[linux-audio-user] recording keyboard works (e.g. rosegarden)

[John Check]

On Wednesday 22 December 2004 10:28 pm, Hans Fugal wrote:
> Thanks for the input, I think I'm moving in the right direction at least.
>
> On Wed, 22 Dec 2004 18:35:56 -0500, John Check <j4strngs at bitless.net> wrote:
> > Do you practice with a metronome? If not, that would be my first guess
> > as to what you're seeing when you sequence.
>
> Not usually, and I think that is primarily what's going on with my
> having a hard time laying it down ensemble-style.

Hey, I cut CD with Jerry Frikkin' Jemmott and he had the same problem, so
don't feel too bad. If you practice with the metronome, you'll get used to it.
Of course, you'll burn through a lot of drummers in the future, but what else 
is new.

>
> > You _could_ turn the click off, crank up the ticks per quarter to the
> > max, jack the tempo up and just record the guide track rubato (fancy talk
> > for "close enough for rock&roll" (I'm figuring you know that)). Not good
> > in terms of a pretty display, using the file to generate notation or a
> > tidy SMF, but it's approximating recording the performance on tape as far
> > as the sequencers temporality limitations goes. Again, I'm not sure of
> > the exact reason you're doing this. These things may be important, in
> > which case you have to take a different approach.
>
> I did something like this and so far it's the closest I've come to
> what I want. Perhaps I'll continue finessing this approach.
>

Really, if you just want a recording it's the best bet. You don't haveto worry 
about getting the click tempo just right

> > Step recording is another possibility, but it's tedious.
>
> On one try, I step-recorded the top voice. I soon realized how poor a
> choice as a guide track it is, and I'm not really interested in step
> recording one of the middle voices.
>
> > You didn't say if
> > your sequencer is auto-quantizing the input, but that can have an effect.
> > If your hearing playback that doesn't jibe temporally with what it
> > sounded like when you laid it down, i.e. tuplets are messed up, then it's
> > either auto-quantizing (either in or out) or you have insufficient
> > resolution ticks per quarter wise. Consider a tuplet that doesn't divide
> > evenly and what happens to the mantissa.
>
> No auto quantization. It's not that things sound different from what I
> lay down, it's just that what I lay down doesn't sound as coherent as
> when it is all played at the same time. I imagine this is just a skill
> to develop.
>

Well, you're listening as opposed to playing when you audition it. That can be 
an eye opener.

> I don't need or particularly care about notation or keeping the bars
> aligned - I'd be perfectly happy ditching the metronome and working in
> pure time, if that works well.

All that is just relative to abstracting the data for other purposes. For just 
record/playback with no or minimal editing kill the click.