I have some early beats/songs in a snapshot on my MD and have been struggling for years to figure out a good way to create songs on which I perform with/on the MD.
I think It’s about time that I ask for some help now.
I have a MegaCommandLive, Ableton, an APC Mini, a PadKontrol and a BCR-2000. MD lives in a flight case with an ESI-2000 sampler, a SE-50 FX unit, basic mixer, MIDI and audio interface.
Mainly I am stuck on how to divide up the MD’s tracks, and how/if I should utilize Ableton or MCL to wrangle everything.
What I would like:
- To set up the BCR-2000 to control all 24 parameters of any track. It has 32 presets so using up 16 of them isn’t unreasonable. I have done a few performances on the MD but what I don’t like is how params are accessed, and how cramped the knobs are.
- A consistent track layout or at least reduce the number that I need to worry about
- To figure out I am going to (re-)arrange my songs. On MD? MCL? Ableton? (If Ableton, I believe I would prefer if it was a combo of audio clips and tweakable MD patterns, synced to Ableton or the other way around.) I would prefer a progression of patterns to jamming on a single pattern, though having some jamming sections might be fun.
- Figure out which devices it makes sense to use right now. I’d rank the non-sound-generators this way, from most to least useful in this context: BCR-2000, MCL, APC Mini, and PadKontrol.
I would also like to involve my trusty Model:Cycles since I created a really nice sound combining the two in previous performances. The thing is it was too much to manage, mutes and pattern changes. I wonder if the thing to do is beforehand set up the patterns on both devices to match up.
Or if arranging audio clips in Ableton and lifting the burden of the machines so I can jam freely over the songs would be better.
The preference is to not require a laptop. One I don’t like having to bring my $1000 gaming machine to a crowded place, and I would like to avoid the troubleshooting that can be required or glitches that can happen. But I will do it if the pros outweigh the cons.
That’s all I can think of right now - I have tried many different setups and still feel like I don’t know anything.