I haven’t used a MIDI controller before. This is for live use.
I will probably have around 20-30 different patches on the synth (no banks or anything, just a program number for each) and I will need to quickly select the next one by name, and in some arbitrary order (depending on what song is called next).
What is the workflow for creating a named list of all the patches I have, and what is the workflow for choosing a patch to select?
I’m trying to figure out how many buttons have to be pressed to choose the next sound, and what the display looks like when doing this. It seems like it should be simple, but I haven’t been able to find a simple example of what it looks and feels like to do this in a live pressure situation. I’ll be using either an MC3 or a MC4 Pro.
Each button on the controller can display whatever label you want, and it can display whether it’s toggled “on” or “off” using either the label and/or colors (the background and a light-up “strip” provide two different color zones). Since you’re using a smaller controller but want to be able to quickly access 20+ presets, I think the MC4 Pro is more useful for (1) providing one more button; (2) being visually clearer; and (3) having more banks and pages for you to arrange your patch changes.
You’re basically building your own user interface that has four buttons, so think about how you can group things. For example, if you could group your synth sounds into four groups: Leads, Pads, Basses, Plucks. Each of those might jump you to another bank with their specific sounds. When you select a synth on that bank, it might automatically jump you back “home” or leave you there to browse, depending on your preference.