The Arranger is awesome, with the mute, preselection of parts and transpose options it virtually multiplies my patterns.
As an example I can trigger many patterns of my AF using a single pattern on the OT by the use of the Transpose option over the MIDI track I use to control AF. Also Send CCs that set AF’s Performance Knobs to specific values, I can do that on specific moments, and by the use of the Mute option on the arranger I just need one Pattern on the OT to accomplish that.
Note that you can also change your Patterns Live while in Arranger mode, and leave the arranger and back seamlessly.
So for this and many other motifs the Arranger for now is my way to play live.
It will be awesome if it could be controlled by MIDI, like:
Select Next Row
Select Previous Row
Play Selected Row
In this way I can be playing another instrument and advance Rows remotely at will.
Also a Select Next Row on Play option in the Personalise or Sequencer setting will be so handy to easily control your Arranger while playing live with a single foot-switch.
Yep, overall I´d personally like to see a few added options regarding the Arranger mainly for live use (i e “record” a sequence of rows in realtime, controlled via MIDI commands).
But I think that those options I had in mind would a bit confusing for users in general, as the Arranger are more intended towards pre-paring for live use than using it for “programming” it in itself in realtime…
But if having specific MIDI CC# commands able to the functions you mentioned as well as the abovementioned example, would indeed make the Arranger really powerful for live use.
i like that idea. i think it’d just be generally useful to have MIDI interaction with the arrow and yes/no buttons.
wouldn’t it also be very time consuming and potentially distracting to step through a big arrangement? i mean you can setup really gigantic/complex arrangements especially when you start nesting loops and jumps and i don’t know if i would want to manually tap through them all or focus on counting.
i sent in a request a long time ago for the ability of the arranger to jump to predefined points, which would be especially useful to go between loops, with the trig buttons or with MIDI.
Even though I´d like to see ALL buttons having an corresponding MIDI “ID” tied to it. I don´t think it really would be an effective way to use it in this manner, due to the reasons you mentioned.
Perhaps something like setting it up with SPP messages, recalling specific row locations?
I´m not that familiar with the SPP concept though (so maybe I´ve understood it wrong), so I´m not sure that it wouldn´t be awkvard to transmit SPP via MIDI. Can it even be transmitted without interupting everything else in any gear?
Which is why I thought of CC#s first. Thinking of it kinda like an Arranger Row Chaining, which would be quite similar to the Pattern Chaining already implemented. But not confused with the Arrangement Chaining (which I´m not interested in). Like you could transmit messages to the OT that would line them up in the order received in the specific Arrangement. But given that you can use up to 256 rows in one arrangement, any standard MIDI values wouldn´t cover all rows. Maybe NRPN, I don´t know…
Yes overall IMHO, the Arranger could be improved upon a lot.
After a weekend of working intensely on the arranger preparing for a gig I have found my new nemesis:
Pressing stop 3 times takes you back to the start of the arrangement.
I have lost count of how many times I have pressed stop 3 times without thinking and had to scroll all the way back to like line 200. Its my own fault but I wish this behaviour could be turned off in settings. Aside from that arranger is totally sweet.
Yes, I can imagine that being quite annoying. Although I´m using it myself extensively while “programming” the Arranger, I would probably hate it as much as you do in a live situation…
An “performance mode” of the Arranger would be nice. Where you set certain settings (as your example), as well as defining type of external control (MIDI).
