Korg Z1 synth works as MIDI controller w/ Kontakt in standalone, but can't trigger Kontakt in CbB

[abacab]

8 minutes ago, Christian Jones said:

You should be able to see my MIDI Preferences images at this link https://imgur.com/a/mNgTnKa

Even though the CbB MIDI indicator is flashing, and even though when I depress the keys on the Z1 the corresponding keys on the CbB piano roll also depress, when I arm the track to record it does not print any data when inputting from the Z1 so I'm not able to record anything that way.

Try unchecking "Zero Controllers When Play Stops". That may sound random, but I have heard of cases where the mod wheel can reset volume to zero.

[scook]

The only settings I see which diverge from defaults are the enabled "Key Aftertouch" and "Channel Aftertouch" in MIDI Playback and Recording Preferences.

20 minutes ago, Christian Jones said:

Even though the CbB MIDI indicator is flashing, and even though when I depress the keys on the Z1 the corresponding keys on the CbB piano roll also depress, when I arm the track to record it does not print any data when inputting from the Z1 so I'm not able to record anything that way. 

This is pretty strange. I am assuming recording fails this way with a new project and just a MIDI track.

If so, may want to involve support.

[Christian Jones]

So the Z1 is working as a MIDI controller in CbB now for no reason. I didn't change a single thing or do anything differently. All I *did* do near as I can tell is install Cantable Lite the other day and found the Z1 worked w/ it right away. And last night I had Cantable open w/ Kontakt and then I just wanted to see something unrelated in CbB real quick so I opened my previous CbB test session w/ Cantable still open and then I just happened to hit some keys on the Z1 and saw that it was triggering both Cantable and CbB. So I closed Cantable and CbB continued to work w/ the Z1 as the controller and now it works consistently w/ CbB lol. The end. ?

[Robert Bone]

58 minutes ago, Christian Jones said:

So the Z1 is working as a MIDI controller in CbB now for no reason. I didn't change a single thing or do anything differently. All I *did* do near as I can tell is install Cantable Lite the other day and found the Z1 worked w/ it right away. And last night I had Cantable open w/ Kontakt and then I just wanted to see something unrelated in CbB real quick so I opened my previous CbB test session w/ Cantable still open and then I just happened to hit some keys on the Z1 and saw that it was triggering both Cantable and CbB. So I closed Cantable and CbB continued to work w/ the Z1 as the controller and now it works consistently w/ CbB lol. The end. ?

Sounds like some parts of your system - heck why not get the whole house in one shot - could use a good EXORCISM, to get rid of those demons.

Maybe it fixed itself, because it had what it needed to work right all along, and just needed to believe in itself. 

Bob Bone

[Robert Bone]

By the way, Christian - I too use Cantabile *sometimes I forget the 'i' in it too), and LOVE it, for live performance.  I used to use Forte, from Brainspawn, but they ceased to exist a year or so back.  I still have it, but took a generous offer of a cross-grade option from Cantabile, and went ahead and switched over to it.  Both programs provide VST hosting for live performance, just different terminology and a different approach, but I am firmly with Cantabile now, and it is my software of choice for playing my keyboards live.

VERY happy your Z1 has magically fixed itself.

Bob Bone

 

[abacab]

1 hour ago, Robert Bone said:

VERY happy your Z1 has magically fixed itself.

Likewise!!!

[Christian Jones]

Lol thanks fellas. 

[SentientClump]

I hope your problem is solved. One thing that occurred to me is that your Korg may have a global parameter like my Trinity called Local On. If the box is not checked the keyboard will not send midi signals. Often, this parameter gets deselected when I launch the DAW and I have to reselect it.

[Robert Bone]

1 hour ago, SentientClump said:

I hope your problem is solved. One thing that occurred to me is that your Korg may have a global parameter like my Trinity called Local On. If the box is not checked the keyboard will not send midi signals. Often, this parameter gets deselected when I launch the DAW and I have to reselect it.

The Local On/Off midi parameter controls whether or not the external synthesizer's 'engine' reacts to any notes pressed on its keyboard.  If Local is On, then when you press a note, the synth engine will see that and produce sound (if the note pressed is within the playable range of the sound).

Local Off severs the synth engine from the notes on its keyboard being pressed.  It does NOT stop midi data from being transmitted through a MIDI Out port, if connected, or through a USB connection to a computer, if that is how the external keyboard is connected.

If you have an external synth connected to where the DAW sees it, and Local = On, then for every note pressed on the external synth's keyboard, the synth engine will see that note event, and will produce a sound (if a playable note for that loaded preset, and the synth's audio outputs are connected to speakers or headphones), AND the external synth will ALSO send that midi event data to the DAW, which may also send that back through a midi out port or through a USB connection, if the synth is designated as a midi output device.

When you have Local On you may end up having the synth engine attempt to produce sound TWICE for every single note played on its keyboard - once from it having local control between its keyboard and its synth engine, and another note coming back from the DAW.

