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Rock Band 3 To Include MIDI Keyboard

Posted by Soulskill on from the hey-guys-let's-get-some-of-that-innovation-in-here dept.

xbeefsupreme writes with news that Harmonix has officially demonstrated Rock Band 3's 25-key MIDI keyboard. From USA Today: "During the game, green, red, blue, yellow or orange keys flow on a 'stream' representing the notes to be played on five corresponding keyboard keys. In a new authentic Pro mode meant to help players segue to actual instruments, all 25 keys are used; the streams shifts left and right to cover the correct keys. The keyboard also works as a MIDI keyboard that can be connected to a computer. 'This is a real instrument and a real device,' says senior designer Sylvain Dubrofsky." The game will also support more advanced "real" guitar controllers, which have six actual strings you can strum. Hit the link below to see the keyboard in use.

1 of 107 comments (clear)

  1. DIY MIDI tips by Simonetta · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    This is not off-topic! It is about how to make cheap music. Not as cheap as moving 3000 songs between iPods and PCs with USB2, but cheaper than blowing your entire Pell grant at Guitar Center.

        You can make a cheap keyboard by using a PS2 keyboard and an microcontroller. I've uploaded mine to the projects section of www.avrfreaks.net. Also there is a description of making a very cheap continous controller using a 16-cent InfraRed diode, a 16-cent InfraRed detector, and an op-amp. Moving your hand from 1 to 6 inches from the diode/detector pair changes the op-amp voltage between +0.2 and 4 volts. Plug this voltage into the microcontroller's analog-to-digital converter, map it to 0-127 range, and link it to the MIDI PitchBend or Filter Cutoff controller. Add a lot of reverb and echo-delay and you have very cool and very cheap sound.

        Get a free VSTi host and some VSTi instruments for your PC. My absolute favorite is the Nanotron2, which is a Mellotron emulator. Moody Blues, King Crimson, and Strawberry Fields sound nearly exactly like the original recordings.

        Not sure what to play? Download a MIDI file to sheet music notation program and some MIDI files of your favorite songs. You'll need to learn to read music and figure out what the chords are. But if you learned C++ then learning music notation is a breeze. Soon you'll just look at a cluster of notes and know that it's a E-flat, suspended, sixth chord.

        Cheap MIDI synths like the Yamaha TX81Z allow you to get some seriously strange and industrial sounds. You can always resell any old cheap synth that you buy a year later for what you paid for it, if you grow tired of it.