Disklavier

Good morning, everyone.

A couple of points regarding System Exclusive (SysEx) MIDI messages and Sequencer-Specific Meta Events.

SysEx messages are always sent from the sequencer to the MIDI output device. They are not assigned to any particular channel in the MIDI file.

Each SysEx message includes a registered, manufacturer-specific ID. The idea behind these messages is that a manufacturer can create unique MIDI events that trigger features that are specific to their own instruments. Sometimes the nature of these messages are publicly disclosed or uncovered and other manufactures may choose to respond to them if they wish. 

If a MIDI output device does not understand a particular SysEx message, it is supposed to ignore it. 

There are a few universal SysEx messages that are not manufacturer-specific. For example, the General MIDI (GM) reset message that tells the MIDI output device to reset itself to neutral General MIDI settings. If the output device does not support the GM sound set, it should ignore the message.

Many keyboards insert SysEx messages at the beginning of every recording that you make. The Disklavier does this, for example. Over the years with changes to Disklavier models, there have been some changes to the recorded SysEx messages as well.

Unless a mistake has been made in the rendering of the Piano-e-Competition files, the embedded SysEx messages should be left in place and should not cause any problems with any particular model.

Different sequencers will display or not display these messages in various ways. I use Digital Performer on the Mac. DP always shows SysEx messages in a track that is assigned to MIDI channel 1. This display is technically incorrect since those messages do not actually have a channel assignment. However, that is where DP shows them.

Sequencer-specific meta events are messages that pass information on to the playback device when the file is opened. These messages are not sent to the output device during playback. Like SysEx messages, these messages begin with a registered manufacturer ID.

An example of such a message is this one (shown in hexadecimal):

FF 7F 05 43 7B 0C 02 01

“43” is Yamaha’s manufacturer ID. “02” tells the Yamaha keyboard that the notes on channel 2 should be interpreted as the right hand track. “01” tells the Yamaha keyboard that the notes on channel 1 should be interpreted as the left hand track.

In my experience, the overwhelming majority of sequencers blow away these sequencer-specific meta events if the sequencer, itself, does not understand the message. Thus, if you open a file with one of these messages in a sequencer such as DP and then export a new MIDI file, the sequencer-specific meta event will be lost.

MidiKit on the Mac is an event-list type editor that shows SysEx and sequencer-specific meta events. Spencer Chase has quite a number of Windows-based utilities. I am sure that some of them show and enable editing of these events.

Regards,
PianoBench