Forum to discuss all matters relating to the MPC1000 and MPC2500 operating systems created by 'JJ' (all versions).
By 6/8 Stanley Mon May 10, 2021 5:17 am
Time to record a few songs. Using mpc2500 with JJOS128XL v2. Also mixer, zoom H6 multitrack recorder/interface, and reaper on the laptop. First song I'll try is 5 to 8 minutes, guitar and vocals on one mono track, 12/8 beat with some variations to change up the beat without loosing it. The guitar makes a solid beat but I want some home-grown percussion samples on the track. For this project I'm not "fixing" the audio track so it's sure to deviate from a steady drum track.

So one way is to record the audio in the H6 (so I have a bunch of takes to choose from). Then send to mpc as an"Audio Track" or a sample (both ways seem to have their good and bad) and make some unquantized freestyle drum/inst tracks that hopefully will align with the audio (I'm still beginner).

I could also leave the audio track in the H6 and monitor it and the mpc through the mixer while making drum tracks on mpc. Same thing except maybe harder to align audio with drums.

The other way is use jjos or Reaper to make a tempo map for the drum tracks that aligns with the audio. There's a thread (experts talking to experts) from '08 on here that shows how to do that, can't find it now. Different jjos versions and my 12/8's may complicate it. Another thread from '13 discusses problems with it. That seems like a beautiful solution but with about 50 bars it would take a while if it works at all.
Just watched a new Kenny Gioia reaper video about tempo maps. Seems way easier than mpc jjos tempo map. I put my audio .wav in reaper, map it to midi file and put that midi file in mpc with usb cable. Mpc turns it into a sequence with one track that I copy and make my beat on with a drum program. Hope I got that more or less right. Sounds easy what could go wrong? Besides everything. Might need some advice on this.
By 6/8 Stanley Wed May 12, 2021 8:05 pm
Here's 2008 discussion: viewtopic.php?f=25&t=96025&start=15
Couldn't find anything about this for 1000/2500 JJOS or Akai OS in any manual or tutorial. Wasted days looking.

Maybe some stuff he's doing can't be done with 128XL (move events with q-links?) and some don't work except in 4/4. Probably work-arounds though. I'll try it but I think it's way too slow for a long song. Especially for five long songs that I want to finish up ASAP. Even reaper too slow but I'll try that too on a short audio track. Probably ok for short audio tracks or loops. I'll probably end up just playing the drums in freestyle.