I haven't actually tried sending mono MIDI from the VG99. I don't think it would make much of a difference, except possibly if strings disturb each other. I've tried using one-channel MIDI and omni (six channels), and the actual midi data transmits just as well, except the obvious problem when the same note is struck simultaneously on different strings. That's what omni mode solves. Getting the MIDI data right is a struggle - I can't play too fast and I need to make sure I press the strings down firmly and strike them cleanly, and still some notes go wrong or get lost. There are a bunch of different settings for sensitivity on the VG99 that can be tweaked, I haven't gotten it nailed down which one works best yet. Still, the result is ok enough that it can be used with e.g. this ChucK synth I posted. If I record midi data into a DAW I can quantize and move stuff around afterwards - I can still benefit from using the guitar as I get different kinds of ideas and a different playing style than when I use a keyboard or program it. MIDI aside, using a hex pickup with a gadget like the VG99 has its pros and cons compared to monophonic guitar synths like stuff you can find in a Line6 POD or other computer programs that detect pitch. Monophonic handling feels more stable, but polyphonic handling gives you loads of possibilities for messing around with the sound. I've been thinking about getting an RMC fanout box, which gives you six outputs that you could send into a soundcard and ChucK or other things. /Stefan On Sat, Mar 23, 2013 at 7:52 AM, wrote:

That sounds like a good idea, though I haven't bought any sort of MIDI guitar yet. Can you describe the difference in sound you get with monophonic vs polyphonic? Does it make the sound more accurately reflect what you were actually playing on the guitar?

-----Original Message----- [chuck-users] Synth for use with guitar hex pickup From: *Stefan Blixt * To: ChucK Users Mailing List Thursday, March 14, 2013 at 1:23PM This is pretty basic stuff, but it still worked well enough that I think it may be worth posting, for any ChucK addict with a hex pickup and hex/MIDI converter (yeah, maybe not that many) hasn't tried this yet.

Also to anyone is making polyponic synths: include an omni mode that supports this kind of setup!

So basically this is a simple polyphonic synth using a single BlitSaw for sound. It listen on six channels, treating each channel as its own mono synth, which suits the output from my Roland VG99 perfectly.

/Stefan

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Kassen, perhaps you're thinking about the YouRock guitar? I've been glancing at that one myself - looks like a clever piece of gear. They're actually getting better at polyphonic pitch detection - there are polyphonic tuners available (the TC Electronic app for iPhone), and the RockSmith console game (great fun!) detects chords - though how well it does isn't apparent, maybe they're faking it ;) I do think there's a fair amount of latency involved in both of those though. /Stefan On Sun, Mar 24, 2013 at 4:09 AM, Kassen wrote:

On Fri, Mar 22, 2013 at 11:52:23PM -0700, ryguasu@gmail.com wrote:

...

That sounds like a good idea, though I haven't bought any sort of MIDI guitar yet. Can you describe the difference in sound you get with monophonic vs polyphonic? Does it make the sound more accurately reflect what you were actually playing on the guitar?

Didn't the Rockband (the video game) people do a guitar controller with poly MIDI output and actual strings? I seem to remember they did a few years ago and did so at a fairly modest price as far as such things go. I think you could also plug it into a amp, which is really quite spectacular for a game controller.

That might suit your needs, or at least let you test without committing to a exotic beast like a pro guitar with poly MIDI output.

To answer the literal question; pitch detection of simple monophonic signals (the flute, the recorder) is doable, pitch detection of notes in chords (say; 6 notes chords as likely found in guitar playing) is very hard even if you don't need to be fast. Using a pickup per string reduces the problem to six monophonic sounds. This should be far more accurate and far faster, especially in the context of relatively (as compared to the flute) complex sounds like strummed guitar strings.

