Logic - Rewire - Notion (issue)

[hselburn]

I have been looking into Monitors. I've heard, though I've not auditioned yet, the Presonus Eris 8. I did attempt to listen to some monitors at last years AES but try really hearing anything in an expo setting. Yeah. right. LOL. The thing is The. Eris 8 goes down to 35hz without a sub. At $500 for the pair, if they are as good as I've read, they could be a good deal. The only headphones I would consider monitoring through are so expensive as to take them out of contention. They are made by Audeze. I know one legendary engineer who uses them when he's on the road, but not in his own studio. They cost $2000 for their top model. As for other monitors, I heard the m-audio box-8'and they gave me a headache. They may be good for techno or hip hop but as that's not what I'm doing, and the fact that I don't want my monitors to give me a headache, no thanks. LOL. I really appreciate your post and I'm going to go through it a few times to make sure I didn't miss anything.

Thanks!
Howell

[hselburn]

Notion told me that their instruments can only be used from within Notion. Hence using ReWire. If I could use their instruments in logic or studio one, I'd be all set. It's not likely I could top the London Symphony Orchestra. That's about as good as it gets. The question, using rewire, is recording, playback, and exporting a mix.

[Surfwhammy]

I have been looking into Monitors. I've heard, though I've not auditioned yet, the Presonus Eris 8. I did attempt to listen to some monitors at last years AES but try really hearing anything in an expo setting. Yeah. right. LOL. The thing is The. Eris 8 goes down to 35hz without a sub. At $500 for the pair, if they are as good as I've read, they could be a good deal. The only headphones I would consider monitoring through are so expensive as to take them out of contention. They are made by Audeze. I know one legendary engineer who uses them when he's on the road, but not in his own studio. They cost $2000 for their top model. As for other monitors, I heard the m-audio box-8'and they gave me a headache. They may be good for techno or hip hop but as that's not what I'm doing, and the fact that I don't want my monitors to give me a headache, no thanks. LOL. I really appreciate your post and I'm going to go through it a few times to make sure I didn't miss anything.

Thanks!
Howell

As noted in one of my first posts to the topic where Notion Music announced the new association with PreSonus, I did a bit of research on the PreSonus studio monitors and was surprised in a pleasant way with the overall specifications, since I think that with the deep bass response is sufficient that the ARC System 2 (IK Multimedia) can pull it into a reasonable full-range zone, but even though this appears likely, the fundamental problem exists, which is the "big and heavy" aspect, and the rules of acoustic physics cannot be violated . . .

To put this into perspective, the Surfwhamy sound isolation studio is approximately 6 feet wide by 7 feet high and 12 feet long, which makes it about the size of a walk-in closet, and the studio monitor system I use consists of a pair of Kustom KPC15P 15" Two-Way Powered PA Speakers and a pair of Kustom PA112S Powered Sub Woofers, as shown in the following photographs . . .





These units are vastly overpowered for the size of the sound isolation studio, but I run them at a very low volume (approximately 2.5 on a scale of 0 to 10), and I check everything with a NADY DSM-1 Digital SPL Meter to ensure that the maximum volume is no greater than 90 to 94 dB SPL, which is very important because in this small a room these units are so powerful that they can do permanent hearing damage, and for reference I recommend wearing OSHA-approved hearing protection during the time when one is configuring the units and the overall system, because even with a room 20 feet wide by 20 feet long and 12 feet high, these units are vastly overpowered . . .

Nevertheless, there is an advantages to running them at such low volume levels, and one of the advantages is that the power amplifiers have plenty of headroom and dynamic range, which maps to being able to handle rapid transients without distorting and is one of the characteristics that audiophiles value, for good reasons . . .

Explained in a simple way, if you are running a 10-watt amplifier at maximum, then it has no headroom, but if you run a 100-watt amplifier at a low volume that matches the power of a 10-watt amplifier running at maximum, then the the 100-watt amplifier has plenty of headroom, reserve power capability, or whatever to handle rapid increases without distorting, and the same thing happens with the loudspeakers (woofers, horns, tweeters, and so forth) . . .

