Need help understanding Racks, Songs and States

[Corky]

Hi Greg

This is what I’ve observed in my own setup. Others may debunk this, but it is all about the song. Example…in song #1 I use a piano rack, and an organ rack, using 25% CPU. In song #2, I use an amp sim, compressor, reverb, and chorus, using 36% CPU. In song #3, I use a synth rack and a huge Kontakt sampled piano rack using 51% CPU.

If i run them seperate…no problem. But, if I put them all into one song, that adds up to 112% CPU. All the crackling, and dropouts would lead to a crash. Yes, I could put everything into one basket, and pick and choose, which would take quite an effort to deactivate the ones I wouldn’t use. When pre-loading, it’s all in memory, but I only use a small part of that memory when using songs to control what you use. Otherwise, everything is active and pushing CPU. I reuse several racks throughout the set list, so not as many things loaded in memory.

Again, others may debunk this, but that has been my experience since I started using Cantabile in 2016. I averaged 4 gigs a week until Covid, and I learned through experience what works well for me. I was in 6 bands at one time, and each one had a approx. a 120 song repertoire That’s roughly 720 songs that I had to keep up with. With my setup, I could load the night’s setlist for the respective band, and be on my way with no problems. I was always ready for the next song before a guitarist could reset his pedalboard.

BTW…no need to feel stupid. We were all in that position at one time or another, because there is quite a learning curve to this. I still feel that way when others come up with their elaborate bindings. Hope this helps you.

Cheers

Corky

P.S. I usually have a song at the end of each setlist that contains a rack with an organ, piano, synth, horns, in case of requests, or a guest is invited onstage. Those are ready in case I need it quick. They usually cover most anything thrown at me.

[Corky]

@PianaTuna

The way I have done it so far makes programming my songs so very quick and easy.

The beauty of Cantabile is making it your own. If this works for you, then go for it. I don’t know if there is a right way, or a better way to approach this. Just going by all the threads I’ve read on this site, everyone has their own way of setting things up.

@PianaTuna

Is there a ‘proper way’ to do this ? Do I create a new song then create the rack, or is it the other way around ?

I’ve done it both ways. If I have a song that requires something I don’t normally use, I would probably create a rack for that song. I have also created racks I know I am going to use. When IK Hammond was released, I created a rack for it, and created states within the rack…each state had a different preset, which I could select within the song.

@PianaTuna

Only drawback is switching between songs is not as quick as they could be.

Again, probably because you have so many active vsts. I keep things very lean, and don’t used many sampled instruments. I try to use as many modeled vsts as I can.

[Torsten]

@PianaTuna

This is another example of why I’m confused. I thought the function of PRELOAD was to load all the plugs ever used in all my songs ‘up front’ ? What is the difference and benefit in creating and ‘pre-loading’ several different racks as opposed to just ONE rack if they are all going to be ‘pre-loaded’ anyway? I just don’t get it.

There’s nothing “wrong” per se with loading one big rack in every song, but it’s a bit unflexible in putting together your songs.

I have dozens of racks that I use in my songs - mostly for different instruments, so I have an acoustic piano rack, a Wurly rack, a Rhodes rack, a string layer rack, a pad synth rack, a couple of solo synth racks, my favorite two virtual sax racks etc…

Each of these racks has different rack states - think of them as “presets” for a synth. So my acoustic piano rack may have different states like “Rock piano”, “Ballad piano”, “Solo Piano”, …; same with all other racks.

Now for any given song, I string together strictly the racks (i.e. “instruments”) I need in this specific song - for a plain piano song, I may simply need one acoustic piano rack, with possibly a string layer rack in addition. For a massive Pink Floyd arrangement, I may need a dozen of different instruments (piano, organ, pads, string machine, lead synth, sound effects from a sampler), so these songs will get complex.

The good thing is that since I have all my instruments wrapped in re-useable racks, the piano rack that is used both in the plain piano song AND the Pink Floyd arrangement will only be loaded once. And, since all my racks (“instruments”) are loaded at the beginning of the set list, loading any given song will be pretty quick.

This makes building your songs pretty easy and efficient - especially when you build your songs from a number of different “colors” - I have a couple of racks (acoustic piano, electric piano, organs) that get used in most of my songs, but a couple of others just get pulled in occasionally when I need that sound (e.g. virtual sax).

I’ll post pictures of some songs when I’m back at my music machine.

Hope things start making sense…

Cheers,

Torsten

[Torsten]

@Corky

I usually have a song at the end of each setlist that contains a rack with an organ, piano, synth, horns, in case of requests, or a guest is invited onstage. Those are ready in case I need it quick. They usually cover most anything thrown at me.

