Song Volume

[trout]

Hi All,
Can anyone tell me why some of my midi files are louder than others?

I have raised the track volumes to maximum (127) but they are still not as loud as others in my collection.

[lee]

I think t is to do with how they were originally created in the first place. Others will know differently.

[JazzCat]

Chances are the individual note velocities are low. Velocity measures how hard a note is played.
If your sequencing program has a piano roll editor ( called Key Editor in Cubase)
and has a controller pane ( or controller lane in cubase)
You can look at the levels of the velocities quite easily and raise or lower a whole track, usually through a menu driven command.
If not you will have to look at the Event list to see what they are.

[rossi]

Cat,
Just read through your last six or seven posts. Were you writing in English?
Only Joking!
You know me with technology...
Absolutely amazed.
You must think I'm a real idiot when I send you a file and ask "where is the drum part"
Cheers,
Rossi

[JazzCat]

Nawwww Rossi! You gotta remember that I've been doing this now for about 4 years and I am still learning! There are people on this board that know a lot more then I do!
Did you know that Berkley School of Music has a 4 year degree program on MIDI synthisis alone? There is a lot to MIDI that few of us ever delve into! I'm taking a class right now that is mostly centering around MIDI.
If you don't understand something and want to know more just write to me direct because I never know if I'll find messages again on the boards.
I can help you to understand the technical terms in regards to MIDI sequencing, and believe it or not, one day, all of a sudden, it'll hit you, that you are finally getting it!

[JazzCat]

Question:

I have Cakewalk Music Creator 2003 program.
Do you know how to how to raise the velocity in this program.
---------

Answer:

Unfortunately I do not have that program so I wouldn't be able to tell you how to do it there.
Hopefully someone on this board can help you with the program you are using.
Each sequencing program has different methods of getting the same job done.

What I will tell you is that you need to see the velocities so you can get an idea of how much to raise them without peaking them out and thus destroying the dynamics of the song.
You need to look at each individual track and adjust each track separately.

Most programs give you a choice of setting, offsetting or scaling velocities. But they may call each of these different things than my program does.

Setting velocities will make all of them the same. If you have a velocity of 30 and a velocity of 60 and you set velocities to 100 both velocities will now be 100. You don't want that.

Offsetting will raise (or lower) each velocity the amount you choose. In other words, if you have a velocity of 30 and a velocity of 60 offsetting 10 up will change them to 40 and 70 respectively.

Scaling will raise (or lower) velocities by a percentage. If you have a velocity of 50 and one of 100 scaling up by 10% will now give you velocities of 55 and 110.

Normally you will look at the track with the piano roll and the controller pane and scroll through the entire track to get an idea of how much you want to raise the velocities. Then you would go back to the track view and highlight the entire track and do the adjustment, then go back and look at the controller pane again, and of course, listen to what you've done. LOL!

[doodie]

trout said:

Hi All,
Can anyone tell me why some of my midi files are louder than others?

I have raised the track volumes to maximum (127) but they are still not as loud as others in my collection.

Hey Trout i'm not sure if you know this or not but changing your volume to 127 sometimes doesn't work...your may have to go into your "EVENT'S list" and see what the instruments are set at there.It maybe set at let's say 90 instead of 127 so you will have to change that to 127.Hope this helps you. DAVE

[gibbo]

The other controller that can cause this is #11 Expression, for max volume on a track it needs to be at 127, it's often set to other values. Again, don't be too over-the-top with changes; you can destroy the mix, swells and fades by messing with this if you don't know what you're doing.

[JazzCat]

The way to handle that is with offsetting and/or scaling the expression controllers, if your program will do that. Of course if they already maxing out, then a complete rewrite of the expressions may be in order. That's best done, not in the event list editor, but rather in the controllers pane./lane within the piano roll view ( Key Editor in Cubase) , and using a 'draw' tool.

(Note- Not all programs call things by the same name. Offsetting' and 'scaling' may not be the terms your program uses.)

Another thing that causes 'loudness' differences are patch selections. Some of your patches will be inherently 'louder' than others.