Based on current prices in the US at Musician's Friend, each pair of the Kustom self-powered loudspeaker units is approximately $400 (US), but Musician's Friend usually has a discount promotion with a coupon code, and most of the time these discount promotions apply to the Kustom self-powered loudspeaker units, where in some instances the additional discount maps to 15 percent, and the strategy is to do two separate purchases so that each purchase qualifies for the discount, which with a bit of thoughtful shopping and perhaps having more than one Musician's Friend account maps to reducing the cost by as much as 15 percent, which is more than enough to cover the required cables and Tripp-Lite surge protector power strips, where for reference I recommend and use GLS Audio cables . . .

You can start with a pair of Kustom KPC15P 15" Two-Way Powered PA Speakers; NADY DSM-1 Digital SPL Meter; Tripp-Lite ISOBAR8ULTRA surge protector; and set of GLS Audio cables to connect everything, and this is a very nice studio monitor system for a while, but it needs to be enhanced with a pair of Kustom PA112S Powered Sub Woofers, which you can do as your budget allows, and the Kustom PA112S Powered Sub Woofers are not optional for the complete system, because with the addition of the Kustom PA112S Powered Sub Woofers, the studio monitor system goes subsonic, which is what makes it literally amazing . . .

Later you will want to add a Behringer DEQ2496 Ultra-Curve Pro, which among other things is the external signal processor you will use to do Real-Time Analysis (RTA) and calibration using the separately ordered Behringer calibrated microphone, which is important because this makes it possible to calibrate the studio monitor system separately from the ARC System 2 calibration, where the strategy is to use the Behringer unit to get the studio monitor system as closely calibrated as possible but then to use the ARC 2 System (a) to do final more detailed and precise computer-based calibration and (b) to get a chart showing the response of the system before and after the ARC System 2 calibration, where the chart is what you use to do a bit of "by ear" fine-tuning using the Behringer unit with an emphasis on making only tiny adjustments (+/- 3 dB at most), primarily in the subsonic and deep bass ranges once you have the pair of Kustom PA112S Powered Sub Woofers, which you can do because while they are not specifically rated to go subsonic, you are running them at such low volume levels that you can push them just enough in a small room to go subsonic . . .

Another reason for the ARC System 2 is that they chart it produces will provide clues to the acoustic characteristics of your studio, and once you understand how everything works with respect to the acoustic behaviors of studios, listening rooms, and home theaters you can identify any "hot spots" or other types of problem areas and then do various room treatments, where for example the Surfwhammy sound isolation studio has a "hot spot" around 70-Hz that makes the deep bass "boomy", so once I realized this I corrected the problem with 6 rolls of fiberglass insulation and 5 cubes of compressed cellulose, which is an easy and relatively inexpensive way to solve the problem and by doing so transforms the way everything sounds from (a) "boomy" and indistinct to (b) crisp, clear, distinct, punchy, and tight . . .



One of the more curiously fascinating aspects of having a calibrated full-range studio monitor system is discovering that motion pictures have subsonic and deep bass even though with most playback systems you never hear it because the ability to reproduce subsonic and deep bass is not there, and if your studio has a fully floated floor, as does the Surfwhammy sound isolation studio, then you actually feel the subsonic bass . . .

The audio information is present in the motion picture soundtracks, because the studios where the audio work is done all have calibrated full-range studio monitor systems and the music composers, foley, and audio folks specifically include subsonic and deep bass, but other than in a motion picture theater you never hear it, because so-called "home systems" cannot reproduce the subsonic and deep bass . . .

One of the things I like to do when someone visits is to play their favorite song or to let them watch a favorite motion picture in the sound isolation studio, and it is fascinating to watch their expressions and responses, because most people have not heard music and motion picture soundtracks as they actually were recorded and heard in professional studios, where a good analogy is taking someone to a symphony performance where you have very good seats when they have only heard a symphonic orchestra on the television, and it nearly always maps to their having an epiphany . . .

THOUGHTS

You can do a reasonably good "by ear" adjustment without having the Behringer unit and the ARC System 2, but you need the NADY DSM-1 SPL Meter, and I recommend doing the initial procedure while wearing OSHA-approved ear protectors like airport workers wear when working around commercial jet aircraft . . .

~ ~ ~ Continued in the next post ~ ~ ~

[hselburn]

So are we saying that the Eris is overpowered for a home studio?

