Hi Everyone - I've been looking through the forums for this, but can only find one reference and it was without a followup.

Do any of the piano courses (SudNow etc) contain MIDI equivalents that show how its played? Listening to an Audio CD is all well and good, but many of us have MIDI capable devices, and if you've a Clavinova with the "Lights" you can easily see what is played and copy it - its just like looking at the "Dots" but for real!

It's also easy to slow it down or pause it, to get the right pattern. I haven't seen anything like this mentioned so far.

Thanks for any help!

Mike

hi mike, welcome to PW!

one of the folks here, frog52, wrote a computer program that allowed one to input the sudnow tunes and then play them back on the computer. the idea was to get an idea of how the different voicing combinations would sound.

i don't know if once in the computer they could be put in midi format, and transferred to the clavinova, but it sounds intuitively possible. you might PM frog52 and ask as he is the expert.

i'm interested in hearing more about how you have done with the "teaching" features of the clav, which i'm assuming is a CVP. one big one to me is being able to hear the song as it is supposed to be played. i can read music but do much better if i have in mind how the song goes. of course, you would have to have a correct midi file to do that.

have you been able to download midi files off of the www, take out the piano/keyboard part, and play along with the band? a salesman told me about that feature, and then i read something possibly here that said it really didn't work as advertised.

thanks, and good luck with your midi hunt!

I'm not familiar with the Sudnow method, but most of the more widely used methods (Alfred, Bastien, Faber & Faber, Hal Leonard) have the option of buying MIDI disks in conjunction with the methods. A lot of publishers of sheet music even offer MIDI disks with individual songs along with collections of materials. With the popularization of the Clavinovas and the guide lights, these MIDI accompaniment disks are starting to become more popular again.

Hi Mike, you don't need a Clavinova to see the playing from a midi file. There are programs like the free "vanBasco's Karaoke Player" and "MidiIllustrator" that allow you to watch the keys on a virtual keyboard as the music is being played. They also convert the notes to score so you can follow along with the notes if you like.

Sudnow's course has explicit instructions on what keys to play and when, so there is no need for midi to see what keys are being played since you already know what is being played from the instructions.

But perhaps I'm misunderstanding your point?

Thank you everyone for the responses. I am familiar with sequencers and midi in general - what I was hoping was that the courses would supply midi along with the audio. I can manipulate this more easily and find it simpler to follow the voicings that way, in real time as they're being played by the instructor - just me I guess :-)

I have been playing with a teacher for a couple of years - I used to study organ (the full multi keyboard and double octave pedals) but found that wasn't so helpful when you walk into a bar with friends or just want to play for yourself at home... they're massive!

I am very interested in great voicings and the techniques for constructing them. I've recorded a version of The Boy Next Door to illustrate where I am in capability. I also included the MIDI file if anyone else is interested.

http://www.filbo.uwclub.net/in/BoyNextDoor.mp3
http://www.filbo.uwclub.net/in/BoyNextDoor.mid

This is a great forum - very responsive.

Mike

Yes - that works just fine, though what I do is slightly different for playing along...

I use BIAB (Band In A Box) and PowerTracks sequencer. If you understand MIDI then this is a relatively simple app to use - I open the MIDI file and mute the Piano tracks. Then I can play along as it outputs the rest of the file through my CVP 209 (it's older than the current models which have USB already). The onboard sequencer is a bit pants I'm afraid. I started with it but its frustratingly designed... a PC or laptop is much easier. I bought a MIDI USB lead that works great (MidiMan USB Uno http://www.music123.com/Midiman-USB-Uno-i85139.music )

If I just have the chords from a fakebook or otherwise, its just as good - I enter the chords into BIAB and it generates all the other tracks (incl Piano if you want, which is a good way to learn some voicings too). This is output again via MIDI to the CVP. The sound samples on the CVP are pretty good IMHO, particularly the acoustic bass and drums ... then I add in my piano part and hey presto, I have a "live" band! I use BIAB instead of the onboard auto accompaniment as its just way better. Its to do with knowing what comes next in chord progressions ... I could go on and on but that should give you a taster.

Regards
Mike

thanks, mike. i'm familiar with BIAB.

so, why is outputting BIAB to the clav superior to playing BIAB over the computer, and playing along? are the clav sounds better than the BIAB sounds?

On my laptop, if I play BIAB through the speakers, the soundcard samples for almost anything are pretty dire. If you have a wavetable-soundcard, I expect they are more than acceptable. The reason I connect the laptop to the CVP is the laptop can sit on the music stand easily enough (with screen opened to 180 degrees), I can read the chords or music direct off the screen, and the USB link makes the drum 'n bass sounds come out of the same speakers as the piano sounds.

