# Logic - Articulations on separate tracks or use Articulation maps?



## Jean Wilder (Feb 27, 2021)

Why do Cubase and Logic orchestral templates have each articulation on a separate track? Like high strings long, short, etc on separate tracks. It’s seems like it would be better to organize by say high strings, low strings and use articulation maps per note in the editor.


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## emilio_n (Feb 27, 2021)

Sometimes have the longs and short separate is useful to adapt the dynamics, the volume or even the EQ or the reverb. In any case, personally, I prefer to have fewer tracks and sacrifice a little bit of flexibility. I am not an expert so for sure other members can give you a better or more detailed explanation


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## proxima (Feb 27, 2021)

Where each template lies on the continuum between one track per instrument and one track per articulation is a matter of taste. I'm sure others can lay out the pros and cons more completely than I can, but if you want some reasons why you still see so many templates on the one track per articulation side, I can lay out some that I've noticed. For what it's worth, I like to have things in the middle, grouping shorts and longs into their own track and trying to have as smart of an articulation setup as possible. But it's easy to see why a giant pile of tracks is fast to set up, and if you use Cubase you can easily hide all unused tracks (c'mon Logic, add that!).

Setup:

1. Articulation maps (Logic) and expression maps (Cubase) can still feel annoying to set up and test. 
2. You can buy some pre-made (Babylonwaves), but they often will not break out every feature combination you might want
3. It can be easier to click a bunch of options in a VST rather than learn the idiosyncrasies of how to control those on the fly. For a specific example, in Cinematic Studio Strings the marcato has an option for a staccato overlay. Having it on is a useful sound on its own, having it off is the recommended way of writing runs with this library. Sure you can control that on the fly if you learn the keyswitch method or incorporate it into an articulation map, but it's trivial to set up two tracks, one with it selected and one with it not. You can just click the track and know what you're getting, never having to remember this particular instrument is setup with articulation maps.

Workflow:

4. Different articulations often need different predelays to sound on the beat. 
5. Switching tracks is easy, setting up one of a variety of ways to physically switch articulations (another keyboard, often set at C-1, a tablet, etc) feels good to some people and a pain to others.

Sound:

6. People often like to use different fx settings on shorts and longs.
7. For some libraries, some people will prefer to rebalance volume or mic positions or whatever between shorts and longs.


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## Jean Wilder (Feb 27, 2021)

Thank you for the detailed responses! This makes a lot of sense. I was curious about the pre delay and articulations. I like the neatness of articulation maps and not breaking out each one into a separate track. I’m evaluating Logic and Cubase at the moment, and I do find Cubase has great organization features, but man does it lag, take me out of the mood, look dated with skeuomorphism(misspelled) and lack some midi features of Logic that I need. Going with Logic for now as I find it more inspiring. I look into the pre delay on articulations. Maybe that’s why Cubase has it in an automation lane, so one can place the switch ahead of the note


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## Kent (Feb 27, 2021)

proxima said:


> and if you use Cubase you can easily hide all unused tracks (c'mon Logic, add that!).


They did add that in like 10.2.1 or something. It’s a key command you can set for yourself.


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## proxima (Feb 27, 2021)

kmaster said:


> They did add that in like 10.2.1 or something. It’s a key command you can set for yourself.


Whoops, I stand corrected. Still tricky if you put a short midi region at the beginning of each track in your template to set defaults, but that's not my workflow.


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## Jean Wilder (Feb 27, 2021)

Yes


kmaster said:


> They did add that in like 10.2.1 or something. It’s a key command you can set for yourself.


Yes, not to start a DAW war, but I noticed that Logic has all the features of Cubase minus logical editor and macros. Everything is the same or better.


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## proxima (Feb 27, 2021)

Jean Wilder said:


> Yes
> 
> Yes, not to start a DAW war, but I noticed that Logic has all the features of Cubase minus logical editor and macros. Everything is the same or better.


Perhaps it's that Cubase has a "hide all tracks without data at the current location"? This would let you avoid the issue of seeing tracks with only a short midi region at the beginning to create settings.

Another feature useful for people with giant track counts is to search the tracklist. I'd be happy to be corrected, but I don't think Logic has that yet.


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## SupremeFist (Feb 27, 2021)

Jean Wilder said:


> Yes
> 
> Yes, not to start a DAW war, but I noticed that Logic has all the features of Cubase minus logical editor and macros. Everything is the same or better.


tbf Logic doesn't have multiple automation lanes in the piano-roll editor, which is the one Cubase feature I'm really envious of.


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## InLight-Tone (Feb 27, 2021)

Also the CC transform thing in Cubase is absolutely necessary for massaging CC's and Velocities...