[Surfwhammy]

~ ~ ~ Continued from the previous post ~ ~ ~

The first step is to turn all the volume levels for the Kustom self-powered loudspeaker units to zero (all the way OFF), and then you turn the volume level on your Mac to maximum, as you also do for the MOTU 828mk3 Hybrid if you are using it . . .

I like to use the single version of "Billie Jean" (Michael Jackson) as the reference song, and once you have it playing in iTunes you begin by gradually increasing the volume levels of the KPC15 units until the NADY DSM-1 SPL Meter reads approximately 85 dB SPL when set to dBA weighting with Fast response, where the goal is to get a nice balance from left to right with a nicely centered stereo image . . .

[NOTE: The reason for using the single version of "Billie Jean" (Michael Jackson) as the reference song for adjusting and tuning the studio monitors is that it is superbly mixed and mastered and has full-range material with enough subsonic and deep bass combined with punchy kick drum that it is obvious when everything is correctly configured and balanced. Additionally, it has orchestral instrumentation and a very nice stereo image, which in my opinion makes it an excellent song for this purpose. When this song sounds good, everything else will sound good, including more traditional symphonic orchestra and related genres, and since this song was done before Dubstep and all the heavily "pumped" subsonic and deep bass genres became popular, it works nicely for current hit songs without overdoing it. The single version of "We Can't Stop" (Miley Cyrus) is another excellent reference song for this purpose, where the basic logic is that these songs were done by the most skilled folks on the planet in the best recording, mixing, and mastering studios, hence when it sounds good here in the sound isolation studio, I think everything is in the desired zone . . . ]

Once that is done, you can switch to the Kustom PA112S and gradually increase their volume levels until you have deep bass, which will be obvious and does not require a lot of volume, all the while checking the sound pressure level (SPL) in the room with the NADY DSM-1 SPL Meter . . .

You can switch to dBC weighing once the subwoofers are engaged, and depending on your preferences for subsonic and deep bass the levels can be in the 90 to 100 dB SPL range with dBC weighting, which favors deep bass . . .

The overall goal is that when you are finished it needs to be impossible to increase the volume beyond 90 to 100 dB SPL with either the volume slider for the Mac or the Master Output control for the MOTU 828mk3 Hybrid, and even for a room 20 feet wide by 20 feet long with a 12 feet high ceiling, the volume knobs for the Kustom units should be no higher than 2.5 to 3.5 on a scale of 0 to 10 . . .

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recommends 80 dB SPL as the maximum safe listening level, but I use 85 dB SPL, and I am comfortable with the dBC weighted reading being occasionally in the 90 to 100 dB SPL range, mostly because I play electric bass guitar and I like to feel the deep bass, but I keep it a bit lower when other folks are in the studio, hence the "by ear" aspect of final tuning where you make tiny adjustments to tailor the studio monitor system to your preferences, although it is important to understand that I only listen to music at the higher SPL range for short periods of time, mostly to do a bit of final mix checking . . .

This is a screen capture of the Mac OS X volume slider at the EPA-recommended maximum SPL using dBA weighting for the single version of "Billie Jean" (Michael Jackson), and it is a comfortable but loud listening level . . .



The reason that headphone mixing will not work is that each ear hears something completely and totally independent, which for all purposes makes it impossible to include phase alignment considerations, even though some folks suggest that humans cannot hear subtle phase alignment, which I think is nonsense . . .

A good loudspeaker mix will sound better when you listen with headphones than a "good" headphone mix, although I am somewhat inclined to allow a tiny bit of adjusting of a loudspeaker mix to tailor it specifically for iTunes and headphone or ear bud listening, but with emphasis on "tiny" adjustments, except that such adjustments can be made by the listener using tone controls or intrinsic equalization settings like "Rock" or whatever . . .

If it sounds good when played through a calibrated full-range studio monitor system with a flat equal loudness curve from 10-Hz to 20,000-Hz at 85 dB SPL, then it will sound good when you listen with headphones, and this is the reason that final mixing and mastering must be done with loudspeakers not with headphones, and even when you allow a tiny bit of tweaking to tailor the sound to favor headphones, you need to check it with the studio monitor system, since the studio monitor system is the final authority . . .

Lots of FUN!

[Surfwhammy]

So are we saying that the Eris is overpowered for a home studio?

