Using Instruments and Staff Widgets

One of the core MidiStickers purposes is to provide advanced MIDI visualization for learning music.

Click . on the Toolbar or use the ‘Add Widget’ shortcut (Shift+Ctrl or Cmd+Shift on Mac) to add a new Instrument or Staff widget.

Instrument Widgets

Instrument widgets provide MIDI visualization in the form of various musical instruments, such as Piano, Harpsichord, Xylophone, Recorder. They also provide other forms of visualization, such as a Piano Roll simlar to those found in DAW software.

The Piano widget, for instance, displays MIDI input on a keyboard. Double-click the keyboard to quickly change the number of octaves. Using the Widget Settings - acessible by holding Control and them clicking on the button) - you can customize your instrument.

In the Instrument menu, you will also find Virtual Instruments, which are used to generate MIDI from your PC Keyboard when you don’t have a MIDI controller nearby.

Staff Widgets

The Double Staff widget displays notation for the current MIDI input. If you double click a Double Staff you can switch between single and double staff, using different clefs.

You can limit the range of single staffs in the Widget Settings , as well as configure colors and visual style.

Use the mouse wheel while hovering to quickly change keys, adding flats or sharps to the key signature. Use Ctrl+Right Click while hovering to open the context menu, from which you can also switch to the paralell minor key.

Staffs in MidiStickers, by default, try to ensure appropriate enharmonics are chosen, based on the tonality and chords currently played.

Coloring Schemes

You can assign dynamic coloring schemes to many widgets. These include coloring by pitch or scale degree, by dynamics and even by harmonic function.

MIDI Velocity and Decay Simulation

One unique feature in MidiStickers is the ability to map dynamics to colors, providing visual real-time feedback for your playing. To enable this feature, set coloring to By Dynamics (velocity).

To make the feedback more realistic, you can also enabled the Decay Simulation toggle. This feature simulates the decay of a grand piano based on your MIDI input.