Ableton Forum

UPDATE: I added some screenshots to demonstrate how this momentary midimapping works. I refined the workflow a little so you only need two miditracks and no midiclips. Hope it helps:

First you want to make sure you set everything up so that you'll receive midievents that are mappable from the virtual midiport (midiyoke on PC or IAC on OSX). Activate "Track" for the "Output"-port (in this case "Out to Midiyoke 1"). Then activate "Track" and "Remote" for the "Input"-port (in this case "from MidiYoke 1").


I had some problems when trying to map Noteoff events from the Launchpad in User1 mode. Those problems did not occur when using the Computer Keyboard for midimapping. As everyone of us has a Keyboard, I thought it would be the best solution to use this for midimapping and then switching to the midicontroller. But: This means you must know the midilayout of your controller before you start midimapping. You can find the midilayout for the Launchpad here. If you want to use this technique with the Akai APC40, you'll need either the script from Hanz which you can find here or the Native Kontrol scripts for APC here.

I did a screenshot (see below) that should cover all the details of this technique:
Basically you only need to
step 1: setup two miditracks, set "Midi from" to Computer Keyboard (just for mapping), activate Midi IN, set track 1 Midi out to Midiyoke/IAC channel 1. Set track 2 "Midi out" (Note Off) to Midiyoke/IAC channel 2.
step 2: Drop a Notelength plugin with the settings shown in the screenshot on the second miditrack
step 3: go into midimapmode

Now follow the midimapworkflow (same as in the screenshot):
#1: select NoteOn event
#2: press and hold the Note on your Computer Keyboard that corresponds to the button on your controller
#3: select NoteOff event
#4: release the Key (mapping finished)
#5: repeat steps 1-4 for each button you want momentary behaviour
#6: after leaving midimapmode you can change the „Midi from“ for miditrack 1&2 to your Controller and you‘ll have momentary behaviour






Old posting:

In this thread I somebody wanted momentary behaviour for his midimapping:
http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=139741
He ended up using m4l, which is fine, but I always wondered, if Live can do this on it's own.

Now thanks to this posting from oddstep I found a way around m4l:

oddstep wrote:use the note length device, with the trigger set to note off, rather than note on. create a 2 instrument rack. chain one = snare. chain 2 = note length device then bass.

So, in order to get momentary behaviour for a midinote played on your keyboard you can do this:

1st step: setup one miditrack, set it to IN or draw some notes into a midiclip. (this will be the channel which sends the midi that you want to use for momentary behaviour)
2nd step: Add another miditrack, pull the midi from the midi1 miditrack and route it to midiyoke / iac channel 1
3rd step: Add a third miditrack, pull the midi from the midi1 miditrack and add a Notelength plugin with the following settings:
Trigger = Note off
Release Vel.=51%
Length, Decaytime and Gate set to minimum value
Route the midi from the 3rd track to Midiyoke/IAC and channel 2

Now you can use the second track for midimapping NoteON-events and the third track for midimapping NoteOff-events that come from miditrack 1!!
Simply deactivate the opposite (NoteOn/NoteOff) track when midimapping in order to avoid collisions.
In order to receive midimappable-events you need to activate "track" for the Midiyoke/IAC-outport and activate track and remote for the Midiyoke/IAC-IN-port in the midisettings of Live8.

To test this I simply pulled an audioclip into an audiotrack, played a key on miditrack1 and mapped the noteOn-miditrack to the playbutton and the Note-Off track to the stop-clip-button of the audiotrack, set the Launchsettings to None and could play a sample as long as I held down the midimapped key. Of course you could also map anything else with this technique, like DeviceOn/Off, Dummyclips containing CC-Automation etc..

There maybe smarter ways by using Instrument racks but this works fine for me.

Hope you can follow my instructions... if not feel free to ask!

Cheers

you deserve todays dirty-but-clever-workaround-award! applause!!!

Thanks a lot #1thelark !

Here is the same method (without M4L) with only 1 MIDITRACK :
* Create a MIDI TRACK
* Put the MIDI effect "Note Length" as shown below
* Group this effect in a effect chain
* Add a second "chain" (called "Normal" on the picture below) with no effect on this chain
* Route this to MIDIYoke !

Enjoy !!

Here the MIDI note sent when NoteOff will be the same than when NoteOn, with the same channel. With this method, it is very easy to assign Device ON / OFF with momentary switch behaviour





PS : A last request : i would like my APC40 to send MIDI notes instead of "clip launch messages" for the last row of the "clip launch 8x5 matrix" . Thanks a lot !

nc2010 wrote: PS : A last request : i would like my APC40 to send MIDI notes instead of "clip launch messages" for the last row of the "clip launch 8x5 matrix" . Thanks a lot !

That's exactly what I wanted to do, a bunch of momentary switch on the latest rows of my Launchpad. I'll check these tricks but I'm not sure I'll achieve what I need. Seriously, a drop down choice in MIDI mappings would be much more simpler! (And not impossible, it seems to me like a reasonable basic need for a software like Live)

I thought about it some more and came up with the idea of some dummyclips for Attack and Release, so you can play your clips with different fadeins and fadeouts... if you raise the release on the NoteLength-plugin you get a longer tail which you can then fadeout with a series of "Release"-dummyclips. You choose the length of Attack and Release via a pitch plugin that triggers the dummyclip that contains the desired fadelength.



Here's an example for an "attack dummyclip":

nc2010 wrote:Thanks a lot #1thelark !