No!

I am saying that while I am very pleased to see that at least one studio monitor manufacturer actually knows that the low-pitch "E" string on a Hofner "Beatle" Bass at standard tuning (Concert A = 440-Hz) is 41.204-Hz, the fundamental "big and heavy" rule of acoustic physics cannot be violated . . .

In other words, instead of being overpowered for a home studio, it is quite the opposite . . .

The Eris 8 has an 8" diameter woofer, and even for the Surfwhammy sound isolation studio it is too small to be able to push enough air, as is the case with the Scepter 8 . . .

The wavelength of a 20-Hz pure tone at 68 degrees Fahrenheit is approximately 56 feet, which among other things is the reason that you hear a car with a massive deep bass system a blocks or more before it drives by your house and if you want to hear deep bass and to feel subsonic bass then your studio monitor system needs to push a lot of air, which requires "big and heavy" physical materiel no matter how it is done . . .

I am not suggesting that the Eris 8 and Scepter 8 studio monitor systems have no use, because I think they can be useful as secondary monitors if your budget allows this luxury . . .

In the 1950s and 1960s professional recording studios used calibrated full-range Altec studio monitors similar to the following Altec A-7 "Voice of the Theater", which is approximately 2 feet by 3 feet by 4 feet and was called the "Voice of the Theater", because there usually were one or two of them behind the screen in motion picture theaters. . .


Altec Lansing A7 "Voice of the Theater"

As an example, the silver gray loudspeaker against which Ringo is leaning in the following photograph is a portable enclosure for an Altec 605A 15" Duplex Loudspeaker, which is the portable version of the 15" woofer and high-frequency horn in the A-7 "Voice of the Theater" . . .

[NOTE: I think there might be another unit on the left side behind George Martin, although perhaps not, since the early Beatles songs were monaural and technically one needs only one studio monitor to do monaural work, but so what . . . ]


Altec 612C Cabinet with 605A 15" Duplex Loudspeaker ~ Abbey Road Studios (EMI)

[NOTE: I did a bit more research and found the following photograph showing that there were two of the Altec studio monitors, and to put this into perspective the duplex loudspeakers were comparable to what would be behind the screen of a motion picture theater that seated from 500 to 1,000 people, which also is a clue that in the studio monitor scenario at Abbey Road Studios, these monitors never were run at full volume, and based on what I know about them from direct experience, I doubt that they were run at more that 5-watts each, a probably less, where this is 5-watts of a maximum 35-watts, since each loudspeaker was rated at 35-watts, and running the power amplifier(s) at 5-watts would be loud for the size of the room. Based on the information in "Recording the Beatles" (Curvebender Publishing), I am confident that the Abbey Road Studios engineers measured the sound pressure levels and ensured that everything was safe and so forth . . . ]



For reference, these Altec loudspeaker systems were rated at 30-watts or 35-watts, depending on the specific model loudspeakers and horns, and they were full range which specifically mapped to 20-Hz to 20,000-Hz; and they were "big and heavy" as well as being highly efficient, which in those days was important, because amplifiers used vacuum tubes and were very expensive to maintain with respect to replacing vacuum tubes and so forth, hence it was cost effective to pay more for highly efficient loudspeaker systems initially when this mapped to being able to use lower power amplifiers with fewer vacuum tubes, as well as lower heat controlling requirements . . .

During this time James B. Lansing who had been the senior design engineer for Altec and then Altec-Lansing was starting JBL . . .

THOUGHTS

It is not a matter of running the Kustom self-powered loudspeaker and subwoofer units at high amplification levels, which would be physically dangerous . . .

Instead it is a matter of needing to satisfy the "big and heavy" rule of acoustic physics and being able to push a lot of air without introducing distortion, all of which needs to happen at the ideal final mixing and mastering level of approximately 85 dB SPL with dBA weighting . . .

If you expect to be able to hear a 20-Hz pure tone in your sound isolation studio, then you are expecting to be able to hear a sound wave that is approximately 56 feet long and is streamed at rate of one complete wave every 50 milliseconds . . .

In other words, Hertz (Hz) is the standard abbreviation for "cycles per second" where a "cycle" refers to one complete sine wave, and for a 20-Hz pure sine wave the total length of the complete wave is 56 feet . . .

