Here’s the thing. This Roland’s sampler offers pretty crazy midi implementation that works in two modes to choose from:
-
Either it takes all 10 banks and divides them into just two midi channels. Each bank has 16 notes, so we have two midi channels 80 notes each. Pretty wild range comparable to full blown grand pianos.
-
Or it assigns a midi channel to each bank separately which gives only 16 notes in each channel. Too many channels in use without any room for chromatic sampling beyond one octave.
The question is… Can I make a virtual keyboard split with Midihub, if I’m going to use the first mode? For example, I want an external sequencer to send notes to four instruments/channels (to take advantage of generative features), while on the SP-404 I’d use 40+40 notes on channel one and 40+40 notes on channel two.
Am I getting this right: it needs to filter the incoming notes from sequencer that are set on channels 3 and 4 to stream them into 1 and 2 channels on 404 with applied note shifting? Or maybe there is a more elegant solution?
thanks.
Hey @ambivalence,
I’m also using an SP-404MKII with a Midihub – nice combo!
I think I get what you’re trying to do, and the approach you suggested makes sense to me: CH REMAP to remap sequencer tracks on channels 3–4 to channels 1–2 and TRANSPOSE to remap the note output to the correct pads.
I’m assuming you want your sequencer tracks to be able to output identical note data, but for it to arrive on the SP-404MKII on different pads.
One thing to watch out for: the SP-404MKII imports left-to-right, top-to-bottom (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 etc.), but playback is left-to-right, bottom-to-top (13, 14, 15, 16, 9, 10 etc.). I’d recommend prefixing your sample names with the bank/pad number (e.g. A01, A16, B05) to make life easier when importing.
Here’s a screenshot with a quick demo of how I’d set this up. You may be able do it with fewer pipes, but I quite like the sanity check of filtering. The sequencer tracks would only send note on/off, while the final line handles clock and MIDI transport messages.
4 Likes
@echoicMalady thanks for your reply! I will try this out and let you know 
the whole idea of making virtual instruments within SP-404 seems alluring to me – it has great polyphony (32 voices) and plenty of memory to work with. Overall 180 samples loaded in a project offer a great range, almost an orchestra.
Also, I was thinking about using SP’s velocity sensitive pads to actually trigger different samples in itself, from different banks. as far as I know, MPC devices has such feature, but seems like Midihub can offer such workaround. Can be useful to make drums sound more alive. The built-in volume bound to the velocity doesn’t do the trick, at least for me. But it may depend on a sample/genre.
All in all, I welcome any tricks 404mk2 coupled with Midihub can offer. Changed the topic name.
2 Likes
Excellent idea! Perhaps you could use the Dispatcher pipe to create round robins for the velocity layers 
.
I’ve got a template that switches channels based on a velocity threshold, providing two velocity layers for piano/keyboard instruments. The Midihub also provides sustain pedal support.
And I’ve got another template that switches channels based on mod wheel threshold, providing quick access to samples on banks F–J. I’m using this to switch between instruments (two across banks A–E, two across F–J).
Something to watch out for: the voice count on SP-404MKII is 32 for mono samples only – it’s 16 for stereo samples. So, convert before importing if you want a larger voice count. Also, it seems that MIDI input eats some of these voices (14/31 if memory serves).
Let me know what you come up with!
3 Likes
