I’ve been using Cantabile for musical theater synth gigs, and I’ve always encountered a mild inconvenience in naming song states. I use numerical identifiers for every state that correspond to patch change indications written in my music to make sure I’m in the right place. Instead of typing out each number, it would be great if the program numbers could be used for this purpose. The problem is that there’s no option to display them next to titles in the ticker. So I end up putting together songs that look like this:
Why the need to attach a number to each song state? I think it’s the clearest way to go when patches are changing fast and you’re in the dark. If I just see “Piano” on the ticker, that doesn’t tell me what patch is coming up next – for that, I have to squint at the song state list on the left.
You can see on the left sidebar the awkward syntax of program numbers followed by identical title numbers. Another reason I use these numbers is because Cantabile doesn’t allow states with identical names, and I totally understand, but it’s either do it this way or use a system like “Piano1, Piano2, Piano3, Piano4, etc.” And that’s less clear because it doesn’t tell you where you are in the list of patch changes.
In short: might be helpful to display song state program numbers next to titles in the ticker, and is there any way to get around that no-duplicate-state-names rule?
Also, I’ll definitely entertain suggestions to improve workflow - I wouldn’t be surprised if I were overcomplicating something here.
I do not use C3 as you do, nor do I have a solution to your problem, but I will tell you what I do to keep up with many changes in what I do. I do not keep my live mode routing on the screen…I find no use for it once I set it up. I use show notes that inform me what changes are occurring, AND I use different colors on the background of those notes to let me know that a change has occurred. I also use the same colors on the states in the left hand column.
Regards
Corky
PS: In the show notes I sometimes show (in large lettering) what presets I am using, and what is coming in the next state change.
Have a look at the “show notes” view - it allows you to display exactly the information you need at a glance. Here you can see my layout Small themes request - #2 by Torsten (OK, I have changed the color of the current and next state to something more legible in the meantime )
You can use variables like $(State) or $(NextState) in your show notes, so you can see immediately what it is you are playing and what comes next. And yes, there is also a variable $(StateProgram), so by combining
$(StateProgram). $(State)
$(NextState)
in your show notes, you can have your current state AND ITS NUMBER displayed in beautiful bold type and any color you like - PLUS you can see what comes next. And of course you can have state-specific notes in your show notes - you just need to set “state behavior” for the respectife text block to “text”; then you can customize your notes for every state.
I’m not using the ticker bar anymore - show notes are so much more powerful…
As for the duplicate state names that’s not really possible - state references are stored by name so if there are multiple states with the same name there’s no way to resolve which one you mean. What’s the purpose of having more than one state with the same name. Are the states actually the same, or do you have two states called say “Piano” that actually refer to two different piano configurations?
This may or may not help you but I use C3 for the same purpose as you (keyboards in musical theatre) and my preferred approach is to have the song name as the number (from the score) plus the title and then the song states named by the bars that the state is active in.
I find that this makes it much quicker when the MD calls a bar number to start from rather than me having to check what patch number is scribbled in my part at that bar. I then just stick a small fluorescent post-it at each point I need to move to the next song state rather than having to read a patch number or anything which can be tricky in the gloom of the pit.
Thanks for all the replies! I had overlooked the capabilities of Show Notes; it sounds like they can actually do everything I’ve been relying on the ticker bar for, and more.
And Ben, great idea about naming states by measure numbers. I’m going to try that for my next project.
Exactly the same state. But now that you ask, I realize it would be more logical and clear to use linked clones. So never mind about that. Thanks for logging the program numbers in ticker bar idea!
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