Hi there,
when I export Midi and load it into my DAW (LogicX) or any GM-Player, the instruments sometimes sound very different from that what I hear in Hookpad, especially the drums exported as “Rock Band”. Don’t you use the GM-Standard always or what is the reason? Will it come with the next updates?
1 Like
Hey juegofono,
at the moment we’re not exporting any GM mapping, but we’re planning to do this with one of the next updates. Right now Logic is trying to figure out which instrument to choose only from the name of the track.
Regards!
Dennis
thanx. Any idea how long it will take to implement the “GM-Feature”?
We have to finish some other things first so I’ll guess this will take a few weeks.
1 Like
any update on this? in general i have some main moves i make for my AD2 kit but it would be handy to have standard GM mapping if possible
Yes, the midi mapping feature has been released some updates ago. If you have updated your Hookpad to the latest version, it should already have been working for a couple of months.
thanks! i’m running 2.26.6 – so then the drums are all output as per the GM MIDI drum mapping then.
when i import the MIDI – the “shaker” instruments are off. it may be partly due to wanting texture sounds alternating on tambourines and shakers etc.
however, per General MIDI - Wikipedia and General MIDI Level 2 - Wikipedia
using GM “standard kit” or “complete kit”:
tambourine = should be 54 and it’s 49, 50 & 52 (crash1, high tom1, china cymbal)
maracas = should be 70 and it’s 54, 60 (tambourine & high bongo)
for level 2 kit:
shaker = should be 82 and it’s 58, 59 (vibra-slap, ride cymbal2)
(note: shaker would likely be maracas in a GM level 1 kit as there is no 82 unless using a GM level 2)
the noise one is 51 (ride cymbal1) so as far as a substitute this makes sense as there is no specific GM percussion for that…
Yes, our percussion instruments are a bit complicated to translate to GM. Each of those is using 4 different samples for swinging forwards/ backwards and accents. So lots of this information would be lost when putting the tambourine only on 54.
In my experience you have to adjust your Midi files to the VST Plugins of your DAW anyway as they’re all working a bit differently. So I decided to keep the extra information rather than forcing our percussions to the correct channels of the GM specification.
I know this is not ideal. Do you have a better idea?
just thinking - maybe on the export you can set the MIDI notes, but for your internal sound generation, just do what you’re doing. just add the translation on the export from your descriptor of the instrument to the GM export.
so if you’re using 3 notes for tambourine, keep those internally, but when someone has tambourine in their instrument list being exported, then map those notes to note 54. etc
this would also give you options for adding other percussion later like conga, bongos, dividing up the orchestral outputs – you internal sounds remain as-is and your MIDI export is the simpler and GM conforming MIDI.
and for now i’ll continue to move them or simply map specific instruments to those tracks (like using sforzando with tambourine, another with shaker, etc samples/soundfonts)
i mean in reality - the GM stuff has to be mapped to whatever VI i’m using - Addictive Drums, EZ Drummer, BFD, SI Drums, Sitala, etc etc etc – even though most support a GM mapping option, for really detailed work (like shakers up/down etc) i tend to use some stock MIDI to create those, otherwise just generic shaker/tambourine etc all usually work ok.
Yes, our internal Midi will stay the same, regardless of what the export does. But I’d really like to export that extra information, too. This way people can use it, if they have more detailed Shaker VSTs. Or they can just make two clicks and put all pitches onto a pitch they need.
I’ll have to think a bit more about it.
one suggestion then - make one of the notes in the selection of notes, the GM one for the instrument name (e.g. tambourine - 54 + … other notes) 
this way it would be fairly straight forward to re-use the extra notes, remove the extras, or compact them into a single note.
preferably, do not use other percussion instrument notes in other instruments - example – for tambourine - do not use maracas, shaker, noise, etc notes in the set of notes for the tambourine. similarly, for maracas/shaker so not use tambourine, noise, bongo, etc). this way each instrument as a “clean” set as well GM root note.
and if you wanted to have a setting on a project which says “compact MIDI to GM note per instrument” on/off would then compress the total notes of the given instrument (say all tambourine notes) into the GM note. default “off” for backwards compatibility
yes, that’s probably a good idea.
1 Like
thanks! no rush for me as i have my process, but looking forward to changing it someday.
I guess I took “no rush” a bit too literally. I finally got to implement the correct midi values. After the next update, shakers should get exported to 82, Tambourine to 54, maracas to 70, and the noise patch to 70 as well.
Thanks again for your input and patience!
Dennis
2 Likes