Can I use midi to transfer a melody and a played instrument?

Joined
Jul 28, 2019
Messages
1
Reaction score
0
I know the title makes no sense but here's my situation, I use a program called LMMS which has terrible presets and samples. I am fairly new to music making so I am not sure how to fix these problems. I recently bought a midi to USB converter to connect my keyboard to the PC. If I connect the keyboard to the PC will I be able to transfer a preset from the keyboard as well as the notes I would be playing?
Here are the links to the midi wire as well as the keyboard:
midi cable: https://amzn.to/2Y8uZ43
keyboard: https://yamaha.io/2ZaZKSd
 

SeaGtGruff

I meant to play that note!
Moderator
Joined
Jun 6, 2014
Messages
4,111
Reaction score
1,736
will I be able to transfer a preset from the keyboard

Yes, in a way-- or no, not really-- depending on what you mean exactly.

You can't transfer the sound samples used by the preset and add them to the DAW, but you can use the DAW or other MIDI software to play the connected keyboard as though it were one of the DAW's virtual instruments. You would then record the keyboard's audio output using the DAW

Well, technically you could sample the keyboard's sounds at different velocities and use the samples to create a virtual instrument, so that you can use the keyboard's sounds in the DAW without the keyboard needing to be connected to the computer. But that's tedious, and could require additional software designed for that purpose-- plus, it's borderline illegal depending on what you do with the sampled sounds, because the keyboard's internal sound samples are the property of Yamaha.

In any case, it's far better to just use the keyboard as an external sound module.

As for having the DAW play the keyboard as though it were a plug-in, the keyboard has an "InitSend" function that can be used to send all of the "preset voice settings" to the DAW so you can record them. This lets you send those settings back to the keyboard at a later time so it selects the desired voice and applies the desired settings (such as Reverb Type and Reverb Depth) to that voice.

You can also create a "patch list" or "instrument definition file" that contains the basic information (Bank Select values and Program Change values) for selecting each of the built-in voices, although your DAW might not let you add new instrument definition files-- some do, some don't, and those that do tend to use their own particular data format for storing patch definitions.

I'm only slightly familiar with LMMS, so I'm not sure about all of its features, capabilities, and limitations. There are a number of commercial DAWs available to choose from, some of them available in free editions, and many DAWs are available for all three of the major operating systems-- Windows, macOS, and Linux. Which operating system are you using? If you're already familiar with using LMMS then you might want to stick with it; but it's possible that a different DAW would be easier to use for what you want to do.

Regardless of which DAW you choose, there are basically three possible configurations for using your YPT-230 with your computer and DAW:

(1) Use an audio cable to connect the keyboard to the computer, so you can record your keyboard's sounds to audio tracks in your DAW. The YPT-230 has a PHONES/OUTPUT jack that takes a 1/4" (6.35mm) TRS stereo plug, whereas your computer almost certainly has a LINE IN jack that takes a 1/8" (3.5mm) TRS stereo plug, so you'll want to get an audio cable that has one size plug on one end, and the other size plug on the other end, similar to the following:


(2) Use a MIDI-to-USB cable, similar to the one you linked to, to connect the keyboard to the computer, so you can transfer MIDI messages back and forth between the keyboard and computer. This lets you record the keyboard's MIDI output to MIDI tracks in your DAW, plus you can play back MIDI tracks to your keyboard so the DAW plays it remotely similar to a player piano. I'm not certain about the quality of that particular cable, because some of these types of cables seem to work better than others; and the length of the cable might also be a factor, so you might want to see if you can find one that's less than 5 feet long just to be on the safe side.

Of course, you'll probably want to do both connections-- audio and MIDI-- at the same time, so you can record the keyboard to either audio or MIDI tracks in the DAW, and also have the DAW send (or "sequence") MIDI tracks to the keyboard and record the keyboard's resulting audio output to audio tracks.

(3) Another option would be to get a USB-MIDI audio interface. You would use a 1/4"-to-1/4" TRS stereo cable to go from the keyboard's PHONES/OUTPUT jack to an audio input jack on the audio interface, and use standard MIDI cables to go from the keyboard's MIDI IN/OUT ports to the audio interface's MIDI IN/OUT ports. Then the audio interface connects to the computer using a USB cable. The advantage of this method is that an audio interface will almost certainly have a higher quality sound card than the one that's in your computer. Also, audio interfaces often come with a complimentary license for a commercial DAW. There are many audio interfaces available to choose from, but they don't always have MIDI IN/OUT ports. The following is an example of one that does:


But you can start out with the first two types of connections if you don't want to buy an audio interface right now or don't need the extra audio quality that an audio interface would probably give you.

You could also use a USB-MIDI cable to connect the keyboard directly to the computer for MIDI communications, but use a less expensive audio-only interface for the audio communication, such as the following:


Note that you'd need a special TRS-to-RCA cable for that interface, such as the following:

 
Last edited:

Ask a Question

Want to reply to this thread or ask your own question?

You'll need to choose a username for the site, which only take a couple of moments. After that, you can post your question and our members will help you out.

Ask a Question

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
14,049
Messages
86,683
Members
13,148
Latest member
sbmusichelp

Latest Threads

Top