Harmony Bloom by Mario Nieto (MIDI plugin)

[morelia]

Try programming your kicks and snares by hand, then using Harmony Bloom on a separate track for percussion and hihats.

Just a query about purchasing via jrrshop. How are updates downloaded? They don't show up in my HB website account.

[Uncle E]

I’ll ask Mario.

[Uncle E]

I've probably phrased that badly. I'm not talking about creating percussion sequences. What I mean is I have a 4/4 beat, then try to create some rhythmic sequence with something like a pluck or a synth bass, etc. by feeding chords into harmony bloom which feeds a synth. If I don't touch the offsets, all is fine (but boring). Depending on the loop length there seem to be different sweet spots for the offsets that sound interesting while most settings between them sound like a cat walking over the keyboard. When I've found a sweet spot it seems even harder to "escalate" because there is no easy way for little variations other than probability (not a fan of randomizing). Automating the offsets doesn't work for me right now and automating the other parameters (loop length, note count,...) doesn't give musical results or is too much work (triggerbars). It feels like eating a soup with a fork.

Try this:

Turn on 1 trigger bar
Set Note Collection to Minor9, Scale to Minor Pentatonic, N.Notes to 6, and Loop Length to 1
Limit N.Min and N.Max to 1 octave

Now play with the E.Offset. Once you find something you like, try different Trigger Bars (but only one at a time).

[MarioNietoWorld]

Hey, although Harmony Bloom works well for creating harmonies, it can also be used to create rhythmic patterns. But sometimes getting interesting results depends on knowing HB well or randomizing until something cool happens. It's also important to choose the sounds carefully. I'm thinking about adding new options so that if the user wants, everything can sound in time, or maybe add a mode to use with drums; I'll see what I can do. On the other hand, in my live streams, I show how to use Harmony Bloom in many different ways and contexts (including with percussion). Here’s a percussive piece, but there’s a list with quite a few hours where you can explore:

https://www.youtube.com/live/d22eoeUI6F ... HhX&t=7084

List:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... SXzZ80mpEJ

[Dr.Gunjah]

Maybe some kind of real time quantization feature where you can make the notes quantize to 1/4, 1/8, etc. and maybe the amount of quantization would help to tame the chaos.

Anyway, thanks for your suggestions guys, I'll try that.

[MarioNietoWorld]

I updated to v1.2.5 and a project that I'm working on sounds different with regard to the generated sequences from Harmony Bloom. Also the "Custom Colors for Dots" cannot be reset back to default. Back to v1.2.3 as I need to finish my current projects.

I've been doing some tests and I haven't been able to reproduce the compatibility issue you mentioned between version 1.2.5 and 1.2.3. The states are saved and opened the same in both versions. Is anyone else having this problem? Any more details you could provide? For example, is there a parameter that doesn't load correctly when using the new version?

Thanks a lot.

[elassi]

Maybe some kind of real time quantization feature where you can make the notes quantize to 1/4, 1/8, etc. and maybe the amount of quantization would help to tame the chaos.

Nice idea. Ideally also mixed quant's like 16th and 16th_d or 16th_t and something like that.

[pdxindy]

Maybe some kind of real time quantization feature where you can make the notes quantize to 1/4, 1/8, etc. and maybe the amount of quantization would help to tame the chaos.

That is so easy to do in Bitwig, I really don't need it in Harmony Bloom. I kinda assume other DAW's have a quantization device too... but maybe not.

[elassi]

But that'd mean an extra step/work, pdxindy.

Precisely: editing the recorded MIDI.

[pdxindy]

But that'd mean an extra step/work, pdxindy.

Precisely: editing the recorded MIDI.

Huh? Why would you need to edit midi?

[elassi]

To invoke the quantizing-operation on the recorded or dragged MIDI-file, which is "editing" to me.

The DAWs I use (Live and Reaper) don't have input-quantization. Unless I've overlooked something.

[MelloProg]

Quantization ideally should be part of the pattern generating algorithm.
Using a DAW's quantization features would be insensitive to the musicality of the pattern and the result can become awkward. You'd end up doing a lot of hand work after all.

[pdxindy]

To invoke the quantizing-operation on the recorded or dragged MIDI-file, which is "editing" to me.

The DAWs I use (Live and Reaper) don't have input-quantization. Unless I've overlooked something.

In Bitwig, you put the Quantize device after Harmony Bloom and it quantizes the live output of HB to whatever percentage you set. No editing of any kind needed... but yeah, maybe other DAW's don't have such a device. Must be a midi plugin that does that, but maybe easier to have it in HB.

[Dr.Gunjah]

I can't find it in reaper either... There may be a js fx around but it's certainly not the same like having this feature directly in the plugin where the "issue" happens.

@MarioNietoWorld: I had some better results with lower note counts and also deactivating some of them, then playing around with quantized offset and low values for E and F offset. I think I have a better idea now how to use the plugin more musically. However both the automation rounding issue and missing legato mode still drive me nuts. I'll have to wait until you have some time to check this.

[jonnybueno]

The bitwig quantize device works really well. I tried to replicate it using other plugins in other daws but wasn't able to find many options that worked well.

+1 for a quantize mode please.