Bank change with an external midi controller

[klauzzdesign]

Hello,

I'd like to know if it's possible to change bank up and down in Amplitube 5 with the help of an external midi controller. It seems to me that there's no explicit assignment button in the midi 'control change' section and I'm not interested in 'preset next/previous' because it doesn't do what I'm looking for.

I don't own the iRig Stomp I/O which apparently can perform the change bank by simply holding buttons 1 and 2. I'm using instead a Line 6 FBV MK II pedalboard and I'm able to send either PC or CC messages to Amplitube. Both the program and continuous changes work like a charm, but I haven't found anything related to how achieve a bank change.

Looking at the Stomp I/O manual https://download.ikmultimedia.com/plugi ... Manual.pdf

specifically at the bottom of page 11 it seems that when button 1 and 2 (in the stomp I/O) are hold for > 1 sec the pedalboard sends the following midi control commands to Amplitube:

Bank down: CC#25
Bank up: CC#24

I mapped my external midi controller to the CCs above but nothing happens. I wonder now if the bank change can only be achieve with a iRig Stomp I/O. Maybe it's a commercial decision, but I'd like to know if someone has actually found a solution to it with other external midi controllers.

[klauzzdesign]

It seems that someone else had difficulties in reaching presets >= 5 with a midi controller.
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=26828#p114549

The fact they didn't get any answers in how to achieve that is not promising at all

Hope that someone from IK Multimedia can help with this. I don't have anything against the fact that switching banks can only achieved with the Stomp I/O but I'd like to be more transparent to the end user. The Stomp costs ~250 bucks which added to the cost of Amplitube 5 would bring the total cost close to other products more suitable for live performances.

[DarkStar]

As this is primarily a user to user forum, someone-else may chip in. Maybe someone with a Stomp I/O can monitors the MIDI message it sends and provide that information

Have you tried just sending MIDI Program Change messages with values of 4 or more?
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[klauzzdesign]

Thank you DarkStar for replying.

Have you tried just sending MIDI Program Change messages with values of 4 or more?

I have no problems whatsoever with passing PC with values > 4.

Most of the midi pedalboard controllers have
- a dedicated A, B, C, D buttons for patches or stomp changes
- two dedicated up and down buttons for bank changes

A, B, C, D can send a fixed PC change e.g. 0, 1, 2, 3 (and they correctly recall preset 1, 2, 3, 4). If they are mapped to for instance change 4, 5, 6, 7 they can do that without any hiccup.

Now, I think that the big issues that most users (myself included) face are the followings:

1) is not clear what kind of PC should be sent to map the up/down banks buttons. That would allow to jump to presets up and down 4 at a time.

2) provided that point 1 is solved, there's another important aspect to consider. Since A, B, C, D can be mapped to a fixed number (0, 1, 2, 3 in the example above) those buttons will always recall the presets 1, 2, 3, 4 (even if a bank has been changed up or down).

I have the feeling that the iRig Stomp I/O has some custom behaviour in order to allow A, B, C, D buttons to dynamically call a different number according to the bank the user is on. So it can be possible that Stomp I/O has some internal processing to allow that.

I'm not an expert with MIDI unfortunately, but yeah... the only messages I can send from the Line 6 FBV MK II are fixed PC or CC.

[DarkStar]

OK, so the presets are selected by a straight-forward PC number.

So it seems, indeed, that there could be some firmware in the stomp I/O that alters the PC numbers sent by A, B, C and D depending on the numbers of "ups" or "downs". I do not think that the that the Stomp I/O Up and Down buttons send any MIDI, but I could be completely wrong.

[datkings]

OK, so the presets are selected by a straight-forward PC number.

Thanks to DarkStar...I did a little experimenting myself. Using Bome's MIDI Translator Classic (for my setup I need this for my MIDI controller to work) I was able to send MIDI program changes to Amplitube 5.

