I’m considering buying Logic Pro for its supposedly excellent stock instrument library (want to avoid spending a lot of money on different virtual instruments for “basic” needs).
Is there a way to use the instruments of Logic Pro directly from Dorico in playback?
I found this old post from @benwiggy in the forum. Is that still a valid and/or recommended method or does it need an update?
Hi @Wimuz ,
I’m not a Mac user, but if you have some virtual midi cable, then you should be able to send data from Dorico, to Logic Pro. That way you could use Logic Pro as virtual instruments host.
Currently the opposite isn’t possible.
So, most probably the method provided by @benwiggy, is still valid for Mac.
The only possible update on the method will be a direct synchronization between Dorico and DAW,
but it’s still unavailable even between Dorico and Cubase… And when such sync is available, most probably it will remain only in the Steinberg’s ecosystem.
Best wishes,
Thurisaz
Hello Wimuz,
as Ben described, his test included a single instrument only. But engaging the IAC-Driver in Audio-Midi-Setup (needed for internal Midi-Routing on Mac), is the first step. One IAC-Bus gives you 16 midi-channels, and you can add more busses if needed.
To get a multitimbral instrument in Logic (without the help of the Environment), create a „Summing Track Stack“ (name could be different since I use german language). I named that track-stack "Logic Instrument Rack“.
Add instruments to that summing-track-stack, every one with a different midi-channel, corresponding to the channel in Dorico.
What is important, this track-stack has always to be the selected track in Logic, so that Dorico can address the included instruments.
As for the audio drivers, Logic uses an external audio interface, while Dorico is set to the internal Mac sound card. In both programs the latency is set to 256 samples.
Here’s a screenshot while playback. As you can see in the in the bottom right, the CPU load is huge. I guess the internal Midi routing is taking a big part from that cake.
PS: If it’s just the sounds you’re after, then Mainstage would also be an option. The program contains the same sound library as Logic Pro and is much cheaper.
Thanks for the Mainstage tip @bobmusic, I wasn’t aware that it uses the same library as Logic. Indeed for now the sounds would be my main reason for the Logic purchase, so Mainstage would be a better option in my case. The price of it seems almost to good to be true.
But is it possible with Mainstage to build a “track-stack” similar to what you explained for Logic, then activate that track and hear it play?
As far as I understand from the Mainstage manual it is possible to add channel strips to a patch, so I wonder if it would be possible to send Dorico’s midi to such layered patch (each Dorico channel corresponding with a different MS channel strip) using the virtual midi cable?
It’s even easier to use MainStage in this case, because the main purpose of this app is to be an instrument rack. The assignment of the midi ports works the same as in Logic, each channelstrip can have its own midi port and channel.
Yes, that looks comprehensive.
I did a test where Mainstage and Dorico use the same external audio interface at the same time. One Instrument in Dorico and the other in Logic. Playback of both in Dorico works fine.
@bobmusic I’ve installed Mainstage and tried the connection from Dorico to Mainstage via the IAC driver. Easy to set up and it works fine for playback.
Next step; would I also be able to create an audio file somehow? When I export audio from Dorico (mp3, wav…) with only one instrument, and this instrument connected with Mainstage, I get an audio file without sound. I guess that’s because Dorico is just sending midi and has no knowledge of / access to the audio source (Mainstage in this case).
How would you solve that? (if any solution at all) Use some tool to record the Apple built-in audio? Or are there better ways?
Audio is processed in MainStage, so the audio file should be created there. Fortunately, Mainstage has a built-in recording function, normally the keyboard command for this is "option-r“.
…also have a look at the preferences for recording in MainStage, there you have options for bit depth, sample rate etc.
@bobmusic yes indeed it’s possible to record in Mainstage (after pressing playback in Dorico, then quickly switching to Mainstage and starting record, cause the other way round doesn’t seem to work).
But what if my Dorico composition has a combination of “Mainstage instruments” and Dorico plug-ins? Part of the sound will be generated in Mainstage, part in Dorico. I could of course record them separately and then combine the audios in a DAW, but maybe there are more elegant ways?
Also I observed that the only way to “mute” the Mainstage sound is to mute in Mainstage itself. Muting the midi-track in Dorico doesn’t stop the midi-data being sent to the IAC driver.
Maybe much ado about nothing, but it would be nice to have an elegant solution to combine Dorico’s top notch notation features with the infinite synth-sound possibilities available out-of-the box in Mainstage/Logic (best of two worlds I would say).
Hi everyone,
I got the TXLTimeCode Router yesterday and I’ve been looking for any YouTube that explains how to set up things between Logic Pro & Dorico Pro. Any recommendations?
I tried to create a new IAC Driver (I have an iMac), but for some reason that option is missing for me. I also tried to ad a buss in the IAC that exists and it only has 1 midi I/O. I can’t increase to 16 I/O like I’ve read.
Anyone running into this problem?
I can’t say exactly when this changed, but with the latest version of Logic and the latest macOS operating system, I no longer need the IAC driver.
Logic itself now provides virtual MIDI inputs and outputs for use in other applications.
I have just tried this virtual Logic midi port with Dorico and it works straight away, even with multiple sounds on different midi channels.
That sounds great. Can I ask which program controls the tempo in this set up you show?
In this example, Dorico does the playback and Logic only serves as a multitimbral sound modul.
