Pitch to Midi.

[jkhuri44]

I know this is the vintage synth forum...but better here than elsewhere i guess

i'm still looking for a convincing/decent Pitch to MIDI converter.


The best i've seen to this day is the Analog Systems Module for Eurorack frames...however i'm not at the point where i think im getting a eurorack...

i've tried the pitch tracking on the demo for the new Melodyne, and wasnt that impressed...

does anyone have any experience with a good on?? i need one that tracks pitch bends well as iim doing stuff with ethnic scales/bends, etc....

[no-fi]

Midi isn't the easiest. Especially if you want something out of the 12 tone scale...
what instrument are you wanting to drive with, and what is your desired result?

[jkhuri44]

my guess is 2 independant CVs as an output would track smoother? is that what u'r alluding to?? ie. 1 volume/gate CV and another dedicated to a continuous pitch output??

I guess i'd like to take recordings of ethnic stuff...a range of instruments, could be plucked, or flute or whatever, and output into a synth pad, or a harder edges synth saw sound...just as examples....

[no-fi]

pitch - CV is pretty rough too but it sounds like you would be better off with pitch-CV tracking to an analogue synth (ms20, x911, SPV355, etc) or some kind of digital resynthesis like antares kantos (or roland VG88 if you are a guitarist) rather than going for actual MIDI conversion.

At least CV (and direct resynthesis) can theoretically represent any pitch.. as soon as you try to funnel interesting tunings into MIDI, you're up for all sorts of trouble. But even with an equal tempered western scale you need to also keep in mind that with MIDI you are defined by note on and note off messages, most real accoustic instruments don't have anything as cut and dried as note on and off.

and CV or MIDI, whatever you want to do - keep in mind that if you want to play a synth with another instrument you have to play your instrument very unlike how you might normally play it. precisely articulated very clean well defined notes. or you're in tracking glitch world (which I actually like... but it's maybe not what you are expecting) spending a bunch of time tweaking level and filtering the input can make a big difference with these things too.

[jkhuri44]

interesting...
i have tried kantos when i first tried to work out whether this is going to work, wasnt getting anything i liked...

now...the Ms20 VST which i have does do volume to CV...but the pitch in the preset patch just sticks around...

im going to need to see if i can re patch it to extract pitch from audio...if i can get that, will be laughin!

its a bit annoying patching the VST, i cant read what any of the holes are...ffs. (insert joke)

[no-fi]

I have never used kantos, so don't know what it is like in practice, but I remember when I first heard of it that it seemed like an interesting possibility for doing guitar synth work on the cheap and easy.

just keep in mind that you're really not going to preserve much of the "soul" of the original recording if you want to pitch track it. at the end of the day you're trying (often unsuccessfully) to work out when it is playing or not, and what the note is, and then generating a note to match that... you lose a lot of the articulation and subtle variations in the original playing because there are only really ways to extract the fundamental aspects of a note here.

and remember that you need to spend lots and lots and lots of time adjusting the input settings if you want your pitch tracker to have a hope at working. at least running recordings through it, you have an advantage that the input signal doesn't change between attempts!

have you considered just setting up some crazy FX chains? or re-creating a line in your sequencer from scratch?

[jkhuri44]

not really wanting to keep any soul of original instrument, more so, would like to explore possibilities i have in pitch in electronic music...

its very difficult getting bends that indian/arabic music have on a keyboard if u are not incredibly skilled at it

figured sampling, chopping,re arranging, an instrument like a oud, could be a good source for some new melodies for my own stuff.

i'd like to take those melodies and play them through an 8 voice unison saw patch for example...so, in that case, a crazy FX chain wouldnt do what i want.

a eurorack frame with the Analog Systems RS35 looks f*king mental...there's a video of someone playing one on youtube...by all reports, it looks like the best tool for the job. only prob is it only outputs CV...which is prob why its so accurate...?

[no-fi]

I actually own an RS-35 (though only got it the other week and still building up my modular, and need to sort out input filtering so I haven't used it that much) if you want to see what one can do, I highly recommend going for a trip up the blue mountains to visit flo at equinox oz. He's very friendly and loves to meet people who are into synths, and he is the the AS distributor in australia, and he has a cool setup you can play with the RS-35 in. bring along some sounds on an mp3 player or something, and see what it can do to them.

