Correcting "articulation" errors in piano performance using software

An MP3 Sound File hosted on the open internet. ^ | 11/28/2025 | A.I.

[CharlesOConnell]

There were an older era of "analog" audio recordings, produced in the old "waveform", analog audio computer application program, "Audacity". They were functionally supported by a "metronome", a "click track" or a "rhythm track". With a lot of concentration and some luck, a performance could be produced that would satisfy pianists, critics and teachers. The metronome needed to be used to set the basic tempo, but if it were doubled in speed to correspond with the smallest "note" value in a piece (an eighth note in a 6/8 example piece with longer/bigger quarter notes and dotted quarter notes, a typical piece with 3 levels of rhythmic duration), setting the tempo double-fast would be distracting and against the purpose—you could use it to provide for accuracy support for the fastest/smallest note value in the piece, but you would be disoriented at the level of the slowest/largest note values—difficulty "seeing the forest for the trees".

A usable solution to the problem described, involves performing the piece as "data entry" into a digital audio workstation (DAW) in MIDI mode. The clunky, artificial "computer" sound of MIDI of yesteryear has been moved past, because audio recordings of all the sounds and articulations of a musical instrument, or music section, even up to a complete orchestra, have been bridged over to computer packages called "VST patches" that are capable of making the artificial MIDI output, sound realistic and warm. (Virtually all movie music is now produced this way). The program that handles the MIDI, the DAW, has easy-use controls to snap notes to a grid (Cubase: Quantize), all the 5 or 6 parameters of musical sound, like loudness, pitch/flubs, duration and how the blank spaces between notes line up with staccato or smooth, voice-like note-to-note legato, can be used with practicality to efficiently correct a recording, whereas analog-audio "waveform" recordings have severely limited functionality in this regard.

The issue described here is, how can older, non-MIDI, "analog" audio performances be converted to MIDI and corrected?

At the link-click in the top of the article, is an example audio-file, performance piece to illustrate this problem, known as "Drink to Me Only With Thine Eyes" by the poet of the monarchy of James I of England, Ben Jonson. (I don't know who composed the music, where it is generically described in the sheet music as "Old English Air", it is known as the tune "I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say". You can hear a production from about 1960 by Johnny Cash, in a kind of Country-Calypso beat, released as Drink to Me.) In the sheet music, the issue, the question comes up about an "articulation" error in the second line, the second measure, the fifth of six notes, the second note on the word "cup". The error is, the key is struck too soon, marring the performance.

The core of the issue is, what can music software be expected to do?

Question to ChatGPT: The 27th note in the piece has premature execution, "too soon". It is the kind of issue that could easily be corrected in a MIDI file in a DAW. My question is, what are near-term, future developments in computer application program development, to the effect of allowing sound files such as those in an MP3 format, easily to be rendered as MIDI files?

Reply: The it touches a major frontier in music-technology development. A realistic overview of where things stand today — and what to expect soon — regarding converting MP3 (audio) into MIDI with enough precision to fix issues like “the 27th note came too soon.”

Future of Converting MP3 (Audio) to MIDI

You’re asking about the near-term future of tools that will let you take a performance in MP3 format and convert it into an editable MIDI file, so that issues like a single premature note (e.g., “the 27th note is too early”) can be corrected easily in a DAW.

1. Current State (2025): Audio → MIDI Is Possible, but Imperfect

1.1 Monophonic Melody Extraction

• Works reasonably well for single-note lines (e.g., flute, solo vocal, solo violin).
• Common tools: Melodyne, Ableton’s Audio-to-MIDI, ScoreCloud, AnthemScore, etc.
• For piano, this only really works if the part is essentially a single melodic line.

1.2 Polyphonic Piano Transcription (Existing but Limited)

• Tools like Melodyne 5 DNA, various AI-based transcribers, and research models can detect multiple notes at once.
• Typical issues:
  • Notes missing in octaves or dense chords.
  • Arpeggios getting “flattened” or misread.
  • Rhythms needing extensive manual cleanup.
  • Expressive timing being interpreted as timing errors instead of intentional rubato.

For a case like your 27th note being too early, these tools can help, but you still typically need to fix the timing manually in a DAW after converting to MIDI.

1.3 AI-Assisted Score Reconstruction

• Certain AI tools can generate an approximate piano score from audio.
• For simple pieces, they can provide a usable, but not perfectly clean, MIDI or notation output.
• You still need to:
  • Quantize rhythms,
  • Manually correct obvious errors,
  • Adjust the timing of specific notes (like your “too soon” 27th note).

