Posted
A common feature in DAWs is the ability to trigger slices of a sliced audio file by MIDI IN note events.
The same makes sense for Synfire with its automatc phrase creation (simplified, one could call it "MIDI slicing"): If you import a midi file, you get many phrases P1-PX (the "slices").
Now it is pretty boring to click single phrases with the mouse. It is much more inspiring if you could trigger the phrases with a midi keyboard, because you can test much faster which phrase sounds good after another, etc...The advantages are obvious, you know it if you have ever done this with audio slices.
Of course, this way you can only address the first 128 phrases. But that would be sufficient for many librarys. (with audio slice triggering in DAWs you have the same problem and it is nevertheless a great feature)
Mon, 2016-04-18 - 08:47 Permalink
A more tactile approach to composition. Sounds like a lot of fun. Ableton is extremely successful with this user experience. The idea of launching and mixing clips in real-time is nice.
This would however require a different user interface from the ground up, one which caters to live mixing of phrases (play and arrange during playback), as opposed to the hierarchical top-down layout it supports now (arrange and play). And the delay imposed by re-compiling the entire arrangement every 1-2 bars is significant too. MIDI is easier to "mix".
Mon, 2016-04-18 - 19:10 Permalink
I understand that my suggested feature might not be suited for live performances. And if it would only support
playing
one phrase at a time, then the only technical difference would be that the phrase gets triggerd by a midi in note event instead of a mouse click event.
But I think the feature without this live performance would be valuable too, because it is often more comfortable/pleasant to hit keys on a physical midi keyboard than those tiny "PX"-rectangles with the mouse!
Btw: in my opinion, the ideal music producing and composing software would be Ableton LIVE with some of the features of synfire. Maybe you want to delvelop a MAX for LIVE synfire plugin ? ;-), which would become the most popular MAX plugin for sure....("liquid notes" did something similar)