Hello,

You're rushing over a number of possible issues here, and it's not clear where the problem might be, so need to take things step-by-step.

To start somewhere, any chance you could attach one of the midi files that's causing you problems, so I can check that the things that are supposed to be there ARE there, and in the right order, and that it seems to play OK on my setup. This may start to shed some light on what's causing the problem.

Geoff

Thanks for the fast reply! Ironically the site won't let me post a track -- "The file BACH VIVALDI CONCERTO BWV 982 MVTS 1 and 2A.cwp, which you are attempting to upload is in an unsupported format." Can I email you one? PM me an @ddress if so.

Like I said, these tracks have 'worked' on almost everything through the many years e.g. Yamaha PSS-680 (made 1988 I believe), ca. 2008 Rodgers organ, ca. 2006 Casio WK-1500, new 4-octave Casio ca. 2016, ancient Clavinova (has only piano 1 and 2, harpsichord and chorus effect if that helps), Casio Privias. Instruments they haven't 'worked' well on:

Circa 2000 Technics Digital Ensemble piano: as soon as I connected the interface each note on the keyboard would only play for a split second and drop off.
Circa 1998 61-note Casio CTK keyboard. Super weirdness: aside from the initial default piano sound, the only patches I can activate once the interface is connected (which neessarily precedes opening Cakewalk) are from the eccentric, pingy groups -- one for the lower notes, another the upper! No idea which ones they are. They're on no matter which sounds I select, and something occasionally adds a note that doesn't belong -- 2nd D, I believe.

The file you output with the suffix ".cwp" is a Cakewalk project file and can only be read by someone with Sonar or CbB, if you can export it as a type 1 MIDI file (suffix .mid) then anyone can read it on any MIDI sequencer/DAW s/w and, you should be able to attach it to a post to the forum.

Try doing that.

JohnG.

What's CbB?

Boy, "File > Export" in Sonar was no help -- only wants to send 'track templates' (with an existing track of mine open). I made a track in Sonar by copying some content from an existing one and pasting it into a new one. In the Save As box it gave me the .mid option plus MIDI Format 0 or 1, so I did up tracks for both 0 and 1. Still doesn't work: "The file VIV GLORIA SNIPPET FOR SENDING TO MIDI DOT COM midi format 1.mid, which you are attempting to upload is in an unsupported format." 'MIDI DOT COM'in the track name is simply our URL here.

I think .CWP is not the default for what my tracks originally were and suspect it was .MID. Could this have gotten accidentally changed somehow? The puter world is full of choices to make accidentally. Also, does anybody know if there's a way to stop Sonar from making track folders? This has happened for seemingly some of my tracks but not all. Why would I need the folders? They clutter the list of tracks and the tracks that exist by themselves are just fine.

THANKS.

CbB stands for Cakewalk by Bandlab, the latest name for Sonar. Free to downlaod from Bandlab once you've established an account.

I should have said "Save As" then select the file type as MIDI file type 1.

Then you should be able to post it here.

Isn't that what I did per the file name and extension above? There's no "MIDI file type 1" in the Sonar 7 dialog box, just "Save as Type" giving choices of Normal, Template, Cakewalk Bundle, MIDI Format 0, MIDI Format 1, RIFF Media Format 1 and 2. The next form down is "Go to Folder:" and I picked Project Files, the only choice there with .MID in its list of extensions.

Opening the new or altered file from an index, it's now an audio file using that tinny fake piano sound -- opens in a media player. I went back and renamed a pre-existing track that I definitely saved to the Cakewalk Projects folder as "VIVALDI GLORIA 1st mvt i548 WHOLE MVT TRY 1.mid" It turns up as audio too when opened from a search, so wouldn't upload here. The track I started from this time was most definitely MIDI -- the original is still sitting in its original spot (MIDI 1 below Audio 1 and 2) now as I close Sonar.

Nelson,

I very much suspect that 'MIDI Format 1 is the same thing as MIDI file type 1. I've seen 'Type 1' and 'Format 1' used. Type 0 has all the data in a single Track, while Type 1 stores the data in separate tracks.

Also note that MS Media Player knows how to Play a .MID file, even though this is not a digital Data file - BUT - media player will invoke the available Synth device to render the midi data into sound, and the default device may include the 'tinny' sounds you're hearing. So media player (and other parts of the system) may well view a .mid file as being 'Audio' even though technically it is not, it contains instructions to create audio. When you play the same file on your setup you may be invoking a much better sound system so the file will sound MUCH better!

