Re: Unintelligible MIDI output

[Marcelo Gomes de Queiroz]

Thanks, Mats, for your answer.

I wonder if it wouldn't be very nice, from the user-interface 
point-of-view, if Lilypond generated a warning, or even an 
error message, every time a wrong MIDI output was created, 
and let the user know about his/her mistake. 

This is an unnoticed erroneous output after all, even though
the user is to blame. :-)

Best regards,

Marcelo

Mats Bengtsson writes:
 > By default, LilyPond uses a new MIDI channel for each stave.
 > If you want to squeeze in more parts in the available 16
 > MIDI channels, I guess it's easiest to define a separate
 > \score{} context for the MIDI version of your music.
 > As long as you have used identifiers for all the different
 > parts, it's not much job to write the new \score block.
 > An alternative might be to redefine the way LilyPond maps
 > the different contexts to MIDI channels, see for example
 > http://mail.gnu.org/archive/html/lilypond-user/2003-01/msg00088.html
 > Note, though, that LilyPond onlyl handles one instrument per
 > channel, even though it would be theoretically possible to
 > insert instrument changing commands in the MIDI file between
 > each note to allow for more instruments.
 > 
 >     Mats
 > 
 > 
 > Marcelo Gomes de Queiroz wrote:
 > > Hello!
 > > 
 > > I have been struggling the past few weeks with an example 
 > > that produced a very odd MIDI output. Unfortunately it is
 > > an awfully large orchestral example, and I can't reproduce
 > > it with a small file. The main file is orchestra.ly. The
 > > music lasts for about 4 minutes and 40 seconds. The midi 
 > > output has events up to 40 minutes, several notes without 
 > > 'note-offs' and other strange things. On aplying timidity 
 > > to it I got, among other messages:
 > > 
 > > 
 > >  > >>orchestra.midi: Can't read track header.
 > >  > >>Drum set 7 is undefined
 > >  > >>Drum set 127 is undefined
 > >  > >>Instrument `pistol' can't be found.
 > >  > >>Couldn't load instrument pistol (tone bank 0, program 127)
 > > 
 > > 
 > > but the music has no pistols nor drums. I'm using 
 > > Lilypond 2.0.0. I had the same problem with 1.6.6. The
 > > example files are tgz-ipped. 
 > > 
 > > I think it has something to do with MIDI limitations on 
 > > number of tracks, because when I try less than 16 staves
 > > everything works fine. The fact that Lilypond didn't 
 > > report anything wrong on producing the wrong midi file 
 > > made me think it might be considered a bug.
 > > 
 > > By the way, I tried to find in the internals documentation 
 > > any hint on telling Lilypond to use a specific midi track 
 > > for a particular Staff (since my example has 34 staves but
 > > uses only 13 "midi instruments"). I guess I shouldn't mix
 > > a question with a bug report... sorry! But if you could
 > > help me...........
 > > 
 > > Thanks in advance!
 > > 
 > > Marcelo
 > > 
 > > 
 > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
 > > 
 > > _______________________________________________
 > > Bug-lilypond mailing list
 > > address@hidden
 > > http://mail.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/bug-lilypond
 > >  > 
 > >  > -- 
 > >  > =============================================
 > >  >         Mats Bengtsson
 > >  >         Signal Processing
 > >  >         Signals, Sensors and Systems
 > >  >         Royal Institute of Technology
 > >  >         SE-100 44  STOCKHOLM
 > >  >         Sweden
 > >  >         Phone: (+46) 8 790 8463                         
 > >  >          Fax:   (+46) 8 790 7260
 > >  >         Email: address@hidden
 > >  >         WWW: http://www.s3.kth.se/~mabe
 > >  > =============================================