# Composing in a DAW - correct pace in piano



## PeterN (May 27, 2021)

So heres the thing.

You compose inside the DAW, you dont have a midi piano with you, and you make a piano ballad. You add the chords, the finesse, and you want it to be realistic, so you use humanise etc on midi. You make some changes in tempo.

It still does not capture it - and IMO this is because the tempo - the subtle slow of pace between notes etc - they just dont fall in their places when you do it in midi.

So I keep correcting this making changes in the tempo bar (Logic Pro X).

Would there be any plugin out there - likely not - that would make a "realistic" tempo (you could choose different styles in tempo pace) and it would analyse the piano midi, and suggest pace?

Yea, I doubt there is anything like this out there, but throwing a coin in a well, ok. I could see this as an expansion in EZkeys or something like that. Fixing a nice pace in the piano is one he.ll of a headache. Suggestions? Yes, record it with a midi or real piano, but if thats not around. Keep fixing the pace in the tempo bar- yes. Seems to be the only solution?

I think if you do this a lot, maybe you learn where to put those subtle changes. has anyone achieved this *mastery*?


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## Arbee (May 27, 2021)

I feel your pain and wish I had an answer. When I play what feels right then look at it in midi, the natural ebb and flow of tempo even within the bar can be surprising. Obviously some genres are more organic this way than others (e.g. try to get authentic big band swing accents right in midi 😂). Very interested to hear the responses you get to this.


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## PeterN (May 27, 2021)

Arbee said:


> I feel your pain and wish I had an answer. When I play what feels right then look at it in midi, the natural ebb and flow of tempo even within the bar can be surprising. Obviously some genres are more organic this way than others (e.g. try to get authentic big band swing accents right in midi 😂). Very interested to hear the responses you get to this.


Wouldnt mind tossing this to Logic too. They guy here who knew Logic developers seem to have disappeared mysteriously - hope all is well!

So, Logic got a bunch of great drummers - havent tried the others out there - but Logic drummers work great - me thinks. You can paste in "bridge", "chorus" etc. there too.

They could fix something like this for the piano, rather than making those endless synths, beats and EDM stuff. We have enough of them already - thanks.  Throw in that piano pace tool - and we will bow to you and wash your feet.


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## PeterN (May 27, 2021)

Arbee said:


> I feel your pain and wish I had an answer. When I play what feels right then look at it in midi, the natural ebb and flow of tempo even within the bar can be surprising. Obviously some genres are more organic this way than others (e.g. try to get authentic big band swing accents right in midi 😂). Very interested to hear the responses you get to this.



The same *Pacemaker(TM) *could be used on guitar too. You dont get that guitar ok with humanise function, there are subtle changes between chords. But easier to draw in the tempo bar for guitar than for piano.

The *Piano Pacemaker* plugin (could be used on guitar, accordion etc. too)

Did you hear that developers?


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## cmillar (May 28, 2021)

You may know this already, but is your particular DAW MIDI recording resolution set at the highest rate for your particular DAW?

Are talking about a performance that feels 'over-quantized?

If so, then maybe you're playing with too much quantization happening while you're actually playing....if so, any subtleties will get lost.

Just a thought.


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## NekujaK (May 28, 2021)

if your DAW is Reason, you can use the ReGroove feature that's been in Reason since version 3 or 4. ReGroove lets you apply a groove to a track, to automatically alter the timing and dynamics of MIDI notes so they conform to the selected groove. It was designed as a way to realistically humanize robotic MIDI parts that are locked to the grid.

I've only ever used it on drums and bass lines, but it'll work on any MIDI note data regardless of the instrument.

Reason comes with a bunch of pre-made grooves, and I believe there's also a way to create your own grooves from existing performances. It's not a feature that gets talked about much, and I often even forget that it's there, but it can definitely transform a stiff or awkward MIDI sequence into something that's very musical.


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## Jerry Growl (May 28, 2021)

The 'humanize' function in any DAW is meant to add small quantities of random timing 'errors' and velocity variations so to achieve less mechanical results. It's just a patch to cover up rigid mechanical squareness. Which you get when you insert notes with e.g. a mouse click. 

