I asked this question in VI-Control, but no one knew the answer. If I open in Synthesizer V a file with lyrics, exported via midi from Sibelius, the lyrics are contained in the file. But if I export a midi file from Dorico I only get the notes but not the lyrics. This is a real pity, because both Sibelius and Dorico are superior in quickly entering lyrics, and Dorico better than Sibelius in many ways, but it is incompatible with Synthesizer V until it exports the lyrics in its midi file. Will this be possible in the future? Or can it be done now with some other setting?
Support for lyrics is an âoptional extraâ in the MIDI 1.0 spec. There is a Text event, which simply occurs at the same time as the note event. Itâs described as a âmeta-event, which is not required for every program to supportâ.
I donât know whether the MIDI 2.0 spec has any improvement on this.
Can you not import the lyrics any other way? Copy and Paste?
Note that Dorico does export lyrics since v.4 (and itâs great for proof-reading)
For some strange reason, midi files exported from Dorico do not seem to contain lyrics, but exported from other notation programs they do.
I have tried to see if there is another way to get lyrics out of Dorico in a midi file, and cannot seem to do it esily. I have looked for settings, etc. to see if the midi export can be changed, but found nothing.
Here is what I am trying to do: I want to open midi files made in Dorico in a program called Synthesizer V, which is very popular at the moment, and by far the best AI singing program on the market. Dorico is great for putting lyrics to notes, with bulk entry, and other advanced features, so it is ideal for preparing lyric files for export to Synthesizer V with a fast work-flow.
Here is what I found testing various methods.
- Export a midi file from Sibelius, and Synthesizer V opens it WITH lyrics.
- Export a midi file from Encore (30 year old program and file), and Synthesizer V opens it WITH lyrics.
- Export a midi file from Dorico, and Synthesizer V opens it with only notes and NO LYRICS.
- Export an XML file from Dorico, reopen it in either Encore or Sibelius, re-export it as midi and then Synthesizer V receives the lyrics.
- Export an XML file from Dorico, use an online converter to change it to .svp file (which is the Synthesizer V proprietary format) and it also includes lyrics.
From the above, it is clear that Dorico is different in its midi file (no lyrics) than at least two other notation programs, but has the ability to export lyrics and notes together in the XML format. This would require three extra steps and file saving, to get midi out of Dorico efficiently for use with Synthesizer V (which cannot import xml.)
Lyric export, as a text file, is a great feature in Dorico, and useful for many functions. It is just as easy to do in Sibelius (using a different method) but in either case it takes a lot of work to re-attach these to the notes of a midi file inside Synthesizer V, so that option is very slow and cumbersome.
I am sure, therefore, that this is something simple, since even very old programs can do it, so Dorico should have no problem fixing this.
(There is a web forum for requesting update features to Synthesizer V, and they are very helpful, so I will point this out to them and see if they can add xml as an import option, in order to make them compatible with Dorico, in case this cannot be corrected by Steinberg.)
FWIW, I donât think that Finale exports lyrics in MIDI files. (Opening one in a text editor doesnât reveal any syllables, anyway.)
Really?
I expect that, if it were so simple, the Dorico Team would already have implemented it.
Perhaps no one has brought it to their attention yet! Artificial Intelligence speech and singing synthesis has advance rapidly in recent years, and now there are incredible programs like Synthesizer V that will be used by many musicians, combining with DAWs and notation programs, so maybe up till now a midi file with lyrics was not so important. So when I noticed this, I thought I would bring it to their attention.
Thatâs interesting! Is it possible to send to me a midi export from Finale (with lyrics) and I will open it in Synthesizer V to see if it receives the lyrics?
You know you can bulk-enter lyrics in SynthV V as well?
Benji
Yes, I know! Synthesizer V is very sophisticated and powerful in its handling of lyrics (which, being dedicated to intelligible singing, so it should be.) I use Synth-V bulk lyrics entry all the time. But Synth-V is not as good at fast and accurate programming of complex midi files as is Dorico or any DAW, so it is great to be able to make your vocals in other programs and instantly open them in Synth-V with the lyrics included. With bulk entry in Synth-V you have to be very careful to have the little â-â and/or â+â in exactly the right places and right number, and even if one is misplaced, all the lyrics sing on the wrong notes. With a midi file coming from Sibelius (and soon, hopefully, from Dorico) you donât have this problem, and can see everything clearly, and they automatically align, ready for further tweaking in pronunciation.
I am currently working on a project converting more than 50 choral scores from notation to Synth-V, and am forced to use Sibelius because Dorico cannot export lyrics together with the midi. It is possible to use Dorico lyric export (to a text file) and then use that file to bulk enter them into Synth-V, and that works fine, but I have choral scores with 4,6, and sometimes 8 parts, and this has to be done separately for each part, so it takes quite a bit of time to do what is automatic and instantaneous if you export out of Sibelius or Encore.
But because Dorico is more sophisticated and capable of itself bulk-entering lyrics and general handling of them, it would be a far better match to work with Synth-V, since you can use offline text processors to get lyrics in a form more suited to Synth-V before export.
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It wouldnât be trivial to export lyrics in MIDI files, though it would certainly be possible for us to add it. The reason itâs not straightforward is that MIDI export works on the playback representation of the score, and at the moment, lyrics are not included in that representation at all, so we would first need to add lyrics to the playback representation, then do the necessary work to include that data in the MIDI file.
Weâll plan to include this in a future version of Dorico, but I canât say for sure when we will be able to add it.
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Good to hear that, because I have to switch back to Sibelius too only to solve the problem of the missing lyrics. So hopefully this will be a nearby future version 
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I see! Thank you for that clarification.
It will be great when Dorico can do this, as I love the program except that it doesnât have pause playback and midi lyrics, and I am now working a lot with Synthesizer V and these two features are essential for that integration. Both are scheduled for Dorico updates, but Iâm thinking out loud that Dorico can, in fact, export notes and lyrics in the XML format, and there are programs which can convert XML to MIDI, so perhaps instead of changing the architecture of the program for this one issue, perhaps a conversion filter could be added to automatically convert Doricoâs XML output to MIDI?
Itâll be easier to simply include lyrics in MIDI export. It just needs us to find the time to do it! Weâll try and get to it soon.
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Been working with Synth V a lot lately and I must say such a feature would be awesome!
Could you share the links to those online converters?