MIDI program change 00 = Preset 001
MIDI program change 01 = Preset 002
MIDI program change 02 = Preset 003
MIDI program change 10 = Preset 011
MIDI program change 19 = Preset 020
etc.

The preset numbers are off by 1 since the MIDI starts on 0 and the preset numbers start on 1.

DarkStar's comment got me on the right path...so I thought I would report my findings in case it could help klauzzdesign.

[klauzzdesign]

Thank you Datkings for experimenting and sharing your feedback.
As I mentioned above I don’t have any issues with sending PC messages in order to change a preset, and my main problems are related to ‘moving up and down the banks’ and recall the 4 presets of the current selected bank using button A, B, C, D of my pedalboard.

Provided I will be able to find the CC messages to move between the banks, I won’t be able to assign more than one PC to e.g. button A. In bank 1-4 button A can recall preset 1 (passing 0 as you also noticed), but in bank 5-8 button A should instead recall preset 5. This means that button A, B,C,D should dynamically send different PC messages depending on the bank I’m on. This is clearly not possible with my current pedalboard (Line 6 FBV MKII) and, as mentioned in my previous message, I believe (as also DarkStar mentioned) that the dynamic behaviour I was referring to is handled by the pedalboard itself in the case of the Stomp I/O.
If this is correct, it means that there’s no way in AmpliTube 5 to freely move between banks and preset using any midi pedalboard. Unless you have 127 buttons (one per preset) of course

Now, in order to allow ANY pedalboard or controller to recall any presets in any bank, I think that Amplitube should handle that behaviour internally.

If you set Amplitube in Live mode you'll notice the following controls on screen:
- the four buttons - to call each preset of the current bank
- a left arrow - to perform bank down
- a right arrow - to perform bank up

If the user will be able to simply map the buttons of their pedalboard to any of the controls in the list above I think that would be it. For instance:
- four buttons (presets) could be mapped to: PC0, PC1, PC2, PC3
- left arrow (previous bank) could be mapped to: PC4
- right arrow (next bank) could be mapped to: PC5

This means that anytime PC5 reaches Amplitube the bank will move up. Since Amplitube knows that the user is on bank e.g. 5-8, then PC0, PC1, PC2, PC3 will be able to recall respectively preset 5, 6, 7, 8.

This solution would allow more flexibility and will open up Amplitube to many MIDI pedalboards out there. But maybe I'm just overengineering...

[smata65]

I see some midi confusion here.

A midi bank contains 128 presets, For example a keyboard i have has 7 banks of 128 presets.

When you send a midi bank change, you select the active bank for the device or software that you are using, and then you can use PC command to select any of the 128 presets on that bank
Amplitube DOES NOT use banks. You assign 128 of the thousands of possible presets, to be selected by your midi controller.

Of course, there is no midi controller with 128 buttons What midi controllers usually do is to have"BANKS" with 4, 5, or in the case of my FCB 1010 10 buttons. But these are not midi banks, so no midi command is sent from the controller, and have nothing to do with the controlled software or gear.

Usually there is a way to program the controller, to select what PC commands are sent from each internal "BANK"(Keep using quotes to remind you that these are not midi banks)

You have to check your controller documentation, to see if it has this function outside Line 6 products

[klauzzdesign]

Thank you smata65, that was really helpful.
I think you’re very right and the limitation I’m facing comes from my Line 6 controller which was originally designed to control a POD.

Following your explanation it means that a requirement for a MIDI controller (in order to be used with Amplitube) is to be able to handle different “internal banks” where each preset can be manually configured to send specific PC messages.

For instance, If my pedalboard had 10 buttons (per internal bank) I could assign the first ten ones from PC0 to PC9 and in the second ‘internal bank’ start from PC10 onwards and so on.

Will check if the FCB1010 works for me or if there are some alternative solutions on the market.

Of course I’m also open to other suggestions if someone else has successfully tackled it and is happy with it.