anyone know of a good midi forum?

[kindkind]

Im going to be delving deep into a master sequence with program changes and control changes for multiple devices and ive done a little searching with no results so far so i thought i would post here and hope for the best. any good forums out there? ive been to midistudio.com and that place is not a resource.

[Slim Shady]

Are you talking about doing this with ProTools? This is the best place for PT related questions, but you could also check out the forums at OSXAudio.com, they have forums that cover every OSX Audio App there is, as well as general technical and technique related forums.

[kindkind]

Well here goes...
my sequence wont really be used for recording back into pt. itwill be used live on stage with an external sequencer controlling multiple devices via a midi patch bay. i will have to use pt as i havent got any other midi software. first of all i just want to be sure that what i want to do is possible with midi. ok so there are 16 channels on one midi cable. so i can have basically 16 separate mini sequences with full on program changes and control changes written independently for multiple devices all on one cable? on one sequence?

[Slim Shady]

Technically, yes, that's all correct.

The program changes etc. might be a pain in the ass though. Basically once you're done sequencing your tracks in PT, you're going to have to export the file as a standard MIDI file, which does support program changes and all that, but a lot of the time that sort of info doesn't translate well. If you're going to be sequencing using the exact same rig (external devices) as your final performance rig, then you might be alright, but if you were planning on putting in program changes that would later control a different device, you're going to have headaches.

Just out of curiousity, why do you need to use MIDI sequences on stage? Why not make a 16 channel PT file with the MIDI bounced down to audio? (or use an external audio player, like one of Roland's hard disk recorders)... MIDI isn't known for it's stability in a live situation, although I personally have triggered small sequences on stage before successfully (nothing longer than 30 sec. though). If you're talking about a whole set or something though, I'd look into other options, one laptop or hard disk recorder is a lot easier to troubleshoot and have a backup for than an external sequencer and a large number of external sound modules. And what's the MIDI patch bay for? Are you going to be doing live switching between different modules using a MIDI patch bay? Ouch.

[kindkind]

hey slim. Yes, it will be the same rig that i will be controlling live. The sequence will set off the drum track, which is just a wav file that will be coming from a computer or if necessary a hard disk player, on another channel program changes could pace the voice works vocal processor, another channel will tell the triton rack when to change its patch and also send it some note info(the midi patch bay will have to merge input from the triton channel on the master seq with the controller keyboard that my bandmate will be playing, and output that to the midi in on triton rack). I dont know that the patch bay will be doing live switching of the routing, once it is set it will be set. There are some other keyboards and boss toy samplers that could also be triggered via midi but that is probly not necessary since there are humans capable of controlling them. I dont really want the midi seq to come off of a computer for live because it just doesnt seem as stable as hardware. Seems like it should work. I know there will be many fits had as we construct the system but hopefully it will come together eventually and it will make us more pro.


Anyone have the phone number for ed & tom of the chem bros?