So if you really want to dive into that end of the pool, here are some more pointers on how I’ve organized my setup for maximum flexibility and portability. In previous incarnations, I tried to get all my various controller keyboards to behave similarly, i.e. get them to use the same CCs, but that became impractical with some hardware, so I thought I’d weed these dependencies out completely. Here’s an overview of what things look like in my setup:
In my setup, I have two kinds of MIDI ports in Cantabile: “abstract” ones that aren’t connected to any hardware and “hardware-related” ports that get their input from hardware. In between those, there are conversion racks in my background rack that take their input from the hardware and convert and forward it to my abstract ports.
You see that some Windows ports are assigned to more than one Cantabile input port - that’s because I use a 2-port MIDI interface (mio2) to connect my main and upper keyboard, so when I use my “MagicKeys”, these are connected to the second port, alternatively, I can use my Motif XF as an upper keyboard, connected to the same physical MIDI input (but using a different conversion rack in the background rack).
The “abstract” MIDI ports then get used inside my input racks - these essentially take the input and split it up to various outputs so routing gets easier. Some other racks, e.g. volume faders or effect racks use standard controls from the “BG rack” input directly to control levels. Since these racks are dedicated to one single purpose, and I have a special command in BG rack dedicated to that purpose, it’s easier for these racks to listen directly to that port than to have to create routes from the “Faders” rack explicitly, like I used to in previous versions of my setup. Nowadays, I just drop a “Main Volume” rack into my song, and it automatically reacts to the correct fader on my controller.
Some instrument racks, e.g. my String Layer rack or my Solo Organ also use the BG rack (string level, string filter) or the Drawbars port directly, since the assignment is permanent and clear, and no song-specific config is necessary. Again, less routing necessary at song level; just drop in the rack and route notes, controllers, pedals as needed.
Hope this clarifies things and gives you some inspiration for your setup!
Cheers,
Torsten