A4 & Digitakt pattern sync & direct pattern change

How would you expect this to work? If the A4 isn’t in sequential mode doesn’t affect the Digitakt behavior. Digitakt will change pattern after its received a program change message AND the current playing pattern has come to an end.

yes, that’s how it is supposed to work. thanks for your help.

Hello…!

I want to control digitakts pattern change with analog four. I have midi cable coming from a4 output to digitakts midi input. Prog ch send is on in a4 and prog ch recieve is on in digitakt. Also midi clock is synced. Pattern changing is in sequential mode.
Midi clock sync does work fine but the pattern changing doesnt do anything, so what could be the proplem? :confused:

It could be the pattern length and/or change length options (Func + Page)

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happened to me too, make sure that auto channels are set to the same channel, otherwise it won’t work

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I forget if the a4 has a program change channel but if it does set that to the same channel as the dt auto channel.

If it doesn’t have a program change channel setting, put both machines on the same auto channel.

Hopefully this solves the problem.

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Thanks guys…! It was that auto channel-thing. I changed autochannel in a4 and dt. Now the pattern change works fine. (:

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As a reminder, AK,A4, MD and MnM still have a way to instantly switch patterns using midi notes…Why do you have to wait two steps when using program changes ?
I can understand that is a factor here and the machines cannot see what hasn’t already been trigered but this specific two steps limits exists afaik only in elektron boxes and can be bypassed on the machines I mentionned on the first line…Why ?
I opened a ticket regarding this issue and you can maybe do the same…First reply I got was “midi protocol cannot see the future”…Yeah right…i did not know, thanks…
So I had to remind the specific cases of fisrst elektron boxes…I asked for a future update to let the user decide if pchange delay is acceptable and to be able to put it on pchg lenght = asap. Not to hardlock users in what enginneers feels acceptable for us…I have absolutely no hope but who knows…

Huh… didn’t realize that the A4 could send pattern change, gotta take another read of that manual. I guess you can’t really set it though? Like pattern one will always send pattern one? Not like the program changes on the digitakt. So I guess if it weren’t for the delay on the DT it would give it access to song mode of sorts. Hmm sounds like quite the pain to set up if you didn’t build your stuff this way from the start. Maybe useful if I ever get around to using song mode :sweat_smile:

Thank you manolo! :pray:

All of the elektron boxes can send program changes to one another to keep patterns in sync across boxes. It is a different system than plocking program changes on a midi track (like you can on the dt) and is enabled by send/receive program change options in the global settings. If you set it up at the beginning of a project it’s a great workflow for multiple boxes.

What dt delay do you mean?
I use currently songmode on the monomachine to control dt patterns, works quite well. there used to be a delay between the dt and other elektron boxes but that bug was squashed.

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Oh I never realized it got squashed, just been living under a rock manually switching patterns :sweat_smile: kinda like it that way though makes me feel more like a maestro

I’m having some issues with the digitakt and A4mk2 program changes - seems that I can’t set a program change for an arbitrary bank/pattern from digi > a4. Instead, when changing the digi pattern, it sends the corresponding pattern to the a4 (eg changing from A1>A2 will happen on both instruments).

Is there no way to send a pattern change to a pattern of my choice with a plock? I’ve checked the manuals for both instruments and they don’t really cover this aspect of their sequencers very well.

You can use a MIDI track and it’s corresponding SRC page to send a customized program change instead of the 1:1 mapping when the pattern changes. When using this just make sure to turn off the automatically sent program changes, of course.

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On the dt midi tracks you can plock the program/pattern change you want the dt to send to the a4. Pattern a1 is pc0, a2 is pc1, etc. On the dt you want to disable the program change send option that is found in the midi sync global menu.

It’s been reported that pattern/program change messages from the dt have a 2 step latency so place your trigs accordingly.

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OK thanks so much for the help jefones and tnussb - I was struggling, but then realised I needed to send the prog change to the “prog ch in ch” (in my case 10), I was sending it to one of the A4’s track channels.

Progress! this is very exciting.

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Last question - I’m happily changing patterns on the A4 from the digitakt and everything is rosy. However it seems A4 won’t do a direct jump / direct start / temp jump when sent a pg chg - has anyone had any luck doing this? It would be pretty nice if it could.

Is there still no way to send a pattern change to the Digitakt (with Program Change via MIDI) that will change the pattern after one or two steps? Do we still have to wait until the end of a sequence?

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Yes, wait

A post was split to a new topic: Songmode inconsistencies with DT A4 and other devices