I realise this has been covered a little before but i would like put my 2 cents in regarding Dorico/Cubase sync.
I generally prefer putting ideas together in Cubase because of numerous reasons, the most obvious being the ease of recording, comprehensive transport controls, markers and just general flow. I will often have Cubase and Dorico open at the same time though, Dorico muted, but sketching more complex ideas (eg harmony/lines across numerous instruments) that are better worked through with notation, then physically play that back into Cubase. In this way I build up the notation and DAW arrangement together, which saves time in the end when i have to hand the notated parts out + have a reasonable representation of all the parts sound etc.
Lately Iāve been looking at syncing Dorico and Cubase so they play at the same time, that way i could divide up what I prefer to do in each program, press play and both programs start. I use Windows and have been experimenting with a program called TXL Timecode program and a midi Loopback program to facilitate this.
So far I sorta have it working in one direction, with Cubase as slave- but at this point, as far as i know, there is no way for Dorico (5) to receive Midi Time Code? Right?
I would far prefer to be using Cubase as the MTC master, controlling Dorico start/stop, bar number etc - I was wondering how many out there who use Cubase and Dorico together would be interested in utilising that workflow?
Or maybe there are some other workarounds to acheive this, I havenāt heard about?
Thereās a video by Music Chef showing his use of TXL to sync the two, but i havenāt found too much else out there.
Yup. Been asking for this for a while now. Iām hoping the delay is due to Steinberg working on a deeper level of integration between the two platforms such as real-time synchronization of MIDI events between the two apps for a given instrument (track) and not just playback sync. TBH, Iād be happy with simple sync like what you described butā¦
Bumping this topic to keep it on the radar. Iām in the middle of a hybrid project (full orch plus synth/modular) and this would be REALLY useful about now. Hoping we can get in D6!
Bumping a topic on the forum doesnāt do anything to change its priority in our development plans. We know many users are looking for features like this.
Building synchronization features between Dorico and Cubase is complicated because it requires changes not only to Dorico but also to the shared audio engine (which requires us to compete for the limited development time of some of the senior developers who are working on many other projects within Steinberg), and if we want to go further than MTC, which we may well in future, it would also require deeper changes within Cubase itself. So it is a complex area of development and requires us to align our product and development plans carefully.
Appreciate the quick response, Daniel! I get it. Itās complicated with a lot of people on both sides involved and needs to be done with care and all of that takes time. That absolutely makes sense. Itās just (for me) the one thing about Dorico that can sometimes keep me up at night wondering what the best workflow to be in these kinds of situations.
That being said, MTC is a GREAT starting point and would be immediately useful! I definitely appreciate the insight in to the processes and challenges that the Steinberg dev team has to work through.
Daniel, I just want to say thank you (once again!) for providing context and background, itās helpful and very reassuring.
In another post, someone mentioned Doricoās possible support for ARA. Would it be possible for you to shed some light on whether itās actually sensible or even possible on a technical level at all? I understand that ARA involves processing of an audio stream that is then returned to Cubase. On the other hand, since it is an audio extension for VST3, it might not be necessary as VST3 already supports MIDI exchange natively? Confused and grateful for any clarification. Thanks!
Iām not an expert on the finer points of ARA, but my understanding is that ARA doesnāt make much sense for Dorico because Dorico is not fundamentally an audio editor, which is really what ARA is all about.
ARA does allow the exchange of things like the tempo map between the host and the plug-in, but Dorico and the audio engine can already do that to a limited extent anyway, and we will continue to build that out rather than relying on ARA to complete the support for that.
Set the same time signatures in Cubase and Dorico (including any time signature changes)
Set the same constant tempo in Cubase and Dorico or make a tempo map in Cubase, export it and import it into Dorico or vice versa
Create position marker(s) in Cubase in those points youād like to sync (like specific bars, sections, whatever)
Create a MIDI Controller Surface in Cubase that uses a virtual MIDI port (e.g. IAC on macOS). IAC can cause a MIDI feedback loop, so deactivate that input in Dorico.
MIDI-learn navigating to markers created in step 3 and MIDI-learn Play and Stop commands in Cubase
Create a player (or conductor? ) in Dorico that outputs to the MIDI instrument using the same virtual MIDI port used by the control surface created in step 4
Send MIDI messages from Dorico at the beginning of each sync point to navigate to the appropriate Cubase marker and start Playing and send MIDI messages to stop playing when the synced section finishes
This is just a basic idea with many additional possibilities including advanced MIDI remote scripting in Cubase.
Dorico also has a remote API, but I think it has too much latency before clicking play and actually starting playing, so itās better to use Dorico as master anyway. But I think itās possible to use both remote APIs together for some advanced workflows that go beyond playback syncing.
Iāve tested the above idea and it turns out that Cubase also has significant latency between receiving Start command and actually starting playing. So the above method is not really reliable. But for academic purposes, I will explain the experiment. It may inspire some further ideas.
There is a piano track with MIDI region containing simple 4-bar C F/C G/B C progression and I placed a marker at the beginning of the region. MIDI input for this track must be either disabled or set to anything other than IAC as we donāt want the track to receive events sent out from Dorico through the IAC port.
I created a simple control surface with IAC input port containing 3 buttons, that maps notes C4, D4 and E4 to navigating to marker 1, starting playing and stopping playing respectively.
On the Dorico side, there is a piano track with 4 bars of C F G C bass notes and another track that sends MIDI through IAC :
The idea is to sync playback between the 4 bars in Dorico and the 4-bar MIDI region in Cubase by sending C4 (go to marker 1) and D4 (start playing) just before Doricoās first bar with notes. So I set the input grid to the smallest possible value (1/32) and tried something like this:
This is of course completely unreliable as the delay between Cubase receiving the start command and actually starting playing is not deterministic. It was an interesting experiment anyway.
Rather than synchronization, giving Cubase/Nuendo the ability to read binary XYZ.dorico files would do the trick nicely and be all thatās needed. Just a new Import option on the DAWs. Now that the Dorico score reader has been integrated (and into Nuendo too eventually presumably) I donāt see a need for synchronization. My ideal use case
Do all the work in Dorico
Save the binary file - now all the āheavy liftingā on the MIDI drudge has been done
Import into Nuendo (Cubase)
Score editor is populated - ideally including score items not in MIDI like comments and text - and the corrosponding MIDI is the same as from Dorico
Edit and mix away ā¦
Itās a one way street but thatās fine, it should help relieve the developer burden, but I donāt see a need to export DAW edits back to Dorico, itās a downstream process ā¦
) in Dorico that outputs to the MIDI instrument using the same virtual MIDI port used by the control surface created in step 4
