Midi VSTi and Compression

[Robkress]

Hello All,

There is something I don't understand about midi virtual instruments and compressors.

I have inserted a midi virtual piano into a track (pianoteq) and built a part. Then per usual, I have moved on to a mixing phase and tried to add compression to this piano part (fabfilter pro c2).

However, the compressor doesn't work correctly at all. It hard compresses as long as the midi note is held and then releases.

I worked around this by freezing the track (which basically converts the midi data into analog audio) and then compressed. This works well but does "gate" the real time editability of the part in midi. It also forced me to add the compressor (on the track) after freezing. Then unfreezing and refreezing doesn't work as I expected.

Surely there is something here that I don't understand. Is this the recommended approach? Are there other plugins that will require the same treatment as this? Is there some other native way to do this that I just don't know about?

A little bit of background understanding will go a long way here for me and send me on my way.

Thanks in advance for any shared knowledge.

Cheers,

Rob