Arpeggiator from Cubase?

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GilgaFrank
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Arpeggiator from Cubase?

Post by GilgaFrank »

Hello Roland Clanfolk. I've had my JD-Xa for a couple of weeks now and I am deeply in love with it. It sounds glorious, it can trigger my modular and everything about it is pleasing to me. With the exception of one niggling annoyance ...

I've got the JD-Xa syncing nicely with Cubase, all the clock stuff and SLAVE settings are working fine but when I play it from another controller keyboard (Novation 61SL Mk2) the arpeggiator doesn't run. It only runs when I trigger the notes from the JD-Xa keyboard. Am I missing something here? I've tried all 16 MIDI channels and so far I've had no arpeggiator action unless I record from the JD-Xa. Do I need to use the MIDI CTRL feature?

Obligatory photo of the beast in its lair.

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GilgaFrank
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Re: Arpeggiator from Cubase?

Post by GilgaFrank »

You know what? It's amazing what you can learn by reading the manual.

or rather, what I can learn by reading the manual.

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GilgaFrank
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Re: Arpeggiator from Cubase?

Post by GilgaFrank »

Spoke too soon. That didn't work, still no arpeggiator when using a remote keyboard.

If anyone else has hit this problem then I would very much appreciate some guidance.
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GilgaFrank
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Re: Arpeggiator from Cubase?

Post by GilgaFrank »

ok, I'll post Roland support's reply just in case anyone googles this looking for the answer.
Thank you for your email.

Yes, that’s correct.

The ARP is local only – so when using with a DAW, if you enable the ARP – the notes are then sent out via MIDI ( Arp affected ) so upon playback, you get the same results.

Great for using the JD Arp patterns with other synths etc.
In other words, there is no way to trigger the arpeggiator from an external controller or DAW. You have to physically press the JD-XA keys in order to get the arpeggio, contrary to what is suggested by the manual.

Now, I have to say I hate this. I've got other hardware synths and none of them work this way. There's no reason for it to be this way and it makes recording into a DAW hideously complicated as you have to play the part on the JD-XA keyboard, record the arpeggio MIDI then use Dissolve Part to split it into separate tracks, route these tracks back to the JD-XA and finally disable the arpeggiator so the recorded arpeggios don't get arpeggiated a second time. Want to change the arpeggio pattern? Go back to the start and record everything again.

This is the only thing I don't love about the JD-XA. It's poor design and could so easily be made a switchable feature.

Which I would immediately switch off.

And leave off.

Forever.

EDIT: Many thanks to Oliver Davis at Roland tech support who told me that the arpeggiator is triggered if Remote Kbd is st to ON and the controller is connected to the MIDI IN socket. No idea why it isn't implemented over USB MIDI but at last I have a solution.
WhatThe
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Re: Arpeggiator from Cubase?

Post by WhatThe »

I've never understood why the XA's midi implementation isn't translated over USB! Seems very odd!
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