Restrict pitch bending to only pressed notes?

[sudo]

Hello,

 

I was wondering if there's a synth that can do the following:

- Play one note - let's say D

- Pitch bend it to E

- Now, i want to play G, but does not want it to sound like A, just G.

 

I know that as a workaround, i could play F, but it's not natural/easy, specially if you want to play a couple of notes while still holding the D bent to E...

 

The idea is that only the pressend note(s) would be affected by the pitch bender, but anything played later would sound in its original key...

 

Can this be done on some keyboard/synth (probably with some editing) ??

 

Thanks,

Sam.

[g.]

Assign aftertouch to pitch pend on any keyboard that has NOTE-specific (and not CHANNEL) aftertouch.

[Dave Bryce]

Originally posted by sudo:

Hello,

 

I was wondering if there's a synth that can do the following:

- Play one note - let's say D

- Pitch bend it to E

- Now, i want to play G, but does not want it to sound like A, just G.

 

I know that as a workaround, i could play F, but it's not natural/easy, specially if you want to play a couple of notes while still holding the D bent to E...

 

The idea is that only the pressend note(s) would be affected by the pitch bender, but anything played later would sound in its original key...

 

Can this be done on some keyboard/synth (probably with some editing) ??

All Kurzweil VAST synths have the ability to select a mode where only the notes actually held by your fingers will be affected by the pitch wheel - notes held by the sustain pedal will not be affected. That's the closest I know of, but I don't think that it'll do what you want here.

 

Originally posted by greenboy:

Assign aftertouch to pitch pend on any keyboard that has NOTE-specific (and not CHANNEL) aftertouch.

What keyboards do you know of with that function? Keyboards with polyphonic aftertouch will obviously work, but has anyone made one of those in the last ten years?

 

dB

[Prague]

Ahh, polyphonic aftertouch. Thisis why I keep my Ensoniq VFX-SDII (despite all the ridicule from "real" keyboard players!).

 

It allows licks like a pedal steel guitar to be played.

 

The Alesis ION can be made to do this. Just put the same sound on two different keyboard zones. The two zones would split the keyboard at F, F#, or G in your example. Disable pitchbend in the zone that you don't want to bend.

[Markyboard]

All Kurzweil VAST synths have the ability to select a mode where only the notes actually held by your fingers will be affected by the pitch wheel - notes held by the sustain pedal will not be affected. That's the closest I know of, but I don't think that it'll do what you want here.

 

I seem to remember a similar function with the sustain pedal on the DX7II but I'm not certain.

 

I was wondering if there's a synth that can do the following:

- Play one note - let's say D

- Pitch bend it to E

- Now, i want to play G, but does not want it to sound like A, just G.

I think I would set up a layer with 2 identical patches(A & B) except patch A has the pitch bend interval set to whatever and patch B has pitch bend range set to 0. Then set each patch to respond to a different controller range of your choice. For example patch A responds on velocity 0-63 and patch B responds on velocity 64-127. When you want to have pitch bend play with a light touch and when you want no pitch bend play with a heavy touch. There are many variations on this but it depends on your synth (pitch bend may be common to all patches in a layer so you may have to do this at the next level up) and your performance preference. If you work with Logic environnments or something similar you can set up a processor to do this kind of thing.

 

BTW the Voyager does great with polyphonic aftertouch

 

But not transmitted over MIDI

[Philip OKeefe]

All Kurzweil VAST synths have the ability to select a mode where only the notes actually held by your fingers will be affected by the pitch wheel - notes held by the sustain pedal will not be affected. That's the closest I know of, but I don't think that it'll do what you want here.

 

My old ESQ-1 does the same thing if you want it to. A cool feature that I wish more synths featured... and I wish it was transmitted and responded to that way via MIDI.

[Markyboard]

The Alesis ION can be made to do this. Just put the same sound on two different keyboard zones. The two zones would split the keyboard at F, F#, or G in your example. Disable pitchbend in the zone that you don't want to bend.

Sorry Prague - Good call.I just realized your post snuck in before mine. I'll send you my royalty checks.

[Prague]

No problemo, Marky.

 

So, poly-aftertouch might not be transmitted? I'll have to check out the VFX-SD I have. I thought/assumed it was transmitted. I am aware that many devices don't recognize it, though. Hmmm.

[mate stubb]

Originally posted by Prague:

No problemo, Marky.

 

So, poly-aftertouch might not be transmitted? I'll have to check out the VFX-SD I have. I thought/assumed it was transmitted. I am aware that many devices don't recognize it, though. Hmmm.

Tis more common to receive than transmit, being that receiving requires software, but transmission requires hardware (per note pressure sensors on the keyboard).

[Analogaddict]

Originally posted by Prague:

The Alesis ION can be made to do this. Just put the same sound on two different keyboard zones. The two zones would split the keyboard at F, F#, or G in your example. Disable pitchbend in the zone that you don't want to bend.

The Clavia Nord leads can do the same thing. I´d still prefer assigning pitchbend to held notes within a chord, it feels a bit more natural to me. IIRC, you can do this on a DX7!

 

[jerrythek]

Sure, polyphonic aftertouch will allow you to do this, but it's not required. All the other products besides the Ensoniq that you mention have a mode called something like Pitchbend=Held. This can be done in software, it doesn't require a poly-aftertouch mechanism.