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Re: latency - that's very true. OTOH, someone pointed out somewhere that latency has been around as long as bands have needed to perform on big stages in front of huge speaker stacks, due to the fact that the stacks are positioned some distance away from the musicians, and sound needs to travel a while before hitting the musicians ears. I'm not saying I'm used to performing on big stages, just that latency doesn't have to be a show-stopper, just a condition you need to work with. The problem then becomes to make the latency consistent, which has been a problem for me - some notes are detected later than others. On Sun, Mar 24, 2013 at 2:23 PM, Kassen wrote:

On Sun, Mar 24, 2013 at 01:16:41PM +0100, Stefan Blixt wrote:

...

Kassen, perhaps you're thinking about the YouRock guitar? I've been glancing at that one myself - looks like a clever piece of gear.

Me too, but considering my collection I should really only get game controllers I have actual plans for.

...

They're actually getting better at polyphonic pitch detection - there are polyphonic tuners available (the TC Electronic app for iPhone), and the RockSmith console game (great fun!) detects chords - though how well it does isn't apparent, maybe they're faking it ;) I do think there's a fair amount of latency involved in both of those though.

Frankly I think that is unavoidable. Pitch detection takes time and the onset of guitar notes is really quite noisy on top of that. What I'd do if I wanted to get clever would be to first send that a transient has been detected and only once I were sure of the pitch send the pitch, then using some synth controlled by this that would also start with noisy attacks. That might be ok.

I said it before but there really is no way around latency in pitch detection as pitch is inherently a time-based phenomenon. If the plan is to get new musical ideas that might not be a issue as you could run analysis at your leisure. For rocking out live it's either accepting the math or everyone's favourite strategy; cheat ;-)

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Interesting! :) Do you know if they tried this out in some implementation that we could have a look at? On Sun, Mar 24, 2013 at 3:09 PM, Robert Poor wrote:

Julius might want to chime in, but as I recall, he and Phil Gosset came up with a really nifty technique for MIDI pitch tracking suited for guitars:

As soon as you notice an attack, make a Wild Assed Guess as to the pitch and emit a NoteOn event. Then, as the transient passes and you can actually start to detect the pitch, start emitting NoteBend events to correct your original guess.

Your ear can't detect the pitch at the attack, but it is very sensitive to onset times, so this technique works pretty well.

...

Re: latency - that's very true. OTOH, someone pointed out somewhere that latency has been around as long as bands have needed to perform on big stages in front of huge speaker stacks, due to the fact that the stacks are positioned some distance away from the musicians, and sound needs to

...

a while before hitting the musicians ears. I'm not saying I'm used to performing on big stages, just that latency doesn't have to be a show-stopper, just a condition you need to work with. The problem then becomes to make the latency consistent, which has been a problem for me - some notes are detected later than others.

On Sun, Mar 24, 2013 at 2:23 PM, Kassen wrote:

...

On Sun, Mar 24, 2013 at 01:16:41PM +0100, Stefan Blixt wrote:

...

Kassen, perhaps you're thinking about the YouRock guitar? I've been glancing at that one myself - looks like a clever piece of gear.

Me too, but considering my collection I should really only get game controllers I have actual plans for.

...

They're actually getting better at polyphonic pitch detection -

On Sun, Mar 24, 2013 at 6:55 AM, Stefan Blixt wrote: travel there

...

...

...

are polyphonic tuners available (the TC Electronic app for iPhone), and the RockSmith console game (great fun!) detects chords - though how well it does isn't apparent, maybe they're faking it ;) I do think there's a fair amount of latency involved in both of those though.

Frankly I think that is unavoidable. Pitch detection takes time and the onset of guitar notes is really quite noisy on top of that. What I'd do if I wanted to get clever would be to first send that a transient has been detected and only once I were sure of the pitch send the pitch, then using some synth controlled by this that would also start with noisy attacks. That might be ok.

I said it before but there really is no way around latency in pitch detection as pitch is inherently a time-based phenomenon. If the plan is to get new musical ideas that might not be a issue as you could run analysis at your leisure. For rocking out live it's either accepting the math or everyone's favourite strategy; cheat ;-)

Yours, Kas. _______________________________________________ chuck-users mailing list chuck-users@lists.cs.princeton.edu https://lists.cs.princeton.edu/mailman/listinfo/chuck-users

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