Help with Tap Tempo feature in DP 5.13

[JRadziun]

Hello everyone,

I'm new here and to forums in general. I'm a middle school music teacher and I've been using Macs and Performer in the classroom since 1991. I'm fairly well-experienced with sequencing for my needs (choir acxcompaniment, student composition, etc) but I'm not what you'd call a "power user" in the real world. However, I've learned a lot about Performer over the years and have always been very comfortable with it.

Now I'm forced to make a transition to DP and a feature I've come to rely on, the Tap Tempo, simply does not work for me. I have been on the phone with MOTU support for hours and hours and they cannot find the cause of my problem.

I'm using a basic set up with a new MacBook Pro running OSX 10.5.4, a MidiMan MidiSport 2x2 interface, and a simple Yamaha PSR 273 keyboard (I've also used othe keyboards" Roland digital piano and other sound modules).

I hope someone can lend a hand with either advice or a solution that's helped with their set-up. MOTU people have been helpful, but frankly cannot understand what happens when I try to use the feature. Here's what happens -- after everything's set up (Setup-Receive sync and Slave to external sync) and I tap the four clicks on C3 of the Yamaha, Tap Tempo seems to start on beat one -- and then ends right there with no sound! Even though I can still tap measure numbers, no information appears in the conductor track.

Has anyone else had this problem? And is there a known cure, or what am I missing?

Thanks in advance for any help and suggestions! This is a nightmare, because the Tap Tempo is almost the most important feature for me, and I've had it for years, and now it's gone!!

Janis

[cuttime]

http://www.motunation.com/forum/viewtop ... =tap+tempo

[Shooshie]

The quick answer: set the tempo in the Conductor Track to 400 before you begin to Tap Tempo. Since you have a countoff of a few taps, the tempo of 400 will never actually show up in the final tracks, but for some reason that gives DP the "headroom" it needs to perform a Tap Tempo sync. This is counterintuitive, silly, and kludgy, but this is the state of Tap Tempo at this time in history. I have not yet tried it in DP 6.01. I'm hoping they've fixed it, but I'm not holding my breath.

Shooshie

[JRadziun]

Dear Shooshie and cuttime,

I can't thank you enough for your help!!! The problem is solved, and my confidence in Performer is back. But it's thanks to you that I'm now able to move forward. I spent over ten hours on the phone with MOTU, and not once did they suggest this simple one-step cure.

This was my first time in a forum, and I'm impressed and amazed with the vast amount of knowledge out there and everyone's willingness to others. After all these years with Performer, I really feel like a beginner now ... I can see that I'll be reading a lot here, and I hope someday I can return the favor and help someone else, someone like me who needed a nudge in the right direction!

Thanks again, guys!

Janis

[Shooshie]

Janis, you're more than welcome. I have a feeling that since you've been using Performer for 17+ years, you'll have much to offer in the forum yourself. Yes, we've come a long way since Performer, but there are many similarities between the manuals of 1991 and 2008. DP6 marks the first major departure from the old app, and it appears that the new code is more homogenous -- perhaps more of it written in Cocoa, so maybe we'll see some of these old kludgy work-arounds cleaned up.

If you haven't already found it, I suggest you read the Tips Sheet Thread (in this forum, always "stickied" near the top) for a lot more suggestions on how to work faster and more efficiently in DP. You can print the pages you want as PDFs and have them always handy as searchable documents even when you're off line.

And finally, as people around here have heard so many times, to unlock the full power of DP, go to the COMMANDS Window and print it out both as hard-copy (to paper) and as PDF for a searchable "manual." Don't hesitate to add your own commands to the mix.

Shooshie

[richardein]

Shoosh,

To answer your question, Tap Tempo appears to work just fine over here in 6.01, without the tempo-400 in the conductor track kludge.

[Pokeye]

If you are trying to sync to pre-recorded tracks that don't match the sequence tempo, I suggest "record beats," which will modify the conductor track to follow the tempo of your music. Using "tap tempo" only creates a tempo based on the average of the last few taps rather than placing beats exactly where you want. Neither of these features are well documented. Record beats will "force" a tempo track to match your taps exactly, so tap carefully; if you get too far offbeat, better to start again. It will, however allow rapid tempo changes and accurately follow the music. You can then use the "adjust beats" feature to fine-tune this. I have many projects that require me to sequence along side an old recording and this is the only method I have found that works; the MOTU tech support guys I spoke to never mentioned it(!)

There is also "extract tempo from MIDI" which is completely undocumented; I think that is because it seldom works. I think it is supposed to derive quarter notes from MIDI events in a track.. Motu tech support doesn't even seem to know this feature exists.

[JRadziun]

Pokeye, thanks, I'll give that a try!

Shooshie, thanks again for your help. If there's anything I can offer the forum in the future, I will be sure to do that, although I'm so new to the "new" DP that I can't imagine having some knowledge not already touched on here.

For instance, I've had another problem with my switchover, and perhaps you can point me to a thread or topic where it's discussed. I tried searching the topics, but haven't had any luck. I have tons of older Performer 6.03 files, and no matter what I try I cannot get those files to open in DP. Again, the MOTU tech support has attempted to help me, but to avail. I've saved them as Performer 6.03 documents (the default?), SMF and DP 2.01, but they simply don't open in the MacBook Pro in DP 5.13. They come up as Unix files, or something.

If there's a topic that addresses this problem, I'd be happy to move over there and ask the same question. I don't think I saw it in the Tips Sheet, even though I tried searching it.

Thanks again for more expert help!

Janis

[Shooshie]

Not sure what is causing your Performer files not to open. I regularly open Performer files from as far back as 1987 without problems. It could be that you put those files on a non-Mac-formatted drive. Drives must be formatted to HFS+, or you'll lose the resource fork of old Mac files.


Back to Tap Tempo, there are two forms of it. One is the one which averages two or more beats and sets a new tempo. That's not the one we generally refer to as "Tap Tempo." But you know what Tap Tempo is, as you've used it for years in Performer.


Record Beats is often confused with Tap Tempo, but it's a whole different thing. Tap tempo is for conducting existing tracks that already have beats and barlines specified. "Record Beats" is a method for moving the barlines to where you tap. Adjust Beats is a more accurate (but slower) way of doing this.

Shooshie