MIDI Tracker

[Techno.Jon]

Hello all,
So anyway I was wondering if any good MIDI sequencers in a tracker style exist.  I found one on linux, but I work primarily in Windows, so...I'll keep looking about, but if any of you know of something, I'd love to check it out.  I would use MPT but we all know how good its MIDI import/export is... :-P

[LPChip]

Midi is so restrictive.

May I ask why you need to have midi capabilities?

[Saga Musix]

Maybe you should point out more specifically what you are after. Any tracker that supports VST is a "MIDI tracker" in the sense that it can send MIDI commands to plugins - that includes OpenMPT. So OpenMPT is in fact able to receive and send MIDI messages. Now when I hear someone talking about "MIDI sequencers", I instantly have to think of piano roll, which would directly contradict the concept of a tracker (which doesn't have a piano roll but a pattern editor). Do you probably mean that you want to use an editor that uses the MIDI format to store its song data in? In that case I'd highly doubt that such a tracker would exist, since MIDI and tracking are so much different concepts internally. I haven't tried it but you might want to give ztracker a try. If your only goal is to export your songs to the MIDI format, there are alternatives to OpenMPT's MIDI export, e.g. un4seen's 2MIDI.

[LPChip]

He does talk about midi import/export, so he's obviously after a .mid reader/writer.

Do note that one of the major drawbacks of midi is, that it sounds different on every computer, songs made in OpenMPT are by definition not dependend on the computer they run on, especially if you export to wave or one of its compressed formats, such as ogg, mp3, flac, etc. (you need an external converter for some of these).

[Saga Musix]

You are falling for a common misconception: MIDI does not "sound". MIDI is just a command language. It's like you say a program written in C++ looks different on Windows than it does on a Mac, just because they have different user interfaces. If you use MIDI to control a specific synthesizer, it will always sound the same. This synthesizer could be a real machine, it could be a VST plugin (like in OpenMPT), it could be a soundfont player. Soundfont players always sound the same if they are fed with the same soundfont, like the default General MIDI Wavetable synth that comes with Windows/DirectX and sounds the same on every Windows computer. Again, it depends on what you want to do with the MIDI files you are created, and MIDI files are not restricted to the 128 default General MIDI instrumets, because they just contain commands like "Note On", "Program Select", etc. - pretty much like pattern data in a module, which also heavily depends on the samples that you actually use.

[LPChip]

Yes, I know this. But given that he has written "Musician, gamer, audio engineer, programmer" under his name, I figure he is aiming to make midi for one or more games he wants to make. If this is indeed true, I bet he'll end up using the 128 standard GM sounds. On top of that, if he indeed is going to do this, he most likely can also support mp3 or ogg playback which opens up a whole world for him. Thats basically where I want to go to.

Even if he's using software like MultiMedia Fusion 2, which by default uses midi, its also possible to use OGG, and other tools like this do that too.

And if I'm right, the whole midi can do this or you need software X is no longer a question.

[Techno.Jon]

Well this escalated quickly.

Actually I just want to make standard MIDIs for fun, plus then I can convert them to sheet music on demand, something I can't do with modules.  (I really hate writing in sheet music, I do it now, but it annoys me).  Also, I've used 2MIDI before...it never worked right, it always botched the rhythms and, upon import to sheet music, gave ridiculous results.  I've tried sequencers for midi before, with the piano roll, but I personally hate it.  Now, I know the differences between the formats, but I also know a "midi tracker" exists because Shaketracker exists for Linux.  However I don't wanna have to reboot to linux just to run a midi program, and for some reason the source (in C++) refuses to compile correctly for me (I can't figure out why).  So...yeah.

Also, I use standard modules or OGG for my games, so that's not the reason :-P

EDIT: And I will indeed try ztracker, thanks for that.

[LPChip]

I believe octamed/med soundstudio can import/export midi.

[Harbinger]

Actually I just want to make standard MIDIs for fun, plus then I can convert them to sheet music on demand, something I can't do with modules.  (I really hate writing in sheet music, I do it now, but it annoys me).

Before i found ModPlug Tracker, i notated all of my music on regular manuscripts, and with my classical music i will always do this, as it helps with the creative process. (Plus i may have delusions of grandeur, in which i've come to believe that my music will someday be remembered. )
But when it comes to things that can't be notated readily, then i go to a tracker (OpenMPT of course). There are a few good MIDI players/sequencers out there if you hate notating, but if you don't want to shell out $$ for it, you have to wade thru them until you find one you like. They each have some flaws/benefits.