Some Thoughts on Chord Mode and Triggers

[Sparker]

The chord mode sections in the parameter guide are quite brief and technical in the descriptions of how they work. Initially I thought that the chord mode was restricted to the ‘polysix’ trigger mode – where the chord that is selected on the last played pad is transposed up the keyboard.

So today when I loaded programme AI-000 (Kronos German Grand) and dropped it down an octave with the SW1 button I was pleasantly surprised to hear the bottom eight keys C1-G1 playing the chord pads, while the keys I played above G1 sounded as usual. It took me little while to figure out that I’d changed and saved the Global settings on the Controllers/Scales – Controllers – MIDI/CC assign so that the pads were assigned to keys C1-G1. (The reason I had done this was to set up my Korg Microkontrol to trigger the pads (and this before I realised that the pads are mapped automatically with the OS 1.5.0 upgrade); and I hadn’t realised that these settings would apply to the keyboard).

If you’re an experienced user this may be obvious, or if an accomplished pianist it may not be particularly useful, but if like me you have four fingers and a thumb on your right hand and four thumbs and a finger (metaphorically) on your left hand, then being able to trigger desired chords with a single key is real boon. And as the information in the guide is somewhat sparse and technical I offer my ten pence/cents worth for those new to the game.

The method described above is great if you want eight specific chords at the press of a single key. Set the global setting up as described, (Global - Controllers/Scales – Controllers – MIDI/CC Assign with the Pads assigned to keys C1-G1), and set the SW1 assignment (In Programme Mode - Controllers) to ‘toggle’ and ‘octave down’ – that way the chords only trigger when SW1 is activated; useful if you have a 61 key version. (I think you could extend this up to 16 pads/chords using the KARMA Kronos software and a Korg Pad device, (but I haven’t tried the software yet so don’t know for sure)).

BTW: In Programme mode the chords will only sound when the (Programme – Common – Programme Basic – Voice Assign Mode – Chord) tab is set to ‘off’

The Pad chord assignments are saved with programmes so it’s possible to set up several programmes containing particular chord sequences which can then be quickly copied into the programme being used, with the Pads Tab dropdown menu ‘Copy Pad Setup’ command; and then choose a chord sequence using the ‘copy from programme’ box in the popup screen.

If you want to have a whole range of different chord types transposed from a single keyboard note then you can do this in chord mode by setting the (Programme – Common – Programme Basic – Voice Assign Mode – Chord) tab to ‘basic’ or ‘adv’. If you have Korg Pad device (Padkontrol, Kontrol49, etc) you can then assign different chord types to the pads (major/min/min 7th/ maj7th/aug/dim/etc) and choose different chords with the pads and different pitches/key with a note from the keyboard. (but only in Programme Mode - see last paragraph)

(If you don’t have a Korg Pad device you can achieve the same chord trigger effect as above by using the ‘pad’ tab in the Programme – Common – Programme Basic – Voice Assign page; locking it with the safety pin and then choosing which pad chord type to trigger from the menu – hat tip to ‘Lou’ )

Also in the 'Programme – Common – Programme Basic - Voice Assign' you can lock the ‘'Chord' tab open and turn the chord trigger on and off. If you have the 'Global Settings Pad Assign' set up as described above then when you turn chord mode off the bottom eight keys of the keyboard will revert to triggering the chord pads.

When in ‘chord mode’ one thing I couldn’t do was to play single notes in the upper registry separately from the chords being triggered. I tried using two EXi’s in the same patch but the chord mode affects both oscillators; so that didn’t work. I also tried setting up a combi (and a SEQ) with two German Grand patches (having turned chord mode on and saved the programme to a spare bank/slot – so there was a track loaded with the original A-I 000 patch and a track with the modified patch. The pads would play the unmodified track (chord mode off) but as soon as I included the modified track on the global channel (enabling chord mode) the pads cut off (so it appears there is no way of changing the chord type of the chords triggered in chord mode from the pads when in combi or SEQ mode).