Biggest issue with RS-35 is AS have their own special power scheme, so if you want to use it "right" you have to buy the AS powered chassis too, which is spendy for 6U of eurorack (but very good quality) then you can add a bunch of modules (signal conditioning filter and preamp for the input, then all the pieces to be the synth) and build up a pitch tracking synth. but really for the money it'll take you to build something out of modules, even using mostly doepfer parts, if all you want is a plain pitch controlled subtractive synth you could buy an ms-20 at the normal going rate for less money... and the ms-20 will have easier resale potential, too.

I'm going eurorack modular because I don't want just a subtractive synth (have you seen some of the amazing stuff available in euro nowdays?) and because I can save money by DIYing the case & power, and a bunch of modules (for low effort DIY, elby have 3 complete kits - s&h/noise, synthacon filter, and the mangler - each less than $100 that are awesome, and you can buy flight of harmony barebones modules off ebay au for tiny money, then get blank euro panels for $5 from elby to mount them in with a few minutes and a drill)

[jkhuri44]

I actually own an RS-35 (though only got it the other week and still building up my modular, and need to sort out input filtering so I haven't used it that much) if you want to see what one can do, I highly recommend going for a trip up the blue mountains to visit flo at equinox oz. He's very friendly and loves to meet people who are into synths, and he is the the AS distributor in australia, and he has a cool setup you can play with the RS-35 in. bring along some sounds on an mp3 player or something, and see what it can do to them.

Biggest issue with RS-35 is AS have their own special power scheme, so if you want to use it "right" you have to buy the AS powered chassis too, which is spendy for 6U of eurorack (but very good quality) then you can add a bunch of modules (signal conditioning filter and preamp for the input, then all the pieces to be the synth) and build up a pitch tracking synth. but really for the money it'll take you to build something out of modules, even using mostly doepfer parts, if all you want is a plain pitch controlled subtractive synth you could buy an ms-20 at the normal going rate for less money... and the ms-20 will have easier resale potential, too.

I'm going eurorack modular because I don't want just a subtractive synth (have you seen some of the amazing stuff available in euro nowdays?) and because I can save money by DIYing the case & power, and a bunch of modules (for low effort DIY, elby have 3 complete kits - s&h/noise, synthacon filter, and the mangler - each less than $100 that are awesome, and you can buy flight of harmony barebones modules off ebay au for tiny money, then get blank euro panels for $5 from elby to mount them in with a few minutes and a drill)

posts like this, remind me how much i love this forum. im still new to all this modular shit...i dont actually own any hardware synths in general at all...

i was actually looking in my calander to visit equinoz bloke....as i DEFINATELY needed to try this out before buying...

i like to keep things ITB in terms of synths, however there is alot of stuff that i'd like to do which seems only possibly eternally....and only with modulars...i dont really want to be limited to the sounds in an MS-20...ideally i'd like to get a CV to MIDI conversion piece as well, so i can feed Massive, Reaktor, Tasmann and so on....

as for the amazing array of shit available for eurorack...i am in awe....cwejman shit looks amazing...but prob my fav stuff i've seen is anything by Harvestmann....the dude built a eurorack Polivox filter...authorised by the russian dudes at polivoks...that is....awesome.

[no-fi]

I'm not 100% sure what CV-midi interfaces actually exist. Basic CV conversion on a gate signal would be simple. tracking pitchbend or other things would be another matter entirely. I know why you'd want to do it.. just very unsure of if it's possible to buy. Or if possible to buy, actually any good..

PS - Reaktor should be able to be setup to do pitch tracking. I wonder if anyone ever did it? maybe an ensemble available that does what you want in reaktor already?

PPS. I guess your other option is totally offline processing. seeing as you mostly want to work with recorded sounds... you said melodyne was no good for this. Well try giving it a bit of a hand, and bandpass your audio file around the fundamentals of the note range you're in... Or is there anything else in plugin/DAW land that does note detection and MIDI export?

[jkhuri44]

originally...

i was set on using a standalone software program, prechop all my loops/sounds...

import into said offline standalone prog.

export midi info....

tweak in cubase...

profit...

may have to revisit that option altho, u've provided alot of food for thought...helps to talk about what u plan to do with ppl!