I think Yamaha did a good job on the samples, and not just the Piano which no doubt is their main focus.

Mike

JazzyMike is right. BIAB just uses the bank of General MIDI sounds that your MIDI setup is configured to. If it's to the average soundcard for a computer, then you definitely will get better quality sound from the CVP. I believe you can even revoice the MIDI channels of whatever MIDI file you're playing on the CVP to something like the XG sounds for even more realism.

JazzyMike, if you're pretty adept with handling MIDI files, you might even want to consider using this program called Home Concert Xtreme. You could probably take your BIAB MIDI files and import them into Home Concert Xtreme to create a "smart" backup band that will slow down/speed up and get louder/softer with your playing. It even features a "Learn Mode" that is similar to the Guide Light function on the CVP.

You can see a video of me demonstrating it on my podcast or at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n27pR-Bz3eQ

wow! pretty cool!

Um. WOW Mario. That is one cool bit of kit. I read the CVP did a sort of "follow your play" setting, but it pales compared to this product.

I have to say, your podcasting is simply brilliant. Really professional and slick. I had a look through the website too - nice style, easy to follow and great that you can download the PodCasts as opposed to only stream - is it mainly classical teaching that you do, or are there other genres?

Personally, I'm mostly classically trained, but my new job is going to involve teaching more non-keyboard music majors along with training undergraduate piano pedagogy majors. So I've been recently dabbling more in teaching popular styles and functional keyboard skills (harmonization, transposition, sight reading, accompanying, etc.). In fact, the more popular podcast episodes that I produced were the ones that I just taught a few measures of a couple Coldplay songs .

Hi Mario - I just tried that Home Extreme product demo... but it only allows you to play with the five built-in MIDI files, which is a bit lame! I really wanted to see the features with one of *my* MIDI files. I don't mind not saving .. it's a shame really. It looks a good product but its not selling itself to me very well, with that limitation.

Mike

I suppose I should explain what I was trying to do - maybe you can tell me if its possible:

Most of my MIDI files have the piano all on one track but also bass and drums too (on seperate tracks, of course), so they are not split for L/R hands which it looks like HCX expects. Most MIDI files I use or create are not recorded with seperate hands (other than those bought specifically for teaching).

What I was hoping to use HCX for was so I can use a MIDI file created from Band in the Box, then get HCX to play that file and "teach" me the piano notes used. I don't mind so much that I may not play with the right hands - I'm likely to anyway as the notes are positioned accordingly for L/R hands.

What I was keen to test was .. if I have a MIDI file with a single piano track but also the bass and drums which I don't want to play, but have played through MIDI output (so my CVP can render them), and then I play all the PIANO notes one way or another, the "teaching" mode would still work.

Would HCX still be appropriate for me?

Mike

I have uploaded a typical example of what I mean. Can you tell me if what I want to do is possible from this file?

http://www.savefiles.net/d/ev5vd5mx6o.html

Mike

I took that MIDI file that you posted and imported it into Home Concert Xtreme. I took a screen shot of what it looks like in the "Learn Mode":



It works fine with HCX. The only drawback is that since the left hand and right hand piano parts were both recorded on one track, then the notation displays only on one staff (the bass staff in this case). If you're really good at handling MIDI data, you could probably split the track so it displays on both the treble and bass staff, but that didn't seem to be a high priority to you.

As you can see, the onscreen keyboard will prompt you what keys you should be playing throughout the piece in Learn Mode. In this MIDI file, it will just expect you to play whatever was recorded on that solo piano track. The bass and drum tracks won't continue unless you play the keys exactly as shown. This is an excellent learning tool when first learning the piece.

Once you have it learned, then it will be fun for you to play with the Perform Mode. Remember in Perform mode, the bass and drums will slow down/speed up and get softer/louder according to your tempo and dynamic level instantaneously. You don't even have to play all the right notes in this mode.

Or let's say you're playing a gig. If you get lost or have to go back to a previous measure for some reason, the drums and bass will analyze that you've jumped to a different section of that song and FIND YOU! Pretty cool, eh?

Now that's something that Band-in-a-Box can NOT do.

I hope that helps clarify things for you.

Great video Mario! BTW, MidiIllustrator will separate a single track piano midi into left and right hand tracks. It's not perfect of course, but it does a pretty decent job of it.