I am usually a pretty big fan of Human Playback.  It really does add some great nuance for very little work, percussion playback not withstanding.  One area that needs some clarification on the part of the programmer is how HP handles fermatas.  The real issue arises in a document that has fermatas that are not placed on the cadence.   There are a series of settings that affect Human Playback, but are not contained in the Human Playback Settins Window.  And there is one setting in particular that affects how Human Playback performs, or doesn’t perform, fermatas.

That setting is called Interpret Harmonic Cadences and it is only found in the Human Playback Custom Style Window.

The only way to get to this window is by selecting Custom from the Human Playback Style drop-down within the Playback Settings Window.  Once you select Custom the Human Playback Custom Style Window will appear with 29 different settings - all of which have been affecting Human Playback whether or not you have chosen a custom style.  Why these settings aren’t included in the HP Preferences, I do not know.  Space is probably the reason, but I digress.

My fermatas were not working properly.  I had two fermatas placed one measure after the other.  The second measure was a harmonic cadence, the first was not.  The second measure’s fermata played back correctly, the first measure’s did not.  I did some digging and found the Interpret Harmonic Cadences setting within the Custom Style Window.  This setting is supposed to process the document harmonically and slow slightly around cadences.  Usually a nice feature, but it does seem to affect fermatas place within non-cadence measures.  At least it was in this files case.  So I unchecked the Interpret Harmonic Cadences option and the fermatas played back correctly.

As the composer I would expect that the articulation, manually placed into the score by me, would take precedence over Human Playback’s interpretation of the harmonic structure of the piece.  At the very least I would like to see them work together - allowing the correct playback of any fermata placed within the score and nuanced ritardandos around harmonic cadences.

Ah, the eternal quest for the ideal.

See you in the score!