I’m curious if there is an Akai MPC style Note Repeat function in the MB SEQ firmware. I’ve had a look about and there doesn’t seem to be an option mimics this.
If you aren’t familiar with Note Repeat it’s a very simple but powerful feature. It works like this, you hold down the note repeat button and a window opens that allows you to select the note interval (1/16 Note, 1/8Note etc) and swing percentage (57% is the magic number). You then hold down a pad and notes are triggered at the selected interval on the beat, ie. If you don’t hit the pad on the beat it doesn’t start triggering notes until the defined note interval is reached. The pads also transmit polyphonic aftertouch which controls the velocity of the notes being triggered thereby making it very easy to creat expressive patterns quickly and in real time.
The Sonic Potions LXR implements a similar feature in its performance mode that works really well.
The pads also transmit polyphonic aftertouch which controls the velocity of the notes being triggered thereby making it very easy to creat expressive patterns quickly and in real time.
This is the key feature of note repeat that makes the MPCs so magical and expressive!
Great feature indeed. I don’t have any MPC but on the Akai XR20 it’s even possible to change the repeat rate on the fly while holding down the beat pad(s) and repeat button. Next to the pads is a 1-10 numpad and the first 7 or 8 buttons allow you to switch the rate while playing (1, 1/2, 1/2T, 1/4, 1/4T, …). Really cool for twisted drum rolls or rhytm fluctuations. It would be a dream feature on Seq4.
The way Roland implemented the arpegiator is way more flexible. To mimic the note repeat on the mpc you just select 1/4 1/6 1/8 etc. There is a knob to change octave intervals, note length. Then you can also change swing and Vario’s note orders. Then there are many many other ARP types. I mean the note repeat is nothing more then a simple ARP? Or am I missing something?
I already see some conflicting requests… changing parameters on the fly, triggering notes or vel level of a note with the existing MBSEQ V4 CS is too cumbersome.
Would it be acceptable to use an external keyboard (or MIDI controller with drum pads) for note/vel entering, and to use the GP buttons for on-the-fly parameter changes?
Would it be acceptable to use an external keyboard (or MIDI controller with drum pads) for note/vel entering, and to use the GP buttons for on-the-fly parameter changes?
Yes, that is what I had in mind, the Seq CS isn’t really suited to triggering the notes. A big part of the vibe of the MPC is the pads, I think something like a korg nano pad or akai LPD8 connected via USB OTG would be ideal, unfortunataly neither of these devices transmit polyphonic aftertouch.
As long as there is the option to assign the repeat function to a CS button and the behaviour of this button can be set to latching and momentary. Maybe press and hold the button it behaves in a momentary way and two quick sussesive presses it latches on, press again once and it latches off. Also the option to have an LED assigned to the button, I think I would personally use the “Fast” button and LED because I haven’t found myself using it yet.
It seems that the Arturia Beatstep transmits polyphonic aftertouch in response to pad pressure, has a hardware midi output, A CV/Gate interface and 16 encoders thrown in all of less that €100. It looks like it will be the ideal add on pad controller. I’m borrow one this week from work to confirm it does transmit polyphonic aftertouch and report back.
Usage: enter the Utility->Live page, then press GP8 to enter the (hidden) “Repeat Config” page.
On a common track you will see a “Repeat” on/off switch and the repeated note length at the left side, and 8 repeat configurations at the right side.
On a drum track you will be able to select the drum instrument in addition at the left side, means: each drum instrument can get it’s own configuration.
once enabled, notes won’t be played immediately, but will be repeated according to the selected repeat raster
in drum mode, an individual raster can be specified for each instrument. Notes which are not defined as an instrument in the drum track will be passed immediately and won’t be repeated
channel aftertouch controls the velocity of all repeated notes
polyphonic aftertouch allows to control the velocity of the corresponding note
What is not working & known limitations:
no support for recording yet
no overdubbing takes place yet. Which means: if the sequencer step plays the same note, it will be sent twice
probably won’t work properly if sequencer plays glided or sustained notes
triplets and dotted notes can’t be specified directly, because the repeated note has to match with the track raster. Means: if the track is configured for triplet modes, you will get triplet notes for all notes played by the track. There is no solution to overcome this limitation
due to the same reason, 32th notes will only be played if the clock divider is configured for 32th notes in the “track divider” config page
due to the same reason, 6th and 24th notes result into funny patterns - I left it as it is, because it results into an euclidean-like effect (try it
configuration won’t be stored on SD Card (because it’s a moving target…)
the same configuration is used for all tracks
There is no way to overcome the “track raster” limitation due to conceptional reasons.
However, we can also see this as an advantage: euclidean-like patterns can be created this way
A possible extension would be to add a note offset, e.g. to shift certain instruments into the off-beat
I have loaded the firmware but I can’t “activate” the repeat function. I have configured a track as a drum track and enable repeat on all the instruments. Im using a Akai LPD8 running into Ableton live the being sent to the SEQ via USB and then back to Ableton to trigger an instrument.
The MIDI routing is fine as I can trigger the instrument with the controller, I just can’t get any repeats to happen.
It’s working correctly now after a bit of messing with the router/bus settings. I can already see this is going to be a great feature. I like the 1/6th and 1/24tn settings, they provide some new options that no existing (the I’m aware of) can do. It makes me think that it would be great to be able to chose a Euclidean as the repeat rate. All in all its really good, thank you for taking the time to do this.
As mentioned by flyweight303, the feature would be more powerful if it would work like an arpeggiator.
What I’ve in mind are 16 or 32 soft-configurable patterns with:
gates
accent
delay (for swing)
how many steps would be required for such patterns? 8 or 16 or even 32?
Memory consumption would be 3*(steps/8) bytes per pattern - no problem for STM32F4, could work with STM32F1 as well, but problematic for LPC17 (since RAM is almost fully allocated)
But: for LPC17 I could at least provide pre-configured patterns (stored in flash)
