Kaossilator Pro + Ableton Live 8 (Mac) + midiNotesToCC

[balero98]

Has anyone used this combination to play the Kaossilator Pro's synth sounds with an external MIDI keyboard? Not quite sure how to get it to work. I know the KO Pro's synth engine only responds to MIDI CCs, so this plugin should do the trick. I just haven't been able to figure it out.

Thanks!

[insertpizhere]

first you'll have to set up Live to send the midi through midiNotesToCC. i think you have to use two tracks, kind of like this:

setting "MIDI From" your controller on the first track and "MIDI To" the Kaossilator on the second track.

for how to set the plugin, without having one myself i can't say for sure, but i looked at the kaossilator pro's manual... three CCs appear to control the touch pad:
Touch pad X-axis - Control change (#12)
Touch pad Y-axis - Control change (#13)
Touch pad on/off - Control change (#92)

so you could set "Note to CC" to 12 and "Velocity to CC" to 13, maybe??

hopefully this is enough to get started...

[balero98]

Thanks insertpizhere, but "Note to CC" can't be set to 12. SAdly, I found out yesterday from another forum that even if I got the MIDINotestoCC to work, the mappings are really complex and sadly not worth the time.

Thanks for the help anyway.

[balero98]

For the record, is there any documentation on what all the various settings do in midiNotestoCC? I just set up the configuration as you suggested, just to try it out. I can only get one note to fire, no matter where I press on my keyboard. Thanks.

[balero98]

Never mind. I figured it out. The mappings are indeed a pain. The problem is that each program has a different octave range and scale mode. Even if you got on Program set up completely right, it would all go to hell in a hand basket as soon as you changed to a different program. Maybe Korg will come up with a savvy way to address this in the next firmware update.

[aphterglo]

So, yeah, it could be a real pain to have different set ups with different programs on the KO-Pro. I would suggest you set the octave range to a range that is compatible with all of the programs, for instance, a 2 octave range. I personally, since I use modes to write songs in, don't use the chromatic setting, I use Ionian, Mixolydian, etc. In these settings theres only sixteen notes to deal with, and I can lower or raise the root note's octave to suit what I'm doing. I suppose if I was setting it up with a keyboard, it may make more sense to use the chromatic scale, but anyway, that gives you 26 notes to deal with. The way I figured out the note values for the octave range was to go into ableton and raise the cc value one at a time, and then finding the value for every note in the scale. I was using CC to send signals from ableton that I already laid out, but I never had a problem worrying about the range of the program, because the program settings are all greater than 2 octaves. How many octaves do you really need for what your doing? I mean it's monophonic. Sure it would be nice to have as many as possible, but I'm pretty sure all the programs would work with a setting of 3 or 4 octaves. Just set the octave range, rather than having it set to program. I don't have MIDInotestoCC or whatever, I'm going to look into getting it, last time I was checking it out there was not a way to do it on a mac, so when it was necessary for me to be accurate in a range of notes greater than one octave (it's easy enough to play notes correctly with it set on 1 octave), I would have to program it rather than play it with a keyboard. Anyway, thanks for the heads up on the plugin, and try using it with a set octave number, I'm sure that will work, there was never an issue when I was programming it. Also, one thing you could do is set a solid block of note on at a given note value, placing a small gap between each distinct note, and use the gate arm to sequence out how it plays the notes.