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## Jean Wilder (Feb 27, 2021)

I’m sure there are trades off. The dongle, skeuomorphism in the design, audio cuts out occasionally if you are working while listening, laggy gui, playhead doesn’t quite latch instantly, just feels sluggish and not immediate. I love the macros and multiple automation lanes(I did see this is possible now in Logic), folders, selective export, search function, etc. I’m still between the two, but probably Logic. I like less choices. Leads to less indecision.


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## Alex Fraser (Feb 27, 2021)

My tip on the whole template/articulation setup is simply not to overthink it. You can set things up in multiple ways and have the best of all worlds. 

For example, you could have a strings patch saved with all articulations and map for “traditional” writing, plus other patches featuring nothing but shorts, no maps and a bunch of processing for trailer stuff.

Fly them in via the library as required, let Logic do it’s dynamic loading thing, or import via the files window. Lots of ways to do it. 👍


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## Jean Wilder (Feb 27, 2021)

Alex Fraser said:


> My tip on the whole template/articulation setup is simply not to overthink it. You can set things up in multiple ways and have the best of all worlds.
> 
> For example, you could have a strings patch saved with all articulations and map for “traditional” writing, plus other patches featuring nothing but shorts, no maps and a bunch of processing for trailer stuff.
> 
> Fly them in via the library as required, let Logic do it’s dynamic loading thing, or import via the files window. Lots of ways to do it. 👍


That makes sense. I’m using the disable track thing like in cubase. Everything is there but not in ram. The auto record on track select in Logic is killing me. I’m new so I am getting frustrated easily. Any way to disable that nightmare?


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## Alex Fraser (Feb 27, 2021)

Jean Wilder said:


> That makes sense. I’m using the disable track thing like in cubase. Everything is there but not in ram. The auto record on track select in Logic is killing me. I’m new so I am getting frustrated easily. Any way to disable that nightmare?


Are you referring to the way tracks automatically become enabled and loaded into ram upon selection? You can get around that by manually activating/deactivating tracks.



https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/logicpro/lgcpcaa7aaa5/mac


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## Jean Wilder (Feb 27, 2021)

If I click a midi track and then move to an audio track to record, it keeps the record enable on for the midi track. I hate the automatic record enable on track select. I have to really make sure I don’t have another track selected accidentally or keep turning off the midi track I previously selected. I know this is off subject to the OG post but any help is appreciated!


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## jbuhler (Feb 27, 2021)

Alex Fraser said:


> My tip on the whole template/articulation setup is simply not to overthink it. You can set things up in multiple ways and have the best of all worlds.
> 
> For example, you could have a strings patch saved with all articulations and map for “traditional” writing, plus other patches featuring nothing but shorts, no maps and a bunch of processing for trailer stuff.
> 
> Fly them in via the library as required, let Logic do it’s dynamic loading thing, or import via the files window. Lots of ways to do it. 👍


The problem I have with loading patches from the preset browser in Logic is that the track naming, icon, and color often gets messed up.


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## Jean Wilder (Feb 27, 2021)

jbuhler said:


> The problem I have with loading patches from the preset browser in Logic is that the track naming, icon, and color often gets messed up.


Or all your bus names randomly disappear after an hour of naming them.


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## Alex Fraser (Feb 28, 2021)

Weird. Can’t say I’ve ever had any of those issues. I wonder if it’s system specific? Anyone filed a bug report?

Edit: Now you mention it, I have been having a weird quirk with one particular DMD patch I use where the track names load as they were before renaming them. Tab-ing through them corrects the issue.


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## gst98 (Feb 28, 2021)

InLight-Tone said:


> Also the CC transform thing in Cubase is absolutely necessary for massaging CC's and Velocities...



Most of these are possible in logic


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## InLight-Tone (Feb 28, 2021)

gst98 said:


> Most of these are possible in logic


I'm talking about the Controller event editor where you select controller events or velocities and you can scale, tilt and skew them fluidly. I've used both Logic and Cubase extensively and found Logic clunky and slow for me...


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## gst98 (Feb 28, 2021)

InLight-Tone said:


> I'm talking about the Controller event editor where you select controller events or velocities and you can scale, tilt and skew them fluidly. I've used both Logic and Cubase extensively and found Logic clunky and slow for me...


Yes you can do that in Logic. Your talking stuff like copy CC1 to CC11, or select velocity 80-100, scale up, converge to mid point, +10 CC value etc...?

For me the biggest problem is Logic only lets you save 30 of these, and you can fill that up quite quickly. I hope they just increase the limit some day. Also some of these commands like select highest line, lowest line (this inparticular I find more intelligent that logical editor version), same art, same velocity have shortcuts mapped by default and don't take up the 30 slots. I have these controlled by metagrid, rather than remembering 30 shortcuts.


