I'm working my way through the tutorials and have what may be a foolish question: Because notein uses a velocity of 0 to indicate a "note off" message, I don't see how to retrieve the release velocity of that message. Is there any way to do it?

I'm working my way through the tutorials and have what may be a foolish question:  Because notein uses a velocity of 0 to indicate a "note off" message, I don't see how to retrieve the release velocity of that message.  Is there any way to do it?


silly-question-about-notein

I believe that a MIDI device has to support the 'note off' message in order to support release velocity. Devices that don't support 'note off' use a velocity of 0 to stop playing a note, and do not support note off velocities (so there is no release velocity to extract).

The note on message provides the note and the initial velocity. If the device supports the note off message then the release velocity is sent bundled with that note off message.

[notein] should support both note on and note off messages (from reading the help file) but if there is no note off message coming from the MIDI device in question then presumably notein is 'smart' enough to recognise the presence of a subsequent note on with 0 velocity and treat it as a note off.

If there is a note off message (which has a different command byte to a note on) then the release velocity is extractable from that message.

I would check to see if your MIDI device actually supports note-off + release velocity or not. If it doesn't, then there is no point trying to detect it as the data simply isn't there.

The note on message provides the note and the initial velocity. If the device supports the note off message then the release velocity is sent bundled with that note off message. 

I would check to see if your MIDI device actually supports note-off + release velocity or not. If it doesn't, then there is no point trying to detect it as the data simply isn't there.


note-on with velocity zero is a shorthand for note-off with velocity 64 (the default). Release velocity is so rare in actual devices that Max's [notein] just gives you a velocity value of 0 for any note-off it sees. If you think you have a device which delivers actual release velocity values, have a look at [xnotein].

I have not one but two devices that deliver actual release velocity: a Nord G2 and an Alesis Micron.

You could also use [midiin], and parse after that (maybe using [midiparse] & other stuff).

Silly question about notein