20 times per second maps to one complete cycle every 50 milliseconds, and reproducing this pure sine wave at 85 dB SPL requires the studio monitor system (specifically the woofers) to push a lot of air rapidly, and pushing the air requires a lot of energy, force, and all that stuff . . .

Another way to get a reasonable sense of the energy and force required is to consider drummer Daniel Erlandsson of Melodic Death Metal group Arch Enemy (a personal favorite) who using a pair of kick drums and intricate heel and toe motions is able to play a steady kick drum beat in the range of 20 to 25 beats per second, which is fabulous . . .

"Ravenous" (Arch Enemy) -- YouTube music video

Fabulous!

When everything goes subsonic, the wavelengths increase, where for example the wavelength of a 10-Hz pure sine wave is approximately 112 feet and there is one complete wave every 100 milliseconds . . .

Below approximately 40-Hz, the primary instruments are drums, which certainly are important, and while all this stuff is happening, a lot of other stuff also is happening, which increases the overall work that the amplifiers, loudspeakers, and horns need to do without distorting, which is one of the reasons that it is better to run a "big and heavy" studio monitor system at a lower volume level than to run a bookshelf-size studio monitor system at or near its maximum level . . .

The KPC15P power amplifiers are Class AB, which is excellent . . .

Class AB Power Amplifier (wikipedia)

I have not found any specific information regarding the power amplifier for the PA112S units, but my best guess is that they have Class D power amplifiers, which is fine, since they only do deep bass and nothing higher than 150-Hz . . .

Class D Power Amplifier (wikipedia)

Explained yet another way, if you examine equal loudness curves, as shown in the following diagram, it is obvious that human hearing is not so attuned or sensitive to subsonic and deep bass, and this part of the frequency range needs higher volume to be perceived as being equally loud as midrange and high frequencies . . .



Equal Loudness Contour (wikipedia)

And if the studio monitor system is not reproducing the subsonic and deep bass, then what happens is that folks try to compensate for the missing subsonic and deep bass, which they can only do by changing the midrange and high frequencies to create the audio illusion that there is subsonic and deep bass, which is the fundamental problem, because it forces producers and audio engineers to work with audio illusions rather than with what actually is recorded . . .

You need to hear the subsonic and deep bass, or with respect to the subsonic bass at least to be able to feel it if you cannot hear it, because otherwise you are spinning wheels and by doing so you cannot trust your ears . . .


~ ~ ~ Continued in a later post (see below) which refers to the Equal Loudness Contour diagram (see above) ~ ~ ~

[hselburn]

I have AudioTools for iOS by studio six digital. Do you think it would be enough as far as measuring spl?

[Surfwhammy]

I have AudioTools for iOS by studio six digital. Do you think it would be enough as far as measuring spl?

AudioTools has an SPL Meter, and this should be sufficient to get a general idea . . .

Audio Tools (Studio Six Digital)

At present, I am not certain about the way the microphone for an iOS device (iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch) is calibrated, and it might not be so accurate as the NADY DSM-1 SPL Meter, which is calibrated at the factory specifically for doing SPL measurements, but the AudioTools SPL Meter should be reasonably accurate . . .

Apple is very precise in its specifications and quality control, and it is entirely possible that the various AudioTools measuring functions are quite accurate . . .

I have a second generation iPad and an older generation iPod touch, and I can do some comparisons with the NADY DSM-1 SPL Meter, which makes for an interesting set of experiments . . .

And for this specific purpose I am not so certain that the SPL measurement needs to be super precise . . .

For reference, there are SPL Meters that are super precise, but they are very expensive, so in the grand scheme of everything the NADY DSM-1 SPL Meter is good but by no means is a super precise measuring device, where for reference some of the various audio measuring devices cost thousands if not tens of thousands of dollars and they have the ability to be calibrated in the field each time before they are used, and they also have data recording capabilities, but all that stuff is (a) too expensive to be practical for purposes of setting the volume level in a sound isolation studio on a low budget and (b) are too complicated to use . . .

