer to the "right" attack, then zoom out again and move to the next one that needs it. If I'm working on phrasing, I may show all parts of a section if not the whole ensemble. Remember that you can select the lines you want to hear, then COMMAND-OPTION-SPACEBAR to only your selection played. Also, in SOLO mode, the visible tracks will be treated as "frontmost" and soloed together. This is extremely handy. Rather than having to return to the Mixing Board to solo a track, you just make visible the tracks you want to hear by selecting them to display in the MIDI Graphic Editor.

Also, sometimes I have playback set up to follow what I'm looking at, or to play what is selected over and over, or to rewind to the beginning of what I'm working on, and many other options. With DP you can practically have it read your mind and know what to play. It just depends on how your transport buttons and counters are set.

To sum up simply, what I'm looking at and listening to is constantly changing as I move through the work and determine what to do next. Always, however, I return to the full-ensemble, full-screen view to evaluate how I'm doing and to plan where to go next. So yes, it's always something I return to, though not always what I'm working in. Sometimes I'm working on individual tracks, just like you.

In my workflow this doesn't make any sense at all - one reason being that I constantly use DP's solo mode to listen to only the MIDI tracks that are being shown in the MIDI Editor which is in focus as I'm editing. Secondly, it seems like it would be difficult to know (even with color coding) which MIDI notes correspond to which track when there are so many (even in audible mode which even then if there are multiple notes selected it's not clear which notes are playing what sound)? Although there were many MIDI tracks being shown in your window there were only a handful of actual parts with notes during that period - it seemed like it was the string sections of an orchestra with a few woodwinds and brass and maybe percussion in there. I can see how you would be well aware of which colors of notes were the strings but beyond that it seems like it would be difficult to know what was what. Of course if you have been doing it the exact same way for a very long time maybe you would have that down.

As I said earlier, I change the color coding often to help clarify the lines I'm looking at, listening to, and/or working on. It's so quick and easy that I often change color sets without even really thinking about it, just as you might adjust your glasses or lean in closer. I chose very easy keyboard commands, and I use double-commands ("Sticky Keys") as explained in the video on colors.

Third, in most of my sequences there is some kind of bass track and a drum kit track or set of tracks that are the various components. Those two tracks alone will easily occupy the same pitch range and many of the notes will start at exactly the same place, making it impossible to select ONLY notes from the bass track or visa versa. Add to that the left hand content of piano and padding and whatever else. In fact there are a lot of my tracks where the same note #'s and starting places are occupied. Or notes from one track are simply overlapped completely by notes from another track.

In such cases, I may do one of the following (or not... depends on the situation):

• • Select Velocities. The active track is the only one with velocities showing, of course.
  • Click-Select the tracks that are easy to reach, then SHIFT-DRAG over them all to de-select those and select the ones I could not reach. I call this "negative selection."
  • Switch to the Tracks Overview Window and select the track/bar I want, then switch back. (very fast since they are both always open to full-screen in different Spaces)
  • OPTION-CLICK the track name in the MIDI Graphic Edit Window's track selector to close all tracks but that one. If I've spent time setting up exactly the tracks I want to view, out of a large number of tracks, I'm less likely to do this. I'll use the Tracks Overview instead, or even another window like the Sequence Editor or Event List.
  • Sometimes I see a quick way to select something with the Search feature. I have probably a couple dozen searches saved, so it's usually pretty fast, but sometimes it needs customizing. If this bogs down, I will go back to one of the above.

It should be clear that having my main windows open to full-screen all the time (along with the Consolidated Windows for some of them) makes this way of working a lot more practical. It just doesn't take any time at all to switch to a different window, which will be tracking the cursor, and therefore will be in the location where I'm working.

I guess my music is a lot more vertical and small-ensemble oriented than what maybe you guys do. My music usually has 1-3 melodic instruments, 1-3 vertical chordal instruments 1-2 bass instruments, and rhythmic components. Shooshie's sequence looked extremely horizontal with most every part being melodic. Several parts occasionally hitting a note at the same time to create a chord. I also noticed that there was not very much actual overlapping of notes - and when there was, the note-ons didn't seem to occur at the same time. When notes DID occur at the same time, they were usually different note #'s. Totally different than what my equivalent MIDI editor window would look like. Since so many of my notes across different tracks start at the same time it makes no positive difference to me that it would not inadvertently select the previous note of a different track if I drag select from before the desired note. And if there is an undesired previous note, even with no gap in between, it seems like common sense to drag select the desired note in the middle of the note as opposed to fretting because if I drag from before the note it will select the previous note. Maybe this is a big reason for our difference of opinion, the style of music inherently demands different types of selections.

And I think it's important to be fluent in all types of selections. I may use certain ones most of the time, but I'm usually quick to use another when I see an opportunity for it.

I'm working on my own projects these days, instead of other people's, so I work at a more leisurely pace but the pressure of staying ahead of the pack from the old days still influences my working style.

I think that it is just a force of habit as to whether you are used to beginning your drag select from the middle or from before the beginning of a note. If all of you almost exclusively use DP then I can definitely understand that being second nature. Once again since 2/3 of the DAWs I use do it the other way I am used to being able to drag select a note from anywhere. Since most of the arguments for why DP's behavior is preferable don't seem very applicable to my particular workflow I think it would be nice to have an option here. I saw in Shooshie's video how it would definitely be a problem in his environment if my wish came true but my MIDI editor window never looks like that, and the differences between the two in my opinion would actually make a difference on this.

