News:

Need help with Finale? Have a question about arranging? NSM Resources is the place to go!

Main Menu

Finale MIDI controllers

Started by InsigTurtle, April 27, 2015, 07:14:47 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

InsigTurtle

I was wondering about how to mess around with controller events in Finale, so I could have smooth panning, pitch bending, modulation (which does a vibrato effect) and volume control. I'm not sure if too many of you guys have messed around with this, but if you have, could you please explain how to work with these?

The built-in crescendo works well for the volume in most cases, but it doesn't allow me to add a wobbling effect to the volume. The glissandos (glissandi?) and tab slides and stuff work okay for some things, but they don't allow me to go into another pitch bend right after... (at least, not without the playback screwing up)

JDMEK5

I was super good at this on my first notation program but I haven't tried it with Finale yet. You could use a keyboard if you wanted.
"Today's goal strongly involves not dying. Because nobody likes to wake up dead."

My Arrangements
Finale Version(s): Finale Notepad 2012, Finale 2012, Finale v26

InsigTurtle

I don't have a keyboard with modulation and pitch shift controls, so that wouldn't work.

The cresc. expression does what I want, but that's only for volume. If anyone knows how that expression works in Finale, I could try making another expression that smoothly starts panning or pitch shifting.

Brassman388

I would give Human Playback a try. I don't think Finale is optimized for midi as far as I can tell considering since, you know, it's a sheet music writing program. But you could try there and give it a shot.

InsigTurtle

#4
Well, I messed around a bit, and the only way I've found to make smoother volume/modulation/panning events is by dividing and tying together notes into really small parts, then assigning a different expression to each of them. I've overloaded Finale by doing too many of these a couple of times, so I guess it isn't feasible at times. Plus, it's time consuming.
Adding a different question about the pitch bends- it seems that the pitch bends Finale uses in the MIDI files don't seem to work in some other programs. Also, some MIDIs use pitch bends that sound whack in Finale, but fine in other programs, so I'm not too familiar with how this works now ^_^;
Can someone explain how this thing works? I'm a bit confused. You might be too after reading my convoluted post :/



EDIT: Just for the sake of y'all, DO NOT do rapid panning from left to right (like 20 and 108 every 16th note at 120bpm) as this will give you a really bad headache. Both adding the commands and listening to it.

InsigTurtle

OK, this'll probably be the final thing I post here.

MIDI tool -> Scale

So much time wasted not knowing about that

So if you're planning on doing some music producin' in Finale, there you go

holland_oates89

The MIDI Tool is your friend... or maybe an enemy, I don't know. If you want to start tweaking things manually, you'll need to turn off Human Playback by clicking MIDI/Audio > Human Playback > None. Then, do this:

1. Open your document.
2. Click the MIDI Tool.
3. Select the measures over which you want to process the change in volume.
4. Click MIDI Tool from the menu bar at the top of the screen (toolbar if you're on Windows). Make sure "Note Velocity" is checked.
5. Click MIDI Tool > Scale.
6. In the window that appears, enter a value (0 to 127) for the start and end velocities (volume) you want. Note that this only works with keyboard or percussive instruments. If you're using the Garritan Library, you'll need to scale a continuous controller instead. Click OK to add the crescendo.
7. The above steps create a linear crescendo. If you wanted to taper it off a little, you can use the "Limit" command under the MIDI Tool menu (tedious), or you can use the Scale tool multiple times until you have the contour of the crescendo you want (way more tedious).

I'll level with you - if you need to do this kind of thing a lot and have a DAW, you may want to save your score as a midi file and import it into the DAW instead.
I work for MakeMusic! Please do ask me for help with Finale! Please don't ask me for special discounts, secret information, or bug fixes.

Disclaimer: The views expressed from me are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer!

InsigTurtle

Thanks. Do you mind me asking about the pitchwheel? I don't quite understand it fully. What do the pitchwheel values correspond to and how would I do a smooth pitch bend of, let's say, a major second, or an octave?

holland_oates89

It really depends on your playback instrument. Most MIDI and sampled sounds follow a general rule of thumb where pushing the wheel all the way up causes pitches to bend up a whole step. Theoretically, you could use the same Scale feature in the MIDI tool to accomplish this in a score. The tricky part about pitch wheel is that instead of scaling from 0 to 127 like most other continuous controllers in Finale, it scales from -8192 to 8191, so you have to use some different values (and a lot of math...) to get exactly the pitch bends you want. BUT many synthesizers (including Finale's SmartMusic SoftSynth) have trouble with pitch wheel data that large, so I'd recommend using a range of -4096 to 4096. This will allow you to bed a whole-step down and a whole-step up, just like on a regular MIDI keyboard. Still, that doesn't mean you'll be bending in whole steps all the time - the synthesizer used for playback is what decides how much a full pitch bend does. Most libraries use a whole step, but the Garritan libraries for instance can be set to bend up to an octave above or below. You'll also want to use a smaller increments value to make sure it sounds 'smooth.'

tl;dr - Use the scale feature in the MIDI Tool, but instead of 0 - 127, use -4096 to 4096. If you bend more than a whole-step look at your playback synthesizer. Don't trust these values in other synths/DAWs, but they usually work.
I work for MakeMusic! Please do ask me for help with Finale! Please don't ask me for special discounts, secret information, or bug fixes.

Disclaimer: The views expressed from me are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer!