I’ve got the DT sequencing the CMS on midi channels 1&2… and it works fine.
But when I try to assign and control CC values with the DT, nothing happens.
Has anybody had success with the DT and CMS paired?
I have both and can give this a shot. What parameters are you trying to control?
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I’m just experimenting, so nothing specific yet, but I was hoping to meet with pitch, volume, panning, etc. The usual suspects.
Thanks!
maybe a hint: on the circuit, you can activate / disable midi cc send and receive… in the setup menu (hold shift while powering on) but maybe it is different on the circuit monostation…
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Yes, same method to enter setup, and both midi tx and rx CC are brightly lit, so in theory should work, right?
So it’s entirely possible however not all parameters are basic CC. Some are NRPN which are typically used for high resolution controls.
Have a look at this chart - https://fael-downloads-prod.focusrite.com/customer/prod/s3fs-public/novation/downloads/15733/circuit-mono-station-midi-parameters-v1.pdf
This details what parameters can be controlled and how. The CC(8) ones are NRPN and require 4 knobs to do 1 thing.
Someone did this for the BS2 a while ago (which is very similar to CMS)
Setting the NRPN is a bit tricky.
As a test I did PW which is just CC - on the AMP page set the first knob to 39 (it says MVOL LSB because that’s what Elektron labeled it - there’s a standard midi implementation chart here - https://www.midi.org/specifications-old/item/table-3-control-change-messages-data-bytes-2 which is the default. It doesn’t mean the synth has those parameters though). Next go over to the FLTR page and turn the first knob. If the CMS has square wave selected you should hear the pulse width changing when turning knob 1.
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I’ve done this, I’m not 100% sure why it’s not working for you, but I can confirm that it CAN work.
As mentioned above, you need the right MIDI channel set and the CMS configured to receive as well as transmit.
Virtually every knob on the CMS has a corresponding CC value which the Digitakt can control. I have the Val1 to Val 8 set up for ADSR, Overdrive, Resonance, Filter cutoff, and Distortion most of the time.
You have to set the specific CC number you want to control for each of Val1 to Val8 - have you done that?
You mention panning - you won’t be able to control that as the CMS is mono and there’s no pan control. Pitch you should be able to do with the coarse or fine controls for each Osc. Volume, I don’t think there’s CC for the master volume, but there’s definitely CC for the individual Osc levels in the Level Mixer section.
A really interesting possibility is to use route something to Audio In and have the Digitakt sequence the Audio In level between 0 and 127 to add rhythmic gating to the audio.
I’ve found that for the controls that have extra resolution through NRPN, I can just configure the Digitakt to control first CC number and ignore the second. That gets me 127 steps which is fine, not as smooth as doing it on the CMS itself, but entirely workable.
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Bit geeky but I’ve annotated mine with the CC numbers so I can remember what to configure on the Digitakt.
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MIDI CC RX On/Off, that I’ve highlighted in red is the one you need to ensure is ON for the Digatakt to control CC values.
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Hi,
I’m trying to find the CC message for pattern change on CMS, but I could find it, I’ve sent a support ticket to novation, but I haven’t got any news… Someone knows wich message I could send to CMS from DT or DN to pattern change?
Thx
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I’ve had a play with trying to do this and I’m not sure it’s possible. I think CMS “Pattern” changing isn’t controlled via MIDI, but “Session” changing is. The reason being that CMS patterns aren’t a single selection, you select a pattern range for it to cycle through, which is hard to model with MIDI CC values.
If you don’t mind using your session slots quicker, you may have more luck saving multiple sessions for a song, and configuring each Session to use a fixed group of patterns. It should then be possible to get the Digitakt to switch CMS Sessions with Program Change messages on Channel 16. The CMS supports doing it instantly with values 0-31 or “queued” after the current sequence finishes using values 64-95.
Note, just for extra confusion. If you send Program Change messages on channel 16 it controls Session, but if you send them on your configured MIDI channel (default 1), then it controls the sound Patch.
I have a nasty feeling the Digitakt as some bugs around sending Program Change messages while playing a sequence, and I think it was a bit hit and miss whether a Program Change on beat one of a Digitakt Pattern would always change Session. So I gave up trying in the end.
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Oh wow very cool, TIL! Thanks for that.
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Ha I love it
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Thanks everyone for the input, I’ll dig in and see what I can figure out, and report back.
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Ok so I got it to work, but I’m not sure why, ha. The only thing I did different was turn off CC tx in the CMS setup.
But even though I got the CC controls to work, I didn’t like the results, the effects were very minimal, I could tell, for example, that the overdrive was changing, but just barely. (Maybe I still don’t have it right? Ha)
What I’m done now is to place a trig lock at the start of the midi a track on the DT, and that starts the CSM pattern, and I’ll just control all the parameters from there CSM itself. This works ok for now, and maybe try and get the CC param control working better in the meantime.
Edit: nevermind, the trig lock method didn’t work, ha.
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You can work around this by setting micro timing on the program change to a half trig early on the first trig of a pattern! It’ll change reliably each time.
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Thanks, I’ll have a play with that.
Hi, Is it possible to change sounds per step (p-lock) from digitakt to mono circuit? I’ve seen a video where it’s possible using the BS2. Thank you.