[danatkorg]

The chord mode sections in the parameter guide are quite brief and technical in the descriptions of how they work. Initially I thought that the chord mode was restricted to the ‘polysix’ trigger mode – where the chord that is selected on the last played pad is transposed up the keyboard.

The Operation Guide's "Using the Chord Pads" section might contain more of the explanations you were looking for. Make sure that you have the latest PDF versions of the manuals (E4), as these include detailed info on playing pads from the keyboard as well as from the screen and USB pad devices.

Hope this helps,

Dan

[danatkorg]

When in ‘chord mode’ one thing I couldn’t do was to play single notes in the upper registry separately from the chords being triggered.

I don't understand this part; if you like, please explain in more detail.

also tried setting up a combi (and a SEQ) with two German Grand patches (having turned chord mode on and saved the programme to a spare bank/slot – so there was a track loaded with the original A-I 000 patch and a track with the modified patch. The pads would play the unmodified track (chord mode off) but as soon as I included the modified track on the global channel (enabling chord mode) the pads cut off (so it appears there is no way of changing the chord type of the chords triggered in chord mode from the pads when in combi or SEQ mode).

See the Operation Guide for more info here. The pads should certainly continue to select chords for Chord mode in Combinations and Songs.

[Sparker]

Dan: Thank you for the pointers - I'll check out the E4 version of the operation guide.

I was trying to get the setup described in the operation guide 'Uisng Chord Mode' at the bottom of page 37 'example setup: keyboard split' but I couldn't get it to work in Chord Mode. (I wanted to have the German Grand piano timbre playing in chord mode on the lower two octaves of the keyboard and at the same time be able to play melody lines on the upper octaves - and be able to switch between different chord types by pressing the Microkontrol/external controller pads.

When I assign the Pads to C1-G1 then I can choose between the 8 chords assigned to the pads on the bottom 8 keys (with SW1 'octave down' enabled) and play normally on all other keys, (as described in the guide), when Programme's Chord Mode is off.

When Chord Mode is on then I get whichever chord (type) is selected in the Pad control screen/external controller pads playing across the whole keyboard, (unless I bring the keyboard range down)

I will revisit this and try and find out what I'm doing wrong. It's probably something simple that I've overlooked.

What I was trying to explain in the part about 'Chord Mode' was that when in programme mode with Chord Mode enabled I can select a chord type (from the pads) and a pitch (from the keyboard) - allowing me to choose any one of 8 chord types in the pitch of the key I press. However when I tried to set this up in Combi or SEQ mod,e so that I had one track/timbre playing the chords and another track/timbre for playing melody, then whenever I used a timbre which had 'chord mode' enabled on the global channel it would result in the 'Pads' being turned off, (both from the screen pad control and from the Microkontrol), so that I couldn't select different chord types any longer.

I concluded that when in Combi or SEQ Mode (on Global channel) that enabling chord mode disabled the pad controllers.

Again I'll revisit this with the owners guide in hand.

Apologies if I'm not being clear - I think it's that difference between Chord Mode and Pad Control Mode and how they affect each other that I find hard to explain.

[Sparker]

Dan said: "The pads should certainly continue to select chords for Chord mode in Combinations and Songs".

This is the bit I was having trouble with.

[danatkorg]

I was trying to get the setup described in the operation guide 'Uisng Chord Mode' at the bottom of page 37 'example setup: keyboard split' but I couldn't get it to work in Chord Mode. (I wanted to have the German Grand piano timbre playing in chord mode on the lower two octaves of the keyboard and at the same time be able to play melody lines on the upper octaves - and be able to switch between different chord types by pressing the Microkontrol/external controller pads.

When I assign the Pads to C1-G1 then I can choose between the 8 chords assigned to the pads on the bottom 8 keys (with SW1 'octave down' enabled) and play normally on all other keys, (as described in the guide), when Programme's Chord Mode is off.

