I'm a singer/songwriter and I would like to add an orchestral part to a song using Sib instruments, but I need the existing song to be playing back to facilitate composing those new parts. Is there any practical way of properly syncing a wav file in a Sib 7 project? Here's the background:
I recorded a song (guitar and vocals) in Protools 10 at 76 bpm, bounced it to my desktop as a .wav file, and then brought it into a Sib project (via video import), which is also set at 76 bpm. But for some reason, the two are not in sync.
I fiddled with the timecode settings, as Daniel suggested, but there's 2 problems: 1) even when I get the two sounding like they line up at the beginning, by the end of the song they're still out of sync, and 2) when playback is started mid-way through the song, the sync is way off, despite the timecode correction being made (in other words, with the timecode correction done, it seems as though the correction is only applied when the cursor is set, each time, to play back from the very beginning of the piece, so there's no sync if play is started part-way through!
I would be very grateful if someone, who has achieved this task effectively, could help me to do the same. Sibelius is a beautifully effective tool for composing music to existing film. It would be revolutionary if Sibelius were as effective for composing music to existing music.
Hi Marcos,
Thanks for your reply. Actually what I'm trying to do is a little different than what rewire offers. From what I understand, with rewire, Sibelius is the synth application - or slave, and Protools is the mixer application - or host.
What I want to do is have Sibelius as the host, and Protools as the slave. (I think!)
You're really asking for the full integration of Sibelius and ProTools which (I hope) is part of the point in Avid bringing the development of both under the same roof.
>
Sibelius is a beautifully effective tool for composing music to existing film. It would be revolutionary if Sibelius were as effective for composing music to existing music
>
Sibelius imports an existing audio track in exactly the same way as it does a video one. Maybe you just don't notice the lack of fully locked synchronisation so much with video?
Hi Charlotte.
Well in my last big orchestration project, using Sibelius 6.2, I was able to set up my scores and import audio files of my client's rough song mixes (aiff files) into the individual scores and they would play back in time (obviously setting my score metronome marks to be exactly the same BPM as the song, as you have done.
Now however, using the latest Sibelius version and the same procedure with a new score, I have the same out-of-sync issue as you.
I don't know if anyone else can shed any light, but I never had this problem before using 6.2
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Pip Williams
Sib 7.1.2 (and 6.2), Mac Pro- Dual Quad Core 2.4, Snow Leopard, 16 gig ram, GPO4, Sibelius Choirs, EWQLSO Gold & full composer's collection.
Contact Sibelius technical help by phone (charges may apply):
USA & Canada: +1 650-731-6106
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> At the risk of starting another rumour, does that mean Sibelius still HAS an engineering team?
Whatever thoughts and comments can be about the close of the UK office and the move to another engineering team, AVID can't be fool enough not to setup a transition scheme of some sort. Of course, it may have started a while ago actually, we don't really know when the UK folks were informed of the management decision.
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Sibelius 6.20, Dell Latitude E6500, Intel Duo Core 2 2.5Ghz, 4Gb RAM, SSD 80Gb + HDD 7200t/m 320Gb, RME Fireface UC. XP SP3. 2 Monitors Samsung P2250
> There is a problem that affects Mac only regarding audio and video sync at the moment. The engineering team is working on a fix.
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It affects PC's too. Sib 6 didn't have the problem.
Mads
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Sibelius 7, RME Fireface 800, Win7, Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD3R, CPU Core i7-920 8 MB,
6 GB Kingston RAM, ATI XFX Radeon HD 5770 1GB
It's true, you don't notice the sync discrepancy with film because those small fractions perhaps aren't so crucial.
But it would be so exciting if Sibelius were to borrow and incorporate the same algorithms that allow the syncing and timecode capabilities that DAWs possess. (For example, I can create a wav file on Protools and send that file to someone that works on, say, Nuendo or Logic, and he can import it and carry on without a second thought.)
When Sibelius incorporates this crucial feature, it will become a positively indispensable tool for all writing and recording musicians.
My experience with this - aside from the specific mac issue - is that in general it works well enough both on Sib 6 and 7, at least on PC. There are a few potential issues you should be aware of:
1. Sibelius has a very slight pre-roll of about 0.14 seconds before playback starts which is added to exported audio files.
2. With live recorded music especially the tempo tends to vary ever so slightly over the duration of a song. Sibelius is a computer program and it will strictly adhere to the set tempo so it may drift in and out of sync; the only way to 'fix' this is to add metronome markings which can be a bit tedious.
Daniel has visited this thread a few posting ago and said that it's a mac problem, and they're working on it. I sure hope they can solve it soon.
Thanks for the tip on the pre-roll; that can be shaved off in PT.
If I understand you correctly, I think you're assuming that I record without a click track? On the contrary, whenever I record live audio, I do so with a click track. I wouldn't dream of expecting content generated on Sibelius to line up with non-timed material.
Hi Charlotte,
It's good to know that the team (?) are aware of it.
I should perhaps add that even though my scores would run in sync with the audio file in Sibelius 6.2 (making the process of writing a score for the song easy), if I exported said finished score as audio and imported it into Pro Tools alongside the track, then there would be sync discrepancies.
