midi import creates lots of flute players

Dorico
#1

Hi all

New to Dorico…
imported a midi file into Dorico of Josh Groban Brave and it created mostly Flute players for staves. Tried the same MIDI file in Sibelius 8.5 where I’m coming from and it gets all of the instruments correct on import. Am I doing something wrong or is Dorico not currently good at identifying instruments on import. On the arrangement there are tracks for Piano, Bass guitar, Electric Guitar, String ensemble, String pitz, a vocal melody track and drums…also a pad chord track.

Any tips?

thanks

Martin

#2

Martin,

That’s pretty normal from XML import, since the previous software often doesn’t “correctly” label the instruments, so they get imported as a generic treble instrument. You can simply “Change Instrument” from Setup mode.

#3

Martin said that this was midi rather than xml. When you import the midi file try checking the option to import as general midi, or the option to use track names to identify instruments. The problem is that midi files don’t contain any explicit data about what instrument it is, so we have to use several heuristics to guess.

#4

Sorry. Reading is hard apparently, at least on the weekend. :blush:

#5

Thanks guys yes I now see toggling the options Paul suggested brings better results.
Most of my work originates in Cubase first so there’s a lot of wrangling to do before it reads into scoring software any way well. Hope Dorico moves to make life easier in that workflow in the future!

#6

If you are starting in Cubase then one thing you can also do is switch to Play mode in Dorico and then just drag individual midi parts from Cubase. There are also various options for importing or exporting tempo tracks, which could be useful depending on your workflow

#7

Super. I did not know that! The drag and drop midi parts thing is a potential time saver. Will try it!

thankyou