Note that this assignment (of notes to pads, in Global mode) is completely unnecessary when using a microKONTROL connected via USB. You can just leave all of these assignments set to Off. The KRONOS will automatically assign the first 8 pads on the microKONTROL to the KRONOS's 8 pads.

When Chord Mode is on then I get whichever chord (type) is selected in the Pad control screen/external controller pads playing across the whole keyboard, (unless I bring the keyboard range down)

I will revisit this and try and find out what I'm doing wrong. It's probably something simple that I've overlooked.

Were you in Combination mode, or Program mode?

This is only possible in Combination and Sequencer modes, since in Program mode you only have a single control for Chord on/off. Looking at the formatting, this example does not explicitly state that it's for Combination mode (though the instructions do call for assigning Programs to Timbres). I'll make this more clear in a future version.

What I was trying to explain in the part about 'Chord Mode' was that when in programme mode with Chord Mode enabled I can select a chord type (from the pads) and a pitch (from the keyboard) - allowing me to choose any one of 8 chord types in the pitch of the key I press. However when I tried to set this up in Combi or SEQ mod,e so that I had one track/timbre playing the chords and another track/timbre for playing melody, then whenever I used a timbre which had 'chord mode' enabled on the global channel it would result in the 'Pads' being turned off, (both from the screen pad control and from the Microkontrol), so that I couldn't select different chord types any longer.

I concluded that when in Combi or SEQ Mode (on Global channel) that enabling chord mode disabled the pad controllers.

My guess is that the Chord Source for the Timbres or Tracks in question was set to PRG. This is described in the Operation Guide:

"What if Timbres/Tracks share the same channel, but have different Source settings?
"If Timbres/Tracks share the same channel but have different Source settings, they will maintain the different settings as long as the Pads are not used to select a different chord. As soon as a Pad is used, all the Timbres/Tracks will be set to the same chord–unless they are set to PRG.
"When Source is set to PRG, the Timbre/Track uses the Source chord stored in the Program, instead of any of the chords from the current Combi or Song. This makes it easy to use Chord mode for sound‐specific effects, such as octaves, stacked fifths, and so on."

Again I'll revisit this with the owners guide in hand.

Apologies if I'm not being clear - I think it's that difference between Chord Mode and Pad Control Mode and how they affect each other that I find hard to explain.

This is described in the Operation Guide: "When Chord mode is enabled, pressing a pad edits the Source [chord] parameter. The pad will not play any sounds by itself; it only selects the chord to be played from the keyboard."

I've just run through all of this on my system, and it works as described.

Hope this helps,

Dan

[Sparker]

Dan; again thanks for the pointers.

Re: automatic pad assignment - when I first set up the microkontol under OS1.5.0 I didn't attach both the midi in and midi out cable (just the midi in as this matched my setup for controlling KARMA 1 on the Triton where no output to the controller is needed) & I hadn't used the USB connection.

So to get the pads to play from the microkontrol I assigned the pads in Global and used the microkontrol editor to configure the pads outgoing note message to match the global assignments - thus later when I dropped the Piano down by 1 octave I got the pad chords played on the bottom 8 keys (by PAD/MIDI/CC assign in Global mode) - I mentioned this in my original post purely because I found it a lot easier (not moving my hand from the keyboard) to press a key on the keyboard than having to press the pads on the external controller (there are other situations when I prefer to use the microkontrol pads i.e. for triggering pads/chords when in KARMA mode & without having to move between pages on the Kronos screen).

You asked - "Were you in Combination mode, or Program mode?"
I was trying to do this in programme mode - then I saw that the chord mode on/off affected the whole programme - so it didn't matter if I used two EXi slots as they were both controlled by the single on/off parametre.

