How to get multiple envelopes on one pad? ...or?

Hi folks,

Perhaps someone can help me with the following:

Imagine this:

I have two samples, X & Y.

What i want is to layer them on top of each other so that when i hit pad, it'll play both, and i will have individual envelopes for each sample.

Ok, so we already run into a problem, as a pad can have 4 sample, but only one global envelope (amp & filt).

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An aside: it's bizarre that in my S3000XL back in 1996 i could have multiple layers, each with it's own envelope, but not 25 years later on the MPC X! ...... that's progress i guess!
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So my question is: does anyone have a suggestion on how to trigger two samples at the same time on the MPC X, each sample having it's own envelope?

So far, i only found one way, which is to trigger the pads via midi input.
So, for example, i hit midi note C3 on my controller keyboard, and then i use my DAW to duplicate that note out to the required notes to control multiple pads on the MPC X.

But this is a pretty $hitty workaround because i can't use the pads on the MPC, and it requires some trickery in my DAW to output the right notes to the MPC.

I also note that it doesn't seem possible to set which inputting midi notes trigger which pad, because they appear to be hardwired assigned midi notes (if i'm wrong on that, please correct me!).

Any help on this would be appreciated. To be honest i'm on the edge of selling the MPC X because i bought it on the assumption that it would at least do everything an AKAI sampler from 25 years ago did, but, although it seems to have a lot of modern bells and whistles, they forgot to build in that basic, ancient functionality!

Thanks!

Use the Simultaneous Play in the program edit screen.

Elijah wrote:Use the Simultaneous Play in the program edit screen.

This.

Many thanks guys, that works!

So then i have a follow-up question relating to workflow:

Say you have samples on pads A1 & A2.

And on A1 you assign A2 in "simultaneous play".

But if you want to edit A2's envelopes, you can no longer hear both samples triggering at the same time, unless you: a) also assign A1 in "simultaneous play" in A2, or b), use an external midi controller to trigger while you're editing.

Option "a" is ok-ish, but if you want to layer 4 samples with discrete envelopes, you need to assign 12 pads in total in "simultaneous play", which is a bit annoying.

Or is there another way to get that working?

I cover this technique in the mpc Bible. The disadvantage is that if you want to eventually convert the layered sample into a standalone sample then flatten pad can't be used, but you can use re-sampling instead.

Btw, external controller should work well when simultaneously previewing the complete layer and adjusting an individual envelope.

MPC-Tutor wrote:I cover this technique in the mpc Bible. The disadvantage is that if you want to eventually convert the layered sample into a standalone sample then flatten pad can't be used, but you can use re-sampling instead.

Thanks! ...... strange that "flatten pad" doesn't work, it's obviously just an automated resample.

MPC-Tutor wrote:.......but you can use re-sampling instead.

Sorry, one quickie related to re-sampling:

One thing i don't understand is: where does the re-sampled sample get saved? Can choose the location? I mean on the hard disk, not in memory.
Or is it only saved in memory, and i actually need to then save it again if i want to actually have it as a discrete WAV on the internal hard disk?

DOH! ... i meant "flatten pad", not "re-sample"! ....... so where does the flattened pad sample get saved to? .. or is it only in memory and you need to manually save it to have it as a WAV on disk?

flatten pad just creates the sample in memory, it can then be saved as part of the project or individually saved via MAIN > program row pencil icon > Save current sample