Cantabile now has an official Stream Deck plugin - see here for details.
As always, keen for feedback and suggestions.
Brad
9 Likes
Cool. I use the software based system for my OBS streaming control called Touch Portal It also has plug-ins.
Iāve been beta testing this in the background, with my tongue clamped between my teeth!
I have to say that this is an incredible development. My Stream Deck (SD) has long been velcro-ed to my stage keyboard and has been loaded with my own basic MIDI commands, Brad has taken this concept and pushed it to a whole new level.
All of the basic commands are provided - transport controls, Song and State selection, tempo/time signature display with beat indicator, view selectorsā¦
Songs and States are shown by name, which can link to page-able list pages. Cantabile feeds back to the SD, keeping Song/State names current and showing the state of play, pause and record buttons. This even allows MIDI buttons to act as cue lights - something Iād developed my own light box to undertake before now.
Also provided is a countdown timer, which will help me avoid overunning my āfillerā improv gigs!
Brad has provided a lot of customisation options for the buttons. You can choose colours and some behaviours, such as a long-press for the power button. Very, very clever - a level of refinement Iāve not seen in any other Stream Deck plug-in.
I canāt overstate how useful this is going to be to me - if youāve not yet grabbed a Stream Deck, this is one of the best reasons I could imagine for getting one. I never want to be without this!
Genius! 
Iāve taught Brad a new UK phrase - āGob-Smackedā!
4 Likes
I canāt believe that people arenāt falling over themselves with comments on this one! 
This is a big deal, folks - easily one of the best things to happen to Cantabile!
2 Likes
I am āgob smackedā too but I donāt use the stream deck. I read up on it & I see where it would invaluable for folks that do. I was sure that you would be thrilled by this plugin because it fitās well onto your setup and you were using it already. It is without doubt a wonderful addition to Cantabileās capability and will find itās way into other setups along the way. 
Brad has done it again!
Dave
2 Likes
I probably should emphasise here that the Song names and State names in the selection pages update themselves (and handle their paging) automatically! That may not have been clear.
All this with no bindings to set up.
If I didnāt have one already I would buy a Stream Deck just to use this! Itās like they were made for each other.
4 Likes
I think itās hard to convey just how well the Stream Deck works for this kind of setup. Iāve known about the Stream Deck for years but it wasnāt until half way through developing the plug-in that it clicked with me and I finally saw its potential.
3 Likes
Yup, Streamdeck is still a hidden champion in the music scene - still considered a video streamerās toyā¦
I love using it to control Cubase - canāt remember all those pesky keyboard shortcuts.
The Cantabile implementation is a typical @brad marvel - super-thought-through functionality that takes you a while to wrap your head around and use it to its full extent!
Currently, I donāt have a stream deck in my live setup, but with this plugin, itās definitely an option for a next iterationā¦
Big thanx to @brad for this!
Cheers,
Torsten
1 Like
I donāt think that Stream Deckās name does it any favours. Elgato themselves seems reluctant to push their device beyond the streamer market.
I was a fairly early adopter, and I bought mine half in hope, half expecting I wouldnāt get it working properly with the likes of Cubase and Cantabile. Elgato werenāt really much help when I enquired about the potential.
I was never so pleased to be proved wrong! With the arrival of MIDI as an option most of my concerns were removed, and now it has both Cubase and Cantabile dedicated plug-ins itās something I would buy again in an instant.
1 Like
Unfortunately, the Cubase plugin is based on the Generic Remote concept that Steinberg wants to kill, to be superseded by their new MIDI Remote framework. Just spent a couple of hours reworking my Cubase setup to work with the new MIDI Remote (using only the basic MIDI plugin). Some stuff works nicely, other more sophisticated aspects like enabling or disabling punch-in or pre-roll are only available as virtual keyboard commands, so my Stream Deck isnāt getting any visual feedback on this, which is a painā¦
And the mechanism to train the MIDI Remote page is just the complete reverse of the old Cubase plugin. Probably great for hardware control surfaces, but not ideal for a flexible device like the Stream Deck
Will have to see how Steinberg extend and evolve this going forwardā¦
With Cubase Iāve just switched to using the free(!) Avid Control. It does everything we might want a remote to do, and is fully bi-directional - no remote mapping to do at all. It is based on the Eucon remote standard and runs on both iOS and Android tablets/phones.
