Korg Forums

Here are a few things I would like to know a bit more about if anyone has a good description, the manual is frighteningly vague.

1. Scale On/Off
I presumed that this would affect if the item is constrained to the scale like a melodic element or left at a single pitch like a drum ...but it doesn't do that, I DO know it seems to shift the notes around for a given part...but I cant determine "how" it shifts them as both the on and off settings appear to be in some sort of scale.

2. Trigger Mode Normal/Seq 1st/ Seq Play
I can tell that one mode stops any sound being made as I select parts in trigger mode, but I cant tell why I would want to use it, or the difference between the other two.

3. Length/Last Step...this confusion relates to Korgs own description of the product.
I felt we were led to believe that each PART could have its own length, this is practical as I tend to just programme 1 bar of drums as they are then quick to modify, but I like to have 2 bars for melodic parts and the full 4 bars for chords or bass notes....this really was a selling point to me for buying, but it doesn't seem like it works this way...all I can pick is a 1 bar part for everything globally OR by having the Last Step as 4 which gives me 16 steps in total but STILL spread out over four pages which is the worst of both worlds...

I can't see why they couldn't either have the Length selectable per part and/or have the last step go all the way up to 64 so I could pre-save the amount of bars per part.

1. Scale On/Off
I presumed that this would affect if the item is constrained to the scale like a melodic element or left at a single pitch like a drum ...but it doesn't do that, I DO know it seems to shift the notes around for a given part...but I cant determine "how" it shifts them as both the on and off settings appear to be in some sort of scale.

>>> It basically just locks all the parts with that turned on so that when you change the key for one of them, they all follow. If you have Parts 1-4 with Scale On, you can change the key of Part 1 to D and Part 2-4 will also turn to D. Fun with drum sounds for fills. <<</b>>> Trigger Mode is the normal mode, press a Trigger Pad and get a sound playing C4 (I think it's C4 off the top of my hed). Seq 1st will instead play the first note you have recorded for that Part, instead of using C4. Seq Play will play back the recorded sequence for that Part only when you press the associated Trigger Pad. <<</b>>> No idea, you'd have to ask Korg that one <<<

The last step parameter is available per track, what it does is allow each tracks 4 pages to have a length upto 16 steps, so in the case that you wanted a 1 bar bassline over a 4 bar drum pattern, just set the bassline track to last step of 4 (4x4pages = 16 steps)

But the fun really starts when you use different last step lengths for polyrhythms....

Read the parameter guide already. Not the useless owner's manual, the parameter guide.

Trigger mode sets what the pads do. Seq play = sequence plays as you hold the pad down. Seq 1st = first note in sequence plays when you hold the pad down.

Seq 1st is good for finding which of those synths is your bass sound, and I use it by default.

Seq play could be good for live performance... it'll let you throw short melodic parts into your finger drumming setup.

I agree. Also its important to add that when using Seq1st, if there's nothing recorded, it defaults to C4.

Tarekith wrote:1. Scale On/Off
I presumed that this would affect if the item is constrained to the scale like a melodic element or left at a single pitch like a drum ...but it doesn't do that, I DO know it seems to shift the notes around for a given part...but I cant determine "how" it shifts them as both the on and off settings appear to be in some sort of scale.

>>> It basically just locks all the parts with that turned on so that when you change the key for one of them, they all follow. If you have Parts 1-4 with Scale On, you can change the key of Part 1 to D and Part 2-4 will also turn to D. Fun with drum sounds for fills. <<</b>>> Trigger Mode is the normal mode, press a Trigger Pad and get a sound playing C4 (I think it's C4 off the top of my hed). Seq 1st will instead play the first note you have recorded for that Part, instead of using C4. Seq Play will play back the recorded sequence for that Part only when you press the associated Trigger Pad. <<</b>>> No idea, you'd have to ask Korg that one <<<

Yeah - I learned this when I was using ableton to sequence into a pattern and was absolutely confused at first as to why the notes that I was playing were not being recorded - in actuality they were but with the scale on it interpolated the playback

Sorry for the weird formatting, huh.

Too bad you can't latch the parts using Seq Play....

does seq play work even with the actual sequencer stopped?

so if on part one I limit the steps to 4 and play the notes C,F,C,G

then on part two make a melody, E,D,G,D,C,E,F,C for instance

could I hit pads 1 and 2 at the same time and get

pad1 C,F,C,G,C,F,C,G
pad2 E,D,G,D,C,E,F,C

if that makes sense?

if so this unit could find an odd new life as a purely finger drumming unit for me.

I'm not sure if the sequences loop but seq play certainly does work without the unit 'playing' at the time... I think it's intended to enable finger drumming techniques.

This has got me very excited...can't wait to get back home and see if it is possible to do something like this....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezM9pxc1VpI