APC40 triggering external instrument that it's not routed to

[Wesley]

I took the clip stop buttons and routed them to select active clips 1-8. So if I need to check loop points or something, I can check a track by hitting the clip stop button. Plus, this stops me from accidentally killing a clip.

The buttons are the same MIDI note, they show up as E2 on channels 1-8.

I have an external instrument track, it's an EMU X-board 25 controlling a Dave Smith Mopho. Somehow, all 8 of these buttons send the E2 note to the mopho and there's no 'note-off'. So basically, if I try to select an active clip, I send a permanent "note-on" message to my Mopho.

The track is set to only receive MIDI from the X-board 25.

I'm also using a MOTU MIDI controller. I have the EMU hard wired through the interface to the MOpho so I can jam live, then I have the external instrument functioning as a monitor channel and it receives MIDI from the EMU via the USB port in case I want to record something I'm playing.

I have no idea how the MIDI is getting from the APC to the Mopho, it certainly isn't routed there. Any ideas?

-wes

[Wesley]

thanks for the advice. I've tried disabling the APC from everything. I actually do want it as a midi controller since I'm using lots of it's controls for things other than what it was programmed for.

Anyway, even with it completely disabled for track/sync/remote it's still triggering the external synth. Even the up down arrow buttons trigger it, they send out a F note. quite annoying. I'm going to see if there's an apc OS update or something out there. The external instrument channel is set to only receive MIDI from the EMU keyboard controller, yet somehow it's sending out mostly a F note without a note off message from the APC.

-wes

[Wesley]

ok. really strange. I've created a new project and I can't get the APC to trigger the external synth under any circumstances. I guess I'm going to rebuild my project and copy paste into it. It seems somehow my actual project file is glitchy. I've tried disabling all other channels and creating a brand new external instrument channel. On my main live set it still routes the apc to the external instrument, on a new project it works fine.

-Wes

[Wesley]

update. If I disable all audio tracks in my live set it seems to stop the APC from sending notes. As soon as I click 'enable' a stuck note comes on. Then if I 'disable' that channel the note goes off. Any ideas? Do projects get corrupted?

-wes

[Wesley]

w00000000000t!! I fixed it. Apparently, I still had track enable and solo MIDI routings left over from an old controller. I'm not sure how enabling track enable or solo to be controlled via midi causes this problem, but it does. Removing those routings makes the midi go away. yay!

-wes

[Wesley]

ok, it's me again. Not completely fixed. Sorry for so much posting but I assume I'm not the only person in the world who'd like to route a button on the APC to something custom and still be able to use external synths.

If I route a button on my APC to turn on something like a beat repeat on channel/track one that button now magically sends a note message down the MIDI output of track 8 which is not set to receive midi from the APC. So far the only way I can stop the triggering is by removing the routing.

-wes

[Wesley]

time for another installment. I've been able to create a project and display the problem. So I zipped that up and sent a message to Ableton tech support. It seems simple enough of a bug to recreate, just add an external instrument and try midi mapping some things. Now I'm having the problem when trying to use midi mapping from another controller. It seems using another controller (the faderfox) to control track elements also allows the APC to send MIDI notes to my external synth. What's even more fun is this, even with NO INPUT selected for the external synth track I'm still able to make the APC send messages to it.

Can anybody out there vouch that they're using external synths, an APC40 and also routing things via Ableton's built in midi Mapping? Right now it's looking like Ableton + external synth + APC40 + custom routings is a recipe for MIDI meltdown...

-wes

[Wesley]

ok. I've now gotten this error to happen even when there are no MIDI instruments and no external instruments. Nothing with MIDI. I have no earthly idea how the APC is getting it's MIDI info to my external synth, there's no physical cable, it's not routed there... there's no virtual routing that I can identify. Hell, there's no MIDI output in my project at all right now, and it's still somehow getting into my synth....

-wes

[Wesley]

w00t part 2.

epic thread eh? again, sorry for my incessant posting. I'm working really hard to integrate more things into my live show and the external synth issue has really been plaguing me. Turns out I had 'remote' enabled on the output port that was going to my synth. I still don't get why the APC was allowed to send info down that port, but turning off remote fixed it.

-wes

[hyaahyaa]

My guess: when you map a control on the apc40, ableton tries to send midi feedback for that control, which sends on the same channel as the controller, out of all midi interfaces which have remote output enabled. Is remote enabled in the midi prefs for whichever interface the Mopho is hooked up to? If so try disabling it. Sorry if this is obvious/you've tried it.