Default Program General Midi Note Assignment is killin me

seriously, what the hell...

pad 1 - 37
pad 2 - 36
pad 3 - 42
pad 4 - 82
pad 5 - 40
pad 6 - 38
pad 7 - 46
pad 8 - 44

General Midi settings are archaic nonsense and should not be program default.

every time i make a program, i record my playback only to enter Midi Edit and see my notes all out of ascending/descending order. so i go to GPE and change the note values to 35-98, the way god intended.

i just want to know who dreamed up the original setting in the late 80s and WHY the hell has it stuck to present day?

i don't get it either, 35-98 has always made more sense to me. perhaps someone else has a logical explination regarding the default.

well if you look in the note screen there are also labels for each pad like 'kick' and 'snare' or whatever.

maybe there is some kind of midi standard from drum assignments to keys? I really doubt that though.

If you don't already, just set a blank chromatic program to auto load on startup and create all your new programs by copying that. That's the easiest way to solve the problem. A blank program like that is the only thing I auto load

maybe there is some kind of midi standard from drum assignments to keys? I really doubt that though.

no you're right, that's the General Midi thing i was talking about.

the problem with just loading the black chromatic is that when you chop a sample and create a new program, it automatically goes to the General Midi note assignment

Antonym wrote:

maybe there is some kind of midi standard from drum assignments to keys? I really doubt that though.

no you're right, that's the General Midi thing i was talking about.

the problem with just loading the black chromatic is that when you chop a sample and create a new program, it automatically goes to the General Midi note assignment

Do what I did, make a blank program w/the MIDI notes set how you want them, then instead of making new programs, make copies of that one.

I agree, though, the default setting is archaic and stupid. Maybe JJ could write profiles for the defaults? You could either use the original GM setup, or an auto-chromatic setup?

Antonym wrote:the problem with just loading the blank chromatic is that when you chop a sample and create a new program, it automatically goes to the General Midi note assignment

ah yeah - didn't think of that. I guess there's no way around that one.

you seem to be in good contact with JJ though, maybe you should recommend it to him as an option when creating new programs and new programs from the chop screen, like when the window pops up to name the program theres a little option box for it.

it's never really been a big issue for me, but I don't think I've ever used the MIDI edit screen for anything. I hear you raving about it all the time though, maybe I should get into that.

Well, here's the sitch. Used to be, any drum program you got, sample sets from Akai, or third parties, sample sets from other sampler formats, stuff from the net, all of it, was in general midi format. You could load a beat on the 2000 (pre XL), slap a CD-ROM in your external SCSI drive, and scroll through a thousand programs and the kick and snare and cowbell would stay where you put 'em.

The first PGM files and sound sets I ever encountered that WEREN'T in GM format were...the Akai kits of the week for the MPC 1000 :/

So yeah, obviously even Akai thinks it's dumb for their own PGM files, but it's still the default. Lame. Sometimes I use my MPC to drive the drums on a Waldorf Q or a Vermona DRM1, and neither of those have general midi maps either. Drives me a little nuts.

that's why it's good as an option but goddamn, as a default it makes reverse sense

frankly i'm so new school i've never loaded one of those kits and i never intend to