[Tutorial] Controlling Reason's Combinator from Ableton
Posted: Fri Oct 31, 2008 9:51 am
I've been rewiring into ableton since I upgraded from 6LE, but for the life of me couldn't work out how to automate parameters in Reason (4) within Ableton.
Largely it works in the same way as the pitchbend/mod wheel information, it's just a case of finding the appropriate CC numbers.
You Will Need:
Ableton (with Rewire, i.e. not LE)
Reason (you need the Combinator, so version 3 upwards?)
-The second half of this tutorial requires a midi controller, my choice would be an Oxygen8v2
Part 1 - Basic Setup
Step 1) Rewire a combinator into ableton using the External Instrument native plugin (or into a midi and audio channel)
Step 2) In Reason, link whichever parameters you want to automate to the knobs or buttons on the Combinator using the Combinator's programmer.
Step 3) Create a midi clip in Ableton on the External Instument Channel, open the envelope view and select Midi Ctrl from the first parameter drop down.
Set 4) Now this is the clever bit: what we need to do is find the CC's that operate the Combinator knobs and buttons. Find the midi implementation chart for Reason, which on OSX, is in Mac HD/Applications/Reason/Documentation. The CC's for the knobs are listed as 71-74 and the buttons are CC75-78.
PART 2 - Using it with a midi controller
Unless you're lucky enough to have a keyboard with knobs on, what we need to do is use a controller as a keyboard, which has knobs mapped to cc71-75.
Step 1) If you've got a 'Control Keyboard' as Reason coins it, simply change the knob values to the relevant cc's, or if you can't just use bomes/midipipe. Make sure in the Ableton Midi Prefs that the controller is set ONLY to Track, not remote.
Step 2) If you're using a separate controller (I did this all with an X Session Pro), just make sure it's set to Track ONLY, once you've changed the CCs.
Step 3) If you still want to be able to control ableton, there's a work around in Midi Pipe which allows you to split some controls to a different output, PM me for details.
Have a nice day, shout if you want screen shots!
Largely it works in the same way as the pitchbend/mod wheel information, it's just a case of finding the appropriate CC numbers.
You Will Need:
Ableton (with Rewire, i.e. not LE)
Reason (you need the Combinator, so version 3 upwards?)
-The second half of this tutorial requires a midi controller, my choice would be an Oxygen8v2
Part 1 - Basic Setup
Step 1) Rewire a combinator into ableton using the External Instrument native plugin (or into a midi and audio channel)
Step 2) In Reason, link whichever parameters you want to automate to the knobs or buttons on the Combinator using the Combinator's programmer.
Step 3) Create a midi clip in Ableton on the External Instument Channel, open the envelope view and select Midi Ctrl from the first parameter drop down.
Set 4) Now this is the clever bit: what we need to do is find the CC's that operate the Combinator knobs and buttons. Find the midi implementation chart for Reason, which on OSX, is in Mac HD/Applications/Reason/Documentation. The CC's for the knobs are listed as 71-74 and the buttons are CC75-78.
PART 2 - Using it with a midi controller
Unless you're lucky enough to have a keyboard with knobs on, what we need to do is use a controller as a keyboard, which has knobs mapped to cc71-75.
Step 1) If you've got a 'Control Keyboard' as Reason coins it, simply change the knob values to the relevant cc's, or if you can't just use bomes/midipipe. Make sure in the Ableton Midi Prefs that the controller is set ONLY to Track, not remote.
Step 2) If you're using a separate controller (I did this all with an X Session Pro), just make sure it's set to Track ONLY, once you've changed the CCs.
Step 3) If you still want to be able to control ableton, there's a work around in Midi Pipe which allows you to split some controls to a different output, PM me for details.
Have a nice day, shout if you want screen shots!