Generally speaking, IF you plan on using the audio outputs of an external synth, then you would want to turn Local to OFF, to prevent that note-doubling.

Bob Bone

-

[Starship Krupa]

On 7/14/2019 at 10:58 AM, Variorum said:

One other thing to check is the Control Surface mapping (Preferences/MIDI/Control Surfaces). When MIDI devices are added or removed, the In Ports and Out Ports can get scrambled. If any of these Control Surface In Ports are set to your Korg, they will effectively intercept all the MIDI data and you'll get the symptoms you're describing. This catches me occasionally and I always seem to forget about it

Thank you, thank you, you have rescued me from the depths of MIDI-no-worki H377!

All I did was switch my active Firepod, which I do every 6 months or so to even the wear between the two of them. I usually only use one at a time, with the other one held in reserve in case I need more than 8 inputs or another submix or whatever.

During that switchover, Cakewalk decided that Firepod 1 was its new best friend and that it liked it so much it would use it as the In Port for my control surface instead of my Korg nanoKONTROL thereby causing both the nanoKONTROL and my MIDI keyboard to go completely limp and lifeless while of course they worked perfectly outside of Cakewalk.

[Starship Krupa]

On 7/18/2019 at 1:23 PM, Christian Jones said:

....last night I had Cantable open w/ Kontakt and then I just wanted to see something unrelated in CbB real quick so I opened my previous CbB test session w/ Cantable still open and then I just happened to hit some keys on the Z1 and saw that it was triggering both Cantable and CbB. So I closed Cantable and CbB continued to work w/ the Z1 as the controller and now it works consistently w/ CbB lol. The end. ?

Cakewalk has shown you how to "sacrifice a chicken" to your MIDI configuration to get it to work.

From when I first started using CbB, I found out that every so often I will screw up my MIDI configuration in one way or another, usually in this way, where a MIDI input device will work fine with every other program but Cakewalk ignores it, with or without blinking indicator lights. Sometimes it happens when I get too curious and decide to click on one of those numerous mysterious pull-down menus that lurk on MIDI channel strips that usually won't open when you click on them but sometimes they do so I figure why not check every once in a while.

Nothing I try will allow me to get MIDI information to flow until at some point, it just starts up again as if by magic. I'll exit the program, restart it, create a new project, add a new instrument track, delete it, add a different softsynth, delete it, delete a marker, turn looping on and off, whatever, and then it suddenly all starts working just as mysteriously as it stopped, and I open the other projects that wouldn't work and they're all just fine too.

There is one thing I know and it is this:

if your Z1 stops being able to communicate with Cakewalk, exit gracefully, start Cantabile, load up Kontakt, make sure you can play notes, then start Cakewalk and play some notes and see if the problem has been cured.

[msmcleod]

A couple of tips...

1. Always make sure you use the same USB ports for each interface, and switch your PC on with them all plugged in. That way your PC picks them up in the same order every time it starts up.

2. Keep a backup of your AUD.INI and your TTSSEQ.INI files from within %APPDATA%\Cakewalk\Cakewalk Core\ . If for whatever reason things go belly-up, you can shutdown Cakewalk, copy your backups over to  %APPDATA%\Cakewalk\Cakewalk Core\, and everything should be fine again.

I use a couple of different configurations of audio interfaces, so I've got separate copies for each configuration. Copying the appropriate backup .ini files that match my current configuration over before starting Cakewalk means everything comes up exactly as I expect each time.

[Christian Jones]

Even more tips, thanks guys. I've decided that even after I get my Novation SL61 MKIII, which hooks up via USB (unlike the Korg Z1), I'm gonna leave the Z1 on the legacy midi port from now on because why not have two controllers then if it's gonna work, which it still is. And my woman, she's like "Well since the Z1 is working to control midi now do you really need to spend $700 on that Novation?" "Absolutely and I've already thought this through, it's *gonna* happen plus I expect to keep that Novation for the rest of my life, just like you." That was easy. So thanks for the additional tips for if the connection breaks down again. It's weird, I feel like I've been through this before, where something like this wasn't working right and somehow opening another program simultaneously jogs it into working for no apparent reason. It's probably happened to all of us. 

And speaking of plugging usb devices in the same port every time, that's great advice all the time - yeah the Korg NanoKONTROL2 and Nanopad2 that I sold, those were a nightmare for me if you should unplug one or both and forget which port you initially had them in. Each time you plugged them into a different port Windows would log it as a new midi device or whatever and quickly max out it's device limit so the Nanos wouldn't work and you had to go into the Korg utility thing and delete all the stupid ports it logged and then start over by plugging the Nanos back in *and leaving them there* and deal w/ their driver again. Probably other devices behave like this too actually though I never had that problem w/ the M-Audio Oxygen which I would often move to other USB ports so idk.