I must say, that using MIDI from the Piano Roll view is quite good in Sonar. Thanks to the SWA videos I got what I needed to get running, and find that adding a string section to a song was quite easy. 

I'm not a MIDI fan, and I still believe MIDI is way overdue for an overhaul to make it simpler to understand, but after I struggled for years to begin understanding MIDI, after getting a session where it was needed, I have to say, this explains some of the big benefits of Sonar, and I never saw any of this before seeing it in the SWA videos. Cakewalk should take note here. 

Anyway, found some more value in Sonar. Thanks! It improved my mood over some issues I have with Take Lanes.

During the last 10+ years that I've dreamed of getting Sonar (until I finally did at the end of last year), I always thought of it as essentially a midi program.

In the few months I've hung around this forum, I've noticed that many people (majority ?) see Sonar more as a recording/mixing/mastering program that
just happens to come with some synths if you're so inclined.

So I would expect Sonar's midi handling to be top notch.
Whether it is or not, I'm not qualified to judge.

I think if it weren't for Karl's approach from the SWA videos in explaining how this worked, I would still be thoroughly confused. 

I still do not use Sonar for Mastering. It's not a good tool for that. Only for a quick-shot demo in that regard. It simply doesn't have the capabilities Wavelab does for what I deem a good Mastering platform. But this was what Wavelab was designed for, at least ultimately.

I'm kinda surprised. I've been using Cakewalk since ver. 2 DOS. It was started as just a MIDI program (non-linear digital audio was still a dream) and features have been added. I agree that MIDI is past due for an overhaul, but with most hardware instruments produced in the last 10 years with on-board USB, it renders the MIDI spec as a non-issue. FWIW, think of MIDI as a musical word processor. It basically just records keystrokes. The piano roll, event editor, staff view, they all just display the keystrokes in unique ways, but it's just keystrokes.

gbarrett : " FWIW, think of MIDI as a musical word processor. It basically just records keystrokes. The piano roll, event editor, staff view, they all just display the keystrokes in unique ways, but it's just keystrokes. "

Yes, but I think this is only half the story. MIDI also lets all the different pieces talk to each other.

USB connects them together, but the language they speak amongst themselves is MIDI(the control part of MIDI).

gbarrett


I'm kinda surprised. I've been using Cakewalk since ver. 2 DOS. It was started as just a MIDI program (non-linear digital audio was still a dream) and features have been added. I agree that MIDI is past due for an overhaul, but with most hardware instruments produced in the last 10 years with on-board USB, it renders the MIDI spec as a non-issue. FWIW, think of MIDI as a musical word processor. It basically just records keystrokes. The piano roll, event editor, staff view, they all just display the keystrokes in unique ways, but it's just keystrokes.

MIDI can stand a little evolution, not that I'm here to rewrite a SPEC. What I find quaint about MIDI is that newer technology hasn't replaced MIDI, but merely encapsulates MIDI. It's like scanning a hand-written sticky-note into a jpg, emailing it to a recipient, and then having the recipient print out the sticky note so that it's on paper again. It gets the job done, but the end users/devices will only communicate by writing and reading using pen and paper only.

In Sonar, we need a MIDI channel and then a MIDI instrument to make sounds. Sure this is the case if we need an external keyboard to play the notes, but for Soft-synths, MIDI is terribly redundant. It's almost like MIDI is used specifically because the shove to drop MIDI from Soft-Synths. Fortunately, many Soft-syths just "cover up" the MIDI confusion and handle it all for you. 

I agree that MIDI is past due for an overhaul, but with most hardware instruments produced in the last 10 years with on-board USB, it renders the MIDI spec as a non-issue. FWIW, think of MIDI as a musical word processor. It basically just records keystrokes. The piano roll, event editor, staff view, they all just display the keystrokes in unique ways, but it's just keystrokes.

Yes, MIDI was just designed to connect an outboard controller to a computer. That is one reason that it needs upgrading. But no, USB connection does not come close to replacing the MIDI spec. USB just carries MIDI data to and  from your keyboard in a somewhat less flexible manner. USB through?


If you are editing a MIDI track in Sonar, you are not using the electrical spec at all, but you are using the control spec, as are all of your softsynths. If you are using the piano roll or the event editor, you are using MIDI, not as an interface, but as a programming language, modifying the code in what is unfortunately, not the best imaginable code editor. As someone who has used Cakewalk sequencers for a long time, my biggest complaint is that the midi aspect has not advanced while the audio has been given massive attention. 


Still, I can program midi performances that not only I can not perform on a keyboard, but no one could perform, writing code to control instruments that can make sounds of such rapidity and duration that no human being could manage with a metal or wooden instrument, and with the kind of subtlety that is simply not available from a midi controller manned by a performer in real time.


Even if you think of MIDI as a word processor for music, I imagine you are not old enough to remember when a letter had to be typed correctly the first time and could not be duplicated except by interposing a thin sheet of paper impregnated with carbon dust and a binder, to yield at most two or three readable copies. The ability to produce easily editable copy was an enormous advance. The ability to step out of a keyboard performance and move and alter phrases with such flexibility is of inestimable value.

I was just trying to make a point as to the simplicity of MIDI. I do remember when we used typewriters and had to be right the first time or use correcting fluid and the like. To support my statement about the word processing parallel, I remember in the very early days of midi, before standard midi files, when we tried to backup our midi files, they were saved as a ascii text files. If we wanted to transfer them between sequencers (hardware), we had to use a DOS utility to convert the ascii file to the proprietary MIDI type file. Yeah, I've been doing this for a long time. When MIDI came out as a standard (I was in college with a dual major - music and computer), we thought it was the greatest thing on the planet. Of course, that was 1983 or so, and the personal PC wasn't really personal. Back to the original topic, MIDI hasn't evolved much. It's still note on, note off, and controller info. General MIDI added a few points to that, but still not much. It's time for something better, but I don't know what that would be.

The most incredible thing about MIDI is that it ever happened at all.  And this is mainly down to Dave Smith (Of Sequential Circuits fame).
 
To get various manufacturers to agree to a standard was a major feat in itself.  I think it is unlikely that this would even be possible now.
 
No manufacturer would want to put development time and money into a new standard unless everyone is going to do it.  They will wait for others to adopt first, and you end up in a catch 22 situation.  So I'm not sure if we'll ever see MIDI updated.
 
There was a fascinating live discussion on this recently including (amongst others) Dave Smith, Tom Oberheim, Alan Parsons and our very own Craig Anderton.  If I find the link to the video I'll post it.
 
I've been using MIDI since it's inception.  My first synth was a Roland JX-3P, an analogue synth with this new MIDI invention.  It blew me away then, and it still does.  It means my various equipment, from Roland, Kawai, Ensoniq, Yamaha synths, Yamaha and Roland drums, guitar effects from various manufacturers etc etc - can ALL talk to one another.

The MIDI specifications are under further development.  You can read more about that on the MIDI Manufacturers Association website - they are the official caretakers of it.

http://www.midi.org/

I understand that Yamaha already has a proprietary, more refined version running on some of their MIDI-driven acoustic pianos.  It's wouldn't be a surprise if some or all of that version eventually finds its way into the public version.

But the MIDI spec itself doesn't determine all the ways in which software can handle it - Sonar can do all kinds of stuff with how the data gets displayed and manipulated without changing the underlying MIDI spec.