Hi all ,
First thing … thank you to the guy who answered previously on the other forum.
I am trying to set up my the following with midi.
Access Virus ti keyboard … ( in out thru )
Korg Radias rack … ( in out thru )
Akai MPX16 sampler … ( in out )
Pyramid … ( in out out )
Is there a simple way of connecting these without using a midi interface ?
Just want to play / tweek virus keyboard.
play radias from virus / tweek radias
loop, play Sampler in sync with pyramid.
record and playback the above with pyramid
Please forgive the basic question, I am but an old," has been" keyboard player
Access Virus ti keyboard OUT -> Pyramid IN.
Pyramid OUT 1 -> Virus ti IN.
Turn Local OFF on the virus when using it with the Pyramid.
Pyramid OUT 2 -> Radias IN
Radias THRU -> MPX16 IN
Be sure to set the Radias parts and the MPX16 to separate midi channels, and send clock from the Pyramid Out 2 (should be in settings).
With that, you can record anything the Virus does in the Pyramid, and use the Virus to play your Radias and MPX16. You won’t be able to record the Radias knob tweaks into the pyramid directly without re-patching the midi cables, but you can map CC’s on the Pyramid to control it, and the Radias itself has internal mod sequencers and such, so you’ll be fine there I think
Thank you Knights, I shall try that. It would be good to control the radias tweeks too in pyramid but like you say you can do most of it in the mod sequencer.
I don’t mind getting a midi interface if it makes things simpler but am trying to keep space down as its for a mobile motorhome setup.
Cheers
Yo, if your Radias sends ccs when you tweek the knobs and you want to record those tweeks into Pyramid as well AND keep everything connected (no switching of midi cables into the Pyramid in) then you can get a midi merge box. Patch the midi outs from your 3 devices into that and then the out from the midi merge box into the Pyramid In.
Then set multi track to off in settings and you can control or record into the active track whether you tweek a knob on a device or play a key on the virus keyboard. So make sure you are in a Radias track when you tweak a Radias knob or you could end up recording a CC into a Virus track. Same applies if you want to trigger Akai samples by hand from the Virus keyboard.
Thank you Jim,
Yes I may buy a quadraverb merge as the synth addiction is rearing its ugly head once again. A Blofeld has now been acquired and I suspect it won’t stop there.
I’d suggest getting a Kenton Merge4 over the Midi Solutions Quadra Merge, mainly because of the Merge4’s intelligent Realtime Message (MIDI Clock) filtering. It senses the first MIDI clock message and then filters all Realtime Messages on the other input ports until the first is no longer received, which it them moves the next received clock message. The Quadra Merge just merges all data which means wonky clock on the output if more than one clock is received.
Too late … I’ve just bought a wonky quadra.
Is my music now going to sound like an early depeche mode garage practice ?
I can’t find any wonky clock references anywhere for the quadra merge. I bought the mk2 version.
Are you maybe putting a Kenton cat amongst midi solutions pigeons ?
I will plug it all in and play a vigorously sequenced Toccata in D and if its not clocking to perfection will send it back.
Yeah that is a good thing about the Quadra, it’s two outputs (the Kenton has two also).
I read on another forum somewhere someone complaining of clock doubling, but I can’t remember which forum. It’s only a problem if you plug two or more clock sources into the in ports, with your setup, you probably won’t induce it.
Great thing about the Pyramid is you can choose if it sends clock, as well as which ports(s) it’s sent on.
Like megamarkd said, clock doubling is only a problem if you have multiple devices sending clock. Just shut off clock send on all devices except the Pyramid and it shouldn’t be a problem. (You’ll want to configure everything to receive clock from the pyramid anyway, so it’s all in sync).
If you ditch the Quadra merge, another possible way to go is a switchable midi router / thru box such as the ole’ Midiman 3x8. You would use the switches on that to route whatever device you wanted to record into the Pyramid’s MIDi in. You can only record one device at any given moment , but the advantage is that you avoid any problems that merge boxes can introduce, such as latency or clock collision.
Or you can go bananas and get one of the iconnectivity mio boxes that allow configurable midi merging, filtering etc. They are a bit wonky to configure but very powerful.
Thank you all. It has become clearer now.
Makes me realise how lazy I have been using software for the last 20 years.
I just hope Its worth it and I can produce some decent music with this new set up.
At least, once it is set up, it will be a nice solid tactile object that doesn’t require updating and reconfiguring every five minutes.
What a pleasant change.
I use two MIDI patchbays as well as a MIO4 and and currently have my eye on another old box (I’m not saying which one ). There is an Akai ME30 on eBay currently which is the little sibling of the ME80P (one of the patchbays I own). They are a very good router, a bit more flexible than the old MIDIman boxes. Roland also made a great patchbay called the A-880 (one of which is available on eBay currently as well). They are comparable to the ME80P in that they have 8in/8out (the ME80P being 8in/10out) and can merge one input with any other input. I get around only one merge port by running 4 output ports into my Merge4 and then run one of it’s outs back into the ME80P.
And won’t crash and lose all your work for you (one of the reasons why I gave away computers for music back in 2006).
And a more reliable method than chaining. For one thing it removes latency created by chain. Secondly, if a link in the MIDI chain fails, so do all devices beyond that link. Using a MIDI splitter means all devices are addressed in parallel, which means that any idiosyncrasies that devices may have when passing MIDI data to it’s THRU port (such as stripping sysex or program change info) are negated as well. All in all, using a splitter is the best way to send MIDI to multiple devices.
Thanks, that’s the way I’ve tried with a previous device called ‘midi looper’ by future artists. But each time I’ve send a clock to the kenton merger, together with midi from a synth, the output midi was a complete mess. This was especially the case with a polyphonic synth (rev2 / polysix / nord stage)! Looks like the midi looper couldn’t handle the external clock data and midi data from the (polyfonic) synth.
I’m curious if the pyramid will do the job in such a setup. I’ll test it tonight!
That’s really weird as the Kenton Merge 4 has a really nifty function of filtering tempo out of the Real Time info on all but one in port. Like you say though, it could be the MIDI Looper.
Hi All… just jumping in to this chat… in received my Pyramid today… .
I’m not sure how I’m going to table all my midi devices… there are many…
My current midi interface includes a motu MTP with programmable filtering and routing. it input 1 goes to all others…
And I can recommend the ESI 4MU-EX or the bigger 8 version.
this has self sensing ports so either port can be an in or an out…
have a quandra thru thingy also…
just not sure how to use all 32 channels efficiently…
). There is an Akai ME30 on eBay currently which is the little sibling of the ME80P (one of the patchbays I own). They are a very good router, a bit more flexible than the old MIDIman boxes. Roland also made a great patchbay called the A-880 (one of which is available on eBay currently as well). They are comparable to the ME80P in that they have 8in/8out (the ME80P being 8in/10out) and can merge one input with any other input. I get around only one merge port by running 4 output ports into my Merge4 and then run one of it’s outs back into the ME80P.
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