Stuck MIDI notes with synth plugins

[Reflected]

Originally Posted by Reflected

Here is a video showing the bug in real time:

https://youtu.be/IY4HQjF1qHg

Originally Posted by EvilDragon

Yeah that definitely sounds like non-standard behavior on Harmor's side. When receciving all-notes-off it should purge any internal note on counters.

it happens with many other...

to name few:
Hive
Zebra
Sylenth1 (v3)
Sytrus
Omnisphere
korg polysix
Korg Monopoly

[gofer]

What ED and me meant to be a Harmor issue is that it will continue hanging the note after a successful All Note Off when the note is retriggered. All Notes Off should make it forget any note it has played, but it keeps it in memory.
Strictly speaking, just a regular note-off should be enough to silence any note of that number and to make the synth forget that it ever played that note, no matter how often a note-on came in for it. But apparently some (many?) synths are not behaving nice at that front.

That said, I was not able to reproduce your issue with Omnisphere2. Of my 20 or so synths none misbehaves when duplicating takes (uninstalled Harmor after the test). So it’s a good thing that people start listing the synths where it happens and under which circumstances.

[gofer]

Originally Posted by H3o

Lol- you must excuse the evil dragon- poor guy only sees the world through a pair of reaper coloured spectacles.. being blinded by that,he refuses to see the actual light of any given serious reaper bug situation.
Have no fear though!
Cockos team will probably have 10,000 more buggy features to play with and distract attentions away from all the old problems existing.

If it were my ship,i would fix ALL the leaks before adding any more cargo to an already sinking ship!
Bless.

ED is known as a relentless bug hunter and a man who speaks his mind. Plus he knows by his profession a lot about how MIDI works above and under the hood.

This thread will be more useful if it is kept on topic instead of talking generally about 10,000 other issues or attacking each other.
People with note hanging issues should post details. Eg, the last post in the All-Notes-Off thread Juliansadder links to (in his bestiary thread) was him asking for MIDI logs. Sudden silence ever after...
MIDI logs are very useful, it’s how I found out what’s going wrong when duplicating takes. Showing that to the devs gives them something solid to work with instead of general guesswork.

[gofer]

I don’t see anyone asslicking here, but I also don’t see how your rant is getting things further. Just another empty post. Designed to spawn other empty posts - like this one. I provided supporting evidence, where is yours?



EDIT:
Instead of wasting another post I’ll express my admiration for H3o’s superbly eloquent reply (vv) right here in this edit section. Well done, that’s really helpful and brings your point across.

[EvilDragon]

It's just a fact that I never got any hung notes. Did you ever consider that maybe I have a different workflow that somehow doesn't force Reaper into those edge cases? This is entirely possible. And of course edge cases exist in any software, nobody is saying to the contrary, least of all me.

For example I never duplicate takes during playback. So yeah... if that's one of those edge cases that does result in hung notes, it's a valid info worth checking out, which I didn't get around to doing just yet.


You need to calm down the vitriol towards me. I am not on a payroll here, never was.

[EvilDragon]

I've just checked it, and indeed duplicating an active take during playback will result in hung notes with certain (but not all) plugins, so yep - bug confirmed!

Some plugins seem to be more careful about the events they receive. For example I couldn't get the notes to hang with Camel Audio Alchemy, HrastProgrammer's Diodow/Tranzistow, Roland Cloud plugins, Madrona Labs plugins, Synapse Audio plugins etc..


EDIT: Also happens on MIDI hardware output with certain hardware synths!

[Phazma]

I experience far more stuck notes in Reaper too than in any other DAW and also in my case sometimes "all notes off" doesn't work. However I think so many factors can play a role that it happens apparently random and even for the devs it might be very difficult to find the cause. It might be a communication problem between how Reaper handles MIDI and how certain vstis expect it to be handled.
I don't know when I will have time to pay attention to which vstis do it in which situation and when does the note off work and when not but once I have time to mess around with this more in-depth I will contribute with my findings as well. This behaviour just needs to be eradicated and without very detailed reports of several users the devs will have a very tough time eradicating it.

[EvilDragon]

Originally Posted by Phazma

without very detailed reports of several users the devs will have a very tough time eradicating it.

The importance of this cannot be overstated.

For example, Reflected mentioned using "Duplicate active take" action. That's the smoking gun here (or at least one of them). Very very important to know what you did before you got the hung notes, with which plugin(s), etc.

