Emu XL-7 & MP-7 User's Group

> Does anyone here use Max/MSP in conjunction with an XX-7?

I've been using Max on stage for about 12 years, and MSP for the last
couple, and I've had the XL-7 for about 18 months. I've done a few
live projects with Max/MSP and the XL (including a pretty full-on
techno gig at the ICA in London), and am currently preparing a live
quadraphonic sound score for a Dance Umbrella commission
(http://www.danceumbrella.co.uk).

I like the XL-7 as a scratchpad, but I don't buy that heavily into
PCM-based synthesis these days; my main sound sources/processors are a
pair of OasysPCI DSP cards in Magma cages controlled by PowerBooks,
and a pair of Nord MicroModulars. The XL-7 is maxed out with sound
ROM's, since it's useful to have a lot of library sounds available for
recording commissions, but the Oasys cards are more central to my work
(mainly because they are flexible effects processors and digital
mixers as well as synthesis/sample playback units).

> I've been 
> getting all excited about it since they announced the windows 
> release, expecially in the context of live p.a. - 

The Windows release has been shipping for about a week, so I have no
idea how stable it is (and I don't run Windows so I can't find
out). If it's anything as good as the Mac version, it's well worth
having.

> My idea is to contruct a patch that acts as host for VST plugins as 
> well as an audio looping and mixing tool, which could all be 
> controlled via the XX-7. Then any MIDI coming from the XX-7 can be 
> interpreted in any way imaginable and used to control the sounds...

That would work fine, but in my opinion the XL-7 is not the best
controller for that kind of application. The pads are pretty good (and
feature polyphonic aftertouch!), and notes are held as the pad track
assignment changes, which is wonderful, but the knobs are small, not
particularly high quality, non-nulling, and don't indicate their
position on the LCD. You'd also have to figure out your MIDI routing
and echoing carefully if you want true local-off behaviour.

The XL-7 knobs and buttons work fine for the unit itself, and I use
the XL-7 as a clock source but MIDI slave (under Max/MSP
control). There are some nice fader boxes out there; the one I use is
the CM Motor Mix (http://www.cmlabs.net/MotorMixPage.htm), together
with a couple of the chocolate-bar-sized JLCooper Faderbabies.

-- 

  nick rothwell -- composition, systems, performance -- http://www.cassiel.com