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Hi guys and dolls, here’s my question today: I’m using the Altura to control cheap old keyboards just for fun and to see what kinds of sounds I can make, and it has been a lot of fun, and it really gives the old keyboard a second life. But I have an issue, not really to do with the Altura but maybe you can help diagnose. A whole lot of cheap keyboards have MIDI as well as a whole lot of voices. But the way they set up the controls for those things back then, the external MIDI controller — in this case the Altura — has to send program change messages in order to be able to play different voices, the control panel on the keyboard doesn’t appear to affect the external device’s voice. Now I’ve tried different channels on the Altura and wound up getting different voices on some of them, but I’m thinking I need another device in addition to the Altura to send the program change messages I’m seeing in the implementation chart for the keyboard; would you agree or have I missed something?
That’s right; the Altura does not send program changes. When I played live years ago, I used an ART UltraFoot, which is an array of footswitches, to send program changes while playing. If touching the keyboard control panel does not give you the voice you want, then yes, you would need to inject another device into the chain to send one-off program changes when needed.
Yeah, well I’ve already ordered a pretty good solution, I think, a Yamaha MFC2 MIDI Foot Controller, which apparently was originally meant to complement a wind controller, and it looks like it may have a couple special features that will lend themselves equally well to the Altura. Really excited. This keyboard claims to have 600+ voices, I want to play them!
Okay, the MIDI controller has arrived. It appears to be working but I’m not really clear on how everything is arranged. I can definitely get more voices. Time to get back to the manual.
