I used a similar workflower earlier, but without Frescobaldi. I coded a small script years ago that would convert MIDI-input to keystrokes, but at some point I lost track of maintaining it (didn't do much with Lilypond for a time then).
But I remember using the pitch up/down buttons on my Korg nanoKey for switching between sharps and flats. (I also did a second pass for durations then.)
If anyone's interested I can try and look whether I find it somewhere, but what I can read here, Frescobaldis system should be more sophisticated and as I was using Xorg to emulate the keystrokes it's probably Linux-only.
All the best
Christian
Hi Peter,
> How do you manage enharmonics? Is the black key between C and D a C sharp or D flat? Unless the music is completely tonal, I'd have thought you spent more time adjusting the accidentals than simply inputting the music from the computer keyboard. But I may be wrong. Certainly in the song I was transcribing both accidentals are used in profusion.
Most songs I transcribe are heavily tonal, and the accidentals tend to be consistent enough that Frescobaldi’s input setting (use the key signature whenever possible, favour sharps or favour flats when outside the k.s.) keeps outliers in the <5% range (and often literally zero!). Where I do have to adjust, I do it in the second/proofreading pass, and that change is very quick to implement.
That being said, I’ve also used my workflow on Second Viennese School transcriptions, and while obviously slower than tonal music it’s still impressively fast to crank out that kind of note-code.
> how does it manage durations?
I just “plunk” each note out one by one, with no particular care about durations; in the “second half” of the input process, I pass through and add durations. My workflow is more finessed than that — e.g. if I come up to a large run of 16th notes, I’ll stop the playing process to add a “16” after the first one — but I do find that multi-tasking slows me down, so I tend to just play all the notes through in a single pass (using the MIDI keyboard, ignoring durations), then add durations (using the computer keyboard/numberpad) as a second pass. I can usually “code” the pitch portion of an entire vocal line of a standard (~3') musical theatre song in less than 30s; “running string lines” can be played at maximum speed (n.b. my undergrad degree was in piano performance), so I can get dozens or hundreds of notes from a string part into pitch-code form in less than a minute; etc.
There is a “QuickKeys” plug-in somewhere that lets you trigger durations with one hand (on the keypad) while playing in the notes using the other hand (on the MIDI keyboard)… but my current workflow is so fast that any potential speed gain (and it isn’t immediately obvious to me there would be one!) is countered by the learning/coordination curve I’d have to climb.
> And can one input a piano piece (as opposed to a single voice)? Two hands, lots of splitting into separate voices.
1. Chords are wicked fast, obviously: just play all the notes (it doesn’t even have to be "exactly together"!), and Frescobaldi does the right thing.
2. The way my code is formatted, every voice has its own variable — so I just play each voice into the right variable, and combine them later in the score block.
Naturally, every tune is different in terms of the challenges to get the data-entry done. But now that I’ve found this “MIDI -> pitch code, then add durations” workflow, I’m kicking my 12-year-ago-self that it took me so long to get on board with Frescobaldi+MIDI.
Hope that helps!
Kieren.
________________________________
Kieren MacMillan, composer (he/him/his)
‣ website: www.kierenmacmillan.info
‣ email: kieren@kierenmacmillan.info