Midi Device Setup
Once Jack is up and
running you can start Rosegarden to begin a midi session. There's no
need to close Ardour if you have it open as many Linux music creation
and editing apps are
intended to run simultaneously and can share the same transport
controls through JACK. Step 6 demonstartes
how to setup a unified JACK transport system.
Ensure that you have connected your midi drum machine correctly to your
soundcard, see the Connections page
for further instructions.
In Rosegarden click
Studio -> Manage Midi Devices
Click the "New"
button in the Midi Playback section to create a new
midi playback device.
What we would like to
do is send a midi signal from Rosegarden to the
soundcard, which then routes the signal to the drum machine, which
triggers an audible sound. This sound is then sent back to the
soundcard so that it can be mixed in with other sounds (such as
guitars, synth etc) and we hear the sound composited in the mix through
the monitors. This typical midi setup will allow us to have multiple
midi tracks in Rosegarden and allow us to record the processed signal
though Ardour for the final mix.
Click the "Banks..."
button to setup the new midi device.
1) In the resulting dialog box, with
the Item labeled New Device selected click the "Import..."
button in the bottom left of the Manage Midi Banks and Programs window.
2) A
convenient selection of preset Midi Banks that are installed along with
Rosegarden can be found in ~/.local/share/rosegarden/library.
Navigate to your device's name, select it and click Open to import it.
In the
resulting dialog box choose to "Overwrite Banks" so that any setting
that might have existed in the default Device configuration we just
created will be replaced
with the new Banks we are importing.
3) Conveniently Bank 1:0 is marked
as a percussion bank and as such we will use channel 10 to send
and receive midi data from the RY8. Channel 10, by convention, is
reserved for percussion and adding a track segment to Track 10 in
Rosegarden will attempt to use Bank1:0 by default for processing midi
data as it is marked as a Percussion Bank. This can often save you the
additional setup explained in the section titled "Setup a track to send
and receive midi data" further down this page.
Once midi Banks have been setup click the Close button to return to the
Manage Midi Devices window.
1) Double click the New Device name
and change it to something more meaningful.
2) With the New Device (you just
renamed) still selected click your soundcard as the option under Midi
Output, this is so that rosegarden will send midi data directly to your
soundcard, which will in turn send the data to your Drum machine.
3)Finally confirm that the soundcard
that the Drum machine is connected to is also selected as the "MIDI
input system device" under the MIDI Recording section. This ensures
that when you click the record button in Rosegarden, the data that will
subsequently be recorded will be from the Drum Machine.
Setup a Track to Send
and Receive Midi Data
Once your midi
device is configured, using it in a recording is really easy. Setting
up other external midi devices (such as a keyboard) will follow a
similar procedure. It is, however, recommended that you keep channel 10
and track 10 in Rosegarden reserved for drums.
Right
click on the track you would like to use to either send or
receive midi data on, navigate to the midi
device you just setup and choose
Channel 10 for Drums.
With the
track you are configuring selected, Click the Percussion, Bank
and Program check boxes in the Instrument Parameters section of Special
Parameters (which can be toggled on and off by hitting p on your
keyboard).
You can add as many Midi Drum tracks as you like as they do not have to
be limited to existing only on track 10 (as is standard convention),
and even mix Midi
Drums with other Midi data such as a Software Synth in the same
composition. This is something we will have a look at in the next Step.
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