Song Mode

Imba · Post by **Imba** » Sat Aug 28, 2010 1:02 am

Hey guys, new guy here with his EMX. So I've had it for just under a week now, and I understand a fair amount about it, making patterns, editing parts, step edit etc, the basics to making a good song just out of pressing the different drum and synth parts within a pattern.

Evidently, the manual hasn't been of much help, as what I'm trying to do is to basically, make a song to play automatically. I know how to go onto song mode, and add positions, and add a pattern to it, but is it possible to have the same pattern for each position, but change it so as the positions progress, different synth and drum patterns come on and off? I tried the part mute function, with "mute hold" turned off, so that in different positions different synth/drum parts should turn on and off, but when I start to play the song, it forgets that I've muted any of the synth/drum parts and plays all the parts that I have turned on when I am on pattern mode.

I hope this makes some sense to you, because it's kind of frustrating, and I'm getting the feeling that the answer is obvious. The only other way I can think of doing it would be to have loads of separate patterns, with each one have one drum/synth part, and then you just put these at each position, however that would take forever, wastes space and isn't very efficient... So, if someone would be able to help with, I would really, really appreciate it. Cheers!

tim from texas · Post by **tim from texas** » Sat Aug 28, 2010 5:38 pm

patten copy is your friend.. if youre trying to make song mode remember different changes youre doing to ONE pattern it doesnt work that way. it only references saved patterns in the pattern list. however there is an easy fix to that.. make your pattern. save to whatever slot you want. now make a change to it and hit save. then change to the next slot and hit save. now the same pattern only with slight changes is saved to two slots. you do this as many times as need be and then plug them into the song mode as a1 a2 a3 a4 a2 a3 a4 a4 or whatever sequence you want them in. you can repeat the same pattern over and over by entering it in for several slots in a row but it wont read changed to the orig without saving to a new slot. there is another way you can make patterns save to the 16 steps so you can just hit the steps and jam rather than just programming.

roxxx303 · Post by **roxxx303** » Tue Aug 31, 2010 9:46 am

No, it works really simple, you don't have to save a pattern for each part-muting:

--> I tried the part mute function, with "mute hold" turned off...

Turn "mute hold" "on" in Song-Mode, then insert your Pattern for example 30 times, go to the Song-beginning and hit "Record" and start to groove the hell out of your pattern by muting/umuting parts. Everything will be recorded!

-roxxx303

tim from texas · Post by **tim from texas** » Tue Aug 31, 2010 5:44 pm

ahhh yea i forgot that... youre saying hit record while in song mode and while the song is playing and it will keep all your mutes and stuff. i remember hearing about people doing motion sequences while the song is playing but didnt realize you could do it with one pattern and multiple spots.. thanks for the tip!

beg4silence · Post by **beg4silence** » Tue Sep 14, 2010 2:36 pm

roxxx303 wrote:No, it works really simple, you don't have to save a pattern for each part-muting:

--> I tried the part mute function, with "mute hold" turned off...

Turn "mute hold" "on" in Song-Mode, then insert your Pattern for example 30 times, go to the Song-beginning and hit "Record" and start to groove the hell out of your pattern by muting/umuting parts. Everything will be recorded!

-roxxx303

awesome... i basically had the same question... that just answered it, thanks! One can really get some great "on the fly" leads going whilst jamming... and i wanted to record them (among other knob tweaks, breaks, etc) thanks again!

Badvibration · Post by **Badvibration** » Thu Nov 11, 2010 3:15 am

roxxx303 wrote: Turn "mute hold" "on" in Song-Mode, then insert your Pattern for example 30 times, go to the Song-beginning and hit "Record" and start to groove the hell out of your pattern by muting/umuting parts. Everything will be recorded!
-roxxx303

This works for the preset patterns, but for the ones that I've created it doesn't. Is there a specific setting you need to turn on in pattern mode?

cooptrol · Post by **cooptrol** » Thu Nov 11, 2010 5:23 pm

What I do to create songs is:

1) I create a pattern with the sound I like, without sequences

2) I sequence all the song in Live

3) I make a Song on the Electribe with the pattern I made repeated many times so as to last longer than the song I made on Live.

4) I press Rec on Song mode and hit play on Live, all the song sequences are recorded on the Electribe

5) I record knob tweaks and other stuff that can't be controlled from the computer cos they are NRPNs

Badvibration · Post by **Badvibration** » Thu Nov 11, 2010 5:46 pm

cooptrol wrote:
1) I create a pattern with the sound I like, without sequences

This is what I do, but since I don't have Live I just head straight into song mode and record. But for some reason it doesn't let me part mute anything so I can't undo any of the event recordings I do. Do you know of another workaround for this?

cooptrol · Post by **cooptrol** » Thu Nov 11, 2010 6:28 pm

Sorry I never used the Song mode in the traditional way, I find it cumbersome and anti-creative.
I can't conceive creating a song having to build its separate parts previously.

The way I do it you don't need mutes, cos sounds appear only when there's a sequence for them. You can use any midi sequencer to do this, not only Live, and if you don't like to pirate software, there are also open source sequencers on the net. You just need a midi interface. Believe me, once you make a song this way, you can never go back to the "Korg" way.

Badvibration · Post by **Badvibration** » Thu Nov 11, 2010 9:24 pm

Well I have pro tools and a midi interface, but I don't understand how using midi lets you create songs using the patterns off of the esx. I thought midi was only used to control software. Sorry if this is a stupid question.

Badvibration · Post by **Badvibration** » Fri Nov 12, 2010 7:08 am

Okay nevermind, I found the transmitting data by midi section in the manual. Thanks for introducing me to this, it just opened up a bunch more possibilities.

Also I figured out how to get the part mute to work. Turns out you have to have something recorded on the original pattern for some reason, but it could be just one snare hit.

Good day was good. Thanks again!

goranfritz · Post by **goranfritz** » Fri Dec 09, 2011 10:50 am

cooptrol wrote:What I do to create songs is:

1) I create a pattern with the sound I like, without sequences

2) I sequence all the song in Live

3) I make a Song on the Electribe with the pattern I made repeated many times so as to last longer than the song I made on Live.

4) I press Rec on Song mode and hit play on Live, all the song sequences are recorded on the Electribe

5) I record knob tweaks and other stuff that can't be controlled from the computer cos they are NRPNs

I just get an ESX-1 and this make sense. Korg's way of making songs is annoying.
But I come up with one problem...
I'm sequencing with cubase and everything is going well, but ones it's recorded and I hit play... there must be some DROP-OFFS
...anyone???