I have the IK Multimedia iRig MIC Cast, and this might work with AudioTools, but if not the Studio Six Digital website indicates that there is an attachment device that makes it possible to connect a calibrated microphone to an iPad, and I have two calibrated microphone (one for the Behringer unit and one for IK Multimedia ARC System 2), so I will do some experiments, since I am intrigued by some of the capabilities of AudioTools . . .

iRig MIC Cast (IK Multimedia)

Lots of FUN!

P. S. The Studio Six Digital website indicates that AudioTools is optimized for the iPhone 5, which I do not have, but if you have an iPhone 5, then the AudioTools SPL Meter should be very accurate, since the Studio Six Digital website also indicates that Apple provided audio measuring functionality in the newer or perhaps newest version of iOS, and I like what I have read so far at the Studio Six Digital website . . .

I purchased AudioTools at the iTunes App Store, and I will install it to the iPad in a while to see how it works, which should be FUN, for sure . . .

For sure!

[Surfwhammy]

Notion told me that their instruments can only be used from within Notion. Hence using ReWire. If I could use their instruments in logic or studio one, I'd be all set. It's not likely I could top the London Symphony Orchestra. That's about as good as it gets. The question, using rewire, is recording, playback, and exporting a mix.

There are several ways to input music notation in NOTION 4:

(1) Input notes using the mouse . . .

(2) Input notes using a MIDI keyboard or MIDI guitar . . .

(3) Input notes by importing a MIDI or MusicXML file . . .

All of these will map to having music notation in the NOTION 4 score that will play NOTION 4 instruments (Bundled and Expansion) or VSTi virtual instruments . . .

There are two general ways to play virtual instruments in NOTION 4, which increase the options or methods to five ways in total:

(4) Use a MIDI keyboard or MIDI guitar . . .

(5) Use MIDI notes sent via a "virtual MIDI cable" from another application, which can be a Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) application, provided the DAW application has the ability to send MIDI via a "virtual MIDI cable" to NOTION 4 . . .

[NOTE: I am not certain that Studio One 2.6 Producer can send MIDI to NOTION 4 via a "virtual MIDI cable", but I think that at least one of the DAW application I have here in the sound isolation studio can do this, but I need to do some experiments before deciding if this is possible, although I know that it is possible with Reason 7, and I am somewhat certain that Digital Performer 8 can send MIDI to Reason 7 and NOTION 4 . . . ]

The particular method that will work best for your needs depends on what you want to do and how you want to do it, of course . . .

Of course!

THOUGHTS

I will explain each of the various methods, since at present I am not entirely certain which way you want to do this . . .

It will take a while, so check back every so often for updated posts with more information, but the fact of the matter is that there are quite a few ways to use NOTION 4 and a DAW application, and one of them will work nicely for your specific requirements . . .

And for reference, some of the methods are so complex that it is a bit mind-boggling, but they are intriguing from the perspective of being useful for doing things that most people would not intuitively imagine were possible, where one of the mind-boggling examples involves using a NOTION 4 External MIDI staff to send very simple series of notes to Reason 7 via a "virtual MIDI cable", where the MIDI notes sent by NOTION 4 then are used to control a Reason 7 Rack Extension like AutoTheory (Pitchblende) or AutoArp (Black & Orange), which plays chords and series of notes based on a simple high-level set of controlling notes, where the output of the Reason 7 Rack Extension then is sent to NOTION 4 via a ReWire 2 channel pair which is recorded to another NOTION 4 staff in real-time on the fly, all of which can happen in a ReWire 2 session where a DAW application is the ReWire 2 host controller and both NOTION 4 and Reason 7 are ReWire 2 slaves, all of which is so complex that the only way to make sense of it is to draw a system diagram . . .

AutoTheory (Pitchblende) ~ Rack Extension for Reason 7

AutoArp (Black & Orange) ~ Rack Extension for Reason 7

I have not done this particular experiment yet, but I have done parts of it and based on the parts all working nicely, (a) I am reasonably confident that this is possible and (b) I think there is a logical way to use it productively for something, although at the moment I have no specific idea what it might be other than it probably is a bit mind-boggling . . .

And to put this into perspective, I have done an experiment where NOTION 4 plays a Reason 7 synthesizer while Reason 7 is playing a NOTION 4 virtual instrument, and while this is happening Reason 7 and NOTION 4 also are sending additional generated audio to a DAW application, which is recording all of it, which itself is a bit mind-boggling, really . . .