Having said all this, I definitely see everybody's point on why DP should stay the way it is and why it was designed that way. At least for what I saw Shooshie doing I think I would prefer it that way as well. I think if there WAS an option I would rather it default to the way you guys like it too.

A certain amount of it may be habit, but I've given it a lot of thought, and I don't see myself drag selecting the middle of notes very often even if I could. I've used Logic enough to know that I don't like that way of working.

Shooshie, I think one thing we might have in common is that we both record MIDI piano parts. But I am confused as to your method of recording it. Are you going so far as to say that you don't even record it to a click? If you don't, do you at least use adjust beats on it after the fact? Sorry if I am jumping to conclusions on this or claiming you said things that you didn't. I am interested in hearing more about this.

Ok. This is a topic I enjoy talking about, too, because DP handles it so much better than any other DAW I've seen.

First of all, yes, I record piano without clicks. In fact, any performance I do is generally without clicks unless it's just simply entering a written score into tracks. I like working freely and making DP adapt to me rather than the alternative, but I can work either way and do work with a click when it seems more expedient. I use Adjust Beats when I need for DP to show me a score. If it's just audio with occasional MIDI parts, I may not go to the trouble of adjusting beats, but when I'm depending on measure numbers and when I want to be able to type in a location, beat, and subdivision, then I always adjust the beats. I made a video of that many years ago, but the sound is off-kilter. I should make a new one, but if you want to see the old one, here it is. At about 7:00 I switch from adjusting whole bars to adjusting individual beats, and I show a trick that I developed to help with getting those beats evened out when the music is ambiguous or sustaining over one or more beats. I think this is essential to the process, so you might want to take a look at that. It involves using the Conductor track in conjunction with the piano track.

When I record piano, I have pretty much already worked out exactly what is going to be played and record it to a click. Most of the MIDI note editing I do after that will be minor - quantizing, maybe a little tweaking of note starts and endings, definitely compressing of velocities. But I often record the RH and LH separately onto different tracks so that I can view them independently in the MIDI editor! A big reason for this is also that at least with my music, the right and left hands will not be playing two different halves of one musical part - they will be doing independent things that appropriately should be edited separately. Like left hand chords and right hand melody, or right hand comping and left hand arpeggios, etc. The notes rarely overlap. Yes, I usually perform them in real time on a keyboard controller. And also I guess I don't like clutter. And also instead of having to rely on velocities of dominant parts in the piano performance I would rather just be able to LOOK at that part without having to see the parts that I don't want to edit.

If you can get good performances that way, then that's a good way to work. Most pianists play differently when they are not encumbered with the beat. (Myself included) Not that they can't play with a beat, but they aren't "themselves" with a click. If the point is to capture their personality, then you pretty much have to go without the click. But if they are playing with an ensemble where the piano is not the dominant part, then the click is usually essential. Again... circumstances and situations. There's no single set method.

Tell me where I'm wrong. I feel like I'm from a different planet from you guys, but be assured that I am a trained musician and also not a Logic troller.

Is there a wrong way to work? I don't think so. Only wrong results. If you're getting the results you want, and if your work moves forward at a pace that is satisfactory to you, then there certainly isn't anything wrong. If you find yourself spending an excess amount of time while moving forward only incrementally, then it may be time to examine what you're doing and how you're working.

I spent about a year going back and forth with Logic, because there was a period in which I was afraid that DP wasn't going to be available any more. After a while, I finally decided that DP was my DAW, that Logic just wasn't ready for the way I work, and I figured that if MOTU stopped developing DP, I'd get off the upgrade train right there and stay with what I had forever, if that was necessary. That's when I really looked at how I worked and realized that I had developed some very precise methods that really made musical sense, not just technical sense. I asked Logic users for help in finding the tools within Logic to do the same thing. They'd point me to what I'd already found. The tools just weren't refined. People who haven't used DP's tools to a high degree of precision may not realize how finely developed DP really is. I swore off all other DAWs at that point, though I continue to try out new ones from time to time. They just don't do what DP does, and they can't take it as far. The drag-selection of only the note-on is just one example. Someone had to make that decision. Someone had to say "this becomes a more surgical tool if it only selects the note-on," and make the decision NOT to select the rest of the note except through clicks. That mirrors my way of thinking, so I'm happy that they did. But if Logic feels right to you, then it is.

It's been an interesting discussion. I look forward to others.

Shooshie

[stubbsonic]

I did not thoroughly read the above tomes (neither of you are famous for brevity-- but wanted to respond to one point (if not for emphasis).

I'll take your point that you are talking more specifically about working with a single track or fewer tracks visible, with less vertical info. If you have a string of 1-5 notes, and you want 2-4 selected-- you would like to think: "middle of 2, through middle of 4"-- rather than "just before 2 through just after start of 4"

For that kind of application, there doesn't seem to be any advantage to selecting anywhere in the note-- other than having some consistency when working between several DAWs. And perhaps that is the take-home point.

[frankf]

DP gives us so many ways to work. It's pretty amazing. I come from score paper and pencils, so viewing and editing a single part in a single track is the best and fastest workflow for me. I edit MIDI in the Sequence Editor and Quickscribe for that reason. My brain is just wired that way. I use MGE to edit MIDI when I feel it would serve me best, but not that often. Very interesting thread however as the Selection issues apply to the SE as well. Thanks for the video Shooshie-very clear explanation of your editing approach.