Making MP3s of NoteWorthy compositions (and audio CDS if you have a burner)

[Richard Woodroffe]

If you want to make audio CDs of your NoteWorthy compositions, one way of doing this is to create an MP3. After that, most burner software has the ability to burn MP3s onto a CD as an audio track

So what's the easiest way of making an MP3 from your NoteWorthy composition. Well windows (XP)is set up to do it but it just needs a little bit of extra software (don't worry, if you don't currently have the right software, you can get it for free)

Those of you that have Sound Blaster/Audigy cards will already have the right software (Creative Wave Studio will do the trick). For anyone else, you need to download some recording software. (Windows SNDREC32.EXE just doesn't do the job)
A product called WavePad has all you need to do this. You can download WavePad for free from:
http://www.download.com/WavePad/3000-2170_4-10382895.html?tag=pdp_prod

Having installed Wave Pad, at some stage during the process I will outline, Wave Pad will request and install an mp3 encoder. Just allow this when it asks.

So what do you have to do.  Here is the process using Wave Pad. (Creative Wave Studio is a similar sort of process)

Run Wave Pad and minimize for the moment.

Run NoteWorthy (either version) and load the music file you want to convert to mp3. Set up any sound fonts you want to use etc and play the beginning of the file just as a check. If all is ok, go back to the start ready for your recording.

ALT TAB to Wave Pad.
Click New File and select the sample rate you want (44100 is standard). Select Stereo. Click OK
Click the Red record Button - in the record control window presented, on the right hand side, the top drop down should say Default Sound In.
In the second box, select Stereo Mixer (Those who have Audigy or other sound cards may need to select "What you hear" or a similar option)
In the Advanced Record Options, Make sure "Audio Trim Recording" is selected. (Leave Voice activated recording unchecked)
Click OK
Click the red record button.
ALT TAB to NoteWorthy and click F5 to start playing the music.
While you are recording, you can ALT TAB back to Wave Pad to see what it's doing, but remember that it is recording all sounds from your PC. So a critical stop noise (for example) would be recorded.

When the music has finished, ALT TAB to Wave Pad and click stop.
Then click the close window on the record control. Your recording will then be transferred to the main file window.

From there, you can examine the music and select any gaps at the beginning and end of the file, highlight the area and delete.  There are plenty of other things you can do but suffice it to say that you can now do a simple "File Save As", selecting the file type as MP3.  A window will be displayed asking for the bit-rate etc You can just use the default.

Job done !

Wave Pad will also write the file directly to a CD as an audio file if required.

[Mark Wheatley]

Yes, WavePad is a great program, but the link you gave is for an old version. From the NCH web site http://nch.com.au/wavepad/masters.html you can get the latest with a number of additional features.

[Richard Woodroffe]

Mark,

Thanks for the update on the web site.

[Dennis]

Run NoteWorthy (either version) and load the music file you want to convert to mp3. Set up any sound fonts you want to use etc and play the beginning of the file just as a check. If all is ok, go back to the start ready for your recording.

Hi,

Thanks for the information. one further question:

  How do you set up the sound fonts in Noteworthy?

[Lawrie Pardy]

G'day Dennis,

  How do you set up the sound fonts in Noteworthy?

Actually, you don't.  That's a function of your audio subsystems - sound card(s), their drivers, softsynth etc..  If you do a search of the forum, you'll find many discussions revolving around just this topic

[Richard Woodroffe]

Er - well actually Lawrie, you might have to.

If you have a sound font loaded into a sound bank, you may have to tell NoteWorthy where in the bank it is by going to the properties for each staff and then the instrument.

Having got there, you might need to check the "Send Bank Select" box and select either the LSB or MSB.

So for example, for a Jeux Organ font loaded into bank 42, tick bank select and set controller 0 to 42.
Your Organ patches will then be as defined by the Jeux sound font - ie instrument 40 will be one of the Ripieno stops.

Now of course - if you have your instrument tree set up to do all of this for you automatically, then you might tend to forget it needs doing.  But I doubt that an instrument tree has been set up for every conceivable sound font.

[Lawrie Pardy]

G'day Richard,
hmm.  If I wanted to be a pedant, I would say that you set the sound fonts up in your sound card's software and then you select the banks and instruments thus provided in NWC...  But only if I wanted to be a pedant  :)

Actually, I take your point.  I did simplify a bit more than reasonable.

To those wanting clarification, if you read Richards comments in the message prior to this one he gives a concise overview of what is required within NWC.

In order to make those selections available your synth must support the sound(s) you want.  This is where the soundfont comes in.  Assuming you have a soundcard that supports soundfonts then you load the fonts you require.  If you have a softsynth capable of using soundfonts or vst modules you load them there instead.  I cannot give you much guidence there as each card/softsynth will have its own tools...  (and I haven't explored vst modules and synths that support them much yet anyway.  That's a project for another day).

