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i just want to know how to make my midi sound professional what do i need to buy to make my instruments sound professional.when i record on to my sequencer the instruments sound all cheap not professional at all,they dont sound distorted or anything, they just sound fruity. {magix midi studio deluxe 11 as my sequencer}thnx for help

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Kapt.Krunch Sat, 02/06/2010 - 04:08

OK..first of all, this is the second post you've asked this in. The first was in your initial post. Please don't do that. We could have continued the conversation in the original post, you could have generated less storage space on R.O.s server, and lessened the confusion of tracking the same basic subject in multiple posts. The folks here would appreciate it if you would keep things simpler, and not repeat posts. I'm gonna be a bit blunt here, but it's not to disparage or embarass you. It's to help move you into a direction where you'll actually learn something.

Sooner or later, you're gonna have to do a bit of research, read some manuals, and learn things. You'll also need to learn what information you should supply to keep us from having to pry more info out of you.

For instance, we have no idea what your MIDI sound source is. We know you are using Magix, and from the OTHER post, I know you have a Delta 1010LT, and a Casio CK...something that has ONLY a USB for MIDI integration...no MIDI ports. Well, that's all taken care of there, where you asked the same question as this post.

Your MIDI sounds crappy. Well, what are running it through? Some lousy onboard, built-in sound card? Is it playing back software stuff, like a HyperCanvas? What's you MIDI sound source?

I don't know if Magix can play back samples, or VSTi/DXi sounds. Look that up. You may be able to download some free ones, or buy some shareware or pro ones. Do the instruments in your Casio sound better? If nothing else, play your performances into the MIDI sequencer, arrange them using the lousy sound, and once you are finished composing and arranging the tune, then send MIDI tracks back to your Casio to play instruments, and then from the casio outputs into the Delta to record as audio. Certainly, you can compose and arrange with less-than-stellar sound, knowing that those sounds will be replaced later. In fact, you don't really want to get TOO involved with MIDI sound sculpting until all your recorded audio (guitars, vocals, etc) are recorded. Then, you can find sounds to fit around the audio, instead of trying to manipulate the incoming audio to fit around MIDI sounds. It's much less destructive to mess with, and mix'n'match MIDI sounds, than to EQ the crud out of recorded audio to fit.

Read the Magix manual, and see what it is capable of using. I'm guessing you are running the sounds through some cheap onboard soundcard, and that will surely sound bad. I'm also guessing that on top of that, it's possible that you aren't aware of other things you can do to MIDI to manipulate things, and that mixing may be a bit of a mystery, as well. All those things can help, if you learn them by doing what the rest of us have done. Spend time researching (and reading manuals), spend time experimenting, spend time making mistakes, and then ask questions armed with enough information for people to actually have some chance of answering them. Having people spoon-feed you isn't really helping you learn. That actually slows down your learning process.

Kapt.Krunch

anonymous Sat, 02/13/2010 - 00:31

Sorry I have no idea about MIDI as this part is new to me but I did have a question about something that Kapt said...

...you can find sounds to fit around the audio...

Hold the phone here: you can compose the music on the midi then latter take that and change the "instrument"? IE...I can make a track for a sax then later with I could change it to a bass sax without rerecording it?

apstrong Sat, 02/13/2010 - 02:53

herbycanopy, post: 299802 wrote: I can make a track for a sax then later with I could change it to a bass sax without rerecording it?

Yup. You can change it to any instrument you like later on. MIDI is just controller and note data, not audio. The data says which note to play, how loud, and for how long, and it also says which instrument to use to play that note. You can change the data later on so that it says 'use a different instrument'. And you can also edit which notes and how loud and for how long, because you're not manipulating audio, you're just changing controller and note data. Manipulating audio (think of autotune) is hard. Manipulating MIDI data is easy as pie. You can "record" midi, in the sense that you can make your software recording thing record the MIDI data (which notes, how loud, how long), but it doesn't record the audio that's produced by that MIDI data, so all you have to do is figure out how to use your software to edit midi or select different output instruments and there you go, same track, completely different instrument.

You need something like this:

[[url=http://[/URL]="http://www.tweakhea…"]MIDI 101 by TweakHeadz Lab[/]="http://www.tweakhea…"]MIDI 101 by TweakHeadz Lab[/]

Go think on that for a while, it should sort out the basic issues for you. I bet that once you understand better how MIDI works, you'll probably figure out the answer to your own question.

apstrong Sat, 02/13/2010 - 16:15

No problem. My guess is that OP is either routing the midi output through the computer's built in sound card's midi, which will sound like crap, or it's routed to use the midi patches in Magix, and those are crap. When I use MIDI, which is very rarely, I use Cubase to record and edit the midi data, and route the output through Hypersonic's sample libraries to do the playback. They sound ok to me.