Logic pro session players. Humanise my midi?

FPC

The idea of AI session players aren't really for me but I'd written a bass line that I liked but wondered if Logic's session bassist could add 'something' to it.
Tapped on my MIDI, selected Convert, Replace with Session Player Region.

I was hoping this would take my clumsy bassline and add some funk/human touches to it. It seems to have completely generated its own bassline from scratch, not what I'm looking for

Changing the controls on session bassist don't bring it back to anything like the original.

Can anyone confirm? Can the session players not be used in this way? I just want the AI to keep my notes but add some slides/octaving/phrasing to make MY BASSLINE sound like a good bassist playing it.

NeuM

Session players are not generative A.I. They don't work that way.

FPC

@NeuM said:
Session players are not generative A.I. They don't work that way.

Thanks for the answer.

I think that's a real shame and I'm struggling to see why Logic even offers a Replace with Session Player option when it just overwrites all of your MIDI... just add a session player from scratch surely?

I'd have a lot more use of the session players if they could be used to 'humanise' existing midi notes with little touches that are beyond my meagre playing ability.

FizzyLizzy27

@FPC said:

@NeuM said:
Session players are not generative A.I. They don't work that way.

Thanks for the answer.

I think that's a real shame and I'm struggling to see why Logic even offers a Replace with Session Player option when it just overwrites all of your MIDI... just add a session player from scratch surely?

I'd have a lot more use of the session players if they could be used to 'humanise' existing midi notes with little touches that are beyond my meagre playing ability.

Maybe look into Lumbeat’s Pop Drummer. That lets you program MIDI and it can humanize and add fills.

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/pop-drummer-real-drum-machine/id6746682415

Blipsford_Baubie

@FPC , I believe Mozaic world suit you. I’ve never gone down that rabbit hole, but it did come in handy for me once. I think someone like @McD, who is well-versed, wouldn’t mind pointing you to some resources.
I believe that there’s a library where users have already written many scripts, with varying degrees of humanization scripts, among other things.

I haven’t gotten deep into using MIDI processors inside LP4ipad yet, so I’d first find out if the two play nice together.

FPC

@FizzyLizzy27 said:

@FPC said:

@NeuM said:
Session players are not generative A.I. They don't work that way.

Thanks for the answer.

I think that's a real shame and I'm struggling to see why Logic even offers a Replace with Session Player option when it just overwrites all of your MIDI... just add a session player from scratch surely?

I'd have a lot more use of the session players if they could be used to 'humanise' existing midi notes with little touches that are beyond my meagre playing ability.

Maybe look into Lumbeat’s Pop Drummer. That lets you program MIDI and it can humanize and add fills.

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/pop-drummer-real-drum-machine/id6746682415

Hmmmm thanks for the tip. I'm on a 'too many apps' break. Not a financial thing, just not enough time to learn new things apps. I'll just add slides, octaves and shift notes/note lengths around manually until it sounds like a musician played it!

Cheers

FPC

@Blipsford_Baubie said:
@FPC , I believe Mozaic world suit you. I’ve never gone down that rabbit hole, but it did come in handy for me once. I think someone like @McD, who is well-versed, wouldn’t mind pointing you to some resources.
I believe that there’s a library where users have already written many scripts, with varying degrees of humanization scripts, among other things.

I haven’t gotten deep into using MIDI processors inside LP4ipad yet, so I’d first find out if the two play nice together.

Thanks for the tip. I'm not too bothered, I rarely make tracks with any attention to musicianship/realism so in this case I'll just spend a while shifting notes around in the pattern editor. Most of my stuff is wilfully synthetic

Thanks anyway, just a little disappointed this isnt a thing within Logic 👍

NeuM

@FPC said:

@Blipsford_Baubie said:
@FPC , I believe Mozaic world suit you. I’ve never gone down that rabbit hole, but it did come in handy for me once. I think someone like @McD, who is well-versed, wouldn’t mind pointing you to some resources.
I believe that there’s a library where users have already written many scripts, with varying degrees of humanization scripts, among other things.

I haven’t gotten deep into using MIDI processors inside LP4ipad yet, so I’d first find out if the two play nice together.

Thanks for the tip. I'm not too bothered, I rarely make tracks with any attention to musicianship/realism so in this case I'll just spend a while shifting notes around in the pattern editor. Most of my stuff is wilfully synthetic

Thanks anyway, just a little disappointed this isnt a thing within Logic 👍

With the recent shakeup in Apple's artificial intelligence personnel (including the departure of the former head of Google's A.I. division) they might be more incentivized to move quickly now. I'm going to guess that more generative and A.I.-assisted functions will make their way into Apple's music software sooner than later. Hopefully, they'll see the value in A.I. Sessions players and the ability to do more or less what you imagined it could do. Because quite bluntly, Logic Pro and GarageBand are going to soon get lapped completely as services like Suno gain tremendously in function... and all in an in-browser experience.

wim

@Blipsford_Baubie said:
@FPC , I believe Mozaic world suit you. I’ve never gone down that rabbit hole, but it did come in handy for me once. I think someone like @McD, who is well-versed, wouldn’t mind pointing you to some resources.
I believe that there’s a library where users have already written many scripts, with varying degrees of humanization scripts, among other things.

There are some "humanization" scripts available, but they're really just randomizers that provide variable amount of velocity, probability, and midi note delay. There's no intelligence or logic other than randomization behind them.

Going much beyond that in Mozaic isn't really feasible, though I'm sure someone very persistent and technically talented could manage something a little beyond simple randomization.

McD

There are 3 options to add the imperfections or personality of a human drummer:

1. Vary the samples on a per note basis so there is variety in the sound of the target kit element. This is referred to as “Round Robin” in a sampler app.

2. Vary the MIDI volumes.

3. Vary the MIDI note timing but you can only delay and never pull a note ahead of the clock.

@wim and I experimented with adding a default delay to all notes so some could be advanced ahead of the “delayed clock”.
We agreed that it was not worth the effort because you really need every track in a project to have this standardized delay feature so the DAW would need to implement it. I recall Logic Pro has a nudge feature that can be applied to audio tracks so that’s a better solution to subtly shift tracks to improve the feel or the pocket.

wim

I'm not recommending going to this much trouble for the original question asked, but just for information ...

Loopy Pro's non destructive "Groove Quantize" is a true "sleeper" feature. You can take a midi or audio clip with a groove that you like and use that groove to quantize other clips. It can be used on midi or audio, but is especially effective on midi.