That's why I tried to set it up in Combi & SEQ modes - What I tried was using the A-I 000 patch in two versions; one was the original factory patch (timbre 1) and the other was the same patch with the chord mode turned on (saved as a new programme) used as timbre 2. Whenever I enabled timbre 2 on the global channel the Pads function turned off and I could only select the chord type that was selected in the programme (I think this what the guide says happens) - however what I wanted to be able to do was to select different chord types (min/maj/dim, etc) by using the pads on the external controller/microkontrol (& which I can do in Programme Mode - and which I couldn't do (in Combi/seq mode) as the pads became disabled as soon as I set the second timbre - the patch with the chord mode enabled - to the Global Channel. The only chord type that would sound was the one used (default) in the programme - maybe I've got the 'source' set up wrongly for the combi/seq?

(I hope that makes sense - if not then I'll try and rewrite all this more simply and clearly when I understand better what I'm doing)

I'll follow the Op guide (again) and see if I can find out what I'm doing wrong re:Combi's and SEQ

All part of the learning curve for me

[Sparker]

PS. Re: My comments about the Guides.

There are some parts of the guides that take you through setups in a step-by-step tutorial fashion (like setting up the MOD-7) and then there are other parts of the guide where you just get information about the settings/parameters.

For someone like myself (self-taught) who discovered MIDI and workstations only a few years back it can be fairly bewildering figuring out what's what.

For instance; I understand the terms legato, poly, mono and offset - but don't know what these mean in practice (poly-legato, legato-offset, etc) and changing between 'basic' and 'adv' settings in the chord mode and listening to the results has so far left me non-the-wiser as far as what the actual difference is between these modes.

PS> I'm not criticising the guides, just making observations.

[danatkorg]

Dan; again thanks for the pointers.

I'm glad to help.

Re: automatic pad assignment - when I first set up the microkontol under OS1.5.0 I didn't attach both the midi in and midi out cable (just the midi in as this matched my setup for controlling KARMA 1 on the Triton where no output to the controller is needed) & I hadn't used the USB connection.

Yes, the USB connection is required for automatic pad assignment.

That's why I tried to set it up in Combi & SEQ modes - What I tried was using the A-I 000 patch in two versions; one was the original factory patch (timbre 1) and the other was the same patch with the chord mode turned on (saved as a new programme) used as timbre 2. Whenever I enabled timbre 2 on the global channel the Pads function turned off and I could only select the chord type that was selected in the programme (I think this what the guide says happens) - however what I wanted to be able to do was to select different chord types (min/maj/dim, etc) by using the pads on the external controller/microkontrol (& which I can do in Programme Mode - and which I couldn't do (in Combi/seq mode) as the pads became disabled as soon as I set the second timbre

The pads aren't disabled; they are now selecting chords, instead of playing them directly. This is described in the Operation Guide: "When Chord mode is enabled, pressing a pad edits the Source [chord] parameter. The pad will not play any sounds by itself; it only selects the chord to be played from the keyboard."

- the patch with the chord mode enabled - to the Global Channel. The only chord type that would sound was the one used (default) in the programme - maybe I've got the 'source' set up wrongly for the combi/seq?

My guess is that the Chord Source for the Timbres or Tracks in question was set to PRG. If this is set to PRG, the timbre will always play the chord stored in the Program, and will not be affected by the Combi's chord selection. As above:

"What if Timbres/Tracks share the same channel, but have different Source settings?
"If Timbres/Tracks share the same channel but have different Source settings, they will maintain the different settings as long as the Pads are not used to select a different chord. As soon as a Pad is used, all the Timbres/Tracks will be set to the same chord–unless they are set to PRG.
"When Source is set to PRG, the Timbre/Track uses the Source chord stored in the Program, instead of any of the chords from the current Combi or Song. This makes it easy to use Chord mode for sound‐specific effects, such as octaves, stacked fifths, and so on."

[Sparker]

Dan: Can you clear up a couple of questions for me re: the chord mode?

"When Source is set to PRG, the Timbre/Track uses the Source chord stored in the Program, instead of any of the chords from the current Combi or Song".

