My live rig consists of a Yamaha CP300, a Roland RD700SX, a Motif ES Rack unit and a MOTU Midi Express XT interface.  Currently - I use the CP300 to control the Motif ES Rack unit and have the MOTU Midi Express set to simply route the CP300 MIDI out signal to the Motif MIDI in and have done nothing to “channelize” the MIDI signal. 

I would like to be able to control the Motif using BOTH the CP300 and the Roland RD700SX such that I use two different Motif voices simultaneously - one controlled via the RD700SX and the other controlled via the CP300. 

I’ve been through the Motif Manual - but didn’t see this sort of setup described.  Can anybody tell me if this is possible - and if so, give me a high level explanation of how to go about setting it up?

Thanks,

The SpaceNorman

Hi, Such a thing is possible :-)

I have a rack of gear, including a Motif ES Rack, that is controlled by two keyboards and a Roland FC300 MIDI Foot Controller, and either keyboard can control any of the racks.

The setup I have is a MIDI chain as follows

FC300-->Yamaha EX5-->Novation Remote61-->Rack Units

Basically the two keyboards are setup in their configuration pages to “echo” the MIDI data they receive back onto their MIDI outs, effectively merging the MIDI data that they receive with their own data. The EX5 is used in Performance mode where as well as it’s own voices, you also have good Master keyboard capabilities for controlling external units. The FC300 is an amazingly flexible MIDI foot pedal that gives me three foot pedals (I have an EV5 pedal in addition to the two built in ones), along with the ability to step patches up and down, and there’s also two CTRL foot switches that I use in various songs for turning things on and off. The Remote61 is a very good general MIDI controller with plenty of knobs and sliders for controlling the racks, and also has a secret weapon of you can hold some keys down, change patch and it doesn’t cut off what you’re already playing until you stop playing them, allowing for very smooth changes mid-song. All in all these three units give me a very flexible MIDI control rig! :-)

If your keyboards don’t support a MIDI echo capability then you’d need a MIDI merge unit taking the data from the units and merging them before sending the merged stream to the racks.

The racks that I have all have their MIDI THRU ports chained to the MIDI in of the next rack, and then of course, I’ve set up each rack to respond to a particular set of channels.

Regarding the ES Rack, I always use that in Multi mode where you can have up to 16 voices (eight with the insert effects active) set up responding on different MIDI channels and key ranges. So I set the Multis up according to what I want, and it’s the Multis that I patch select for each song.

For example, in Pure Floyd:

1) I do the intro to “Shine On You Crazy Diamond” using a stack of four Motif ES voices to create a really rich thick pad (including a PLG150-AN masquerading as a Solina), over which I play the lead with my Nord G2 and Organs provided by a laptop running NI B4II. All of those are controlled by the two keyboards which have been zoned to send data on the MIDI channels according to the units that I am using. The Big Motif pad is on the left hand of the Novation, with the Nord Lead on the Right, with top manual organ on the left hand side of EX5, another Motif Voice in the middle of the EX5 and an EX5 voice on the right. And for my next trick, I also use the Foot controller to switch the Remote61 in the song to become either a complete bottom manual B4 organ (so I can do all of the organ glissando sweeps), or a bottom manual B4 organ split with the Nord Lead.

2) In “Learning To Fly”, I have a Motif keyboard/organ on the left hand of my EX5, and EX5 Electric Piano on the right hand, and two Motif pads mapped on the left and right hand of the Remote61 for the centre section of the song.

So, that’s two examples of stacked and layered Motif voices (in a Multi), with the last one being a Multi with two stacked Motif voices played on the EX5 and two split Motif voices played on the Remote61.

Hope that helps!

Derek,

Thanks for the response to my question about 2 controllers / 1 rack module. Given your explanation - I think all I’m going to need to is reconfigure my MOTU unit to serve as a simple “merge” device (currently - it is configured to simply route the CP300 MIDI OUT to the Motif MIDI IN) - and then “channelize” the MIDI signaling between all my devices (currently - it’s set to whatever the default is). 

I’m embarassed to say that I’ve owned the Motif for more than a year and have yet to really use it for anything more than a box of preset patches. While it’s served me well in that capacity - I realize I’ve barely scratched the surface of what it’s capable of. 

I suspect my next challenge will be learning how to create and manage “multi’s” on the Motif. So far I’ve only really used it in “voice” mode - layering a single voice from the rack unit with an internal voice on the CP300 digital piano. I guess I’m going to have to delve into Studio Manager and figure that interface out as well. 

Hopefully you won’t mind a few questions in the future ... I suspect I’m going to have some specific questions about getting pedals to work right. In my current configuration I typically configure my CP300 so that the internal voice ignores the expression pedal - while the Motif Rack recognizes the value changes in CC#007 - allowing me to play a “constant volume” pianovoice (which I simply set with the volume knob on the CP300) and swell in the rack unit voice (organs, horns, strings, etc.) with the expression pedal. I suspect I’m going to have some questions as I try to get this working in the channelized / 2 controller / 2 pedal environment I’m hoping to create.

Thanks again for the direction!

The SpaceNorman