Really!

The examples of the various methods are not listed in any particular order, but I am planning to do an example of each method, so the order depends mostly on how everything is configured at time, and at present I have the Behringer UMA-25S 25-Key Mini-MIDI Keyboard connected, hence the first example shows how the fourth method in the list works (see above) . . .

METHOD (4): USE AN EXTERNAL MIDI DEVICE TO PLAY NOTION 4 VIRTUAL INSTRUMENTS

This is a YouTube video that shows a ReWire 2 session where Studio One 2.6 Producer is the ReWIre 2 host controller and NOTION 4 is the ReWire 2 slave. There is a Behringer UMA-25S 25-Key MIDI keyboard connected to the Mac Pro here in the sound isolation studio via a USB cable, and it is configured as the MIDI input device for both NOTION 4 and Studio One 2.6 Professional . . .

There are three ReWire 2 channel pairs assigned to staves in NOTION 4, and these ReWire 2 channel pairs send the NOTION 4 generated audio to Studio One 2.6 Producer, where it is recorded based on the way the record-enable buttons for the respective audio tracks in Studio One 2.6 Producer are set during the two recording runs, where in the first run the music notation in NOTION 4 for the Drums play quarter notes and are recorded, while at the same time I am playing a NOTION 4 Harpsichord that is run through a Timeless 2 (FabFilter Software Instruments) echo effect . . .

In the second run or pass, the MIDI focus in NOTION 4 is changed to a NOTION 4 Techno Synth which also is enhanced with a different type of Timeless 2 echo, since it is easier for me to compose in real-time on the fly when there is some type of echo happening . . .

S1 N4 ReWire2 MIDI Playing N4 -- YouTube video

This video demonstrates the following activities:

(1) ReWire 2 session . . .

(2) MIDI keyboard playing NOTION 4 virtual instruments, where the virtual instruments are native NOTION 4 virtual instruments . . .

(3) The audio generated by NOTION 4 is recorded in Studio One 2.6 Producer

Additionally, since the Behringer mini-MIDI keyboard is a configured as a MIDI input device for Studio One 2.6 Producer, its MIDI also is recorded, but this is not shown in the YouTube video, since it happens on a track that was not currently visible due to being scrolled downward in the top part of the Studio One 2.6 Producer display where you see the audio tracks as they are recorded and then played . . .

You will observe that the MIDI notes are not recorded in NOTION 4, but they can be recorded to the respective staves, but one stave at a time, which is yet another way to capture and to record the MIDI input, where for reference the MIDI also can be recorded in Studio One 2.6 Producer simultaneously . . .

In these method, the input device is a MIDI keyboard, and it is playing native NOTION 4 virtual instruments, which is one of the several ways to play virtual instruments in a ReWire 2 session with Studio One 2.6 Producer and NOTION 4, but it is not the only way to do this . . .

Lots of FUN!

[Surfwhammy]

~ ~ ~ Continued from the earlier post about studio monitor systems (see above) ~ ~ ~

The midrange and high frequency stuff is easy, since it does not require "big and heavy", but the subsonic and deep bass needs to be present if you expect to get the midrange and high frequency material mixed correctly, because when the subsonic and deep bass is present, you do not need to create arbitrary "missing fundamental" auditory illusions using the midrange and high frequency material . . .

[NOTE: One of the reasons that small BOSE radios and CD players like the Wave have such a realistic sound even though they have tiny loudspeakers is that they use the "missing fundamental" auditory illusion to create the impression that there is subsonic and deep bass when there actually is none at all, which is fine for the intended purpose but is not what you want to happen when you are producing, mixing, and mastering. You need to hear what actually is recorded, and this includes the subsonic and deep bass material. In the external links section, there is a link to a simple test devised by researchers at Heidelberg University for determining whether someone is a fundamental tone hearer or an overtone hearer, and it is enlightening. It takes a while to understand the way the terms "fundamental tone hearer" and "overtone hearer" are used, and initially I misunderstood it, but after a while I realized that in some respects it is reverse logic, where what happens is that "fundamental tone hearers" will synthesize missing fundamentals, essentially filling-in the blanks, and this is where the problem occurs when one is a fundamental tone hearer, because if the fundamental tones are not heard, then you create them in your mind. I am a fundamental tone hearer, as I think most musicians and singers are, and this makes it vastly important that the fundamental tones are present, where for the most part this is focused on subsonic and deep bass. In other words, when it is present I can trust what I hear, since I am not imagining stuff that is not there, which makes sense if you think about it for a while . . . ]

Missing Fundamental Auditory Illusion (wikipedia)

Lots of FUN!

