Program change and pattern mutes

The Lounge General Discussion
#1

I’m working on a song using all the Elektron bells and whistles - song mode, pattern mutes, and program change/midi tracks controlling downstream synths. In the song I’ve got almost everything muted on pattern one, then things slowly come in over the subsequent patterns. The problem with this is that the program change messages are also muted, so the downstream synths will play the wrong presets and internal sewuences until the point in the song where their MIDI track on the Elektron sequencer is unmuted.

For this particular song I have a workaround that is okay, but I’m realizing that workaround won’t work for all songs. So I’m curious if anyone else has a ‘proper’ way of handling this?

My work around for this song is just to have pattern one MIDI tracks be unmuted, but totally empty except for a single trigless trig containing the program change info on step 1, which works, but definitely limits the usefulness of pattern one in a longer looped song.

I’m using digitone keys as the master for this, if that matters. Which I think it does, because I’m reading that program change is a bit different between the digis and OT.

Cross post from Reddit
https://www.reddit.com/r/Elektron/comments/137vu6n/program_change_and_pattern_mutes/

#2

Yeah, I find the downstream-synth pattern change situation a little unpredictable, and don’t know any solution aside from parameter-locking PC messages. And it usually works best on the same channel as the notes, as often a midi track with just trigless trigs won’t “wake up” until a note on message is sent through it.

What sort of program changes are you trying for?

#3

Hey humanprogram, love your videos! All I’m sending for PC is whatever is needed to select a preset slot, which is different for every synth, but generally either a bank or sub-bank plus program change number.

Maybe I could just make it a regular trig where the note has velocity zero, I think that would still be silent.

1 Like
#4

Cool! Yes, regular trigs with zero velocity should work fine, depending on the synth, though it’ll likely interrupt playback depending on what’s there. Good luck!