Also note that calling a file name.mid does not mean that it IS a MIDI file, it might contain whatever. Another thread here a little while back had a file name.mid that was in fact a .zip file containing digital sounds (i.e. .wav type data). However, usually a .mid file is MUCH smaller than any sort of digital sound file. Just out of interest, what is the file size of the Vivaldi Gloria .mid file you mentioned?

Geoff

Great Jeff -- thanks! Was hoping something along those exact lines (your second paragraph) was going on. (I realize we still don't positively know what is.)

My MIDI files are (to me) amazingly small -- this complete short movement shows in an Agent Ransack search of the Cakewalk Projects folder as an 18-KB MIDI sequence. Testing it again, it again plays on the tinny piano. Searching 'vivaldi' in "C:\Users" doesn't find it, and I always leave 'Search subfolders' checked. Searching it in "C:\", the track name etc does appear. Opening it in Sonar it appears to play normally (this is all in my home office 30 miles from the church and organ) except that no notes appear in Piano Roll (which sometimes happens when the computer's in line fore a reboot, like right now).

All that plus the 'Save As' process above surely indicates the file has been converted?

Should I try downloading the current Cakewalk Sonar -- might this clean some problems up automatically? I have trepidations there. My Sonar version 7 has the exact very basic layout I need for my classical stuff -- track takes up most of the screen, nice simple traditional control buttons across the top and I/O tabs below, nothing showing that I don't need. Can the current version offer this without any rigmarole. If I tried it would I never be able to go back to 7 -- would the door to paradise be barred forever. Would I have to reinstall 7 and try to (ugh) remember any preferences I've set.

Cakewalk (or Sonar) version 7 should be absolutely fine for sequencing the Vivaldi Gloria.

I did this track back in 2018 for a small local choir that was rehearsing the piece for performance, and the MIDI file size was ... 18K.

The destination playback mechanism for me, was the virtual orchestra known as Garritan Personal Orchestra version 5 (a.k.a. GPO5).
It came out quite well, as I recall.

I'm currently working on an aria from Mozart's Zauberflöte, "Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen" which is quite a bit more challenging.

JohnG.

Thanks for reporting! Tell us pronto -- what sequencing program were you using, and is it installed on the same computer as the Garritan?

I've been trying to find out if that's possible without super duper wildly expensive state-of-the-art equipment -- play sequences through a sound bank on the same computer, and I don't mean the crappy sounds built into Sonar.

Say, is that the 'available synth device' Geoff referred to above? Can't think of any other I've ever installed.

For sequencing I still use a rather old, and now unavailable program called XGworks (marketed in the late 90's by Yamaha), mainly because I'm so familiar with using it.
But I used an early version of Sonar called Cakewalk Pro Audio before this and I still 'render' the final audio using the updated CbB.
Before that I used, like you, Sonar 7.

I used to use hardware such as the Yamaha sound card called the SW1000-XG, then a sound module, the MU128 and lastly an MU1000 with three PLG synth cards in it, the PLG100-DX, the PLG100-VL and the PLG150-AN. All great hardware.

As I became more interested in orchestral sequencing I migrated to Virtual Orchestras and found that I could get reasonably good results from the Garritan orchestra.
No, it's not a built in sound set but has to be purchased from the MakeMusic company that now owns the Garritan product set.
The Garritan orchestra consists of a pretty large library of instrument 'samples' plus a sample player program.
You may have heard about the notation software called Finale, that's also part of the MM product line.

For a complete orchestra it's one of the lowest cost ones on the market today, but it does need the user to be pretty savvy with MIDI to get the best from it.
Details can be found at garritan.com.

The orchestra is downloaded and then 'set up' on your local hard disk where it occupies about 11.6 GB of space.
The 'player', the program that has the orchestral sounds loaded into it, is called ARIA and looks like this.

It's as well to get started with sequencing on something more simple to start with tho'.
If you haven't discovered this yet, click on the image below to enlarge it.

Are you running the sequencer on one computer and the Garritan on another when using the two programs together? Or are they on the same computer -- that's what I was asking.

Sorry, all on one dual core I5 laptop from Lenovo.

Exciting news -- eureka! And no problems with latency?