 

Regards,

 

Jerry

[sudo]

Thanks for all that replied,

 

Setting up 2 zones will work for a particular scenario - but it's obviously limited to the note where the zones are split (if i understood it correctly) - what i need is to be able to do similar technique on any note while improvising ...

 

Poly aftertouch will probably work, but i'm looking to buy a new keyboard, and as DB mentioned there are few (if any) new keyboards that support it ?

 

jerry, regarding this 'Pitchbend=Held' mode, how does it work? will it allow you to bend a note - let's say 1/2 step higher - and while keeping it bent, if you play other notes, will they sound in original 'pitch/key' or will they sound 1/2 step higher ?

 

Again, thanks for all replies !

 

Sam.

[Analogaddict]

Originally posted by sudo:

Setting up 2 zones will work for a particular scenario - but it's obviously limited to the note where the zones are split (if i understood it correctly) - what i need is to be able to do similar technique on any note while improvising ...

I understand what you mean, I agree, it´s much easier to think in one dimension; with different zones part of the spontaniety can be lost.

 

Originally posted by sudo:

Poly aftertouch will probably work, but i'm looking to buy a new keyboard, and as DB mentioned there are few (if any) new keyboards that support it ?

Not that I know of...

 

Originally posted by sudo:

jerry, regarding this 'Pitchbend=Held' mode, how does it work? will it allow you to bend a note - let's say 1/2 step higher - and while keeping it bent, if you play other notes, will they sound in original 'pitch/key' or will they sound 1/2 step higher ?

 

Again, thanks for all replies !

 

Sam.

I guess that would be hard to do. You could start the pitch bend from 1/2 step lower and play the other notes when you have reached zero bend. Otherwise, you´d have to invert the function to affect only notes sustained, not the held ones. There might be a way, but I don´t know how that would be possible...

 

[Markyboard]

Setting up 2 zones will work for a particular scenario - but it's obviously limited to the note where the zones are split (if i understood it correctly) - what i need is to be able to do similar technique on any note while improvising ...

You mighht want to re-read my first reply. Although it involved layering 2 patches the idea is that both patches span the entire keyboard so you're not limited by which notes respond(or don't respond) to pitch bend. The assigned controller( a footswitch perhaps) would be controlling the notes that allow for pitch bend.

 

Well... I thought it was a good idea.

[Analogaddict]

Originally posted by Markyboard:

Setting up 2 zones will work for a particular scenario - but it's obviously limited to the note where the zones are split (if i understood it correctly) - what i need is to be able to do similar technique on any note while improvising ...

You mighht want to re-read my first reply. Although it involved layering 2 patches the idea is that both patches span the entire keyboard so you're not limited by which notes respond(or don't respond) to pitch bend. The assigned controller( a footswitch perhaps) would be controlling the notes that allow for pitch bend.

 

Well... I thought it was a good idea.

Yeah, but then you´ll also be triggering the patch that you do not want to pitch bend, right..?

[Markyboard]

Yeah, but then you´ll also be triggering the patch that you do not want to pitch bend, right..?

Not necessarily. Wait ...I'm thinking - I'll be back in a little bit.

 

OK - just looking at my Z1, I can set up a Patch (patch 1) with footswitch to control the final amplifier stage. That is when the foot switch is up the volume is what ever volume I have set based on the amp setting plus other controllers such as velocity. When the foot switch is down there is no volume. Also I set up this patch for 0 pitch bending range.

 

Then I duplicate this patch (patch2) except the footswitch behaves in the opposite manner(footswitch up give me 0 volume and footswitch down gives me my controlled amplifier volume ) and I set this patch up for some pitchbend

 

Now I layer the 2 patches in a multi and voila.

Hey wait...that didn't work. When I play notes with the footswitch up I get no pitch bend and am hearing patch 1. However when I press down the footswitch the notes that were previously held are now heard through patch 2 and thus all notes are giving me pitch bend

 

Err... never mind.

 

Well it looks like I would need to control it using velocity differences for 2 patches set up at the multi level. Set up the multi with the same patch in 2 slots. Disable pitch bending for one location an enable pitch bend for the other. Have the first patch location respond on velocities 0 - 63(for eample) and the other to respond to velocities from 65-127.

 

There - that works although it may take some practice to control the velocity according to whether pitch bend is wanted or not.And it does eat up half your polyphony. Although from what I read recently no one on this forum cares about polyphony

[RABid]

A quote from this interview.

 

The Polaris had this great feature - selective pitch bend. Paul should have patented this. It bends only the notes held down, not the ones that are sustained by the hold switch. You could do great guitar licks.

Robert

[Dave Bryce]

Originally posted by Rabid:

A quote from this interview.

 

The Polaris had this great feature - selective pitch bend. Paul should have patented this. It bends only the notes held down, not the ones that are sustained by the hold switch. You could do great guitar licks.

Robert

Yeah, as I mentoined earlier, the Kurzweil VAST synths can do that, too. It's a very useful feature.

 

dB

[bg]

The Kurzweil MIDIboard has a Mono mode that can create this effect. Set the number of MIDI channels, up to 16, that the instrument will transmit. Each successive note-on goes out on a different MIDI channel, then starts over. Set up a rompler, say, with the same patch on 4 or 5 contiguous MIDI channels. Then play a note. It goes out on MIDI channel 1. While holding the note, play a new note. The new note goes out on channel 2. Pitchbend, aftertouch, mod wheel, sustain pedal, whatever, applied to note #2 won't affect note #1.