I donāt use it for anything other than shortcut (āsoft keysā) buttons. The default Cubase setup at launch includes 91 pages of shortcuts! I deleted them all and made a couple of pithy pages of my own - sometimes you can have too much choice.
Itās a good month for remotes.
1 Like
Iām a guitar player. Now if Stream Deck made a model I could stomp onā¦ 
1 Like
They doā¦ 
Stream Deck Pedal
(I have the pedal, so I checked and Bradās plug-in works fine with these too!)
2 Likes
Well thatās interesting. Iāll look into it. Thanks for the heads up.
2 Likes
Very cool!!!
3 Likes
Wow! Iāve been on the fence about picking up a Stream Deckā¦but this news might just push me over the edge! Super cool.
3 Likes
Iām not that familiar with stream deck, I checked the site, but Iām curious to exactly how you guys are using it or what problems it solves. It seems that itās essentially 15 programmable pads that you can assign to an actionā¦ And easier than setting up bindings?
Iām a guitar player and use an FCB 1010 foot pedal for a variety of functionsā¦ So is it similar to that, just not on the floor?
Thanks!
Tom
1 Like
Itās easier than setting up bindings, because you donāt need to set up ANY bindings! It just works! (In fact you donāt even need to create your own Cantabile Profile - Brad has added some templates to the plug-in, which can be added as it installs).
Look at the buttons in the example at the top of this thread - the Song and State names are right there on the Stream Deck, showing you exactly what you have selected - and updating themselves in real time. Press one of those buttons and you can select a Song or State from a list that updates itself automatically!
Press āPlayā - the play button lights up and the tempo button flashes along to let you know all is well. Select a new Song/State and the display will update itself.
The two big problems the Stream Deck is up against are its name, and its makerās marketing. It is not just for streaming - in fact thatās the least of it, in my opinion. There are plug-ins for Cubase, MIDI, Lightroom, clocks, games, screen savers, audio settings, crypto-currency management, calendars, flight trackers, YouTube, home automation, media playersā¦ all kinds of stuff, with more coming all the time.
Forget the āStreamā part of the name - this is simply a slick remote that can do pretty much anything it is set up to do. I have buttons that open folders on my PC, run programs, copy files to a DropBox folder, run Firefox, open web sites, turn dark mode on/off, control photo editing, show the current time, show the RGB values and copy any colour under the mouse pointer, turn on my studio lights - or change their brightness/colourā¦ I even have buttons that type my email address.
The number of buttons are only the start of it - this goes waaaaaay beyond the capabilities of an FCB1010. You can create multiple pages and sub-folders of buttons within any Profile - the number of pages, folders, buttons and Profiles are, to all practical intents, āunlimitedā. Stream Deck follows the current running program - when you open Cantabile, the Deck will show the buttons for Cantabile, open Firefox and the Deck will show the buttons for Firefox - all automatically. You tell Stream Deck with which program any given Profile is associated and it takes care of it, changing from Profile to Profile as you swap focus.
And now I have complete control of Cantabile from my (Velcro-ed to my main keyboard) Stream Deck - and it works superbly. Brad has done a fantastic job.
I use a āstandardā Stream Deck (3x5) for my live rig, and an SD XL (4x8) plus a SD Pedal (1x3!) in my studio. If anyone needs advice Iām happy to help out.
4 Likes
Thanks for the detailed explanation! If I was a keys player Iād be ordering right now. But I can also see the advantages to just have it there in the home studio. Very nice, thanks!
Tom
1 Like
Good thing this is no longer the case! New Profiles are available and while they are not 100% fully functional, they are very well done.
Happy to see it implemented in Cantabile. I have 3 SD units (Mini, Standard and XL) and couldnāt work without it now, either live or in the studio. (Cubase, Dorico, Wavelab, SpectraLayers, Mobilesheets, Windows all benefit from StremDeck).
I used it with MIDI port with Cantabile with great succes with C3.
However it appears that the stability is not that great with the Cantabile Profile.
I installed C4 license to make sure instabilities were not related to C3.
I often have to manually change preset in the Stream Deck app to make it work.
Anyone experienced reliability issues?
1 Like