Two Great Tastes That Taste Great Together

[tcepsa]

I have begun combining my love of (and desire to become better at) music with my computer geekery and developed a Java application that turns any standard 101-key keyboard into a MIDI musical keyboard (actually, I should double-check that...especially since I use certain keys such as '\' that aren't always in the same place).

For those of you who are familiar with Tracking, this uses a slightly different layout (though similar concept) for the keyboard arrangement. Instead of starting with C4 at 'z', I put it at 'v'. This results in the overall range of the keyboard being from F#3 (assigned to 'a') up to A6 (assigned to '\') and also means that I can play certain songs where they were written to be played, instead of having to transpose up an octave to get at all the notes.

As an example, here's how to play a slightly simplified arrangement of Ashokan Farewell in the key of D (with spaces to approximate most of the sustained notes ~grin~):
.2w 2/.k nk, knbcb cxbk.w55t5e .2w 2/.k nk, knbcb cxbk.w5.2ew k,. kbw ./2w.k nk nbc zx . knbk.q w/ 2w.k bxbk.w knbgb

And, as a bonus, here's Simple Gifts:
bb, ,./, /qw wq/ .,. . . , ./.,b b ,k,./ ../qw q/. ../ /., ,., w / ./q/., ./ /qw q/. ./. b, , ././qw q/. . / / ., , ,

And further extra super bonus, here's Prologue from some of the early Final Fantasy games:
b,.bq /.,k,.,,k n./nw q/.l/.n/. b,.bq /.,k,.,,k n./nw q/.l/.n/. e ew /qq/.l./qw r re qw w3w w3wq/.

(Oh wow... these are so much easier to read than notes on a staff... too bad there's no good way to indicate length of note this way ~wry~ Then again, I've spent a lot more time doing things involving sight reading text--even with weird punctuation--into a computer keyboard than I have involving sight reading music into an instrument, so it's not terribly surprising that it is easier (though I am still a little surprised at the degree to which it is easier...))

... and I should probably actually figure out some way to post the program, so if someone who reads this wants to actually try it they can ^_^

Comments

[grum]

"and my brain knows to move my right ring finger down half an inch and press the key there--I don't have to consciously think about it. That's where I want to get with notes on a staff."

But that's going to be different for every instrument. In addition to the text not being as easy for me to see visually, the computer keyboard as an instrument that makes music is foreign to me. Part of how I sightread music is notes on page to sound in head to fingers on keys.. this may be part of why I'm not good at it, but, would you be able to take this notation and play it on an instrument that you already play, does it map that way for you? Because it completely does not for me.

[tcepsa.livejournal.com]

You've got a good point that it'll be different for all instruments--I wasn't quite clear on that. I meant that I want to be able to do that with at least one instrument (and I don't know--maybe that's one of those things that nobody can do; just pick up a piece of sheet music and start playing, I mean. I'm doing my best to keep that in mind, but if it looks to you that I'm starting to be really hard on myself about not being able to do it, kindly give me a good solid poke ^_^)

Part of how I sightread music is notes on page to sound in head to fingers on keys

Currently I don't have the "sound in head" part. Not sure whether that's helping me or getting in my way or neither or both (somehow, though I really don't know how that would work ~grin~). Instead, I have note on page to note in head ("Oh, that there's a C-sharp quarter note") to fingers on keys ("let's see, C-sharp is... this one!") What I'm trying to get to is "Oh, when I see that black spot on that line, that means I hit this key" without actually having to think too much about which note it actually is. Which would be good for a specific instrument but not generalize to all instruments very well... which brings us to the next part of your comment!

would you be able to take this notation and play it on an instrument that you already play, does it map that way for you?

This notation? No. I can look at a staff and go "Oh, let's see, that's a C-sharp" and look at a keyboard and go "Okay, so C-sharp is that one!" but it's even slower for me to look at those strings I wrote above and go "Oh, k is F-sharp" because I (currently) have to look at where that key is on my computer keyboard, start from one of the keys that I do know, like v, which is C and then trace the path between them: b is D, n is E, m is F, k is just above and to the right of m, so k must be F-sharp!

(As a side note, that's roughly similar to how I got these to this notation in the first place; they're all songs that I know on my hammered dulcimer, and I mostly remember the layout of it--enough to pick out the melodies. "That string is B, which corresponds to ummm... c on my computer keyboard... yup, sounds right, okay next...")

I am hoping ultimately that I'll get the staff rote memorized so that the "oh, let's see, that note on that line is what?" takes much less time, which will make playing on any instrument easier. It would also be good if I ended up with better pitch matching (hearing something and being able to say "Oh, that's F4!", but again, not sure that's even something that I am capable of ^_^) so if I didn't know the instrument's notes ahead of time I could still work things out.