P. S. After reflecting on all this stuff for a while, I think that one of the key aspects of my perspectives on studio monitors comes from being a musician, which in a practical way maps to being accustomed actually to playing music in the real world, as contrasted to focusing primarily on composing . . .

In other words, I am accustomed to hearing music played through amplification rigs or in the case of drumming hearing a real drumkit, and the fact of the matter is that I like to hear music at a loudness level which is at least somewhat consistent with what one hears when performing in a musical group, and for this purpose 85 dB SPL is an excellent loudness level, because everything sounds like it actually is being played by a real musical group . . .

And it is not a matter of being hard of hearing or whatever, since I am very protective with respect to my hearing . . .

Nevertheless, as one grows older high-frequency hearing declines a bit, and at present I am good up to somewhere in the range of 13,000-Hz to 14,000-Hz based on an audio test I found on the web, which is fine with me, because most of the important stuff happens below 1,000-Hz with the upper-midrange and high-frequency stuff mostly being important for tonality, textures, clarity, and a bunch of other stuff, which is vastly important but due to the way human hearing works in some respects is more of a problem, because too much of it is bad in the sense that it makes music annoying rather than pleasing and exciting, plus there is the aspect that human hearing is particularly sensitive to a specific section of midrange, which is the "bump" in the midrange shown on the various equal loudness contours (or "curves"). . .



Equal Loudness Contour (wikipedia)

To put this into perspective, consider the information provided in the following chart that maps instruments and voices to frequency ranges, noting that the chart it is available as a larger size poster from the Independent Recording website . . .

[NOTE: This is an interactive chart at the Independent Recording website, where you can click on the various instruments and voices and get more detailed information, which is quite fascinating and very useful toward the goal of understanding the importance of the various frequency range sections, where I think this should make it easy to understand the importance of subsonic and deep bass, as well as low-midrange or whatever one wants to call it, where one can refer to the subsonic and deep bass and the low-midrange collectively as the "low stuff". Harmonics and overtones certainly are important, and they are central to distinguishing among the various instruments and voices, but the "low stuff" is where it all starts, because it establishes the foundation, and it is the most difficult stuff to manage, which becomes virtually impossible to manage when it is not reproduced accurately by the studio monitor system. Explained another way, if you listen to the single versions of "Billie Jean" (Michael Jackson) and "We Can't Stop" (Miley Cyrus) on a calibrated full-range studio monitor system or alternatively on studio quality headphones like the SONY MDR-7506 (a personal favorite), it is easy to hear that the instruments and singing are very carefully partitioned and located spatially in distinct locations, and while it is reasonably easy to do this for the midrange and high-frequency stuff, this is possible only when you get the subsonic, deep bass, and low-midrange stuff right, and you need to be able to hear the "low stuff" accurately to do this. And while these are Pop songs, the same rules apply to every other genre, since among other things the practical perspective is that Mozart and all those folks were doing Pop music, albeit a few centuries earlier. Explained yet another way, if you do not have a calibrated full-range studio monitor system with a flat equal loudness curve running from 10-Hz to 20,000-Hz at 85 dB SPL, then you can remove the entire left quarter of the frequency chart from what you hear, and the fact of the matter is that removing the entire left quarter of the frequency chart maps to spinning wheels and wasting your valuable time because it maps arbitrarily to removing the "low stuff" from your audio palette, and when you do that you make it impossible to be able paint sonically realistic pictures . . . ]





[SOURCE: Frequency Chart (Independent Recording) ]

Lots of FUN!

P. S. This is another way to put the "big and heavy" rule of acoustic physics into context, although it is a bit of an optical illusion regarding the size of the loudspeaker cabinet relative to the two Beatles who actually are more in the background, but so what. Use George Martin to determine the relative size of the studio monitor rather than John Lennon, and as shown in one of the photographs of my previous pose (see above), there were two of this units (left and right) . . .