1. What do I set the timbre source to instead of PRG if I don't want to recall the source chord in the program - ('Int')?
and what affect will it have (setting to other than PRG)?

2. Are 'the chords from the current combi or song' the ones stored on the pads? - if not what and where are they?

Apologies if I'm being dense

NB. I still haven't connected the microkontrol using the USB connection (I'm still using the midi in/out and assigning the pads via Global Pads/CC's) - Would using the USB make any difference other than auto-assigning the pads - (in terms of sending messages)

[danatkorg]

Dan: Can you clear up a couple of questions for me re: the chord mode?

"When Source is set to PRG, the Timbre/Track uses the Source chord stored in the Program, instead of any of the chords from the current Combi or Song".

1. What do I set the timbre source to instead of PRG if I don't want to recall the source chord in the program - ('Int')?
and what affect will it have (setting to other than PRG)?

2. Are 'the chords from the current combi or song' the ones stored on the pads? - if not what and where are they?

This section of the manuals should be helpful:

Parameter Guide -> Combination mode -> Combination P2: Timbre Parameters -> 2–2: OSC -> Chord -> Source Pad.

NB. I still haven't connected the microkontrol using the USB connection (I'm still using the midi in/out and assigning the pads via Global Pads/CC's) - Would using the USB make any difference other than auto-assigning the pads - (in terms of sending messages)

There are some differences, mostly in terms of limitations on clock and sysex messages. There's more info in this section of the manuals:

Parameter Guide -> Appendices -> MIDI applications -> USB MIDI controllers

Best regards,

Dan

[Sparker]

Again Many thanks.

I'm all sorted now - It was a case of getting the correct settings on the source pad drop down menu where I was having troube. (In Combination P2: Timbre Parameters -> 2–2: OSC -> Chord -> Source Pad).

As always the devil's in details

[kenrdot]

Is it possible to play the pad chords on the lower keys without external pads if so how is this done thank you

[Sparker]

Yes it is.

To set up the keys go to Global Mode -> Controllers/Scales -> Controllers and in the panel called Midi/CC Assign (at bottom of page) go to the Pads (in blue) and assign the key you want to play a pad in the pad assign box for each key/pad.

I've got a 61 key Kronos and my preference is to assign C1 -> G1 to the eight pads - then in programme mode I can assign SW1 to 'octave down (in Prog Mode -> Common Controllers -> Panel Switch Assign -> SW1 drop down menu. Then I can press SW1 and the bottom 8 keys will play the chords assigned to the 8 pads.

Of course in the Global mode you can assign the Pads to C2 -> G2 and then the bottom 8 keys will play the pads without dropping the octave down, but this will reduce the keyboard range if you don't want to be using the pads while playing.

Also see Page 779 in the Version E4 of the parameter guide.

[404bekawe]

Hi Sparker,
just found/read this interesting post.
I'm a happy owner of a Korg M3.
The idea to trigger or to play what's "in" a PAD with a (lower) key on the keyboard is something I would like to do, but yet no luck to find info about this.
I'm wondering if there is a way to do this "assignment" with the M3?
Hope you have a minute to drop me a line or direct me to where I can educate myself.
Thank you & regards!

Yes it is.

To set up the keys go to Global Mode -> Controllers/Scales -> Controllers and in the panel called Midi/CC Assign (at bottom of page) go to the Pads (in blue) and assign the key you want to play a pad in the pad assign box for each key/pad.

I've got a 61 key Kronos and my preference is to assign C1 -> G1 to the eight pads - then in programme mode I can assign SW1 to 'octave down (in Prog Mode -> Common Controllers -> Panel Switch Assign -> SW1 drop down menu. Then I can press SW1 and the bottom 8 keys will play the chords assigned to the 8 pads.

Of course in the Global mode you can assign the Pads to C2 -> G2 and then the bottom 8 keys will play the pads without dropping the octave down, but this will reduce the keyboard range if you don't want to be using the pads while playing.

Also see Page 779 in the Version E4 of the parameter guide.