Millimetres versus Tick's conversion utility.

This is a handy (and free) utility for the musician who works with Mechanical Music Instruments. If you have worked with both paper roll/books and a music program on a computer, you are most certain aware of the differences that exist between both mediums regarding tempo.

On a computer, tempo is changed by speeding up or slowing down the music.

On a MMI this would mean that you have to speed up or slow down the rate of paper transport. We know that this is not done this way. Different tempo's are achieved by squeezing the holes closer together or stretching them further apart.

So it may be hard to tell how long a note on a computer compares to a note on paper in real measurements and vice versa.

Hence this utility. Just fill in the proper values, and the result is computed instantly.

You can download it and copy it in to any directory. No installing is required. Just double click it to start it.

NOTE: This utility is only tested on WindowsXP, but should work on any Windows version (starting from Win95). Let me know if you encounter any problems (at tony@decap.be) . Also, to keep things simple, the utility is pre-set to certain values. If you want, a custom copy can be mailed to you with different pre-set settings.

ENJOY!!!

Download here:

Millimeter versus tick.exe 411 KB

CAL/MidiFX routines for Cakewalk.

Cakewalk Music Software has edit feature's that will go a long way to help musicians solve most edit problems, like "Transpose" or "Quantize" etc. But this may not be enough to solve Mechanical Music problems.

Cakewalk is equipped with edit tools that are more suitable for these special occasions.The biggest problem for some people is that writing the needed code to get the edit tools to work is is difficult due to lack of programming skills. I will try to provide some answers and solutions to help people to get started and/or solve some problems.

Two special edit tools exist in CW. CAL routines and MidiFX.

MidiFX is more powerful by far. It even can do edit functions "on the fly", meaning that without actually performing the edit, the edit will be done in real-time while playing the song. Problem is that MidiFX is a COM object written in C++, one of the more difficult computer languages to master. Unless you have some advanced degree of programming skills, you probably should not attempt to write an edit function in this language.

This means that the casual programmer is left with the CAL routines. Luckily, this will go a long way. You will find two sections:

First the "ready to go" version, containing CAL routines that should work the moment you run them.

Second, the "skeleton" versions, containing CAL routines that has to be completed by the user.

All versions will have some explanation inside the file, to help you with the editing.

Rest me to say that CAL routines do not run properly in SONAR (the latest Cakewalk versions) due to bugs in CW. Also, older versions (lower the 5.0) are to be avoided.More complex routines may only work in versions 8 and 9.


More complex CAL/MidiFX are available for sale or can be custom written. Using these utility's can be time saving for the user. But MidiFX in particular can be very time consuming to produce, meaning that complex custom MidiFX can cost 1000 US$ or more. The average custom CAL routine cost about 100 to 150 US$. This is for more complex routines, as you should be able to create the more simple ones yourself.


Free CAL downloads.

Ready to run versions:

Change length of notes.cal :Adjust the lenght of notes by tick's.
Minimum distance between notes.cal :Makes sure that notes have a minimum amount of tick's between them.
NoteSpacer.cal :Evenly spacing of notes, so that you for example end up with a perfect evenly spaced harp staircase, or evenly spaced guitar attack.

Skeleton versions (to be completed by the user):

Change Note Layout -Template.cal :Great to convert music layout's between different type's of organs.

Download here:

Change length of notes.cal 723 B
Minimum distance between notes.cal 3 KB
NoteSpacer.cal 2 KB
Change Note Layout -Template.cal 8 KB



Available MidiFX for sale:

"TrackSliderInMs". Track_slider_in_milliseconds is very handy to offset a track in real-time. This is done in milliseconds. A simple example is if you want to play a midi file along with a acoustic grand piano like QRS or Disklavier or PianoDisc. These piano's need to get their midi sooner then the module by a set amount (I think 500 Ms is mostly used). This is done perfectly regardless any tempo changes the song may have. Price: 50 US$.

Planned MidiFX (working version is ready, but final version depending response):

"GM-DrumsToMI-Drums". General_midi_drums_to_mechanical_instrument_drums is very handy to change a GeneralMidi drumtrack to a Mechanical Instrument drumtrack in real-time. Note transpose is done by changing individual numbers. Time sliding and note length is represented in milliseconds. This is done perfectly regardless any tempo changes the song may have.

Being developed now:

Special midi mapper that will solve all mapping problems for Mechanical Music. This mapper will include sending each individual note to any midi channel/midi output with any timing offset. For example: a snare note to the desired note number (snare sound) on channel 10 (ch 10 = drum channel in GeneralMidi), with a delay of say 85ms to compensate for the mechanical offset. Sounds (midi patches) and channels can be added/switched by intelligent interpretation of the registration notes. Any setup can easily be stored in a preset for immediate recall. This will work with any module, but with a good PC sampler and the proper samples, you should be able to recreate any Mechanical Instrument in your PC.

For more information contact me at: tony@decap.be