If you are asking to emulate everything that is to do with human involvement in music including playing technique, personal taste and emotional interpretation, I don't think the industry is ready for this. Not by far. Unless you want to drag around loops instead of samples. 

There are some really top notch piano courses to teach yourself to play piano out there. IMO you will get much better and much sooner results that way then waiting for the industry to replace the pianist. 

A tempo track ( Cubase) can be adapted to follow a pilot track, which you can play in live. You can use hitpoints to establish your tempo track based on the live track. This way you get a natural flow in the tempo. But the other way around, working with a fixed tempo track doesn't have to sound too mechanical if you select a half time measure (e.g. 2/2 instead of 4/4), so that way you could combine a steady pace with a lively feel as long as you don't quantize everything (especially piano tracks) back to square bricks.


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## PeterN (May 28, 2021)

cmillar said:


> Are talking about a performance that feels 'over-quantized?



No, no. If you see my first message, I was speculating about how to do this natural pace, when you dont have a midi piano - or any piano at all - around. The humanise function is as much "realistic" as if you put oregano, ketchup and a slice of cheese on a piece of bread, and call it a real Italian pizza. (In some countries it is)

You can check Eagles Desperado as example, it slows, it builds, at times it keeps the set pace. Ypu cant use humanise for this, either you play the piano, you imagine playing it and keep changing that tempo automation, or someone invents the Piano Pacemaker Engine, and engine, that analyses midi and gives realistic suggestions on pace - in future known as just PPE (the engine correlates with the DAWstempo bar and suggests pace, like emotional, super in love, angry etc). 

Paint guitar midi, and it sucks, you need to to float more naturally. Humanise is not enough if you solely deal with midi. Well, in some cases maybe, but but....


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## PeterN (May 28, 2021)

NekujaK said:


> if your DAW is Reason, you can use the ReGroove feature that's been in Reason since version 3 or 4. ReGroove lets you apply a groove to a track, to automatically alter the timing and dynamics of MIDI notes so they conform to the selected groove. It was designed as a way to realistically humanize robotic MIDI parts that are locked to the grid.
> 
> I've only ever used it on drums and bass lines, but it'll work on any MIDI note data regardless of the instrument.
> 
> Reason comes with a bunch of pre-made grooves, and I believe there's also a way to create your own grooves from existing performances. It's not a feature that gets talked about much, and I often even forget that it's there, but it can definitely transform a stiff or awkward MIDI sequence into something that's very musical.


I see. So it exists to some degree then. Do you think that would work for a piano ballad? Is there a piano preset? Maybe not - anyway great to hear someone actually did something around this.


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## PeterN (May 28, 2021)

Jerry Growl said:


> The 'humanize' function in any DAW is meant to add small quantities of random timing 'errors' and velocity variations so to achieve less mechanical results. It's just a patch to cover up rigid mechanical squareness. Which you get when you insert notes with e.g. a mouse click.
> 
> If you are asking to emulate everything that is to do with human involvement in music including playing technique, personal taste and emotional interpretation, I don't think the industry is ready for this. Not by far. Unless you want to drag around loops instead of samples.
> 
> ...



Of course. But I was specifically talking when you dont have a piano handy. In fact, even playing a midi piano cant capture it me thinks. A Yamaha digital piano can, but you dont carry them around like that.

Say you just have your laptop with you. 

----

_"If you are asking to emulate everything that is to do with human involvement in music including playing technique, personal taste and emotional interpretation, I don't think the industry is ready for this. Not by far. Unless you want to drag around loops instead of samples."_

I think it is. No expert on AI and music here, but looking at latest development in general, I dont think this is an abstract idea at all. You probably need to update the engine a few times though.


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## Living Fossil (May 28, 2021)

PeterN said:


> _"If you are asking to emulate everything that is to do with human involvement in music including playing technique, personal taste and emotional interpretation, I don't think the industry is ready for this. Not by far. Unless you want to drag around loops instead of samples."_
> 
> I think it is. No expert on AI and music here, but looking at latest development in general, I dont think this is an abstract idea at all. You probably need to update the engine a few times though.


