Immediate Response Please!!!! MIDI different than playback

Discussion of playback and midi issues go here.
Ingtofo
Posts: 1
Joined: Tue Apr 21, 2009 4:12 am

Post by Ingtofo » Tue Apr 21, 2009 4:23 am

I'm trying to make part CDs to learn choral music. I have the song entered in SATB form, and now I want to export 4 different MIDI files, each with all four parts playing but with one part louder than the rest. I used the mixer to adjust the volumes of the 4 different parts, making the soprano significantly louder than the rest. In Sibelius, it plays back exactly how I want it to sound. When I export the general MIDI file, though, and play the MIDI file, all four parts are once again equally balanced. This seems like a relatively simple problem, but I've been messing around with it for hours and cannot figure out how to make this work...every forum I've checked acts like it should export exactly how it plays in Sibelius. Any advice???? I'm trying to get these done ASAP, so please respond right away if possible!!!


kyllikki
Posts: 4
Joined: Fri Sep 12, 2014 6:44 am

Post by kyllikki » Fri Sep 12, 2014 7:00 am

I'm having the same problem as this person, but my problem is even more compound. This was my first Sibelius score, and I found it very difficult to have a "Unison" line transition into both a "Soprano" and "Alto" line, which then became "Soprano 1," "Soprano 2," "Alto 1," "Alto 2" and also high divisi Sop 1 and low divis Sop 1 staves (the parts were too complex to put them on the same line). It was super difficult to figure out how to make the Soprano line turn into Soprano 1 and 2, among other tasks. I ended up having to "Change instruments" but this messed with the mixer and I had to go and change the voice in "edit instruments" to get everything to play the parts in piano or flute (the voice sounds, I'm sure many will tell you, do not work well for voice parts).

So that was frustrating enough, and I'm probably going to have to have like 9 staves for what should only be a 5-part song. Why can't you split a stave into two parts or merge them again at will? Anyhow, dealing with the playback and .wav creation for all of this is immensely frustrating. If I wanted to export *just* the Alto 1 part, for example, the file would exclude the "Unison" and "Alto" parts, which are a PART of what an Alto 1 needs to learn.

How do I get Unison, Alto and Alto 1 parts to all play louder than Alto 2, Soprano, Soprano 1, and Soprano 1 high and low divisi? Then export that file so I can give it to my Alto 1s? How do I do the same with the other parts? Preferably without having to download Audacity and manually splice .wav files together *sigh*.

Thank you in advance for any help. I've been wondering if Sibelius is maybe meant more for instrumental music instead of choral? You can have many singers under the same "umbrella" of, say "Alto," who become Alto 1, 2, 3, or 4, but they don't stop singing the "Alto" line when the line stops splitting. It seems there is no easy way for Sibelius to handle this!

bobp
Posts: 1182
Joined: Thu Dec 27, 2012 12:53 am

Post by bobp » Thu Oct 02, 2014 4:16 am

Both of you, we need to know what version of Sibelius you are using.
In general, Sibelius does not export GM as a playable file you have control over. If you want one voice louder, you must use Sibelius sounds.

If you have 2 voices in one staff there is no way to have one playback or export louder that the other. To have that kind of control you must have each voice on a separate staff. It has nothing to do with vocal vs instrumental music.
So, for the score you hand singers, write it as you would normally. But you will need to do something different for rehearsal recordings. There is a plug in that might help.
Bob Porter
Sibelius 7.5, W10,i5,16 GB ram,desktop

basit
Posts: 2
Joined: Thu Nov 13, 2014 4:46 am

Post by basit » Sat Jan 31, 2015 10:01 am

this is very nice post :D

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