Hello there - I’m very new to Gig Performer and have been working my way through various videos and tutorials. I’m mainly a guitarist, and am getting to grips with building amp and effects chains and switching back and forth with a midi foot controller, but am also interested in what else I can do in a live band situation with the software.
One thing I haven’t seen anywhere is whether it’s possible to control external devices by sending midi instructions at specific time or musically based points; for example, to control a midi-based guitar effects unit to change settings at a certain point, either from a minutes and seconds reference on an audio track, or bars and beats from a midi player. I understand that it’s possible to send midi information when moving to a new variation or rackspace, but is this the only time such info can be sent?
Sorry if this is a silly question but it’s quite a lot to get to grips with! Many thanks for any help.
In answer to the questions, I’m on Windows. Four audio outs should be enough for my needs to start with (guitar to PA, additional audio player track to PA, click track to drummer) so I’ll be using a little Focusrite Saffire 6 USB interface.
Looks like I’ll have to delve into the murky world of scripting…
I control external devices using an iPad and a wireless network. The iPad app I use is called OnSong, and it is a lyrics and chords app with midi built into the song headings (Verse, Chorus, Bridge etc.) I use a harmonizer extensively when playing live and use OnSong on the iPad to turn harmonising on and off via midi CCs embedded in the various titles. You could do the same thing with your guitar fx. No script needed.
Thanks - unfortunately I don’t have an iPad and was hoping to keep it all within GP if possible.
Going back through old threads here I see some people are using Ableton Live (or other DAWs) in conjunction with GP so that midi messages to external devices (in my case for example switching a vocal harmony on or off on my Voicelive unit) could be sent at given points in a song - but would this not make it less flexible in terms of having to rearrange setlists on the fly?
Please be gentle as, being a rhythm guitarist of a certain age, my grasp of technical issues is tenuous to say the least!
Windows 10, with either a 4- or 6-out audio interface. What I’m thinking of is something like the following.
Guitar - VST amp and fx chains - to PA
Occasional keyboard - VST instruments - PA
Audio file (one or two per song) - PA
Click track (either from metronome or as another audio file) - monitoring
I’m fine up to this point, but ideally I’d also like
Some form of midi player running in sync with the audio track, so that I can (a) send midi messages at specific points to change settings on a Voicelive unit and possibly lighting and (b) replay VST instruments (although I understand this could be done by making an audio track of the instrument and using that instead).
The other point is that as the band regularly changes the order of songs during the course of the set it’s important that the setlist can be moved around as quickly as possible, which was one of the main reasons I came here instead of trying to do things with Cubase.
I’d be very grateful for any advice you could give.
I do that all with Gig Performer and Ableton Live (Suite) - when you add M4L it is also working with Ableton Standard.
All my backing tracks are played by Ableton Live and program changes to external device could also be sent from Ableton Live,
I am using the so called Session View in Ableton Live so all songs are loaded at once and therefore the setlist can be switched on the fly without the need of reloading some things.
From Gig Performer I am sending OSC messages to Ableton Live, so each rackspace is in sync with the corresponding “scene” in Ableton Live.
LINK is activated in Ableton Live and Gig Performer and when I press play on my controller S88 MKII then Gig Performer global play is started (that is important because I automated switching of variations) and in Ableton Live the selected scene is triggered.
This way the main Controller his GP and all other things like sending out Midi Messages, playing Backing Tracks and automation of variation switching is made via easy scripting.
