How do you do this?  Specific example: I'm doing a mock-up for a client who has given me a complete score via Finale.  To save time, I've exported each instrument as a MIDI file and imported them to their respective VST tracks in Sonar (obviously resulting in a square performance).  I'd like to 'overdub' a few tracks to add more life - like the piano part, but only capture the velocity and phrase-shaping of my performance, not the notes.  I see in recording options that I can turn notes off, but I don't see an option for recording the velocity.  I've tried aftertouch, but it doesn't affect attack velocity.  Is this doable?
 
 

Velocity is a property of note on/off events; it can't be recorded separately. The only way to change velocities of an existing performance is to edit them.

brundlefly
Velocity is a property of note on/off events; it can't be recorded separately. The only way to change velocities of an existing performance is to edit them.

It would be nice to have a "pasfe special" option to paste attributes like this - like pasting font attributes/formats in Microsoft Word. 

Brando

brundlefly
Velocity is a property of note on/off events; it can't be recorded separately. The only way to change velocities of an existing performance is to edit them.

It would be nice to have a "pasfe special" option to paste attributes like this - like pasting font attributes/formats in Microsoft Word. 

How is this even possible? As brundlefly said a velocity value is an attribute of a particular note on/ off event.

It would be technically possible if there were a one-to-one correspondence between the source events and the target events, but that would mean the the source is already what you want, so there would be no point in pasting the velocity data from one set of note events to the other.
 
 

To the OP... if you're able to nail the performance enough to get the velocities you'd like, why not just record the notes too?   Without overwriting the original, of course, which serves as a backup.
 

You can create groove quantize templates (not sure if that's the correct term) based on midi performances and use them to groove quantize the velocity of other midi tracks. Not sure how long they can be, but this might be worth a shot.