Summary of the present: Audio-to-MIDI exists and is evolving, but is not yet at the point of “effortlessly fix one bad note in an MP3” without some manual work.

2. Near-Term Future (2025–2027): Closer to What You Want

Based on the current trajectory of music AI and DAW development, the next few years are likely to deliver tools that do almost exactly what you’re hoping for.

2.1 “Performance-to-MIDI Correction” Tools

We can expect tools that will:

• Take an audio file (MP3, WAV) of a piano performance.
• Detect:
  • Which notes were played,
  • When each note was played (timing),
  • What the “ideal” quantized rhythm would be.
• Output a corrected MIDI file in which:
  • Rough human timing is cleaned up,
  • Individual mistakes (like a too-early note) can be fixed with simple edits.

The goal of these systems is exactly what you described: “Correct the performance to the written rhythm.”

2.2 DAWs Adding Built-In AI Transcription Engines

Future versions of major DAWs (such as Cubase, Logic, and Studio One) are very likely to include:

• Direct audio-to-MIDI piano transcription, built in.
• Automatic rhythmic quantization derived from the audio itself.
• Commands like:
  • “Convert Piano Audio to Score”
  • “Quantize performance to notated rhythm”

In practice, this may mean you will be able to:

1. Import or record the piano performance (e.g., MP3).
2. Click a command like “Convert to MIDI/Score”.
3. Apply AI Quantize or “Correct Rhythm” to straighten out timing.
4. Manually adjust any specific note (for example the 27th note) in the MIDI editor.

2.3 Real-Time Audio-to-MIDI (Piano-Specific)

• Manufacturers and software developers are experimenting with systems where:
  • A digital or hybrid piano streams its audio to software.
  • The software produces clean, quantized MIDI in real time.
• These systems are likely to trickle down into mainstream tools in the near term.

3. Longer-Term Outlook (2028–2030)

If current deep-learning trends continue, within about five years we can reasonably expect:

• High-quality, polyphonic piano transcription that:
  • Accurately identifies all notes, including dense chords and inner voices,
  • Reconstructs the written rhythm with high fidelity,
  • Handles rubato and expressive timing intelligently.
• Automatic detection of:
  • Pedaling,
  • Articulation (staccato vs. legato),
  • Dynamic shaping.
• Direct creation of:
  • A clean score (notation), and
  • An editable MIDI file suitable for DAW work.

In other words, the workflow of Audio → Score → Editable MIDI, with enough accuracy to edit individual notes, is very likely to become a standard and reliable feature.

4. Practical Options for You Right Now

Given currently available tools, here’s the most realistic path:

1. Use a polyphonic-capable tool like Melodyne 5 Studio to analyze your piano recording.
2. In Melodyne:
   • Convert the audio to a note-based representation.
   • Use its timing tools (e.g., Quantize Time, Quantize to Grid) to tidy the rhythmic placement.
3. Export the result as a MIDI file.
4. Open that MIDI file in your DAW (Cubase).
5. Manually adjust specific problem notes, such as the 27th note that is too early.

This isn’t yet a “one-click fix”, but it is currently the closest practical approach to your desired workflow.

5. Summary

• Today: Audio-to-MIDI for piano works, but needs manual cleanup for timing and note accuracy.
• Near-term (next 2–3 years): Expect practical tools that explicitly correct performance timing from audio and produce workable MIDI/notation inside DAWs.
• Longer-term (5+ years): High-quality, nearly automatic audio-to-score and audio-to-MIDI for piano will likely become standard in music software.

[CharlesOConnell]

Experience in MIDI instruction in schools, is that there is constant need for remediation for poor exposure to music-listening: A group instruction environment typically experienced by a student who actually does belong in the class, is that the class can't move any faster than the poorest, slowest student. In years past, typically in group instruction for a practical computer application program, like business applications, (Office: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Publisher and Access-dB, or Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator and the wide suite of media production platforms), the fatal stumbling block in the group setting is students who have never even used a computer. So the instructor's attention is arrested by trying to keep up the slowest student, and the more advanced students get neglected, and don't end up learning anything. In the MIDI instruction environment, students may come in knowing a lot about novelty-tricks, whistles-&-bells, but the cultural basis of knowing about a wide variety of musical forms and developing discrimination to know what is good music product, what actually to do with the high-powered music technology, is lacking—they may know "how" to do things, but not "what" to do. In general, the de facto experience of college is that it can't really teach you anything new, or which you can't better get somewhere else, it can only confirm what you already know. About this issue, that would involve listening for years to classical, jazz and non-frivolous world music, before getting behind the wheel of some souped-up music technology. That is a kind of education that needs to be started in early childhood, and trying to catch up in the teenaged or adult years, represents a steep learning curve slope.

