Accessing Non-Registered Parameter Numbers (NRPNs) possible?

[MQS-mark]

Hi,
I hooked up my MC-303 to seq66 and was wondering if one can also access NRPNs. If yes, how?
https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/editing-tips-roland-mc-303/

[ahlstromcj]

There's a macro set that you can define in a 'ctrl' file. See the sample ctrl file. That supports sending sysex etc to a device, eg to set it up. I think it's discussed in the manual. Can you explain further? In the meantime I will refresh my knowledge on nrpn.

On Fri, Aug 11, 2023 at 17:25 MQS-mark ***@***.***> wrote: Hi, I hooked up my MC-303 to seq66 and was wondering if one can also access NRPNs. If yes, how? https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/editing-tips-roland-mc-303/ — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#115>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AB45LKFKNNM2MPORZBJYZCDXU2POJANCNFSM6AAAAAA3NNU6XU> . You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread.Message ID: ***@***.***>

-- Chris Ahlstrom

[MQS-mark]

Let's take the cutoff as an example (see link https://www.sweetwater.com/insync/editing-tips-roland-mc-303/):

CC99 | 01 | Selects NRPN function.
CC98 | 32 | Selects filter cutoff.
CC06 | 74 | Settings of 70-114 will open up the filter for a brighter sound.

The two first controller values I would set at the start of a pattern, CC99 to 01 and CC98 to 32.
And then for changing the cutoff frequency over the pattern progress I set multiple events with different values between 90-114 for CC06. That's how I understand it right now. Will test tomorrow.

As I understand now, three different controllers have to be accessed instead of just one, such as for note velocity.

[MQS-mark]

So it worked.
In this example with the MC-303 one just needs to set CC99 to 01 to access the different NRPN functions.
And with the additional CC definitions one can basically access all sorts of things of the MC-303.

This is pretty cool and way more easily to do than in Ableton and Bitwig in my opinion. Terrence Dixon uses for example a lot the MC-303 via Ableton (and gets some interesting stuff out of this low budget machine). This made me want to conquer the MC-303 in all its details and seq66 allows this. So thank you Chris for maintaining and further developing this fine piece of software.

Some UI things are a bit tedious though:

• Setting events holding the right mouse button and then clicking with the left button is tough to do with notebooks/laptops which have some modern touchpad without any left right button but using two fingers for the right click for example.
• Also the the window frame for setting/locating/removing events is a bit small, would be nice if a user could re-size it as desired.
• Setting the value via holding down the mouse button and then dragging the line over the event value to then scroll up and down to set it to a specific value is tedious. Would be great if one could click on the circle of the event and type the value for example or at least then drag the circle up and down.

[ahlstromcj]

I had that mouse-pad issue a long time ago. There are two ways to enter/exit the note-painting and trigger-painting mode: (1) Click on the grid to give it keyboard focus, then the "p" key to enter painting and "x" to exit it ("Esc" is reserved for stopping playback); (2) Click on the checkable "finger"/"hand" button to enter/leave painting mode. The mouse cursor icon changes. The main window, the external pattern editors, and the external song editors are all resizable. I have keys in Fluxbox that maximize horizontally or vertically, for example. The pattern and song grids can also be zoomed via the z, Z, v, V, and 0 keys. Check out the manual. As for your last issue, that seems worth looking into. Although you can select notes and move them around with the arrow keys. Similar for the song editor triggers.

[ahlstromcj]

Can you show us the part of the configuration that you used to create your workable setup? I just need to get some context for further investigation. Thanks!

[MQS-mark]

Hi @ahlstromcj,
Sorry for my lack of response. I now have some time looking into the Seq66 + MC-303 setup again.

I basically installed Seq66 under Ubuntu described in this issue: #142

The zoom keys z and Z for horizontal zooming work nicely, and 0 for re-setting too. v and V do not show any effect for vertical zooming and the events editor window frame does not show any hoover over functionality at its edges for resizing that window or any details where I could resize it via the mouse. It would be nice to see it a bit larger. In the following a screenshot (what I'm referring to is the events editor with the dark-grey background):

When taking a look at my last comments and working with the newest release of Seq66 I still have the issue that it is hard to set a specific value for an event, since sometimes one needs to have an exact specific value set for the MC-303.
This issue relates also to this issue: #140
where zero values can not be changed due to accessibility issues with the mouse.

[ahlstromcj]

Sometimes the best way to set an exact value is to use the event editor: right-click on a pattern then select Edit / Events in tab (or use the minus key followed by the pattern hot-key, e.g. "-q" to open the event editor for pattern 1.

In the event editor, when Channel Message & Control Change are selected, and then the "Ctrl" button is clicked, a nested popup to select the control by number and name pops up. One can (tediously) enter the necessary RPN or NRPN events, setting the D0 value

It would be nice to add some way to load the NPRN names and make a "NRPN" popup for them to fill the correct number into D1.