Some suggestions

[bassengunder]

Hi Dan,

I have some suggestions for vA2 that I would like to share. I posted this in the end of the thread/subject "vArranger Beta Program v1.18 Started" but realized that it might be better to post it as an individual thread. First I would like to say I am quite new to vA2, but I like vA2 very much, so thanks for you work Dan! Here is my wish-list:

1. On my Roland G-1000 keyboard there is a timing tolerance when I press a new chord right before the next beat 1 in the bar, then it waits until the start of the next bar / beat 1, and the chord shift is executed exactly on beginning of next beat 1 (not right before beat 1 when I set the chord). In this way the chord transition becomes smooth and nice, and no strange half-notes or half-riffs are heard in the chord transition. Is it possible to add such a tolerane Varranger? It could be a setting/option called "chord shift tolerance" or similar, with values from 0 for total flexibility in timing of chord shift, to 1/16 bar before next 1/16 of the bar, 1/8 bar before next 1/8 part of the bar, etc until 1/2. Example for a 4/4 beat with 1/2 tolerance: any chord shift after beginning of beat 3 but before next beat 1, will be executed in the start of next beat 1, and any chord shift after beat1 but before start of beat 3, will be executed in start of beat 3. If the tolerance is 1/4, any chord shift after beginning of beat 3, but before next beat 1, will be executed in start of next beat 1. For any chord shift within the tolerance interval, but not before it or exactly on it, the chord shift shall be started in the beginning of the next upcoming quantized interval (1/4 1/8 of the bar or whatever).

2.  I was also wondering if it is possible in the vA2 midi settings, when an external midi-module is chosen (not soft synth), that the loaded style can be loaded with un-modified bank select 0 / 32 and PC, so that I can use my Roland G-1000 as a sound module with vArranger for my old styles, without the need of changing the sounds back to its original bank select 0 / 32 / PC after the loading of the style. Could be a choice in the midi-settings like "Unmodified" instead of GM / GM2 / GS etc.

3. For some of the older Roland styles (older than BK-7, like G-1000 / G-800 etc), the soft synth does not load the correct drum set compared to the Roland hardware. For instance when I load the Roland G-1000 Style CntRock1 (from MIDI-SPOT), that originally has the bank select (0 3 9) Room kit drums, the sound bank selected by vArranger is (0 3 0), while it would be better to choose BK7 DrumKits Room in this case (0 4 8 ), to be similar as the Roland hardware. The snare drum seems to be mapped to another key than Roland in other sound modules (like 0 3 0).

4. When I mark the Drums track and press INS & SF2, the sound bank selection chart does not always come up with the DrumKits chart and the current drum selection, but it shows the piano's etc instead, even though the drum track are marked. It would be fine if the sound/drum chart shows/mark the sound or drum that is selected in the overview.

And a question: is it possible to load song setups using numbers on a keyboard or similar? When I am playing, I normally pick songs on-the-fly, according to mood of my audience. I have not tried the concept of "next-song"-playlist, but assume I would prefer to choose song setups by associating each song setup with a number or similar, that quickly can be entered on the keyboard or similar.

Again, thanks for your great work!

Best regards
Bjørn L

[Dan]

Hello Bjorn,

Sorry for late answer

1. This is a good idea to quantize a little bit when playing a chord close to the down beat
2. Only Ketron SD2/SD4/SD1000/XG mode are changing the roland sounds numbers a little bit, to adapt to the sound module. other modes like GM2 / GS does not change. If not... can you post a style?
3. Maybe you can post the style, so we can check it. We can add some G1000 DRUMSKITS too
4. Do you use the SF2 list on a separate INS file? Can you post a style with this problem?

5.  You can use the SEARCH bar feature.
You rename your songs with a number
then in search bar, you write the number and then enter
you can assign a key to enter in search mode

Sorry again from not answering fast to your private email

Dan

[bassengunder]

Hi Dan,

Thank you very much for your reply.

Regarding 3) I will send you the style by e-mail so that you can test. Regarding 2) and 4), I will test a little bit more myself, so that I can explain better, and possibly send you a couple of styles with problem.

Best regards
Bjørn