Load Yamaha Styles directly in Live and play them

[Udo Behm]

Hi guys, I guess many of you know that there are plenty of musical styles available on the internet that can be played with many MIDI keyboards like the Yamaha ones. Unfortunately Ableton Live does not have an import function for any of these styles available for free on pages like this: http://www.psrtutorial.com/sty/yamaha/

When loading the .sty files in Samplitude you get results like this:




Wouldn't it be cool having all of the different sections of the style parts (see the markers on top of the timeline in the picture) in different scenes in Live??

I pretty much like the idea, having all the style parts in all the different scenes in Live and being able to actually "play" the styles live in Live.

Adding the J74 HarmoTools http://fabriziopoce.com/HarmoTools.html to each MIDI channel makes it possible to play the sounds in different scales, like on real keyboards!!

The only two problems are that Live currently does not allow the import of STY-Files and also it does not "cut" these files automatically on the right positions so that their elements fit in the Live scenes and rows of the Session view. Here comes my question: Can anybode create a script or something that does this job? Would be helpful if the J74 HarmoTools also get added automatically to each track and mapped to a MIDI channel that has the HarmoChord J74 main device included.

The next problem is that on a real keyboard you can directly change a "scene" (a style part) when changing the parts of the style on the keyboard (Yamaha calls this function "Auto fill". It directly plays a pattern in between the different style parts and "fills" into the next stype part (Main A, B, C, D)). In live so far you cannot launch other cips immediately if you want them to be still in sync with the global quantization. I've suggested in another thread before that scenes should be able to get launched immediately (in this case the "fill" parts of the song) as soon as you launch them, but still in sync - cutting off the notes that should have been played already - see my other post here: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=202530 Then the fill scene should be configured to automatically launch the next scene that includes the Main parts A, B, C or D of the Yamaha style.

Last but not least the MIDI channels are not mapped to any instrument in Live yet, except for external MIDI synthesizers that change their behavior according to the already set Program Change values in each of the channels of the STY-Files. Means that you could use the Microsoft MIDI Mapper or an external hardware to actually "hear" the sounds of the STY-File. Maybe someone has an idea of how to "auto-map" Live instruments according to the Program Change information provided in the MIDI channels??

I think so many people could benefit from loading Styles into Live and play with them like on real keyboards. I hope, someone is able to make this idea happen. I know that there are programs like OneManBand or Live-Styler that do this job already. But think of the combination of playing styles directly in Live and adding other stuff in the program. Wouldn't that be worth the time making this idea happen?

[nonchai]

Hi ,

just seconding your idea.

Been thinking along these lines too.

Out of interest there is now a cross platform arranger app for windows and Mac - Giglad - that loads and plays Yamaha styles in the exact way hardware arrangers do. Now currently there's no MIDI plugin or M4L version of this - but here's the thing - and something that with enough monetary help - the developer *might* do - the app was written using C++ and the JUCE framework. This means there's a lot of potential and support library wise to port the core code to something else potentially - VST or midi plugins- or maybe even putting the core essentials into a DLL ( or on Apple - Dylyb/component etc.. ) and have it run inside some custom Max 4 live code in order to make what you ( and me ) are wanting.