How to utilize a multitimbral instrument on an inst track?

Cubase
1

I have heard that Instrument tracks are now multitimbral, but I am having trouble using them that way…

If I set up an instance of say Omnisphere and load patches into two Omnisphere slots (the row 1-8 at the top of the GUI). I set them up to output on channel 1 and 2 respectively.

I then create a blank instrument. I put a few notes on each track

I then try to point the second track to Omnisphere MIDI 2. But it loads a new instance of Omnisphere in the rack.

What am I doing wrong please? Do you have to go through the mixer or something

Z

2

There are 2 ways you can do this.

  1. Highlight your existing Instrument Track and then add a MIDI Track (not Instrument). When it’s created its output will be automatically routed to the Instrument Track (alternatively you can route any existing MIDI Track to the Instrument Track in the MIDI Track’s Inspector). Make sure this new track has its output channel set to 2 (or whatever).

  2. Edit a MIDI Part on your Instrument Track and put in notes to play what you want on both of the patches. Then select all the notes intended for the second patch and change their midi channel to 2 in the Info Line. Make sure in the Track’s Inspector that the midi channel is set to “any” (if it is set to 1 all your channel 2 notes will be sent on 1). This method is better for stuff like horn parts where you want to write/edit all the different lines and keep them together. You might want to change the event coloring in the Key Editor from the default Velocity to MIDI Channel to see what’s what.

3

Thanks for your input Raino - you have helped. I will check this tommorow

4

Just curious, does your British Rail sandwich stay in tune?

5

With whom? The Inert K9?

6

Got both methods working thank you - elegant and useful.

Z

7

I usually do my parts on MIDI tracks after creating the Instrument Track. Later I’ll just set the Instrument track to channel ‘any’ freeze the MIDI tracks, and drag all the parts (stack them) on the Instrument track.

8

Pourquoi? Is this not self-flagellation?

9

Because, then the Instrument Track can exported as a ‘MIDI Loop’, which can be previewed directly from Media Bay without pulling it into a project.

10

Brilliant!