[dupont]

It's urgent Cockos solves or tell us more about this issue before it turns balls and somebody speak again about asslicking, which is neither fair nor a Reaper feature.
I reported many times this bug with as details as I could : plugins used, it happens mostly is loop mode play, audio interface ...but it is not reproducible it happens at random.
It's like the covid 19, it's a vicious bug !

[EvilDragon]

It's not like COVID-19 in that it cannot kill people.

But interesting that you mention loop mode, I could never get hung notes in loop mode...

[STOP]

Originally Posted by EvilDragon

EDIT: Also happens on MIDI hardware output with certain hardware synths!

I don't if it's relevant but also the panic button on midi keyboard doesn't work when I get stuck notes. I checked with ReaControlMidi MIDI activity log and the panic button do is job, every part of the message is sent and received.

[EvilDragon]

Support for all-notes-off is up to the plugin. Some plugins don't respond to it, actually. Hardware synths should be responding, though.

[Janne83]

Originally Posted by EvilDragon

Support for all-notes-off is up to the plugin. Some plugins don't respond to it, actually. Hardware synths should be responding, though.

VST2 versions all work, VST3 versions also worked but somewhere during the v6 development stopped working- I remember using All notes off command on vst3 version of Hive2 without a problem, but now it doesnt work. In cubase 10.5 vst3 all notes off work

[EvilDragon]

Confirmed CC123 not working with Hive VST3. Works in S1.

[schwa]

I've just spent an hour duplicating MIDI takes during playback with about 20 different synths. What would be most useful is an actual test case, a simple MIDI project with directions to use a particular (easily available) synth and instructions to duplicate the take when playback is at a particular position.

[Janne83]

Hey Schwa

I attached a simple project with the most obvious synth- a VST3 version of Hive 2 (laest version) with 4 long midi notes.


Try to duplicate takes during playback at any moment
Try to change tempo during playback

I get a stuck note every time- The All notes off command doesnt function for the VST3 versions.

Thanks J

[Reflected]

Originally Posted by schwa

What would be most useful is an actual test case, a simple MIDI project with directions to use a particular (easily available) synth and instructions to duplicate the take when playback is at a particular position.

what do you mean by easily available?

You can quickly download Harmor demo from here: (no registration is needed i think)
https://www.image-line.com/plugins/Synths/Harmor/

insert one of these vsti's: Harmor / Zebra / Hive / Sylenth1

write some midi (just put a long note) put in loop and play.
duplicate the take when the note plays, it will get stuck right away.

[Janne83]

Also a video demonstration:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/17nv...ew?usp=sharing

[STOP]

Originally Posted by Janne83

Hey Schwa

I attached a simple project with the most obvious synth- a VST3 version of Hive 2 (laest version) with 4 long midi notes.


Try to duplicate takes during playback at any moment
Try to change tempo during playback

I get a stuck note every time- The All notes command doesnt function for the VST3 versions.

Thanks J

Tested attached RPP and same stuck notes problem with vst3 Tyrell N6 when duplicating take.

[schwa]

Originally Posted by Janne83

I attached a simple project

Thank you, that is very helpful!

[Tale]

FWIW: I just quickly tried Janne83's project with Arturia DX7 V, and indeed I get a hanging note when duplicating the take while a note is being played. What seems to happen is:

1. Note On (from the original take).
2. Duplicate take.
3. Another Note On for the same note, I guess from the new take.
4. Note Off from the new take.

DX7 V simply allocates another voice for the 2nd Note On (because that's how a DX7 works), hence the hanging note. If I try the same with e.g. Elka Panther, then I get no hanging notes, because I guess it simply ignores the 2nd Note On (it has full polyphony, so it doesn't use voice allocation).

BTW, I didn't see any All Notes Off message during this test. This probably would have fixed/obscured the issue for DX7 V, but I guess it would be better to send a Note Off when bypassing the original take during duplication.

[gofer]

The VSTi is only needed to make the bug audible, and in order to reveil it it needs to be one of those instruments that don't handle their note counter nicely, I assume.


The underlying misbehavior in Reaper which causes these plugins to hang a note is happening no matter whether an instrument is involved or not. The clue is, you have to trigger the duplicate action while a note is active.

Easiest way to follow what happens is by using a MIDI take with a single long note. Make it long enough to give you all time in the world to watch it happen in your MIDI logger.
As soon as you do duplicate, you'll see that the note will get an extra note-on event. This is what ticks the offended synths off.

I don't think it's best to send an all-notes-off during the duplicate action, that would be brute force and annoying - and it won't cure in case of Harmor (which will just hang that note next time around) and VST3i (which are prone to ignore CC123 at least in Reaper).
When a take is duplicated Reaper knows that the same MIDI stream continues until the user does something different. Nothing really changes content-wise at that moment. So it could just not throw another note-on for notes that are currently active.