If I exported the score as MIDI files, then imported these into my PT session as Instrument Tracks, then all was OK.
I should also add that this the case when using my East West or Garritan GPO4 sounds.
I don't believe you can use Sibelius Sounds outside of Sibelius.
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Pip Williams
Sib 7.1.2 (and 6.2), Mac Pro- Dual Quad Core 2.4, Snow Leopard, 16 gig ram, GPO4, Sibelius Choirs, EWQLSO Gold & full composer's collection.
Thanks for sharing your experiences with composing alongside a rough song mix imported from a DAW. Every little bit I can learn from people like you - who are already doing what I'm trying to do - is so valuable to me!
To my thinking, the fact that there were still sync discrepancies when you imported an audio track into Sibelius 6 means that Daniel and his team may want to look hard at that issue. Perhaps, as I said earlier, adopting the same logarithms that DAWs use to recognize and employ audio files may be possible.
With regard to Sibelius Sounds outside of Sibelius, I believe that rewire, being an instrument plug-in in PT, should happily play Sib Sounds. Then all one need do is just record the instrument (rewire) track into an audio track, and voila!
But that's not my issue. As you know, Pip, what I'm yearning for is a dependable way of composing music against the background of imported audio, in Sibelius itself. (Getting it out of Sibelius, as we've started talking about here, is yet another can 'o worms.)
What has become clear is that 76 bpm (for example) is not sacrosanct when exporting a 76 bpm Sibelius audio file into a 76 bpm Pro Tools session!, yet if you export MIDI files from Sibelius into PT, (into new Instrument Tracks), then things work out OK.
Peter R is quite right about the pre-roll which gets incorporated into the exported Sibelius audio file.
However, as I've said, with Sib. 6.2, I could at least import an audio file of my songs into Sibelius and have the two play back in sync (as long as the song and score were set to the same bpm). This was the case with 11 songs on my last project, so it wasn't simply a case of getting lucky once or twice!
Tomorrow, if I get a break from Olympics fever, I will take the latest project I'm working on and try again in Sib 6.2. If the track syncs up OK, I will report back.
Best, Pip
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Pip Williams
Sib 7.1.2 (and 6.2), Mac Pro- Dual Quad Core 2.4, Snow Leopard, 16 gig ram, GPO4, Sibelius Choirs, EWQLSO Gold & full composer's collection.
Yes, let me know if you get a chance to try your current project out in Sib 6. I'd be very interested in knowing if your imported audio track syncs, not only with the playback line positioned from the beginning of the song, but from part way through, and near the ending. (I've experienced the problem of having sync ONLY when playback started from the very beginning, but not when playback was started part-way through.)
If you get sync, then I'll have to go back to using Sib 6.
OK Charlotte, I've started again with my score in Sib 6.2. So far, I've just created the correct number of bars and imported the audio file of the song- not yet inputted any notes. However, the track is perfectly in sync with the Sibelius click, no matter where I start playback from.
So as Daniel has said, this problem appears to be a version 7 fault.
Given the current situation, this is incredibly worrying, given the amount of people who routinely need to use this function. In the meantime, we can but hope it will be sorted soon!
Best, Pip
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Pip Williams
Sib 7.1.2 (and 6.2), Mac Pro- Dual Quad Core 2.4, Snow Leopard, 16 gig ram, GPO4, Sibelius Choirs, EWQLSO Gold & full composer's collection.
Hey Pip! Thanks for running that test! I guess it's back to Sib 6 for me... You have been so kind to help me on this. I really appreciate it. Enjoy the rest of the Olympics, and all best on your projects! x
It's a pleasure Charlotte. Willingness to share ideas and help each other has always been the spirit of this forum, which has saved me many times. It's surely the best user forum around! Let's hope it will continue!
Same here- if I need to import an audio track I'll stick with 6.2- at least until a fix is forthcoming.
Best, Pip
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Pip Williams
Sib 7.1.2 (and 6.2), Mac Pro- Dual Quad Core 2.4, Snow Leopard, 16 gig ram, GPO4, Sibelius Choirs, EWQLSO Gold & full composer's collection.
I have been experiencing the same problem as Charlotte in Sibelius Ultimate (2020) for Mac. The problem started after I upgraded from 2018 to 2019. Playback is in sync with the video (or audio) when the score is started from the beginning, but if I start playback later -- even, say, halfway through bar 1 -- the video is ahead of the score by about .6 seconds.
I have Mac OS Catalina, so downgrading back to 2018 is not an option, at least according to Avid's OS compatibility chart.
> I have been experiencing the same problem as Charlotte in Sibelius Ultimate (2020) for Mac.
> The problem started after I upgraded from 2018 to 2019.
> Playback is in sync with the video (or audio) when the score is started from the beginning,
> but if I start playback later -- even, say, halfway through bar 1 -- the video is ahead of the score by about .6 seconds.
The last version of Sibelius in which synchronisation was correct was 2018.7, which is not supported under Catalina.
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Sibelius 2020.1/7.5.1/7.1.3/6.2/5.2.5, PhotoScore Ult 2020.1, Windows 10 64-bit 16GB. Desktop, and Microsoft Surface Book.
