PBC 10 - send MIDI commands with a song, not just preset?

jjtguitar

jjtguitar

Well-Known Member
I'm trying to work out if it is possible to send/attach MIDI messages to a song, not just a preset? Here is why I want to do that:

When I play, I generally only use five to ten different presets. Maybe up to fifteen, but generally that is how many sounds (combinations of pedals/recalled presets of MIDI pedals) I use.

I would like to be able to deploy this core group of presets across many songs, which have differing tempos and different song names. But I don't want to have to copy/paste and make a new preset for every time I want to use it in a new song (which is what I am currently doing). I use a Selah Quartz V3 for tempo duties, so I need to be able to send a MIDI PC message to the Quartz. If I can do that at the song level, then I think it would work.

So I think what I need/want to do is be able to send a PC message to the Quartz at the song level, not preset level. Then I can reuse my core presets, but have tempo (the only thing that really changes between presets) be controllable outside of the presets.

Is this possible somehow currently?
 
One idea - you could put the Quartz upstream from the PBC in the MIDI chain. That way you could set your songs on the Quartz, which would call up songs on the PBC. I haven’t done this but it looks like you can do this by checking the “MIDI bank selects song” on the MIDI tab in the editor, and sending CCs from the Quartz to the PBC change songs.

The downside is that, from looking at the manual, it looks like you can only call up songs on the PBC with CCs if the songs are in the current set list, so you’d probably have to keep the current set list always set to “All Songs” to have consistent song numbering to correspond to the songs on the Quartz. But that’s probably feasible as long as you don’t exceed the PBC’s 1008 song limit.
 
Thanks for the suggestion. I reckon that would work, however I want the PBC to be the true brains of the whole rig. It truly is the Mastermind! :D
As a workaround I'm going to just make four copies of my go to presets, make four songs, and then just update the Quartz PC message for preset 1 of each song. A little by fiddly, but a workaround I can live with.
 
I agree, that’s how I use my Quartz and PBC as well, just thought I’d make a suggestion that might work better for a particular use case.

I’ve always just created new presets per song, even if I do have a lot of duplicates. It’s quick enough to build new presets, and it’s nice to have song-specific preset names like Verse, Chorus, Bridge, etc. With the ability to use the | character in the preset name to separate everything after it as “invisible” on the PBC screen, I use preset names like “Verse 1 | Song Name” and it keeps my preset list in the editor nicely organized.
 
Yeah I was doing the "section name | song name" thing, but then I figured I was just using the same presets over and over again.
Maybe what I'll do is create my "Master" or template presets, and just copy from them to the new songs. That could make it quicker and easier, if my master template presets are already set.
Thanks for your input!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top