Hello. I’ve been using Gig Performer for about a year now, and this is my first post on the forum. Apologies in advance if I mess up any of the forum etiquette, or if I’ve chosen the wrong topic category. I did search this topic, but came up empty. I’m running GP5 on a M1 Macbook Air.
I am working on sound design for the short synth solo for Magic Man by Heart. General internet consensus is that the part is multitracked on 2 separate Moog mono-synths - rather than a set interval. I know both lead lines, and this seems to be correct.
I am using the Arturia Mini plug-in to emulate the Minimoog. I’ve loaded two separate mono instances of the Arturia Mini, set up my keyboard splits, and transposed octaves as needed.
I am attempting to use the Chord Maker Utility (which is awesome, btw!) to enable a one-handed play-through of the duo-phonic solo. I’d like to build two-note chords based on the single notes of the upper melody. My need for this stems from the following…
I am also playing guitar on this tune, and need to get to the keys really quickly for that break. I am capable of playing both lines at once with 2 hands, but I’m trying to make my life easier through technology:)
The lower melody goes into some portamento passages that I need to control separately on the fly. I plan on mapping a knob for this. I don’t want the upper melody preset to be affected when I do this move.
I have attempted to set up Chord Maker to play both parts while using just my right hand to play the top melody. Chord Maker doesn’t seem to want me to do this. I can choose one note from either synth, but not from both simultaneously. The sounds I’m using are both monophonic. Perhaps that is the issue? Also, I am running both Midi Ins as Omni to keep life simple on my controller.
I’ve had easy success with Chord Maker in other situations, but this time I’m stumped. Thank you in advance for any ideas. Warm wishes, everyone.
I am sure it would be easier to program your harmonies in one chord marker instance.
Would something like this work?
Come out of chord maker into two Mini In blocks with Midi Merge activated. Set one Mini In block for Lowest Only, the other for Highest only in the Monophonic options. Come out of each of those Midi In blocks into two separate mono synths and then to the mixer?
I’ve mocked it up, but don’t have a midi controller available where I am at to test with.
I think he is trying to play both parts by just playing a single part. If he was going to play both parts explicitly, he wouldn’t need the chord maker at all.
He would play one part into chord maker which would create the harmonies and then running it through the Midi In blocks would separate it to high note and low note using the monophonic options?
Yes, but that seems unnecessary since the synth plugins are already monophonic
Assuming you’re just playing one note at a time, what you play could go straight to the first Moog and then via a single chord maker to the second moog, so you don’t need those extra MIDI Blocks
FYI - if you want to do that merging trick in other situations, use MIDI OSC ports instead of GP4 ports to avoid other MIDI messages sent into a GP4 port from showing up as well.
Good morning and happy Monday. Sorry for the delay… This wound up working.
I am still not completely sure, but I think the issue that got me stuck was the monophonic synth patches from two different instances. Maybe? Anyway, I used the 1st instance of Chord Maker to trigger the first synth (labeled “bottom line” in the screen shot), and the 2nd instance of Chord Maker to trigger the second synth (labeled “top line” in the screen shot).
I also set up the midi in processor blocks for those two synths to play only the lowest, and only the highest notes accordingly.
It was trickier than first expected because of the nature of each melody. There are some duplicate notes on the lower melody that don’t line up if I play the correct melody with my right hand. As a result, I wound up needing to spread the entire phrase over a linear scale. I chose to set things up so I could simply use a one-handed (right hand) chromatic scale to cover the entire 12 note phrase. Worked like a charm!