There is ongoing research in this area.
Around a decade ago i came across a paper which was called "The Horrowitz effect" (or something similar) that analyzed the tempo rubato in piano performances. IIRC it was research performed in Salzburg (Austria).

Now the interesting thing with the tempo rubato is that when you perform the same phrase on different occasions, you will execute the rubato in a different way. It's supposed to be something like a "living" part of the piece that's not supposed to be defined strictly.
IIRC there is even a video where Horrowitz talks about a piece and plays a snippet several times. And each time it's executed in a different way.

The mentioned paper also concluded that while it's not complex to make some general observations, it's extremely difficult to capture solutions in algorithms that appear "plausible" (to somebody who is familiar with the style in question).
The problem is: there are countless "good" solutions.
But there's an even bigger chunk of countless "not good" solutions.


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## Jerry Growl (May 28, 2021)

PeterN said:


> Say you just have your laptop with you.


You can learn to play convincingly piano on a crappy 61 key plastic keyboard type. I am not one of them but I' ve seen people come close. Me, I'd rather have my 88 wooden key Kawai midi remote with me when I'm stranded on that Island with a laptop.


PeterN said:


> No expert on AI and music here, but looking at latest development in general, I dont think this is an abstract idea at all.


I don't think you can easily emulate 'Chopin' style or switch back to 'Jerry Lee Lewis' style presets and have your midi sound like it's played in that style. The main reason is because of the complexity and intrinsic humanity that comes not as something that you can measure or boil down to an algorithm. And if you did it wouldn't make much sense or be any useful I think. It would always be an algorithm of one specific aspect of a style.


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## PeterN (May 28, 2021)

Living Fossil said:


> There is ongoing research in this area.
> Around a decade ago i came across a paper which was called "The Horrowitz effect" (or something similar) that analyzed the tempo rubato in piano performances. IIRC it was research performed in Salzburg (Austria).
> 
> Now the interesting thing with the tempo rubato is that when you perform the same phrase on different occasions, you will execute the rubato in a different way. It's supposed to be something like a "living" part of the piece that's not supposed to be defined strictly.
> ...



Right

Thats why the pace engine should have many suggestions to choose from. But all are built on analysing a number of natural pace exmples. 

Basically it could also let you draw in areas (like EZkeys and Logic drummer - probably many other VI too), theres the intro, chorus, bridge, etc. Then you could further choose between "emotional" and "angry " playing styles etc.


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## PeterN (May 28, 2021)

Jerry Growl said:


> Me, I'd rather have my 88 wooden key Kawai midi remote with me when I'm stranded on that Island with a laptop.


_Wooden key Kawai midi remote._


Sounds special


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## Jerry Growl (May 28, 2021)

PeterN said:


> Basically it could also let you draw in areas (like EZkeys and Logic drummer - probably many other VI too), theres the intro, chorus, bridge, etc. Then you could further choose between "emotional" and "angry " playing styles etc.


As I said, you could be working with loops or approach things like Actions Strings 2, where you sample fragments of loops and phrases and try to be creative with that... But ok for ostinato strings, I see the point. For piano, not sure...


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## Jerry Growl (May 28, 2021)

PeterN said:


> _Wooden key Kawai midi remote._
> 
> 
> Sounds special


It's a MP9500 stage grand. I call it a midi remote, because well that's the only thing it's useful for. I tried dragging it on stage a few times. It's sooooo heavy. Not even Moby-Dick would manage to help me get it on that Island after shipwreck.


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## NekujaK (May 28, 2021)

PeterN said:


> I see. So it exists to some degree then. Do you think that would work for a piano ballad? Is there a piano preset? Maybe not - anyway great to hear someone actually did something around this.


The groove presets aren't so much about a particular instrument, but rather, a particular style of performance. They impart the same timing and dynamics to your MIDI notes as the source recording from which they were derived. You can also dial in how much of the "groove effect" to apply.

Can't say for sure if it would work on a piano ballad, or any kind of keyboard part, but in theory it should.


