MIDI Instrument Mapping Issue

[nerdtronic5000]

Old guy here trying to get back into music after 20 years...picked up a few used synths I used to use back in Cakewalk 3.0 (yikes!)...  Songs still open!  OK...great...now let's map those sounds to the right MIDI channels and get back to work...um...that's where I am failing....  I've spent hours trying to figure it out and I'm sure it's something stupid...  I can get basically whatever patch on my main synth to play back on MIDI ch 1...  the rest of the channels?  crickets.  I can't get the app to map to the other 2-16 channels by selecting them or whatnot...  I've tried manually assigning them, channel 2, channel 3, etc...  Back in the day, I'd pick a channel, say channel 1 on a track, set the patch on my synth (Roland JV-90)...insert a new track, set channel 2...pick a new sound, etc...simple...  I'm sure it's still that simple, but - I'm a dufus now apparently and can't seem to figure it out....  I am *fairly* confident my MIDI routing is correct, I remember that part  - plus, Sonar indicates activity on all channels, then I play - I can see it's receiving MIDI data...  Any help would be grand...  

[user905133]

20 hours ago, nerdtronic5000 said:

. . . let's map those sounds to the right MIDI channels . . .

. . . I can get basically whatever patch on my main synth to play back on MIDI ch 1... 

. . . I can't get the app to map to the other 2-16 channels . . .

. . . Back in the day, I'd pick a channel, say channel 1 on a track, set the patch on my synth (Roland JV-90)...insert a new track, set channel 2...pick a new sound, etc...simple...  I'm sure it's still that simple . . .

. . . Sonar indicates activity on all channels, then I play - I can see it's receiving MIDI data...    

Are you using a hardware synth?  If so, did it get changed to a mode where the gear only responds to one channel and/or only responds with one patch (i.e., non-multitimbral mode)?

Are you using a software synth?  If so, what MIDI channel are you sending data on? Is it a multi-timbral soft synth?

How are you directing the data to different  MIDI channels? What MIDI routing method are you using? 

For example, sometimes (with a usb keyboard and either a soft synth or hard synth) I will have different presets on different MIDI channels and just change the global (transmitting) channel on the keyboard. This gives me a single track with multi-channel data that plays different sounds on each different midi channel.

Other times, I have tracks dedicated to specific MIDI channels and use the the MIDI output widget to force the data from they keyboard onto a onto a single, specific midi channel. With this type of track routing setup, it doesn't matter what channel my keyboard sends (and Cakewalk records) because I am forcing the data to a specific MIDI channel.

Also, how are specifying the channel, bank, and patch? If you are using the track widgets, does it make a difference if you insert a patch change command in the Event List?

 

Edited June 12, 2020 by User 905133
to add some words that were left out.