MIDI out / thru merge?

Elektron Gear Digitakt
1

I have a setup with a Digitakt as master clock. Midi OUT goes to IN on a Digitone and from the Digitone midi THRU goes to IN on an Octatrack. I sequence a Modor NF-1m from the Octatrack, so OUT on the Octatrack goes to IN on the Modor. When i press play on the Digitakt all the devices play in sync.

I also have a Keystep 37 that i want to use to play keys on the Digitone and the Modor. When i connect the Keystep midi OUT to the Digitakt IN this doesn’t work. When i change the Digitakt’s Midi OUT cable to THRU i can play midi on the Digitone and the Modor, but nothing is in sync anymore.

Is there a solution for this, or do i need to get a midi merger or something? This did work when i used a Roland TR-6s instead of the Digitakt. The Roland doesn’t even have a midi THRU.

Thanks for any advice!

2

You could send clock from the Keystep, but there’s another problem, which is that the Digitakt won’t pass through mod wheel and pitch bend.

3

Yes. You can use the AUTO CHANNEL feature of the Digitakt to route the incoming MIDI messages from the Keystep 37 to the active track on the Digitakt.

If the active track on the Digitakt is a MIDI track that is set up to send on the MIDI channel number of the AUTO CHANNEL of the Digitone, then the Digitone will route those messages to its active track. Therefore you can play the Digitone from the Keystep 37.

If the active track on the Digitakt is a MIDI track that is set up to send on the MIDI channel number of the AUTO CHANNEL of the Octatrack, then the Octatrack will route those messages to its active track.

If the active track on the Octatrack is a MIDI sequencer track that is set up to send MIDI messages to the NF-1m, then you can play the NF-1m from the Keystep 37.

There are a lot of channel assignments to set to achieve the above, but you don’t necessarily need a MIDI merger box or other hardware.

If the Octatrack is the only unit that is sequencing another, then you might consider putting the OT earlier in the chain and making it the clock transmitter.

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4

But won’t this mean a key press on the Keystep would trigger the sound on the active Digitakt track (and maybe affect the active track of the Octatrack also, I don’t own that machine and have only a vague idea of how it works)? That may not be desirable. Changing the clock source seems more promising.

5

Not if a MIDI track is the active track, as I wrote above.

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6

Good point, sorry I missed that.

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7

Thanks @PeterHanes, this seems to work well! The only thing is that i had to change the OT’s midi out to thru to play the Modor, but that’s not a big deal. I can sequence the Modor from the DT fine.

Actually, i didn’t do exactly what you described. It was early and i was also about to go to work haha. The only thing i really did was to change the midi channel of the Keystep to the auto channel of the Digitakt. On the Digitakt i changed the midi channel of the active track to the midi channel of the Modor and to the auto channel of the Digitone.

8

Thanks @plragde! I actually tried this but i couldn’t stop the arp/sequencer from playing. I’m sure there’s a solution for that too but that’s for another time :blush: