Yamahas Midi Song to Style Software

[OldTimerBill]

Hi All,

I wasn’t sure what the proper forum for this question is but this looked the most likely.

Yamaha has a free program called Midi Song to Style. The purpose of the program is to take a midi song file and convert it to a style file that can be used on an arranger keyboard. I am trying to get my head around why you would want to do this? (I have installed the software and it works.)
Is anyone here using this software and how do you use it?

MIDI Song to Style - Overview - Yamaha USA

Convert any standard MIDI file to a ready-to-play Style, complete with intros, endings, main sections and fill-ins. MIDI Song to Style is a new PC software that automatically converts your MIDI file into the most suitable Style data for playing Style on your Arranger workstation. It not only...

usa.yamaha.com

Thanks,

Bill

 

[nakeyer]

Hi Bill!
You know - it will take to you about 10 min to insert markers for Mains , Fills, etc.. in any midi editor. And it will be your Conscious choice, but not the choice of some soft. I think it will be much better. I tried the Midi Song to Style software and I am considering it as a toy (or as a joke).

 

[SeaGtGruff]

I haven't tried it, but I suspect it might be Yamaha's answer to their competitors who have had similar capabilities for years. In other words, I suspect it might be partly a marketing thing (I don't think "gimmick" is really appropriate unless you think other companies' song-to-style tools are also just a "gimmick"), and partly an effort to provide their customers with an easy-to-use tool.

Since I haven't tried it, I can't comment on how successful or unsuccessful it is at doing what it does, or how easy.

However, there have long been third-party tools for converting MIDI songs to styles, or for converting styles from one make and model of keyboard to work on another make and model. Some of those tools are only available for purchase and can be pricey, but others are completely free to download and use.

And as @nakeyer said, you could also do a song-to-style conversion yourself, manually, using a suitable MIDI editor, although that does require having a good working knowledge of how style files are formatted and organized for your particular make and model of keyboard, not to mention a good working knowledge of MIDI data and the Standard MIDI File structure. Since style file formats are proprietary, and keyboard manufacturers generally don't publish the details about their style file formats, the knowledge required to manually convert a song file to a style file can be difficult to come by, and definitely isn't the sort of thing that the average keyboard user is going to be capable of doing without pulling out all of their hair or having a nervous breakdown.

 

[amwilburn]

It works for some songs without much input, it fails miserably at others. It's best, as Nakeyer said, if you insert you own section markers for Section A,B,C,D, intro 1,2,3, and ending 1,2,3 and the fills. However, one thing I don't like is it keeps the relative chord structure of Intros and Endings (meaning you have to tap once, and not touch the chord until the intro or ending is finished), wherease JoSoft's Midi2Style (which came first) automatically flattened bar to its root chord, meaning that intros and endings will play just the 1 chord that you're playing (and it also means you can play various chords for intros and endings and the style will now properly follow you)

As SeaGT just stated, it was in response to the automatic midi to style on board Pa4x (which in theory should have the same strengths and weaknesses, but I found that on the PA4x it inexplicably would change the voice completely, rending it almost useless there.

It works (usually), and that's especially cool when you don't want to set any parameters. But I find Jørgen Sørensen's at

YAMAHA Keyboard - Home

Home of the world's best and greatest YAMAHA Keyboard Resource Site

www.jososoft.dk

to be the more useful style creation tool.

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DX7, CLP300, PSR60, Roland E20 + MT32, CVP309, PSRS970, Fender Std Strat, Squier RB3 Midi Strat, Ibanez SA262, Yamaha CG131, Fujiyama FC390, TUC-Kitty