Topten Software

ricmat · Post by **ricmat** » Fri Dec 12, 2014 11:38 pm

Hello all,

I'm new at all this. I just installed Cantabile 2.0 lite. I've successfully connected a Roland 3000s (very old) digital piano to my computer via a USB adaptor. At this point:

1. The piano keyboard successfully transmits MIDI to Cantibile. The indicator lights flash, the notes show up on the on-screen keyboard, and the audio gets to the speakers.

2. The piano sustain pedal causes the indicator lights to flash.

3. The sustain pedal has NO effect on the Roland piano key output from Cantabile.

4. The sustain pedal DOES have an effect when I use the on-screen (computer) keyboard. I can push the sustain pedal on the real piano, then push on the computer keyboard and the sustain works fine for those sounds!

Of course, what I'd like to have is the sustain pedal usable with the real piano keyboard, not the on-screen keyboard.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

Thank you in advance.

Ricmat

RunBeerRun · Post by **RunBeerRun** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 1:13 am

I'm not a keyboard player, so I have to use my sustain pedal in different ways. Also not familiar with the current Cantabile.

Is it that the sustain pedal is working with the computer-and will therefore trigger software, but you want it to work with the internal sounds of the keyboard? No that doesn't sound right-if Cantabile has lights flashing for it, it's there, in some form. Sustain is usually control change number 64, so either the software plugin you load would need to have that built in, or you'd manually have to set it up so it'd work that way.

I'd wait until an experienced user has specific info...

humphrey · Post by **humphrey** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 3:42 pm

Hi Ricmat,

I`m not clear about what you`re doing and what you expect cantabile to do. So as RunBeerRun mentioned some questions on the issue:

You connected the Roland via USB to cantabile. What about the audio outs of the Roland: are they also routed to cantabile or to your speakers? Are the audio-outs of your soundcard (also?) routed to your speakers?

Did you disable "local control" on your Roland (otherwise the keyboard will still control the soundmodule in your Roland indepently from what you are doing inside cantabile)?

ricmat wrote:3. The sustain pedal has NO effect on the Roland piano key output from Cantabile.

What do you mean with key output? Is this the MIDI-Target or an audio output in a rack?

ricmat wrote:...the notes show up on the on-screen keyboard, and the audio gets to the speakers.

What is the audio you´re talking about: the soundmodule inside the Roland or a vsti inside cantabile?

Sorry to ask this, but I will only be able to help if I understand what`s happing inside your setup.

kind regards, humphrey

ricmat · Post by **ricmat** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 4:05 pm

Hello Humphrey,

I'm sorry I wasn't more clear in my original post, but I'm new to all this, including the correct terms to use....

This problem seems to have gone away, I'm not sure why. I hope it doesn't return, because I won't know how to fix it.

Local control is disabled, and there is no sound direct from the Roland piano. I'm listening to the output from my PC. I'm using the Roland piano only as a MIDI controller.

Cantabile lite comes defaulted with a "keyboard" in the main screen, and some MS based synthesizer voices (I'm not sure if that's considered a VSTi or not). When I use that computer screen keyboard, or the PC keys that map to them, that keyboard successfully produces sound from the PC, and the PC's shift key successfully acts as a sustain pedal.

In addition, my Roland piano keys successfully generate sound coming from the PC. But not sustained notes.

The funny part was that when I used the actual physical sustain pedal on the Roland piano, it would not sustain the notes generated by the Roland. But it WOULD sustain the computer based keys.

As I said, this has gone away, and I've moved on to a different problem. There is a significant real-time delay between the Roland keyboard and the actual sound output. It seems to be a half-second to a second.

Perhaps all of this has something to do with "Lite" Cantabile.

Best regards,

Ricmat

humphrey · Post by **humphrey** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 4:49 pm

first off: no need for apologies: I definitely understand you`re a beginner on live hosts and cantabile (even though you only use the free version) can be really complecated till you have understood the "speciallities".

o.k., fine the problem is gone so far. Should it appear again feel free to post here.

Concerning delay: this strongly sounds like an audio driver problem. You should check:

1) Which driver did you chose in the audio-driver menue (Setup -> Audio Engine Options -> Select Audio Driver). If an MME or DirectX driver is selected, this will most probably be the reason. What you need is an ASIO or a WDM driver.
2) If you don`t have such a driver in the menue you can:
a) look if the manufacturer of the soundcard is offering ASIO or WDM drivers in the downloadarea, or
b) simply use ASIO4all driver: this is a teriffic bundle which is permanently cared by the developer. It is stable, can be used on all the OS (up to Win8) and works with 98% of the soundcards out there - and the best is free!
3) Install one of the drivers and don`t forget to chose it in the menu I pointed out above.
4) Last step is to chose a sufficient ASIO buffer size (can normally found under "Control Panel" in the same menu). To give you an impression here: I`m able to handle 512 Bytes but if possible I use 256 or 128 Bytes (in some cases when timing is extremly important also 64 if the cpu is able to run this). So you should find an optimum for yourself between cpu load and latency. If the cpu-load is too high you will hear crackles and should increase the buffer size again.

regards, humphrey

ricmat · Post by **ricmat** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 5:08 pm

Thank you for the suggestions, Humphrey. I'll look into those things. In my experience it is rare to post on an on-line help forum, and get any answer, and your responses are very fast and informative. Your help is really appreciated.

