Can I control external synth with a MIDI controller?

[Megus]

Hello everyone.

I have Waldorf Blofeld connected to MIDI Out of Digitakt and Korg NanoKey Studio which give USB Midi In through the computer to Digitakt. I can modulate any audio track parameters with NanoKey, but I couldn’t set it up to modulate MIDI Track parameters.

The actual example: I want to use NanoKey’s X-Y pad to control modulation wheel value on Blofeld when playing live. I’ve set up Mod Wheel as Parameter 1 (I know it is already there at SRC page). What CC number should I use on NanoKey to modulate this value (or, even better, Mod Wheel value at SRC page)? I’ve tried regular CC#1 — it doesn’t work. Then I’ve noticed that when I’m modulating CC#7 (Volume), it changes Parameter 8 CC number at AMP Page which corresponds to Volume at Audio Track AMP page. So, I’ve tried to apply the same logic and modulate CC#70 which is Filter Attack for Audio Track and corresponds to Parameter 1 Value for MIDI, and it didn’t work too. I think I’m out of variants now.

Did anyone try to do this?

[elektrobot7]

try to get the waldorf cc chart and you chan check the differences between your synths (blofelfd and Digitakt)

[Megus]

I have Blofeld CC chart and I just want to control the very common ModWheel controller on Blofeld with NanoKey. When I modulate it from Digitakt itself, everything is working. But when I play live, it’s more convenient for me to do it from NanoKey, not from Digitakt.

[Megus]

Okay, after some experiments I’ve figured out the answer myself. There’s quite a strange mapping of Digitakt CC to MIDI Track parameters. You can use CC 70-77 (Filter Page parameters) and see what MIDI Track parameters do they modulate. E.g., CC#74 maps to Parameter 2. I couldn’t find CC for Parameter 1. Well, that’s enough for me for now

[elektrobot7]

Great you solve it What i use on this type of cases is a midi program to spy all the midi transmission like Midi Monitor for mac

[Megus]

The problem here was that I clearly knew what I transmit to Digitakt but I didn’t know to which CC do Digitakt respond on MIDI Tracks. The MIDI chart in Digitakt doc specifies Audio Track controllers only. I had to guess and experiment.

[jefones]

did you know you can control what midi ccs the digitakt sends on the midi tracks? This is done on the amp page while on a midi track.

[Megus]

Yes, I know that. The problem was that I wanted to control external synth with a MIDI controller both connected to Digitakt. Now the problem is solved. I set up NanoKey to send control values to CC 71-77 and then set up necessary CC at Amp page on Digitakt. So Digitakt “remap” CC values to another controller. This way I can both sequence and play live.

[Airell]

Hello Megus,

Could you share how you did this?

From what I understand sending CC 71 will change Val2 on FLTR and then ‘remapped’ to the CC you set to Sel2 in AMP, right?

I can’t get this to work… my master keyboard (DT in) is sending them (CC 71 etc) but it’s not changing the Val2 parameter (at therefor not ‘remapping’).

When sending CC’s to track1-8, I can see the corresponding parameter change.

Am I missing something here?

Regards, Airell.

[cellrok]

I have the same problem. Did you figure it out?

I am sending CC70 up to CC77 from my Master Keyboard to DT-IN but when a MIDI Track is selected, and i enabled all VALs for this test, nothing happens.

CC is received on AUDIO tracks (controls Filter section) but on MIDI tracks it doesn’t do anything, despite being covered on page 73 in the manual with these exact values.

I’ve also found on page 62 this “warning sign”:

On TRACK A-H you can only control the parameters on the TRIG (NOT1, VEL, LEN, LFO.T) and LFO (all) PARAMETER pages.

Not sure if they mean “receive CC for from EXT” or that these are the “only ones available in the interface”, cause it’s just midi and no audio. If this means that CC can’t be received for VAL1-8 i wonder why they added it to the MIDI-Chart in the Appendix then…

Very strange.

[Airell]

Hello Cellrok,

No I haven’t. Also the midi chart states there should be reaction to the VALs if those CC’s are send.
Someone asked to try it with the 1.08 firmware, because he/she thinks it had worked.

If it did work, it’s either broken since 1.10 or they have deliberately removed it. My feeling is that it will not come back, as the DT is not the ‘MIDI hub’ of Elektron, but the Octatrack is…

I actually just want to have the PB, MW and AT forwarded to the selected MIDI track, but that’s an utopia…

[L4rs3rik]

So has this stopped working? This is the external control of the VAL parameters on a midi track of the Digitakt. This is quite flexible since I can change the midi track config on the Digitakt but still use the same midi CC numbers from my controller.

Can’t verify now since Christmas is upon us and there’s no time for midi controller messages of any kind. Damn you Santa, damn you.

[cellrok]

Yes, apparently it has.

There are some very strange restrictions in the Elektron machines i’ve noticed. I currently have had 5 of them and every time something weird like this isn’t working for some odd reason. It’s like they choose these imperfections to create some kind of odd dynamics between their devices. You can’t do this here, but for that you can do this, yet the other thing only works on that machine, but not in every mode, etc… why… just why?

I really hope they are just holding out for OB development to wrap up and then go back to the firmware to add new features and fix stuff. I have faith, because it really isn’t much that is missing. Just little things could make it so much more convenient and more versatile. And i hope that is exactly what they want their products to be.

[jefones]

If you read through this thread it sounds like this is a bug that was confirmed by elektron

DT MIDI channels controlled by MIDI?

i dont see any CCs for the MIDI channels, but i just made the ASSumption that the CCs for the audio tracks would correspond to the knobs on the MIDI tracks. example: CC72 = Filter attack time [or the fourth encoder on the filter page of the MIDI track [VAL1]] but when i try controlling the MIDI control of the DT with a MIDI track on the DN i get a pretty severe hang. tempo triples, cant start or stop anything. so…is this supposed to be doable? you can assign MIDI channels to the the MIDI trac…

[cellrok]

If you read through this thread it sounds like this is a bug that was confirmed by elektron

Ah, thanks for finding that. Really looking forward to any new developments. It’s gonna be great if they start addressing all those things.

[phaelam]

Uh…dealt with a while ago. Talking to support. They are on it.

[jefones]

Yes I was linking it so people could see that and that you were told it’s a bug directly from elektron support.

[Frenzies]

i’ve just been messing with this on my DT on 1.06. The CC numbers listed in the picture are not in the manual before 1.10, they aren’t in any of my manuals for 1.05, 1.07 and 1.08. Anyway, they are wrong. I get the following.
VAL 1 - No CC
VAL2 - CC74
VAL3 - CC75
VAL4 - CC77
VAL5 - CC70
VAL6 - CC71
VAL7 - CC72
VAL8 - CC73

These all respond to CC’s on 1.06 on these numbers. And I can transmit the CC in to the DT and have it send through to the external synth I am controlling.

[MacroX]

by the way am I the only one who wishes to have the real CC displayed when changing e.g. when fiddling knob 1 it displays CC1 at the top … which is weird - if I want to know what that CC actually is I have to switch to the other page and then slightly turn knob 1 and hopefully not change that value to see what CC is being sent out … on so many levels not well implemented imho. I wish I could also add my own labels so I don’t have to remember all the CCs which are very different on a variety of gear.

[jefones]

If you hold down the button for whichever page you are on it will show all the parameter values for that page. No need to slightly nudge a knob.