[Red Badger]

https://www.classicfm.com/composers/chopin/guides/chopin-minute-waltz-timed/

[CharlesOConnell]

The Good Stuff: You can tell that classical programmers have a reserve list of “the good stuff” because they trundle it out during pledge. Then when they’re not on a fundraising drive, they are free to revert back to “the usual schlock”.

Dvorak, Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky, Haydn, Schubert, Barber, Wagner, Bach, Beethoven, Mozart. https://wp.me/p256FR-1Za

[Repeal The 17th]

“At the link-click in the top of the article.”
-
The link goes straight to the audio clip.

[Bruce Campbells Chin]

>Apply AI Quantize or “Correct Rhythm” to straighten out timing.

Manually adjust any specific note (for example the 27th note) in the MIDI editor.

So for us lay people, it sounds like the goal here is not to provide additional clarity/fidelity to the original performance, but rather to correct the "mistakes" made by the human performers in the original recording.

Is that correct?

Because if so, that sounds sort of like a more sophisticated version of auto-tune, except for instrumentation.

[John S Mosby]

The revival of real music— not contrived AI crap, exacting perfection which would demand “correction” of say, Jascha Heifetz!! The start of the destruction of AI begins with such nonsense as the need for “remediation” (of course this topic is about recording engineers, so there is “that”. Reduce the labor on this one... AI.

Here AI, perfect THIS-—! Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto First Movement:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFaq9kTlcaY

[Myrddin]

The "magic" of MIDI is the ability to execute a mechanically perfect performance of music with no limits on the technical difficulty. That assumes the composition itself is flawless. From years of writing software with demanding compilers with strict type checking, it should be possible to observe the MIDI content and detect syntax errors that violate timing constraints. At that point, it is the responsibility of the "programmer" to analyze and correct the defect to achieve syntactic correctness. It is likely that much of the music created over the centuries does not measure up to that level of scrutiny.

[Paul R.]

AI has many great applications, but, I have ZERO interest in listening to “corrected” music performances. The little errors or deviations are what very often add to a performance’ personality.

[Myrddin]

I started playing trumpet in 4th grade. I was a huge fan of Herb Alpert and the TJ Brass along with Chicago. The sheet music that I could obtain to play the music never matched what was actually being performed. I finally have a fluegelhorn that I hope will be kinder to my 69 year old lungs with lower back pressure. Of course, I have Chuck Mangione's classic performances as sheet music.

The Flight of the Bumblebee and Zorba the Greek are couple very technical pieces that would be interesting to hear executed using MIDI.

[punchamullah]

Does MIDI even have a clue as to what rubato is?

[dinodino]

I’m not interested in hearing the human artistry stripped out of musical pieces by some stupid algorithms.

[maddog55]

Any digital audio recordings can’t match the pure simplicity of analog music. Digitally enhanced means manipulation of actual sounds.

[Yardstick]

Most studios would digitize the piano track and then fix the bad note using ProTools or some other recording/editing software. The performance would keep its natural feel and the edit would be seamless. I doubt they’d do anything with MIDI.

[Excellence]

I had a friend who was the chair of the music department at a college. Somehow, he had managed to go his entire life without hearing Vince Guaraldi’s rendition of Linus and Lucy. He bought the sheet music but wasn’t playing it correctly. I, who can’t even read music, had to show him. Some things just don’t manifest onto sheet music, and that probably goes double for jazz. He ended up playing the piece in his class, and he said the students just went nuts. It increased his “cool” factor with his students.

[trebb]

I just like listening to music - sometimes a sight “flaw” (instrumental or vocal) makes it better than robotic perfection...of course, I used to drink Boones Farm and Bali Hai too.

Being experienced in electronics, it is common knowledge that when you increase the rate of timing (sampling) signals, you get truer representations of what the original is.

[GingisK]

You described the universal problem that was created once schools were forced to abandon "tracks", which were separate classes for slow, medium, and fast learners. Don't forget the mandatory placement of autistic students into classes they desire.

This is the gift from parents who sue the school system because their child is a dunce, but not in their eyes. Teacher's fault, of course.