MOTM

--- In motm@yahoogroups.com, ivancu@a... wrote:
> Right, but how can you get it to control a MIDI synthesizer so as not 
> to play individual notes when sliding up and down the ribbon?
> 
> Ivan>>

Hi Ivan --

Long time, no chat! 

Regarding the Expressionmate, the bad news is you CAN'T do true 
portamento stuff on it. I bought one a few years ago, and had the same 
frustrations. 

So I called their tech support, and the guy admitted that it wasn't actually 
designed to just play smooth theremin-like notes. A bit misleading, since the 
original Moog ribbons were designed to do just that. 

All I ever found the Kurzweil good for is arpeggio stuff, and I haven't even 
recorded anything with that feature. 

The unit is basically gathering dust with my keyboards. A waste of money.

So I went over to the Doepfer ribbon, which DOES what you think it would.
Check out my modifications here:

http://www.danacountryman.com/ribbon/controller.html

Cheers,

 - Dana Countryman
Everett, WA


> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Scott Juskiw <scott@t...>
> To: ivancu@a...; motm@yahoogroups.com
> Sent: Sat, 30 Jul 2005 10:07:51 -0600
> Subject: [motm] Re: Ribbon Controller - Kurzweil Expressionmate
> 
>   Check if the Expressionmate can do either of these:
> 
>   1. Can it output a continuous controller message instead of note 
> on/off?
>  2. Can it output note on/off with pitch bend?
> 
>   Either of these modes should be able to produce a reasonably smooth 
> portamento from MIDI messages. The brand D ribbon controller supports 
> both of these.
> 
>  At 10:26 AM -0400 2005/07/30, ivancu@a... wrote:
>   >I had bought an Expressionmate when they first came out and was 
> turned
>   >off by the fact that it output info as pure MIDI notes, so instead of 
> a
>  >continuous "portamento" it was a "glissando." Of course later I
>  >realized that this is a function of MIDI, where it is designed around
>  >discrete notes rather than continuous variable voltages.
>  >
>  >Is there a way to get around this?