Ricmat

humphrey · Post by **humphrey** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 5:27 pm

you`re welcome!

ricmat · Post by **ricmat** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 6:50 pm

Good news and bad news....

The good news -- The latency problem was fixed by 2 things...... I installed the ASIO4all driver. And I enabled "Iowa Piano" VSTi in place of MS GS Wavetable Synth. The Piano VSTi fixed most of the latency problem, and the ASIO4all driver got rid of some crackling noises and better overall sound (with no increase in buffer size or sample size).

The bad news -- Using the Iowa Piano VSTi (and a few other Piano VSTi's), the sustain pedal on my real piano has no effect on the sound output. The sustain pedal works OK with the MS GS Wavetable Synth. So I'm thinking that perhaps the VSTi's themselves need to have support for the sustain pedal built-in?

Or do I need to get another plug-in to handle the sustain pedal?

Ricmat

humphrey · Post by **humphrey** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 7:31 pm

Hm, strange. No, sustain pedal should have a noticable influence on vstis (even using it on an organ vsti normally leads to keeping notes playing). So I don`t think this is plugin-specific.

The best way to get this analyzed would be to have a MIDI-monitor connected to the MIDI-Input gereated by the Roland. Unfortunately cantabile 2 doesn`t have one implemented (cantabile 3 will have). So I only can guess what could be the reason for this strange behavior:

Could it be that the Roland is sending note and controller data on different MIDI-channels or MIDI-ports? In this case it depends on the behavior of the plugins if they "understand" the sustain-pedal information (Cc64): plugs that work on a certain MIDI-channel would ignore Cc64 data if it sent on a different MIDI-channel wheras plugs receiving in Omni-mode would accept them.

Maybe you could have a look into the Roland manual.

I`ll think about the theme and be back if I have another idea.

regards. humphrey

humphrey · Post by **humphrey** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 7:45 pm

o.k., could you please download this midi-monitor:
http://www.vst4free.com/free_vst.php?pl ... or&id=1626
You simply have to drop the .dlls into the plugin-folder of cantabile and load the instrument version into a rack.
Then you should be able to track any MIDI-data. This should lead to some clearification.

regards, humphrey

ricmat · Post by **ricmat** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 8:23 pm

I needed to install the 32 bit version of Cantabile since the monitor plugin was only 32 bits.

Sustain still doesn't work, but here's the monitor output for sustain pedal, soft pedal, and a couple of notes:

Controller, Channel: 1, Number: 64 (Hold Pedal (on/off)), Value: 127
Controller, Channel: 1, Number: 64 (Hold Pedal (on/off)), Value: 0
Controller, Channel: 1, Number: 67 (Soft Pedal (on/off)), Value: 127
Controller, Channel: 1, Number: 67 (Soft Pedal (on/off)), Value: 0
Note On, Channel: 1, Key: 60 (C4), Velocity: 43
Note Off, Channel: 1, Key: 60 (C4), Velocity: 0
Controller, Channel: 1, Number: 123 (All Notes Off), Value: 0
Note On, Channel: 1, Key: 72 (C5), Velocity: 53
Note Off, Channel: 1, Key: 72 (C5), Velocity: 0
Controller, Channel: 1, Number: 123 (All Notes Off), Value: 0
Note On, Channel: 1, Key: 60 (C4), Velocity: 32
Note Off, Channel: 1, Key: 60 (C4), Velocity: 0
Controller, Channel: 1, Number: 123 (All Notes Off), Value: 0

Ricmat

humphrey · Post by **humphrey** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 9:13 pm

o.k. this is very clear: everything works as it should. Atm the only explanation making sense is, the plugins you use don`t react on Cc64 (really strange!). I just checked 4front piano and it definitely reacts on Cc64. Here is the download link:
http://www.yohng.com/software/piano.html
Could you try it and report if it changes anything? Otherwise maybe you could send me the stored cantabile-file via PM. I could have a closer look on it.

regards, humphrey

ricmat · Post by **ricmat** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 9:52 pm

I've tried 4frontpiano with the same (no sustain) results on both 32 and 64 bit Cantibile 2.0.

Which file should I send you?

However, things are getting confused on my computer now with both versions installed. And I can't seem to fully uninstall either 32 bit or 64 bit versions. When I uninstall, and then re-install, the old settings keep popping up even though they should have been uninstalled.

If you have any ideas about how to totally uninstall / purge Cantabile before re-installing, that would be helpful also.

Thanks!

humphrey · Post by **humphrey** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 10:15 pm

Hi,

what I meant was: setup the 4frontpiano in cantabile so that you can play (o.k. without sustain button), store this setup under a name and simply send me this file (4frontpiano makes sense as cantabile will also find it on my computer).

Concerning uninstalling cantabile: not sure but after uninstalling you should have a look on the following folder:
C:\Users\<your name>\AppData\Roaming\Topten Software\Cantabile 2.0 (this is the place where parametrization of my cantabile files are stored). Deleting this folder should solve your problem.

regards, humphrey

ricmat · Post by **ricmat** » Sat Dec 13, 2014 10:52 pm

The forum won't allow me to attach a file with that extension. I tried renaming it with a .txt extension and that wasn't allowed either. Here is a link at which you can download it.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B697BN ... sp=sharing

Thanks again...

Topten Software

KVR Audio

Sustain pedal works with computer keyboard, but not real keyboard