How to establish MIDI from organ with serial out and not 8x8 matrix keyboard.

[ELdur]

Many years ago I built a digital organ from scratch. Now I want to establish MIDI encoder (MIDI out). Here I need help. All 61 keys come serially. I have clock and sync/reset input to the keyboard. Then two lines out I call KEY DOWN (and KEY UP for velocity). I can either feed the MIDI encoder with the existing 31.250 kHz clock and sync. Or disconnect everything and feed the keyboard with clock and sync from a MIDI interface. I would like to include velocity as well.

Anyone have any tips or can help?

The challenge is (1) that ready-made PCBs offered online are typically intended for 8x8 matrix. And (2) I don't feel good to programming Arduino or similar.

 

[JH3]

What you are proposing is doable but it is a significant engineering project. It will be more practical to figure out how to replace the keyboard you have now with a keyboard that already produces MIDI. Trying to MIDIfy your existing keyboard if you aren't comfortable with things like programming Arduino is likely to become a project that never yields a usable result.

 

[ELdur]

What you are proposing is doable but it is a significant engineering project. It will be more practical to figure out how to replace the keyboard you have now with a keyboard that already produces MIDI. Trying to MIDIfy your existing keyboard if you aren't comfortable with things like programming Arduino is likely to become a project that never yields a usable result.

 

[ELdur]

Thanks for the answer. I want to keep my existing keyboard and not least my organ. The easiest way for me as a hardware person would be some addressable latch as an interface for an existing board like "Key2Midi64", or an encoder board intended for 8x8 multiplexed input. Not an elegant solution and not pretty with a spaghetti of flat cables.
Too bad as it seems that "Key2Midi64" already has parallel to serial on board.

 

[plinkyspecs]

I'm not familiar with any commercially available serial to MIDI converter hardware that would meet your needs. That being the case, this would seem to be a custom hardware development project.

You mentioned not wanting to program Arduino or similar, and certainly it's not the only option. However unlike some other hardware development platforms, Arduino has available a number of MIDI libraries available that should make this more straightforward, without the need to handle MIDI serial messages, etc.

• https://docs.arduino.cc/built-in-examples/communication/Midi/#code
• https://github.com/arduino-libraries/MIDIUSB
• https://github.com/pschatzmann/arduino-midi

CV <> MIDI may be another option, if you can generate / receive a CV signal from / to your board. There are many commercially available converters.

 

[ELdur]

I'm not familiar with any commercially available serial to MIDI converter hardware that would meet your needs. That being the case, this would seem to be a custom hardware development project.

You mentioned not wanting to program Arduino or similar, and certainly it's not the only option. However unlike some other hardware development platforms, Arduino has available a number of MIDI libraries available that should make this more straightforward, without the need to handle MIDI serial messages, etc.

• https://docs.arduino.cc/built-in-examples/communication/Midi/#code
• https://github.com/arduino-libraries/MIDIUSB
• https://github.com/pschatzmann/arduino-midi

CV <> MIDI may be another option, if you can generate / receive a CV signal from / to your board. There are many commercially available converters.

Thanks for the answer, you are probably, and unfortunately, right that there is no suitable product. Now waiting for a response from a couple of stores that sell encoders, but unlikely to be a positive response. Since I am not able to program anything, the likely solution will be the hard way to install some ICs and ribbon cables as an interface to an established product.