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## nyxl (May 28, 2021)

In your scenario (no midi keyboard, only laptop), you could still use the computer keyboard to tap in the tempo and then use this (other DAWs probably have similar features) to create a tempo map.
However, I would argue that timing (e.g the timing difference when hitting multiple notes at once, which when an actual human plays is probably not as random as the "humanize" function of your DAW) and velocity differences are also very important factors in piano playing, and very difficult to get right without a midi keyboard - and to get velocity right you actually need a decent keyboard and not just anything. Or alternatively, a lot of time for programming in the DAW may also work


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## PeterN (May 28, 2021)

nyxl said:


> In your scenario (no midi keyboard, only laptop), you could still use the computer keyboard to tap in the tempo and then use this (other DAWs probably have similar features) to create a tempo map.
> However, I would argue that timing (e.g the timing difference when hitting multiple notes at once, which when an actual human plays is probably not as random as the "humanize" function of your DAW) and velocity differences are also very important factors in piano playing, and very difficult to get right without a midi keyboard - and to get velocity right you actually need a decent keyboard and not just anything. Or alternatively, a lot of time for programming in the DAW may also work


Thats a great suggestion - does it work? This makes sense though - never tried it. The tempo mapping is there and Logic should be advanced on tempo adjustments. Other DAWs too.

Is there a vid out there on how to do this (for piano)? What search words should be used - Logic tapping and tempo mapping? Can you tap in the whole piece? First you tap it in clicking on, say, the mouse right button. And you imagine the pace.

Sorry, thinking loud, many question marks.

This needs to be looked into - great suggestion. If there is any good vid tutorial out there, pls throw in a link.

*Does anyone write piano midi this way? Imagining pace and tempo mapping it in advance?*


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## SupremeFist (May 28, 2021)

This is never going to happen. If you're "away" from a midi keyboard then of course you can write for piano on paper, or in a notation app, or in a DAW, but if you want a recorded performance that sounds good then at some point you'll have to play it in live (and edit afterwards if need be).


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## PeterN (May 28, 2021)

SupremeFist said:


> This is never going to happen. If you're "away" from a midi keyboard then of course you can write for piano on paper, or in a notation app, or in a DAW, but if you want a recorded performance that sounds good then at some point you'll have to play it in live (and edit afterwards if need be).



Until we get the engine that does it. Based on analysis of several piano ballads, it will analyse your chords and structure, then do a new midi map of it all, as well as suggest a floating pace.

It could be here already

30 years of midi and all we got is the crappy humanise function. Its a shame.


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## PeterN (May 28, 2021)

And just imagine you could do with this toy. Most composers make a piano as a base for their creation anyway. You got this pacemaker there in the piano base, choose the tempo with the pacemaker engine from a number of AI suggestions. Once you have one handy, then you lock it i, and start layering string etc.

Come on.

You do a good job with this engine and put a price tag of 199 (you could even put higher, but that is torture and greed on us pitiful artists).

Then go for Bahamas, this is a sellout.

Remember I said this here, and you guys said its impossible, when its out after about 2 years. Which is 10 years late anyway.

Pianists will no longer be needed - their vehement opposing was in vain. Like when Deep Blue beats Kasparov.


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## antret (May 29, 2021)

Hmmm... well I don’t know if this answers the larger question but....

I am often away from a keyboard of any type while I work (that’s what I love and hate about the laptop!). To recreate/create ‘piano like’ parts I use any number of phrase arpeggiators available (squared heads Nora & Venomode Phrasebox come to mind at the moment). 

I literally create a chord track (doesn’t have to be fancy as you can select the voices played/octave, etc in the arpeggiator) and feed this data into the above mentioned plugins. You can also lock those to a scale and ‘offset notes’ to play/add non chord tones/passages. 

if that wasn’t enough, you can adjust velocity, timing, probability of notes, cc controller data (Phrasebox can do most of these things). I find these have been indispensable while on the move (and even not on the move!).

I hope 🤞 this makes sense.... I’m typing on the phone as the wife drives the fam to a birthday party!


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## PeterN (May 29, 2021)

antret said:


> if that wasn’t enough, you can adjust velocity, timing, probability of notes, cc controller data (Phrasebox can do most of these things). I find these have been indispensable while on the move (and even not on the move!).



Right.

This is the traditional way.

Eventually you succeed, or eventually you destroy a great composition this way - because the small fixes on midi are not always enough. Depends on music genre too.


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