By Digital Larry
Sun Dec 14, 2025 7:01 pm
I did a 15 minute slot at a local EMOM (San Jose, CA), having been learning the MPC for the past 5 months and only made a breakthrough in the past 2 weeks or so.
When I first got the MPC 3.5.0 was current so I worked with sequences as my performance approach with modular up to now has been to have a handful of things (sequences) available and then switch between them and mix things up and down as the performance progresses.
I wanted to try clip matrix mode instead. Easier, if you want to turn individual clips on or off, or mix and match them (which is not how I did this).
First thing I found is that (all of this is AFAIK, so if I say something's not possible, but in fact it is, please let me know) there's not a simple way to convert tracks in a sequence to multiple clips. Maybe you could bounce sequence to arrangement and then select part of the arrangement to clips? Anyway I didn't figure it out and started over fresh.
One of the sequences, I really wanted to keep, so I rendered it as a mixed sample and just played it as a standalone clip.
My first big challenge was weird tempo changes happening when I didn't want them, which I tracked down to tempo change events. Another user here said that tempo change are per sequence, which makes sense I suppose. If the clip matrix allows you to mix any clip with any other clip in a different column, if they all had different tempos going on, that would be a bit crazy. Although truthfully, it would go over pretty well with the experimental crowd that frequents the local EMOMs.
I went into various clips edit clip->list view->tempo and deleted any in clip tempo events. Doing so seemed to remove them from other clips in the same column. I didn't check with other columns. The trick here is that editing a clip from "clip edit" sure makes you think that tempo change events are part of that clip. But it seems they are overlaid into the clip for editing. I'm still not 100% sure.
Although I set out to have a bunch of available clips and select the rows on the touchscreen as needed, ultimately I wound up using "Follow Actions" per row to simply advance to the next clip. The trick here is to set the "at" setting for how many bars you want that row to play through, which includes loops. So if it's 8 bars long and you want it to play twice, set this to "16".
One reason I went with Follow Actions is I kept missing the row tap. If you hold it down a smidge too long then you get the settings menu instead and then you miss the transition. As I am playing steel guitar in my lap, dealing with the touchscreen is a bit challenging. the final reason is that this let me easily adhere to the 15 minute performance limit. My sections are longer than when I was doing modular (one is 52 measures) and so structurally it is more satisfying to let those play through rather than interrupt whatever is going on.
But that's something that could always be variable, you could have shorter sections with no follow action and then the MPC would just spin there until you selected something else.
The next thing that went wrong is a result of my using the MPC's input for my lap steel signal to avoid having to use an external mixer. So you have to keep that track armed the whole time or it cuts off. Well I had to do some emergency mix adjustments in one part, and if you tap the header of a different track, then the new track arms and the other goes off. So that's what happened and it took me awhile to figure it out.
I think I will use my Beatstep Pro for mixing next time around so I don't even deal with the touchscreen for that.
I also mapped the Q-links to various things, "Project 2" (4 vertical columns of 4) layout. I didn't even use all of them. Overall, great implementation. I did not figure out if it was possible to adjust effects on pad inserts in a drum track.
TL;DR it went well, a few things I can improve easily. Psyched to start working on my next one. I'm also interested in bringing in some parts from the modular rig. Guy I ran into last night who performs at the local EMOMs all the time has an experimental radio show at a nearby university and invited me on.
When I first got the MPC 3.5.0 was current so I worked with sequences as my performance approach with modular up to now has been to have a handful of things (sequences) available and then switch between them and mix things up and down as the performance progresses.
I wanted to try clip matrix mode instead. Easier, if you want to turn individual clips on or off, or mix and match them (which is not how I did this).
First thing I found is that (all of this is AFAIK, so if I say something's not possible, but in fact it is, please let me know) there's not a simple way to convert tracks in a sequence to multiple clips. Maybe you could bounce sequence to arrangement and then select part of the arrangement to clips? Anyway I didn't figure it out and started over fresh.
One of the sequences, I really wanted to keep, so I rendered it as a mixed sample and just played it as a standalone clip.
My first big challenge was weird tempo changes happening when I didn't want them, which I tracked down to tempo change events. Another user here said that tempo change are per sequence, which makes sense I suppose. If the clip matrix allows you to mix any clip with any other clip in a different column, if they all had different tempos going on, that would be a bit crazy. Although truthfully, it would go over pretty well with the experimental crowd that frequents the local EMOMs.
I went into various clips edit clip->list view->tempo and deleted any in clip tempo events. Doing so seemed to remove them from other clips in the same column. I didn't check with other columns. The trick here is that editing a clip from "clip edit" sure makes you think that tempo change events are part of that clip. But it seems they are overlaid into the clip for editing. I'm still not 100% sure.
Although I set out to have a bunch of available clips and select the rows on the touchscreen as needed, ultimately I wound up using "Follow Actions" per row to simply advance to the next clip. The trick here is to set the "at" setting for how many bars you want that row to play through, which includes loops. So if it's 8 bars long and you want it to play twice, set this to "16".
One reason I went with Follow Actions is I kept missing the row tap. If you hold it down a smidge too long then you get the settings menu instead and then you miss the transition. As I am playing steel guitar in my lap, dealing with the touchscreen is a bit challenging. the final reason is that this let me easily adhere to the 15 minute performance limit. My sections are longer than when I was doing modular (one is 52 measures) and so structurally it is more satisfying to let those play through rather than interrupt whatever is going on.
But that's something that could always be variable, you could have shorter sections with no follow action and then the MPC would just spin there until you selected something else.
The next thing that went wrong is a result of my using the MPC's input for my lap steel signal to avoid having to use an external mixer. So you have to keep that track armed the whole time or it cuts off. Well I had to do some emergency mix adjustments in one part, and if you tap the header of a different track, then the new track arms and the other goes off. So that's what happened and it took me awhile to figure it out.
I think I will use my Beatstep Pro for mixing next time around so I don't even deal with the touchscreen for that.
I also mapped the Q-links to various things, "Project 2" (4 vertical columns of 4) layout. I didn't even use all of them. Overall, great implementation. I did not figure out if it was possible to adjust effects on pad inserts in a drum track.
TL;DR it went well, a few things I can improve easily. Psyched to start working on my next one. I'm also interested in bringing in some parts from the modular rig. Guy I ran into last night who performs at the local EMOMs all the time has an experimental radio show at a nearby university and invited me on.
