[Seil]

In 65 lines of code, I have created a simple JSFX plugin for REAPER that will hopefully be very useful for anyone interested in pro guitar/bass authoring. This converts your chart in real time into musical notes that can be played back with any synthesizer plugin or MIDI keyboard.

Why? Because unlike all the other instruments, there hasn’t been a way to “preview” pro guitar charts in REAPER. That makes authoring very difficult to check for accuracy, especially if you have no tab or sheet music for reference. Now with this plugin, you will immediately know what your chart will sound like on a real guitar or bass, saving you tons of time.

I hope this will be a helpful tool for existing pro guitar authors, and a motivation for anyone who’s interested in starting pro guitar authoring. Maybe this will inspire a lot more pro guitar charts in the future ” src=”/wp-content/uploads/invision_emoticons/default_SA_smile.gif” />

DOWNLOAD:
Pro Guitar to MIDI v1.0 (3/23/2017)

INSTALL:

1. Open REAPER
2. Go to Options > Show REAPER resource folder in explorer/finder… This will open a new window

3. Open ProGuitar2MIDI.zip and drag the folders “Effects” and “FXChains” onto the window that just opened. Windows should merge the folders together.

 

SETUP:

1. Open REAPER and create a new project using the C3 template

2. Open the FX window by clicking on the “FX” button on your PART REAL_GUITAR track (You might need to resize the track in order to see it)

3. If it asks you to add FX from the list, click Cancel

4. Go to FX > Add FX Chain…

5. Choose “C3 Pro Guitar Preview.RfxChain”

 

Repeat for the PRO REAL_BASS track.

 

I recommend saving your project as a template now! You won’t have to repeat this process every time if you do so.

Go to File > Project templates > Save project as template…

Whenever you start a project and plan on charting pro guitar load this template. I saved it over the original C3 template. ” src=”/wp-content/uploads/invision_emoticons/default_SA_wink.gif” />

 

You can now start charting and instantly hear the results. To edit the settings (difficulty, tuning, etc) just open the FX window and click on the “JS: C3/progtr” effect. You can also edit the ReaSynth settings by clicking on the “VSTi: ReaSynth (Cockos)” effect.

 

Want to use a MIDI device instead?

Make sure your device is enabled for MIDI output in the REAPER preferences.

 

1. Go to Options > Preferences…
2. Go to Audio > MIDI Devices
3. Double-click the device you want to output to. If it doesn’t appear in the list, try checking your connection and then click on “Reset all MIDI devices”
4. Check “Enable output to this device”. If latency is an issue, I recommend checking “Open device in low latency/low precision mode” as well
5. Click OK, OK

6. Now you need to route your pro guitar track to the MIDI device. Click either the “I/O” or “ROUTE” button by the track name
7. Under MIDI Hardware Output, select your device in the first dropdown

 

8. Open the FX window and uncheck the “VSTi: ReaSynth (Cockos)” effect to disable ReaSynth

FEATURES:
So far it just plays back all notes as regular notes. Arpeggio ghost notes are ignored. I eventually want to add support for Guitar Pro-style effects on notes depending on their channel, such as bends, muted notes, and harmonics.

Instrument: Set to Guitar for PART REAL_GUITAR, Bass for PART REAL_BASS. Bass is transposed down an octave from Guitar.

Difficulty: Easy, Medium, Hard, Expert. Self explanatory ” src=”/wp-content/uploads/invision_emoticons/default_SA_smile.gif” />

Tuning: Drag the sliders for each string left or right to change the tuning for that string. The range is -3 to 3 semitones, but should you need a bigger range you can type in the value in the box to the right. With all sliders at zero the overall tuning is Standard (EADGBE).

Output channel: Which channel to play the notes on. This doesn’t really matter if you’re using ReaSynth, but if you’re outputting to a MIDI device and you want separate patches for guitar and bass they need to be on separate channels.

Passthrough other events?: Whether or not to pass through non-note events. I would leave this on Yes.

Enjoy! Please feel free to post any bugs or suggestions.

[Whizzer]

Wow, this is grand! I’ll be sure to let you know my experiences after the coming weekend.

[Fat Halpert]

Looks awesome.

You can reach me on Discord: Fat Halpert#3165

[TheWay123]

This looks great! However, the charting program I use (Ziggy Pro Editor) already has MIDI playback. Thanks for making this though, looks good.

One of the community managers and the main tournament organizer over at SpinShare. Also somewhat decent at charting for RB3 I think.

[The Other Side]

Ooh, nice. Thanks for that!

[Seil]

This looks great! However, the charting program I use (Ziggy Pro Editor) already has MIDI playback. Thanks for making this though, looks good.

Thanks! The goal was to have that feature in REAPER so there would be no need to download an additional program, and people can continue authoring in the same way as the other instruments.

[Seil]

I have created a track template so you can easily set this up with a few steps. See the original post for instructions ” src=”/wp-content/uploads/invision_emoticons/default_SA_smile.gif” />

[atupomaruru]

This has been really helpful, thanks a lot for this program! Like TheWay mentioned, Ziggy Pro Editor also has the feature, but this is really helpful as I no longer have to load up the chart in another program to be able to listen to it. Being able to do it all in Reaper makes pro guitar authoring a lot smoother for sure.

[StackOverflow0x]

I can’t say I entirely understand anything about Pro Guitar charting, but regarding the Track Template, would that be better served as an FX Chain? That way you can just right click and add the effects needed per track instead of having to erase the sample track it makes?

[Seil]

I can’t say I entirely understand anything about Pro Guitar charting, but regarding the Track Template, would that be better served as an FX Chain? That way you can just right click and add the effects needed per track instead of having to erase the sample track it makes?

good idea! somehow I didn’t think of that. I’ll upload that shortly.

[Seil]

Fixed!

[Whizzer]

My feedback is slightly overdue…

 

I quite like the plugin. Very helpful so far. Any chance for supporting capo’s?

[Seil]

My feedback is slightly overdue…

 

I quite like the plugin. Very helpful so far. Any chance for supporting capo’s?

Thank you! I am starting to work on a new update, I will consider adding capo support which shouldn’t be too hard. For now, you can set the tuning of each string to the capo position (if you need higher than the 3rd fret you can type them in the text boxes). If I’m correct that’s what you would have to do in Magma anyways.

[Whizzer]

Thank you! I am starting to work on a new update, I will consider adding capo support which shouldn’t be too hard. For now, you can set the tuning of each string to the capo position (if you need higher than the 3rd fret you can type them in the text boxes). If I’m correct that’s what you would have to do in Magma anyways.

 

Correct, but that would throw any non-open notes off by the same amount. Rock Band interprets the midi notes as absolute fret numbers, so this is not a perfect solution.

 

I could automate this, but that would be a lot of unnecessary work.

[Seil]

 

Correct, but that would throw any non-open notes off by the same amount. Rock Band interprets the midi notes as absolute fret numbers, so this is not a perfect solution.

 

I could automate this, but that would be a lot of unnecessary work.

So you’re saying you want all fretted notes to sound like the absolute notes, but open notes to sound as if there was a capo? For example say a C chord is x32010, if you have a capo on the 3rd fret and you play an Eb chord (with the C shape) it would be charted as x65040?

 

Keep in mind that you wouldn’t be able to play the song in-game with an actual capo. It would also mess up your chord names

[Author]

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