Digitakt and Roland GAIA SH01 - Problem sending Program CH messages from DT

Elektron Gear Digitakt
1

Hi everybody !

I’m very new to this forum and to the Digitakt as well (also i’m quite a newbie when it comes to MIDI tbh). Anyways, this little machine is a pure pleasure. I’m using it sequencing with a MicroKorg XL and i also have a GAIA SH-01 from Roland and waiting for a DM12 :tada:. The midi out of the Digitakt goes to a Kenton Thru 5 that dispatches the signal to the Korg and the Gaia.

I basically use the Digitakt as the brain of my setup, as the main drum sequencer as well as the MIDI sequencer. While everything is working well with MicroKorg (i’m talking especially program TX changes, NRPN etc) i’m encountering a problem when it comes to make the same things with the Gaia.

Detailed explanation :
• My DT Midi config is like this :

  • Clock Send and Prog Ch Send activated
  • Output CH set on AUTO CH
  • Param Output set on NRPN
  • FX Control CH set on 16
  • Auto Channel set on 14
  • Prog Chg Out Ch set on AUTO
  • Microkorg on MIDI Ch 9 and Gaia on MIDI Ch 12

• So i start on PATTERN 1 of a new project on the DT
• I go in the SRC menu of a MIDI TRACK B and select the midi channel 12 - (the microkorg in on MIDI TRACK A, MIDI Channel 9). My GAIA is supposed to receive midi messages on track 12.
• Then I want to select a programm of my GAIA from the DT and go to the bank 1 and then a program, let’s say 16 (doesn’t really matter here).
• Finally : This will only put the sound 1 of bank 1 in the Gaia (Program 001). Whatever program i change in the Digitakt the signal won’t be read by the Gaia. BUT if i change the program on the gaia, then the knobs of the Digitakt start having an effect and changes the program (so weird). If I change my PATTERN though and goes back to PATTERN 1, everything is back to program 1 and impossible to change it again unless i do the same manipulation…

(This explanation is quite confusing i know but i don’t really know how to explain it better…)

I’ve tried other types of change (like using MIDI CC32 w P-Locks) but this doesn’t seem to work either :cry:.

SO MY QUESTIONS ARE :

  1. Did somebody tried to route some similar Roland gear and doesn’t have that problem ? Or found out a way with the CC 32 ?

  2. Can that be a problem from my MIDI config ? (am I doing something wrong here in the MIDI routing ? or the parameters ? Something i don’t get with the Program Changes in general etc?)

  3. Is it a problem from Roland machines / Roland with Digitakt ?

Basically, i’m interested in buying some Roland Gear (especially some Boutique series) but i’m thinking that if I can’t properly use from the DT it doesn’t really make sense to me and I might go for some other brands, maybe switch my Gaia for a Minilogue.

This questions are quite important to me as they will say if i might sell this Gaia to get something else or not (i might sell it anyways :grimacing: )

Voilà ! Thanks in advance to everybody who’s gonna bring some light on that problem ! And don’t hesitate to ask for more details because i don’t know if i’ve been precise enough :face_with_monocle:

Cheers

Marec

2

Let’s take the problems you reported one-by-one.

First, program changes on the GAIA:

These are the two important settings from the Digitakt’s SETTINGS menu regarding Program Change (PC) messages.

If you activate this setting in the MIDI CONFIG > SYNC menu, then the Digitakt will send a PC message (with a value that corresponds to the DT’s next pattern number) whenever its pattern changes. It will send the message on the MIDI channel selected by PROGRAM CH OUT CH in the MIDI CONFIG CHANNELS menu; for your set up, that is currently channel 14, which will not have any effect.

If you don’t want the Digitakt to send a Program Change message every time it changes its pattern, I suggest that you disactivate PROG CH SEND.

I suggest that you temporarily switch off the Bank Select on the Digitakt while we get things working: set BANK to “Off” on the SRC page for any MIDI track that is set to channel 12.

On the Gaia, make sure that you have enabled RX PROGRAM CHANGE in the MIDI parameters section.

Make sure that you are in the User Patch area on the Gaia. You should now be able to select patches in the range A-1 to H-8 in the User Patch area using values between 1 and 64 (or 0 and 63) for the PROG knob on the DT’s MIDI track. Higher values should not have any effect.

Try this and see if it works. If it doesn’t work, let us know.

If it does work, we can then move on to selecting different patch areas on the Gaia.

2 Likes
3

So, i finally had some time to try that out and that did indeed worked with the User Patches ! What about those preset patches then ?

I also have to take some time to dig deeper now to get into CC control etc and see if everything works as well !

Thanks @PeterHanes . :+1:

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4

Great!

The above technique will allow you to change patch in whichever group (as Roland calls it) of patches you are currently using, such as the user group, the preset group, or the USB memory group.

But what if you want to change to a patch that’s in a different group to the one you are currently using?

If you were selecting the patch from the front panel of the Gaia, you can use the [PRESET PATCH], [USER PATCH], or [USB MEMORY PATCH] button to select the group you want.

Roland also allows you to change to a patch in a different group if you send a MIDI Bank Select message immediately before the Program Change message. In order to use this, you have to set the MIDI Parameter RX Bank Select to “On”. The values for the Bank Select message for each group are given on page 1 of the Gaia’s MIDI Implementation document which is available from Roland’s website. The Bank Select values comes as two numbers, labeled MSB and LSB.

Although the Digitakt has a parameter in its MIDI tracks (SRC page) called Bank, it only sends out one (MSB) of the two parts of the Bank Select message. But there is a potential workaround that involves using one of the MIDI Control Change messages to send the missing part of the Bank Select message.

If you set the Bank parameter on the DT to a value of 88, set CC Select for one knob to be 32, and set the CC Value for that knob to be one of 0 (for User group), 32 (USB group), or 64 (Preset group), then it may be possible for the DT to select a patch in a different group.

(It’s possible that you might need the value 87 instead of 88, depending on whether Elektron and Roland are counting from 0 or from 1.)

This workaround is rather fiddly, even if it works. If it were me, I would probably store all the patches that I wanted to use in the User group and simply use the Program Change method that you have been using already.

5

Yeah as long as it works and i know the best practices, that’s fine for me :slight_smile:

Thanks a lot for these precious explanations @PeterHanes. I guess if I encounter any problem in the next days concerning the use of the Gaia with Digitakt i’ll post it here :robot:

Best

Marec

1 Like