Here is the same method (without M4L) with only 1 MIDITRACK :
* Create a MIDI TRACK
* Put the MIDI effect "Note Length" as shown below
* Group this effect in a effect chain
* Add a second "chain" (called "Normal" on the picture below) with no effect on this chain
* Route this to MIDIYoke !

Enjoy !!

Here the MIDI note sent when NoteOff will be the same than when NoteOn, with the same channel. With this method, it is very easy to assign Device ON / OFF with momentary switch behaviour





PS : A last request : i would like my APC40 to send MIDI notes instead of "clip launch messages" for the last row of the "clip launch 8x5 matrix" . Thanks a lot !

so for the n00bs, you basically install MidiYoke, activate its Track and Remote in Midi Settings, then use your instruction and BAM! Just map your buttons and that's it?

Yeah, just install Midiyoke or LoopBe1, set the remote and tracksettings for midiyoke in- and output, create a midieffectrack as shown above and you should be good to go. Go into midimapmode and you can first map the noteon and then the noteoff-event when releasing the key. You may need to add another Miditrack in order to send the Noteoff-events on a different Midiyoke channel.

Hey, I'm really struggling with the instructions and would be immensely appreciative for your advice. I've used midiox and yoke before, so this is not entirely alien to me.

I followed #1thelark's instructions according to the first post on the page (not the one with the chain by nc2010), but to no avail. I also tried the chained version and that didn't work either.

Just to be clear: I'm just using midiyoke, right? I don't have to have any of the devices configured in midi-ox, right?

When I map the buttons, am I supposed to have midi track 1 and 2 active, press down the button I want mapped (hold it down), deactivate midi track 2, activate track 3, and then release the button?

I'm trying to understand the logic of this. I know that the APC40 sends midi info both on the press and the release. So the idea is to make the info sent on release of the button to send "note off." Right?

Hi, I will post a detailed walkthru later... Just to make sure: you need to have your APC send midievents, which is afaik only possible with Hanz' script or the apc40 scripts from NativeKontrol. For midimapping you actually need to setup a midiclip that plays the notes you will send from your midicontroller later. If you set up a long note you don't need to deactivate any tracks during midimapping, as you will have enough time to map the note on and select the next button before the noteoff event. Hope this helps for now...I will post some screenshots later.

Cheers!

Ah, well the script was the missing piece of the puzzle. I found http://remotescripts.blogspot.com/ for Hanz's Script. This looks intense.

A detailed walkthrough would be amazing. Any idea when you might be able to put it together?

Sorry for the delay, I had to find a way around using the Controller directly for midimapping, because somehow Noteoff events couldn't be mapped with my Launchpad. I added some screenshots to the first posting.

Feel free to ask if you have any questions.

Cheers!

Just posted another approach to this rather annoying problem in this thread. Not necessarily superior, but might be simpler/easier for some people.

i'm trying to get my mind around this too.
any idea how to do this to map the note on and note off messages to the same controller.
that is, say, a send level, or a macro knob.
can the note on event turn the level of the send up (while holding down the pad/button) and upon release the same send level goes back to zero?
following these instructions, it seems that you need to assign the note on and note off messages to 2 separate parameters.
plz help!

Ok I was pulling my hair out trying to figure out why my controller wasn't sending the note off, I followed the original 2 track/2 channel directions to a T and finally figured out what the problem was. I needed to turn the Key Scale down all the way to -1! Hope it's helpful to anyone else wondering wtf it ain't working.

Well shit now that remote is on for my controller it doesn't work, looks like maybe a conflict between that and midiyoke...

Ok looks like the Midiyoke Yoke/IAC Channel needs to be different from the controller channel, you can set the midi in to all or the channel you controller is sending at then set the midi out to the channel the mappings are at (when my controller channel and Midiyoke out channel were the same it wouldn't receive)

I also had a problem where the note off velocity got weaker as the notes got higher. C-2 would register a Note off but after that it was nada, so instead of messing with the Key Scale insert a Velocity plug before the Note Off plug, turn the Mode to Fixed and set the Lowest Range to 64. That seems to make things equal. My controller sends a Note Off at 0 velocity but the Computer Keyboard sends a Note Off at 64 so I think this is why you can get Momentary behavior, from some controllers and not others, you need to get the note off Velocity 64 and higher. Hope this helps.

Hi,

thanks for the heads up, that velocity-plugin might have solved the problems I had when I tried mapping with the LP...

In the meantime ClyphX got some approaches for momentary behaviour as well, I haven't tried them out yet but I'm sure once you've set it up properly it will be easy to use.

These excerpts were taken from the ClyphX-documentation:

[...]X-Control
X-Controls will perform their Action List when pressed. They can optionally perform a second Action
List when released.[...]

[...]X-TRIGGERS
X-Clip
As mentioned in Naming Conventions, in order to turn a Clip into an X-Clip, you’ll need to add an
Identifier to the beginning of the Clip’s name.
There are several types of X-Clips:
DEFAULT
Example: [ID] CLIP SEMI > ; CLIP CENT -25
This X-Clip will perform its Action List when the X-Clip is played (not launched). This way, Action
Lists can be quantized via Global or Launch Quantization.[...]

[...]NOTES: It takes up to 100 ms for an X-Clip launch to be recognized in ClyphX. For that reason, if an
X-Clip is in a launched/playing state for less than 100 ms, this may cause its Action List to not be
performed.[...]