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I just wanted to ask this before I dive into a weekend of experimenting so I know where to jump into the pool.
Let's say for the sake of saying, I set aside a track and make it a MIDI track. (Everything I have done in RB until now has been 100% audio tracks.) I pick channel 7. I come to bar whatever where I want harmony singing. I play the harmony lines I want into the software using some kind of controller.
In theory, when I play that back through my M-Audio Fast Track Pro, if I connect the MIDI out of the interface to the MIDI in of my Vocoder, plug a mic in and sing the harmony parts, RB should send that note information to my Vocoder and my mic input will do the formant processing and get the Vocoder to sing, right?
I HAVE in the past done this with Sonar, and since RB is essentially just another form of workstation software capable of MIDI in and out, I have to think it will work just fine.
Has anybody done this with that type of "singing" device? I know several people have the kind that you strum a guitar into and it follows your chord progression and sings harmony. I know of at least a dozen guys here in town that do solo acts and use one of the harmonizer devices. I haven't seen anybody using the old school type vocoder here yet.
First blush, it HAS to work. It can't NOT work. RB doesn't know where the MIDI on/off data is going, just what channel and when to send.
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RealBand
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Joined: May 2008
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Hey Eddie,
That should work. I've never used a vocoder but RB will route the midi where you send it. Then you bring it back in as audio through your interface.
FWIW, some people have had decent results using the TCH software that comes with BIAB/RB. I like hardware better myself but just saying...since you're experimenting...
There are some posts on here somewhere if you do a search because there have been several discussions on it in the past.
Maybe that helps ya a little.
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RealBand
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Joined: May 2000
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As long as you send the the MIDI to the correct port (and match the MIDI channel) it should work. You'll have multiple MIDI output ports available in RB. Right-click a track to assign it to an available port. Enable available ports in MIDI devices area.
I do not work here, but the benefits are still awesome
Make your sound your own!
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RealBand
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Joined: Oct 2008
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Keep us posted Eddie... there's a small learning curve to what you're doing, but it sounds like you've already been down this road before.
More and more modern music uses vocoder... I think MIDI is here to stay in one form or another
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RealBand
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Joined: Aug 2011
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Hi all, I've been using The digitech vocalist for quite a while now with success. It follows your guitar chords (also will follow a simple piano chord, or any other simple sound with at least a triad), the cleaner the sound the better) I play several instruments, so what i do is create a track for the vocalist to "listen" to in RB,sending it out on a seperate audio channel to the vocalist. At this point I am not "tied down" to feeding the vocalist what it wants to hear to work correctly, my track does that, freeing me up to do whatever i want on the instrument I'm playing at the time and still have the harmony i want. Works great. As to MIDI, I just got the new vocalist VLD3. which actually will harmonize according to the MIDI notes you send it and not the sound, if that's what you want it to do, so you can create any harmony you want just using MIDI notes. All settings are MIDI controllable, so you can turn it off and on, add reverb, change the harmony structure and all other functions using MIDI CC controllers. Awsome unit. I also control my DMX lights through MIDI commands. And basically at this point, using RB, I can start a song, and everything happens for me, no pedals to push, no light switches, no guitar pedals, (as I use Guitar Rig4 alongside RB and control the program changes on it through a track in RB.) Takes a bit to program all this, but in the end is completley worth it for live use.
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I did much the same for many years bob1474, controlling synths, lights, guitar FX, vocal FX, delays .. all as part of the show. It does take some work but is so nice once it all comes together. Then it's just a matter of adding songs to a prepared show. Only hard part for us was finding a drummer that would ride the click well, as that was the key to everything working. We were a five piece band that ran the show that way. Works even better for one man shows.
I do not work here, but the benefits are still awesome
Make your sound your own!
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Yes that will defiantly work.BUT one thing I'm not sure of is if you'll need to insert Program Change data to turn the Vocoder from harmony to bypass. Other wise the thing may stay at the last "chord" that was input. I used to use my older Digitech this way and I did have to turn it on & off. I made preset 99 an empty one and called it Bypass.
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RealBand
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I use my TC Helicon Voice works with RB all the time. I set up a channel to send, and then have it send CC's for patch, on/off, which voices, Key, and other cool featuresI am just scratching the surface so far, but am loving it. Rigth now i am working on a file with the old Doobie Bros. Long Train running, and setting up the harms to kick in where they did on tha great tune. "Without Lo------------ve where would we be now!"
Eddie what unit do you have?
HP Win 11 12 gig ram, Mac mini Sonoma with 16 gig of ram, BiaB/RB 2026, Reaper 7, Harrison Mixbus 11 , Presonus Audiobox USB96
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Ditto rharv- That's what I do, a one man show-I sometimes am lucky enough to get a female freind of ours to join in occasionaly, so what i've done is "tweak" all the songs to include (or exclude) parts that she does, save the files and use those when she's available. (I also do this with a "scaled back light show" for smaller places) yep, once the "main" file is completed, it's relatively easy to do tweaks for special occasions.
And for Silvertones- you're right-you'll probably have to do the on-off thing for it to work for you. The beauty of the Digitech is that you can just turn on-off the harmony generator without affecting other parameters of the unit.
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RealBand
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Joined: Oct 2008
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Quote:
Only hard part for us was finding a drummer that would ride the click well, as that was the key to everything working.
I've had the same problem. The click tends to get lost in the noise of a full band, and the drummer's enthusiasm tends to speed ahead of the recorded tempo.
I was wondering if MIDI controlled lights could serve as a visual metronome so the tempo did not depend on sound. Has anybody here ever tried that?
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RealBand
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Joined: Oct 2008
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Quote:
I use my TC Helicon Voice works with RB all the time. I set up a channel to send, and then have it send CC's for patch, on/off, which voices, Key, and other cool featuresI am just scratching the surface so far, but am loving it. Rigth now i am working on a file with the old Doobie Bros. Long Train running, and setting up the harms to kick in where they did on tha great tune. "Without Lo------------ve where would we be now!"
are you using "harmony hold" for that? if so, cool idea! I'm working on that song too, and it never occurred to me to try harmony hold.
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Joined: Aug 2011
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Hey Pat- good idea- I'm shure much of what we all do is similar (classic rock, top 40 ish type stuff ?). About the light/metronome idea,there would be no problem I could see making a (or the) lights flash in tempo. Probably could quantize them really tight, but have never done it, might give it a whirl next time I'm setting up a song just for grins. The method I use saves me lots of precious time. When I'm finished processing a song, I set up a MIDI track (my DMX lights can controlled by MIDI) I've assigned each scene on my DMX controller to a MIDI note number. Start the song- I then can use my keyboard assigned to that track to "play" the light show the way I want it according to the note numbers, and Viola-I'm done. Easy to edit later, too, if needed.
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