The all-notes-off issue with VST3 is something different but should be investigated as well.
Lots of VST3i won't react to CC123 manually inserted into the item and also not to Reaper's MIDI panic. The same plugin's VST2 version will behave properly. Other than I thought yesterday, I see this issue with all VST3i I have here. Must have made some error while testing yesterday. Examples are Spitfire's Lab, Pluginguru's Unify, Pianoteq 6 and Roli's Studio Player.
Someone confirmed earlier in this thread, that the same plugin that didn't react to CC123 in Reaper did react alright in Cubase, which is pretty disturbing.

[EvilDragon]

Originally Posted by H3o

Have a suspicion it has to do with reaper having a note off cc performance lane in the midi editor.
Who really uses that lane like ever? and truthfully,what is it's actual purpose of being there? whoever edits note off values?

That lane has nothing to do with this issue at all - the issue is in the duplicate active take action.

Release velocity is a part of MIDI spec, and MPE controllers like ROLI Seaboard, Haken Continuum, Linnstrument etc. all utilize release velocity. Some regular MIDI controllers and synths (from my experience a lot of Korgs and Kurzweils) also utilize release velocity.

This lane is for editing those events.

Originally Posted by H3o

Logically it would be only 2 states..no?

No. You have note on that can have values 1-127, and then you have note off (release velocity) that can have values 0-127. You can use release velocity to, for example, modulate the release time of an envelope, resulting in sounds releasing slower or faster depending on how fast or slow you release the key. There are plenty other uses for release velocity in order to get more expressive sounds...

[Phazma]

I want to contribute with what is probably the most frequent cause for hanging notes in my case which is seeking while a certein instrument plays a note.

It seems that some plugins don't receive a note off when their note is interrupted by seeking and others do.
2 that DON'T HANG when seeking: Sylenth1, Omnisphere
2 that DO HANG when seeking: Serum, OB-Xd

What I have done is just load one of these Synths, create a long note, press play, seek while the note is being played. It reliably causes Serum and OB-Xd to hang.
I have done the same in Logic and Studio One and it doesn't hang.

One thing I find interesting to note: Both Logic and Studio One only allow the note to be triggered when the cursor passes the very beginning of the note. Reaper allows the note to be triggered also when starting from the middle of the note. Maybe that has to do somehow with the problem?

Btw All Notes Off usually works in these cases.

Another more specific situation where I frequently encounter effects of a hanging note:
I often send a synth to an Aux channel where I have a reverb effect (pro-r but doesn't matter) and a PRO-C compressor afterwards, who is side-chain triggered by the Midi note that is played by the synth on the other track. At a certain point, while the synth plays correctly, I stop hearing the reverb and when I check PRO-C I see that the compressor remains triggered until i send an all notes off action. Seems like when some routing is involved like sending midi from one channel to another hanging happens much more frequently and without me doing anything.

[gofer]

Originally Posted by Phazma

One thing I find interesting to note: Both Logic and Studio One only allow the note to be triggered when the cursor passes the very beginning of the note. Reaper allows the note to be triggered also when starting from the middle of the note. Maybe that has to do somehow with the problem?

I think you’re onto something there.

[EvilDragon]

There's an option for that in MIDI editor Options->Chase MIDI note-ons in project playback.

I cannot seem to manage to get any hung notes when seeking over here... Might be related to some Reaper options.

[schwa]

I just installed serum vsti and I'm unable to get a note to hang when seeking. Can you give any sort of reliable way to reproduce?

[Phazma]

Originally Posted by schwa

I just installed serum vsti and I'm unable to get a note to hang when seeking. Can you give any sort of reliable way to reproduce?

Hey I just tried installing the VSTi version of Serum and OB-Xd and when using that one instead of the AUi the notes do not hang! Guess it's time to swap all my AUs for VSTs.
I'll do so one day that I have time and see if I get any more hanging notes. In that case I will report back. Would be great if getting rid of AUs would solve the problem entirely (at least for me).

@EvilDragon: Thanks for the info. I tried disabling it but it didn't have any effect on the hanging notes. With VSTis it didn't hang, with (some) AUis it did, no matter if Chase MIDI note-ons in project playback was activated.

[STOP]

Stuck note situation.

VSTi3 HELM, Surge, Lounge Lizard...

Preferences->Plugins->VST->[X] Don't flush synthesizer plugins on stop/reset

1- Hit spacebar
2- Stop anywhere in the middle of midi item
3- If you hit spacebar again stuck notes accumulate.

