Emax sysex control success!
2003-10-24 by Chris Strellis
Hi all and special greeting to Rob Keeble and John Silveria, After downloading the Emax midi sysex PDF http://www.emulatorarchive.com/Manuals/ManualsEmax/manualsemax.html (thanks Rob) and scrutinising it thoroughly, I thought I should be able to control my Emax SE and Emax II using my Peavey PC1600 controller (it's the original not the X version). http://www.peavey.com/products/shop_online/browse.cfm/action/details/i tem/18017860/wc/1A1D1/fam/1D/tcode/1/1600x.cfm (you will probably have to rebuild the link into your browser with cut and paste a few times) I bought the Peavey nearly a year ago but hadn't got around to programming it or using it until last night so I had to learn that as well! I picked on just one control as a try out - the Filter Cut Off - a good one in my opinion :-). I programmed the fader to send a MIDI string with the values all in hexadecimal: F0 18 02 1A 00 57 02 1F pr F7 F0 - system exclusive 18 - E-mu id 02 - Emax id 1A - exclusive command to change voice parameter 00 - the lowest key number 57 - the highest key number (87 in decimal) 02 - affect both voices, primary and secondary 1F - Filter cut-off parameter pr - Value from the fader (0 to 120 in decimal) F7 - end of sysex message I then connected the MIDI out of the Peavey to the MIDI in of my Emax II, loaded a Minimoog bass sound and........... It worked!!!! I could control the bass sound filter cut off just from the Peavey fader. However, there are some limitations. Just like editing the sound from the Emax data slider and buttons, the update doesn't happen unless you release the key and press it again. If you play quickly, this isn't much of a problem. Also, if you have an arpeggio or sequence playing, then as soon as you touch the fader to alter the filter cut off, the playing stops. I know I have assigned the right wheel to control filter cut off in the past and that changes the cut-off whilst a note is still held or if a sequence is playing. Therefore, I need to assign my fader as a continuous controller to achieve this if I want or I can still use the wheel - shouldn't be a problem. Furthermore, I shall now assign the rest of the faders, maybe tonight, for Filter Q and VCA AHDSR and VCF AHDSR, LFO rate, Vibrato and LFO to Fc and Env amount - yep that's 16 faders! Most of the controls of an analogue synth. I'm thinking what to do with the 16 buttons? Seq stop/start? Play drum samples from them...? Hope this is useful to some of you out there. Best regards Chris