out of the way mpc tips

stale bread wrote:

deranger wrote:For melodics parts: ...

more details on this please, do you have some steps for us

On a piano keyboard you have 12 keys (white and black) in every octave, but since most music uses "scales" (only 7 or less of the 12 notes are actually used to play melody), you won't be using all them keys In fact hitting a "wrong" key (one not in the chosen scale) will make your piano teacher angry

On an MPC, you can assign what note a pad plays, so you can use all them 16 pads for the "right" notes only! No more wrong notes (as with autochromatic - that thing assigns pads to all 12 "piano keys" (=tones&semitones))

So, choose a scale (e.g. the major scale uses only notes that fall on white piano keys), learn what notes are in that scale (major:C,D,E,F,G,A,B ; blues scale: C,Eb,F,Gb,G,Bb), choose the octave (=very coarse pitch), then look up the chosen note numbers in a "MIDI note number table" (search w Google!). Then assign the pads to these note numbers!

And with a pentatonic scale you can cover four octaves with the pads! Hows that for flexibility! 8-D

Added later: For those not familiar with note names: "b" sign next to a note name (Eb) means :note E lowered by half-note (=one piano key to the left), and the "#" means one half-note higher (one key to the right). Confusion arises because the same key can be referred to in two ways (as a "b" note or as a "#" note, depending on what key you're looking from...)
So ... C# is the same as Db (=the black key between C and D).

Thanks to the centuries of convolution of music theory some confusion is inavoidable

woah.

alien_brain wrote:woah.

It's very simple, really, as long as you know your scales and chords. You could also go all experimental and choose your notes randomly, making up your own scales as you go. Your mileage may vary, though.

don't know if you mentioned it but in addition to programming only scales you can also program chords, ie, create the sound, add different notes as layers, sample that playing with a second pad of notes to get 4, 8, 12, however many note chords you want, then sample that and assign it to a single pad, then you can have the pads mapped out for your chord changes easily.....

word, thanks deranger

real time filtering (pitch shift?) your sequences

here's one of my new discover (but it's buggy?) :
1-assign a sample to out 3-4 or 1-2
2-put your 3-4 or 1-2 out jacks in the records in
3-go to mode pad 8 (mixer)>>>input
4-choose main out destination
5-make analog input go thru

right now you can play a sequence and filter it and /or effect it with inboard effects

it would be great if we could real time pitch shift (bug?)while a sequence is playing.
obviously, you still can play your pads and the reall time pitch shift will apply on the sound of the pads you hit

haha weird one

I have no idea what any of this means.

ok excuse my english, i'm not a native english speaker so my explications can be quite confusing.

in few words :
i'm just routing my main audio out to the record audio in (with a jack) so i can
apply effects on my mix.

hope it helps

deranger wrote:For melodics parts: Instead of setting note numbers to pads using autochromatic, you can assign the pads just to notes that are in a scale that you're using. Since a scale will usually have 7 notes you can either enter more than two octaves of notes or set up the pads creatively - different "fingerings" for example (guitarists will know what I mean

With the simult pad you can set up a single pad to play an interval or a chord...

Thats a cool Idea... I have a similar one which just came into my head: If you know lil basics about chords you could create whole chords with Pad Layering and with or without Simult pad (depending how many notes the chord has, but don't screw up the polyphony!). So you can play one Chord by just pressing one Pad. I've gotta try that with some Rhodes or a Guitar or strings once... Oh, I'm having crazy visions about jazzy ass beats right now..........

PEACE

deranger wrote:Added later: For those not familiar with note names: "b" sign next to a note name (Eb) means :note E lowered by half-note (=one piano key to the left), and the "#" means one half-note higher (one key to the right). Confusion arises because the same key can be referred to in two ways (as a "b" note or as a "#" note, depending on what key you're looking from...)
So ... C# is the same as Db (=the black key between C and D).

awesome! ive always wondered about this and apparently was always too lazy to actually figure it out. i have good, (albe'em) big ears so getting shit to harmonize has always worked but really delving down and understanding what the heck im doing has always been an obstacle.

thanks for the 'b' and '#" explanation!

mkl... wrote:it would be great if we could real time pitch shift (bug?)while a sequence is playing.
obviously, you still can play your pads and the reall time pitch shift will apply on the sound of the pads you hit

nice but why dont we go a bit further and apply realtime tune(track) to Q2
before goin to rtime pitch shift page?

*raising the thread from the dead*


You might already know this, but I've discovered recently that Q-Link assignments are saved as part of a Program. This, together with the fairly recent addition of QLink > Midi CC#, got me thinking.

I call this tip Q-Link "Assignment Programs"

What I've done is saved a few empty programs with QLink assignments for some cool parameters in my various outboard synths. I saved them to my autoload folder. Now whenever I play my Evolver (for example), I can instantly scroll to the "EvolverFilter" program and my 4 QLinks are pre-assigned to Filter, Resonance, Filter Env Amount and Distortion. Or I can scroll to the "EvolverAmp" program and instantly change the Amp ADSR settings, all from the MPC.

With the 99 program limit now, you can create lots 'assignment programs' for outboard gear, and have them permanently loaded for instant access.

nice tip i just bought a second hand virus b i'm going to use that a lot!

thanks

primebeatz wrote:I have no idea what any of this means.

dude, all this is goin over my head and ive been makin beats on the 1k for over a year and a half, i really dont see why anyone would need any of these crazy tips makin hip hop music. I'm saying that thinking most of us hear make hip hop. But its good defenitly good to see people are findin new ways to make music on this thing. they just seem impractical for makin beats.