[fitzclan]

Another way of making CD's out of your  NWC fils is with Musicmatch Jukebox. Open both programs and open the file you want to record. Hit the record button on Musicmatch and then start the file to be recorded. While it is being recorded you can name the file in the recorder window. When done add it to the playlist and record the next file you until you are done.  I find that the best volume level for recording is around 45, but I guess that depends on your sound card.  You may also have to check the proper recording source on your sound cards control panel. The choices are usually something like would be at the back of any stereo component hardware, like: CD player, Aux, line in/out, mic, and for internal recording such as this, Stereo Mix is the source that I use. From there you can create a CD from Musicmatch itself or use Roxio CD creator or whatever program you have.  You will have to move the files to that program from musicmatch if you do it that way.  This is a very simple way to do this and it works very nicely.

[NoteWorthy Online]

See also:

FAQ - Making an audio CD of *.nwc files

[carlsson]

One drawback of hard disk recording is the amount of CPU (I believe) it takes, in particular in combination of replaying a MIDI file. I have found that both when I replay from NoteWorthy or when I export a MIDI to replay in e.g. WinAmp, and then use WavePad to capture the output, some lag and missing notes occur if I use too many systems and channels at the same time. I don't know if true software synths who can (?) work in steptime note by note have similar issues when generating WAV files, but another option would be to have two computers (or maybe dual CPU), one with the MIDI outputting sound card (and NoteWorthy etc) and one with a generic sound card for recording mic/line in.

[John Ford]

I suspect the dropouts are occurring as a result of too much polyphony (how many total notes your MIDI sound source can play at one time).  Many sound sources (soundcards, external units, keyboards, etc) only have 32 not polyphony; others may have 64 or 128.  And then on top of that, because many sounds are layered to achieve their effect, some instruments will use two or three notes for the same instrument playing one single note.  It can add up quickly.  So, a lot of players just drop out the oldest note to make room for the new one.  That can result in the dropout of sounds.  Playing MIDI actually takes very little CPU power.  A lot of folks who perform live using MIDI accompaniment actually use low-end computers, since it doesn't take much to play MIDI (and if something happens to the computer, it's not so great a loss).

If you are having trouble recording MIDI, I would suggest getting a sequencer that supports MIDI and audio - something like PowerTracks Pro at the low price end (but still feature-rich) or Sonar at the high end.  That way, you can record individual MIDI tracks to audio, then merge them all together at the end into a stereo file.  There are no polyphony issues with audio tracks; however, they will use more CPU resources.

Hope this made some sense.

[carlsson]

The music is less than 16 channels, but sometimes two or three note polyphony on a few channels. It plays perfectly well when I'm not recording the output at the same time. On the other hand, I may try it again now when I have reinstalled the computer to clean up any other hidden junk that took system resources.

[John Ford]

The problem might also be your sound card.  There are some that either don't do full duplex (allowing play and record at the same time); others go into a lower resolution mode to allow recording while playing back.  It's probably not this, but it's a thought.  What kind of sound card are you using?

- John

[EdBoy]

Er... What about Synthfont? It uses a soundfont generator like NWC's, and can put out directly into MP3.

It made my Chopin music sound pretty nice. The CD turned out great. Just saying.

[mgrantom]

I have found an easier way to burn audio files to CD or HD.  I simply export the NWC file to a Midi file then drag and drop the file into Itunes.  I can burn either CD's or just play the song within Itunes.  Works for my simple needs.

[melismata]

Er... What about Synthfont? It uses a soundfont generator like NWC's, and can put out directly into MP3.

It made my Chopin music sound pretty nice. The CD turned out great. Just saying.

I use Synthfont too and I find it good for my needs.  I use it in conjunction with sinfonia36.sf2 soundfont which is an orchestral soundfont (and freeware).  The combination of synthfont and soundfonts (sinfonia36 or others) can render midi files into mp3 or wav independently of whether one is using soundblaster-type cards or not because rendition does not depend on the soundcard.  I do use the option to turn off the speakers while rendering to speed up the process.

Having said that, synthfont is a bit overwhelming to use at first glance: its interface is not very intuitive, especially if one is not very audio-savvy. However, it does the job I want it to do for my purpose.  Probably better results can be achieved if one can learn to use all its features such as VST etc - which I unfortunately don't ...

[tony smedley]

We all have our favourite ways of making audio discs from various sound sources.
I have no commercial interest but I use a very inexpensive program RipVinyl which creates a wav file from any sound source passing through my PC to the speakers. I use the Creative mixer to select a sound source. As the music or other sound plays you can see the recording level and if necessary adjust to avoid distortion or adjust left to right balance. When the playing has finished you have a wav file which can be directly copied to a blank audio CD using any of the many copying systems available.  You can delete the wav file afterwards if you wish or if you want to re-record with altered settings.
The RipVinyl program is very easy to use. (which is why I use it!)

Tony