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## Jean Wilder (Mar 3, 2021)

proxima said:


> Where each template lies on the continuum between one track per instrument and one track per articulation is a matter of taste. I'm sure others can lay out the pros and cons more completely than I can, but if you want some reasons why you still see so many templates on the one track per articulation side, I can lay out some that I've noticed. For what it's worth, I like to have things in the middle, grouping shorts and longs into their own track and trying to have as smart of an articulation setup as possible. But it's easy to see why a giant pile of tracks is fast to set up, and if you use Cubase you can easily hide all unused tracks (c'mon Logic, add that!).
> 
> Setup:
> 
> ...


I reread your post after 3 days of research, and the main reasons seems to be predelay varies for different articulations, especially long vs legato(with the extra calculations necessary to compute the legato). Given that, is there a way in Logic or Cubase to set a negative or positive offset per articulation in the map? If so, then that would solve that issue.


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## Alex Fraser (Mar 3, 2021)

Jean Wilder said:


> I reread your post after 3 days of research, and the main reasons seems to be predelay varies for different articulations, especially long vs legato(with the extra calculations necessary to compute the legato). Given that, is there a way in Logic or Cubase to set a negative or positive offset per articulation in the map? If so, then that would solve that issue.


In Logic, you can apply the offsets on a per-track basis (or even regions post record) but not in the articulation map.


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## Jean Wilder (Mar 3, 2021)

Alex Fraser said:


> In Logic, you can apply the offsets on a per-track basis (or even regions post record) but not in the articulation map.


Good to know. So using them seems pointless, given that each articulation requires a precise offset to sound correctly, or one moves the actual notes by ear. Sounds like we need an additional control over offsets in the map editor. Also, as I'm messing with the maps, the articulations don't always switch and some notes intended to be long end up spiccato or what the previous switch was.

EDIT: Spitifre says C-1, but that's C-2 in Logic. So yes it switches now. Still not sure if it's the best idea given the need for offsets per articulation. Really, I want to avoid tracks per articulation. Seems messy visually in logic and a lot of cut and paste between regions.


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## Jean Wilder (Mar 3, 2021)

Anyone know if Cubase can set offsets per articulation?


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## Kent (Mar 3, 2021)

Alex Fraser said:


> In Logic, you can apply the offsets on a per-track basis (or even regions post record) but not in the articulation map.


that's not precisely true, but it does require some out-of-the-box thinking.


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## Jean Wilder (Mar 3, 2021)

kmaster said:


> that's not precisely true, but it does require some out-of-the-box thinking.


So, does that mean you can apply an offset per articulation? If not, can Cubase? I haven't committed to either yet, and this seems like the determining factor for me. Logic articulation IDs are really great, but if I can adjust the offset, I may be SOL down the road. Thanks!


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## Dewdman42 (Mar 3, 2021)

neither cubase nor LogicPro have built in facilities to manage offset per articulation.

In LogicPro you can set a negative track delay per track. I think there is some facility to do something similar in Cubase.

LogicPro also has Scripter, which can be used to adjust timing per channel or even per articulation on the same channel, but requires some custom programming. I have posted some scripts on other threads for this kind of thing they are in early form, I'm working on some more advanced scripts.

another thing you can do if you isolate the sound of each articulation to its own audio channel, then you can use Expert Sleeper's LatencyFixer plugin to report the latency and let the DAW Plugin Delay Compensation engine automatically correct for it. That is able to get up to 1000ms of negative delay, while LogicPro's track delay parameter only goes to 500ms.


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## Dewdman42 (Mar 3, 2021)

In my view, at this time LogicPro is best able to address this problem due to Scripter. No other DAW can address the problem quite as well, especially if you are trying to use articulationMapping...or if you're trying to keep all articulations of an instrument on one source track or one sound channel. If you separate them to different tracks, which is what most people try to do, then you lose automation mapping and all that's wonderful about it, but you get the easy option to use negative track delays on each articulation channel that way.


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## Jean Wilder (Mar 3, 2021)

Got it. Expert Sleepers to the rescue! And it sounds like maps is a waste of time and I need the articulations on separate tracks. That script looks great.

This is off topic, but since you seem like the expert here, I'll ask you. I am trying to do something so stupidly simple, but Logic again makes me feel stupid. How can I record automation after I previously recorded midi notes, and keep looping and recording automation until I like what I have created? It keeps merging all the automation data and sending it to region not track.

I'd rather skip region automation and see all my automation in the track view. I am an Ableton power user, and I rarely use clip automation, which logic clearly implementing with region automation.

Thanks!



Dewdman42 said:


> neither cubase nor LogicPro have built in facilities to manage offset per articulation.
> 
> In LogicPro you can set a negative track delay per track. I think there is some facility to do something similar in Cubase.
> 
> ...


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## KMA (Jul 4, 2021)

jbuhler said:


> The problem I have with loading patches from the preset browser in Logic is that the track naming, icon, and color often gets messed up.


I had a recent problem saving summing stacks in Logic. When loading that saved stack into a different project, all the instruments loaded, but some of track names were listed as "<unknown>".

I opened a bug report with Apple.


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