4 useful tips on MIDI Guitar 2.2.1, Breath controller & SWAM instruments
Ok, so there are probably more than 4 tips here if you haven't seen anything else I've done on the MIDI Guitar setup before. But for the faithful follower, I will showcase 2 of the most significant settings to address in the SWAM instrument series for the MIDI Guitar 2 user in particular. Again, they may very well be relevant for any user of other types of MIDI guitar controllers, as well. I would assume there is useful information here also to Jammy, Jamstik, or Roland GK-mic users too.
The other 2 settings are directly related to the TEControl breath controller interface and aren't as many tips as points of reference, a place to start.
But let's start at the beginning. Guitar as MIDI controller for any virtual reeds or brass, or wind in general, has a major advantage over any controller where vibrato and pitch bend has to be addressed as with special scrips or by saying a mod wheel for instance. Think about it. Guitar has bends available with every note, as the most normal thing. We don't need to take one hand off the keyboard to maneuver some wheel on the side, for either pitch or vibrato. And we decide what the vibrato should sound like. It is our personality shining through, where we feel like it. When we want to play another instrument, and very much sound like those, we must listen and emulate even those quirks that instrumentalists do, that doesn't translate that well to the written code controlling either samples or the modeling skills of the programmers. They can't decide if we should have the vibrato of Dexter Gordon or John Coltrane necessarily. I'm not saying it is impossible to play with other controllers, I'm just saying that guitar is great for this, and it all comes down to note control. And for that, we need as tight a connection as possible between our controller (guitar), and the controlled instrument (here a Tenor Sax). And here is where the suggestions for settings to start with comes into play.
The two main settings to look at in the SWAM instrument 'Advanced Parameters Options' that absolutely makes a difference for us MIDI GUitar 2 players are first:
1. Expression curve: I set mine fully to the left = Lin0 for maximum dynamic control. Do test the different settings here, they make an awful lot of difference.
The other significant setting I normally adjust on the SWAM instrument is:
2. Attack start: putting it at 4 makes the instrument react faster to incoming control, and helps with the overall feeling of being tightly connected with the instrument you are playing. The notes sort of follow your lead better.
Other settings, not mentioned in the video, is
No Random vibrato, and
Transition Max Time: No Port (to get rid of unwanted sliding in and out of notes)
There is a great deal of interplay between a few of the relevant settings on both MG2 and the SWAM instrument. Some of the SWAM instruments play better with MG2 Type set to Polyphonic, whereas others are better with Monophonic. This is an area for exploration for each player, but I would advise starting with Polyphonic to begin with.
The Bends range is interesting. Set it as high as you can, given that both software must match. MG2 doesn't do any higher than 12 today, so twelve it is. That means you can play a note and bend it for 12 semitones, and still have the software follow your actions.
And as for Aftertouch: always enabled. You can use Aftertouch instead of a breath controller for a lot of instruments, and I will do a separate video on that.
Now The breath controller: It really has four possible options for controlling CC:s. Breath, Bite, Nod, and Tilt. But for now, we are just going to look at breath and bite. In the video, I demonstrate the drastic effect the changing of the sensitivity curve has on the actual sense of control one has over the expression. The same goes for 'bite' of course. The changing of those curves are identical. We assign a CC to each option. Breath is usually CC2, and we had bite set to CC4, when we started using it to control the 'Growl' and the 'Flutter Tongue' amount. My aim was just to show how easy it is to adjust the use of the breath controller from the relatively simple interface. It both can, and should be set to each user's standard since it is a matter of taste really. My wish here is really, just for those of you that are interested to get a glimpse of what it looks like and perhaps in the best case, ward off any doubts you might have! And as always, any questions are welcome and I'll do my best to answer you guys.