Hello fellow Logicheads:
Has anyone ever had the experience of recording using Logic's software bass, guitars and piano in Logic X and found upon playback that the piano is flat, or slightly out of tune?
It's weird. It's happened a couple of times. Perhaps it's a timbre issue that I don't understand.
Any thoughts on how to correct for this - e.g., retune the piano up w/ pitchshift?
Thanks!
Logic Pro, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.1)
erniesfo wrote:
Hello fellow Logicheads:
Has anyone ever had the experience of recording using Logic's software bass, guitars and piano in Logic X and found upon playback that the piano is flat, or slightly out of tune?
No. But if I suspected this, I would try and pinpoint and quantify the problem using a Tuner on the suspected instruments. Then I would check if the global tuning (File>Project Settings>Tuning) is at Equal Temperament.
If it is at equal temperament I would then check the Piano instrument and see if it is stretched tuned (this is a common way of tuning piano's, you can look it up, the internet knows it.) Not all piano's can be stretch tuned though.
Another scenario: you could be sending a (small) negative pitchbend value from your controller, this might detune tracks down. Make sure you have no "rogue" Pitchbend events (use Event List to check) and make sure the pitchwheel is correctly calibrated (always sending out 0 as the last value, when released).
erniesfo wrote:
Hello fellow Logicheads:
Has anyone ever had the experience of recording using Logic's software bass, guitars and piano in Logic X and found upon playback that the piano is flat, or slightly out of tune?
No. But if I suspected this, I would try and pinpoint and quantify the problem using a Tuner on the suspected instruments. Then I would check if the global tuning (File>Project Settings>Tuning) is at Equal Temperament.
If it is at equal temperament I would then check the Piano instrument and see if it is stretched tuned (this is a common way of tuning piano's, you can look it up, the internet knows it.) Not all piano's can be stretch tuned though.
Another scenario: you could be sending a (small) negative pitchbend value from your controller, this might detune tracks down. Make sure you have no "rogue" Pitchbend events (use Event List to check) and make sure the pitchwheel is correctly calibrated (always sending out 0 as the last value, when released).
See the post from hMac213 Its likely to be a bug.
No, that bug is only when you use tunings other than the default equal temperament, and erniesfo doesn't mention that he uses custom tuning, so I assume that he isn't, or at least not on purpose.
Just a random thought in case you haven't already done so.
Checked the inspector of the track the instrument is assigned to?
ErikSimon: Sorry it took so long to respond but I just had a chance to to test out your suggestions.
1. I checked the global tuning and it's fine
2. Then I metered/test tuned the individual instrument (Steinway Piano) and it was tuned fine too. It doesn't appear that the Steinway can be stretch-tuned, and I did not see a way to shift the pitch down using the keyboard I recorded with (Korg NanoKey2)
3. I went into the Korg Controller software and it seems that everything was fine there too - Sustain, Modulation, Pitch etc all normal values
The song is a dark piece where I used single notes on the piano with long sustain values (i.e., held the sustain pedal down for a long time so the notes hang with a long decay)
The Steinway Piano channel strip is untouched from initial load, i.e. > Channel EQ and Space Designer using "2.3 At The Opera 2.270s Stereo". It is NOT bussed to another Aux for additional processing. See more below.
I should note that many of the other instruments on the song are bussed to an Aux using/sharing a Stereo Designer with a "1.3s Soft Plate 1.224s Stereo" setting.
I also tried bussing the Piano to the reverb used by other instruments in the project and it doesn't change the effect, my impression.
It's not that the Piano sounds really "bad" - it's just that to my ears It sounds just ever so slightly "off" - like the sustain note just doesn't quite hold up and is flat at the end of the hold. But the tuner says no. I have pretty good ears - knock on wood. Listening again I still get the same impression, but I'm also thinking that my ears may be contrasting the sharp attack vs the long sustain and I'm hearing some kind of ghosting that only (to me) "Sounds" a little flat - kind of my own personal psychoacoustic sensation/phenomena.
I really appreciate the suggestions and the help. I learing additional parameters and where to look to investigate - always a good thing. Nice graphic w/ arrows!
As an experiment, would it be possible to bounce the MIDI Piano track to audio and re-pitch the audio to see if I can achieve some (perhaps mythical) different sound?
Just a thought.
Thanks again!
Animist08: I took your suggestion too and checked the instrument's assignment. Looks fine. Weird! Thanks!
Might be a long shot but I had a similar problem with the retrosynth and solved it in a way that no one described yet.
While the song is playing back, bump the pitch wheel on your controller. It didn't work when it was stopped so make sure its playing.
Good luck!
Thanks for the suggestion. I tried it out but no luck. Worth a try. Just a really weird issue, if it is one.
Don't forget that 1 real piano key plays two or three slightly different strings sounding in unison, with all the harmonics going on between them it is never a static sound, as it decays... Overtones continually change or slowly fade, which may indeed give a psycho-acoustic impression of 'flattening'.
You can achieve nice effects by subtly or less subtly altering the pitch of the audio, like here at 0'10" - you hear a short Speed Fade down.
Change the playback speed of a fade
http://help.apple.com/logicpro/mac/10/#lgcpf7c0cd53
Speed fade at 0'10"
Software Instruments Out Of Tune in Logic X
