Post by eljoe on Jul 7, 2011 7:26:18 GMT
Hi there,
While performing by playing midi's in your keyboards, I've found when you're having hundreds of files in your list, you find most of the midi's are having different volumes. The thing is your vocals will always have the same volume, but you've to keep on changing the volumes of midis all the time. Its a pain and sometime you get so frustrated and you dont do anything and your perfomance gets bad.
So you guys have any solution to this by first making all the midis the same volume in our laptops? What I do for my audio files is, first I put it in my software called Sound forge and without hearing it, I can see the levels going in the meter. That way I can adjust the volume. But to convert all my midi files to audio first and play on sound forge is a big task.
If I can get any software which plays midi files and has got a level meter which I can see like in Sound forge, would be the best thing I hope. After that, I can adjust the volumes by controlling the velocities in my Cake walk and then save it. I hope you guys will come out with an answer like everytime.............
While performing by playing midi's in your keyboards, I've found when you're having hundreds of files in your list, you find most of the midi's are having different volumes. The thing is your vocals will always have the same volume, but you've to keep on changing the volumes of midis all the time. Its a pain and sometime you get so frustrated and you dont do anything and your perfomance gets bad.
So you guys have any solution to this by first making all the midis the same volume in our laptops? What I do for my audio files is, first I put it in my software called Sound forge and without hearing it, I can see the levels going in the meter. That way I can adjust the volume. But to convert all my midi files to audio first and play on sound forge is a big task.
If I can get any software which plays midi files and has got a level meter which I can see like in Sound forge, would be the best thing I hope. After that, I can adjust the volumes by controlling the velocities in my Cake walk and then save it. I hope you guys will come out with an answer like everytime.............
Hi Folks,just to add my tuppence worth (a quote from our own John G) 
to the midi volume control posting,the procedure i use seems to work for me but not forgetting i do not own or even have access to a keyboard so it is a different ball game i would think.Just to make the members aware of my standing when it comes to being involved with music & playing a guitar,i am an extremely late starter who when he attained almost Old age pensioner status surprised he's good wife by declaring that he wanted to become "a pop star" 
much to the good lady's horror,i then proceeded to go forth & purchase a very average acoustic guitar which led to many weeks of being confined to an area of the house which even with all doors closed was vertually anti-television insulated.From this humble beginning 0le Simmo advanced to a stage where not only was i able to play simple chords but ...presto!!! the Ole Bugger even got to singalong to them as well,from there i went through the drum machine stage in my quest to add just about any noise that would help drown out the attempted vocals,then!!!! (wait for it) i was introduced to the wonderful world of midifiles,the rest is history;what with some magnificent help from the forum,John G was an inspiration along with many great members from the forum; they know who they are & i am forever in debt to them all,Sonic cell alone was my biggest challenge & i am still skirting around the edges with all of its capabilities.I have now reached the stage where for the past few years i have been performing on a regular basis at Nursing homes, retirement complexes, dementia homes,(always have a problem getting out of those 
) & not forgetting of course my latest venture into Busking which is giving me a real buzz,(one less wish in the bucket list),anyway i thought my musical background would let you know that it is still all a big learning curve for me.When i edit a midifile to suit my own needs (i am using Sonar le & i am getting the goodie sounds from my Sonic Cell module) i normally customise them for my personal needs,things like muting the rhythm guitar,leaving in any interesting lead fills until i can learn them myself,changing different bass guitars,drumkits etc also muting other instruments that to my thinking clutter up the backing until i am happy with the overall sounds,this is just my own personal preference to suit the type of audiences whom i normally play to,also i use the same tracks for my busking venture.I like to think as being seen to be actually doing something other than just singing to a karaoke track.When i have edited the midi to my liking i then add another audio track underneath my miditracks press record on the audio track & then record on the top of the control section & while the midi is being played it is also being recorded in the new audio track that has just been inserted,John G gave me instructions on how to run the midi out of the computer & into the Sonic Cell module (where it picks up all of the goodie sounds) from there it comes back into the computer as a wav track all of this via a USB cable.Right so i now i have have a midifile edited & recorded with all of the changes as i like them put into Wav format,the next step is to make sure that the overall volume on the Wav is suitable,i have discovered that on the Sonar toolbar there is a box (process) which when opened to the drop down position displays Audio/normalize, if you highlight the recorded audio track then go to click normalize it will balance the volume of the audio track so that you get the maximim volume without going into the red zone which i presume will cause some distorting of the tracks.You do also have the option on the Audio box of increasing the Wav track volume by smaller decibal movements but i prefer to go with the normalize option.I have been making any other volume changes eg, count- ins quieter or louder sections by using a program called Soundforge,it also has a normalising feature but i find the Sonar one is better,(Ole Simmo can't believe he's getting all technical) but i am just describing what works for me.The other thing i forgot to mention was when i have finished all of the editing & recording on Sonar i save the edited midifile plus the new wav track into a file so that it saves all of the changes you have made with both midi & wav so in the event you wish to make future changes it is very simple,you can just open it up & everthing is as you left it.From there i can fine tune the midi & simply open up another audio track & record it including in it all changes i have made & then save it under a different file name.After this I usually run all of the wav tracks through a programme called soundforge & from there after any minor adjustments i need to make i put them in a seperate file,keeping all of the edited wav tracks together for easy acess,after that i have a programme which i can run them all though turning them into mp3s,which is the format i play my backing tracks in,these also are put in a seperate file.Sometimes i can play out with the finished mp3 & decide it needs some minor changes so it is quite an easy job to go back to the midifile stage & make the required alterations,that is the beauty of saving them in different stages,i am sure John G has been a big influence on me & got me to be a better organiser which i never used to be.I seem to be turning this into a full blown rambling episode,possibly because the tv has been a load of crap just lately so i can hide away in the music den & wile away a bit of time,the main thing is all is well in the Simmo household,weather's into winter mode,getting some useful rain but nowhere near enough as the dams are only 23% full,thinking about another holiday but still in the planning stage,thats about it from this end.
