Q. & A. section.

[JohnG]

What do you want to know about MIDI but have been too afraid to ask?

Go on, ask away, nothing is too simple or too complex. I'll try to answer all comers. Notice TRY! If I don't know, I'll really try to find an answer for you.

JohnG.

[JohnG]

No MIDI questions?
JohnG.

[allegro]

John ,,not to many sequencers by all accounts, the questions i get asked are how to control volumes and how and where to insert patch changes and expressions, now i only use cakewalk but you use other programs aswell so if instead of doing a blanket tutorial, if members asked specific questions it may, just may be the response could be better, as it is much easier to understand individual answers rather than try to digest a whole tutorial. Just a thought
Geoff

[JohnG]

Thanks Geoff,

You make a fair point.

I wasn't aware that I had done that. My instinct was (ever the techie) to give a specific example of how to do it using the most common software, and hope people could then relate that to what they were using. But of course it may not suit everyone. I do what I do just from my experience of teaching technology, it doesn't mean it's correct, it's just the way I do it.

Would you be able to point me at a specific example where I did that?

Would you suggest then, e.g. open the software in List View and look for cc#7 changes or cc#1 and cc#32 followed by Program change events. I ask because I'm not sure what exactly you mean.

Perhaps I need to go back and revisit some of the questions asked in the past.

Thanks for the input. It's always interesting to see things from another perspective.

Do any others have similar comments to make regarding answering of questions or the content of the tutorials I've written to date?
JohnG.

[freeway]

Hi John

I think I agree with you on this one a questions and answers thread might be more beneficial to those of us who use our own sequencing progs although Im sure the basics would apply to most of them. You'd need at least a dozen people actively involved to do a Tutorial as there's a massive amount of work involved .

I myself have used Cakewalk for years and have picked up lots of tips from you over my time here but seen as though I now own a PSRS700 I am now trying to get used to XG Works and I enjoyed the first part of your tutorial which set me up and I can pick up more info as I go along .

So John a question for you on this Sunny Easter Morn here in Ireland

Is it possible to record styles from my kb into a sequencer such as Cakewalk or XG ? .........I have all the neccessary drivers instr defs updates etc installed but not getting anything at all. Funny enough when I record notes (right hand side) they record perfect its just the styles that are giving me probs.
Ive tried recording to one track also inserting 7 blank tracks (the amount of tracks in the style ) with the same result .

Thanx as usual for sharing your knowledge and expertise with us ........

Regards

Barry

[allegro]

Hi barry, This may be of use to you

If you mean transfer the style itself so that the accompaniment will play according to the chord names that you enter, I don’t think that’s possible A copy of XG Works 3 might let you use accompaniment bars to which you can assign chords, i dont know, john would be better placed to answer that one

If you have sonar and you want to bounce the style into several midi tracks, that is possible. If you set up your keyboard so that each style part outputs to a different midi track. Then set your keyboard to use an external clock. Set Sonar to output midi clock timing messages. Put as many midi tracks as you need into sonar and arm them. Make sure they take input from a specific midi channel instead of midi-omni. Hit record in Sonar and hit Play on your keyboard.That is the only way that I think it can be done, unless john knows different. Its not something that i would normally want to do. Hope this is of help. One of the things about midi is that you never stop learning

[freeway]

Thanx Geoff......

I'll certainly give that a try ........I don't normally do it that way myself but the other day I made up a sequence and realised later or was told actually that a certain chord wasn't right ...so me being a bit of a perfectionist couldnt live with the fact that this guy was gonna be there everytime I played this one in the bar (and I checked of course he was right about the chord) so decided instead of doing the whole sequence again Id play the full recorded sequence in cw/xg and punch in the new chord

It's not something I intend on doing as a habit but as you say we're always learning new things ....so it would be good to know if it can be done or is there an easier way of achieving this ......

Many thanx for your suggestion Geoff

( btw I meant I was trying to record a pre recorded style from my kb's hard drive into my seq not actually a realtime recording as such if you get my drift )......


Barry

[JohnG]

Barry thanks,

You're right about the amount of work involved creating a tutorial ... especially thinking time.

And thank you Geoff for picking up Barry's point. You're spot on with the advice about arming tracks and assigning channels to the accompaniment and I'm pretty sure that arming tracks in XGworks 3 would record in the same way. I don't work that way, so I'm not sure, but I guess I could connect my wife's PSR to my kit and see how it works.

Another thing to add to my 'to do' list.

The other way, which I have tried, (and also started but not finished a tutorial on (I got sidetracked into playing with BiaB) is adding styles to XGworks. There are thousands of style files 'out there' which can be used within XGworks. You can select the styles as you go and add chords or chords plus bass, then when done convert it within XGW to a MIDI file when all the styles get converted to MIDI tracks.

It's not as advanced as the latest PSRs but goes a heck of a long way.

You can also use the Autoarranger in XGworks 3 to add an accompaniment to a melody line, but it can take some experimentation to get the process working well.

BTW, there's a good if not excellent repository of style files here psrtutorial.com/sty/index.html

JohnG.

[steveb]

Good on ya JohnG...another great initiative, this forum owes you a great deal of respect for the amount of time and effort you put in to this forum. There will be some questions I need answered when I am editing a file in Cakewalk, so I will look forward again to use your expertise.

[JohnG]

Thank you Steve, and please do,

I hope I can help.

JohnG.

[allegro]

Hi john, no comments on your previous tutoriuals they were always exellent but so much information can be daunting if you are not totally aufait with your software, and as we know all software is not the same although the principle is the same.
I think if members were to ask specific questions regarding there own software then they would be in a much better position to understand the answer i can only comment on cakewalk because that is all i use, but from your past posts you use or have used different programs .
I think it is much better to ask (how to) for a specific event because some people grasp information better than others. From my experience i have told people for instance to click on view, click on piano roll, and now open the contoller payne (question how do i open that? ) simple but frustrating if you dont know. The big problem can be getting people to ask the questions in the first place. just my thoughts john
geoff

[JohnG]

Useful thoughts Geoff,

And perhaps this thread will encourage people to do just that.

Or not ... !

JohnG.