RPP file
https://forum.cockos.com/attachment....2&d=1588075887

Edit: fix link

[IadAslan]

Sorry for interrupting here.

fwiw - I can confirm all of my MIDI related woes (stuck notes on loop end + missing notes on loop start) being related to cycle mode being active. I cannot link it to any specific action though unfortunately. The only thing I frequently do is select different tracks and maybe move items back and forth while playback is running.

Usually the project just needs to go through a few cycles for the problem to occur at random. I can't link it to any specific plugin either - had it happen with entire Arturia Suite, Nexus 2 & 3, Kontakt 5 & 6, UVI Falcon, Sylenth 1, Serum and Omnisphere in Reaper 5 & 6.

Hope this information may be somewhat useful...

[gofer]

Originally Posted by STOP

Stuck note situation.

VSTi3 HELM, Surge, Lounge Lizard...

Preferences->Plugins->VST->[X] Don't flush synthesizer plugins on stop/reset

1- Hit spacebar
2- Stop anywhere in the middle of midi item
3- If you hit spacebar again stuck notes accumulate.

RPP file
https://forum.cockos.com/attachment....2&d=1588075887

You made some copy/paste error when creating that link, fixed it in this quote and here it is again:
https://forum.cockos.com/attachment....2&d=1588075887

Now i'm going to check your project file.

[STOP]

Originally Posted by gofer

You made some copy/paste error when creating that link, fixed it in this quote and here it is again:
https://forum.cockos.com/attachment....2&d=1588075887

Now i'm going to check your project file.

I fix the link.

[gofer]

Haha, I managed to create a very similar mess trying to fix it, but now the ones in my post really work

[dupont]

hang notes in loop mode when I adjust some plugins parameters with the mouse and play notes on the midi hardware keyboard, for example when I adjust Tyrell N6 cutoff.

[gofer]

Originally Posted by STOP

Stuck note situation.

VSTi3 HELM, Surge, Lounge Lizard...

Preferences->Plugins->VST->[X] Don't flush synthesizer plugins on stop/reset

1- Hit spacebar
2- Stop anywhere in the middle of midi item
3- If you hit spacebar again stuck notes accumulate.

RPP file
https://forum.cockos.com/attachment....2&d=1588075887

Edit: fix link

Sorry, I tried with Surge VST2 and VST3, no hanging notes when following your receipt, nor when seeking as per Phazma nor when duplicating takes. With the latter it began phasing some notes, like playing the same note twice, but stopped dutifully with the regular note-offs.

Does this also happen for you on a virgin default install?

[STOP]

Originally Posted by STOP

Stuck note situation.

VSTi3 HELM, Surge, Lounge Lizard...

Preferences->Plugins->VST->[X] Don't flush synthesizer plugins on stop/reset

1- Hit spacebar
2- Stop anywhere in the middle of midi item
3- If you hit spacebar again stuck notes accumulate.

RPP file
https://forum.cockos.com/attachment....2&d=1588075887

Oupsss! Only HELM have stuck notes impossible to stop.

[gofer]

But does Surge hang notes for you that are possible to stop (with F3 or restart playback or somesuch)? I mean, when you lengthen that item and seek or whatever you need to do to make it hang notes?

Asking, because I want to know whether it makes sense for me to keep Surge while hunting note hanging bugs. I don't have any of the ones that are mentioned thruoghout the thread. Harmor seems to have other issues on top, so I don't think it's a good candidate (and annoying, because you have to kill/reload it everytime a note hanged) and Helm wants me to donate for the download...

[STOP]

Originally Posted by gofer

But does Surge hang notes for you that are possible to stop (with F3 or restart playback or somesuch?

Did you cheked Preferences->Plugins->VST->[X] Don't flush synthesizer plugins on stop/reset



Surge:

If I let it go to end of item everything stop. Look like normal behaviour.
If I stop in the middle of the item F3 doesn't kill stuck notes.


HELM:
Completely stuck, nothing work.

[gofer]

I have lengthened your item, so I can let it run, but every note stops with its regular note off for me. Following your receipt nothing extraordinary happens at all - sounds start and stop as expected, no matter how often I hit spacebar.

Yes, Surge VST3 doesn't react to all-notes-off messages, somehow expected by now Hope they suss that one out.

There must be some other reason involved that makes the difference, a setting maybe. Which OS are you on, btw?

[STOP]

Did you cheked Preferences->Plugins->VST->[X] Don't flush synthesizer plugins on stop/reset



Windows 10 X64
Reaper 6.09