- similar approach here. I have four “rehearsal songs”:

• Acoustic piano + options
• Wurly + options
• Rhodes + options
• Two-manual hammond with four different setups on buttons (of course Corky’s favorite hammond sound is on button 1 )

The first three all have different options for the upper keyboard - two different flavors of hammond leads, plus brass and a universal polysynth. I can select the options quickly via buttons on my keyboard.

These four songs always live at the top of my Cantabile setlist where I can reach them with two clicks, so I have a quick standard setup away that I can survive with…

[Corky]

@Torsten

(of course Corky’s favorite hammond sound is on button 1 )

Well, of course it is! Where else could it possibly go?
Thanks for the compliment!

[Torsten]

@Corky

Where else could it possibly go?

I have to admit, I’ve messed with it a bit - I’ve mixed it with a classic 888 000 000, blending between them with my organizer script. So with modwheel at 0, I have classic rock, and MW at full is all Corky.

This is my ultimate combination - I have the “bare bones” classic hammond lead (with percussion and vibrato on controllers for variety), and with a touch of the mod wheel, I can add texture and overtones to taste. I do have direct drawbar access on my keyboard, but I rarely use it - blending between settings with the modwheel is usually enough and far more predictable

[Corky]

Actually, the drawbar settings were meant to adjusted per style and taste. I was going for that real Hammond feel on the swell pedal. I like how you setup the mod wheel for blending drawbars. I’ve been experimenting with it. You know how I love my E-MU controller, but it has no sliders for drawbar use. I use your "organ"izer script on it now, so I am digging my controller again.
I am moving this discussion to the organ page since it’s OT.

[Torsten]

Here as promised some pictures of typical song setups with my racks.

First: a two-manual hammond song:

Both keyboards (upper and lower) playing the same rack, containing the IK Hammond. Add a bit of delay and reverb from a separate “effects” rack, and feed it all into my master rack (contains a bit of routing and my master limiters). That’s it.

Now here’s one of the above-mentioned “Rehearsal” songs:

The main keyboard plays an acoustic piano, optionally mixing a string and a Hammond layer to it. The upper keyboard plays the IK organ (red), the alto sax (orange) or the solo synth (yellow), the routing controlled by song state.

Add a bit of effects, volume control (_MainVolume, _SoloVolume) via MIDI controllers and a master rack, and you’re done…

Here’s a more complex one: my setup for our version of “Shine On You Crazy Diamond” - interpreted very loosely

A mix of piano, DX7 rhodes and pads on my lower keyboard, strings, organ, synth solo and tenor sax on the upper keyboard. All in varying configurations, with volumes and routing controlled by song states

So you can see that I compose my song configurations of different instruments in racks, combined with effects and volume control racks. It’s a modular approach - like Lego for grown-ups

My rack states are a mix of “generic” presets (like “Saw Strings” or “TE Live Piano”), which get used in a number of songs, and some sounds dialled in specifically for a song (“Shine On Drone”, “Shine On Intro”. As an example, here is the state list of my Hive_Solo rack:

You see that the rack contains only Hive as the main instrument, plus a lightweight EQ that I use for patch-specific EQing - it helps to cut off too much bass or boost the brilliance a bit.

The patches are a mix of generic (“Moog Lead”) and song-specific (“Radio Gaga Bass”) - I’ll have to clean up the list at some time

Hope this helps!

Cheers,

Torsten

[cpaolo]

@Corky

I love my E-MU controller

Mmh, which controller are you talking about? I had (and still own) E-MU hardware. I’m not aware of controllers by E-MU (it’s not a very popular brand here). I have a VOCE drawbar controller, actually I had two of them, one is gone, broken, stolen, maybe sold, who know?
Do you remember the VOCE clones? What a crap!

[Corky]

Moved discussion to Organ tips page since this is off topic to thread.

[dsteinschneider]

I never get around to ebaying those

[Corky]

I have mine as well. I now feel as if I wasn’t the only sucker.

[cpaolo]

Had the DMI-64 (horrific) and later the V3 (better not so much).
Guess there were lots of suckers, hungry of the Hammond sound.
I achieved best results in emulation, in '90s, using samplers and outstanding libraries (E-MU, Northstar, Best Service, etc.). The real trouble was the Leslie slow/fast transition.

[Corky]

I also used these until I found “Charlie”, which was a precursor to VB3. The E-MU module was actually pretty good, but was limited to what you got.

[cpaolo]

@Corky

Charlie

AFAIK, Charlie is sample based, as well the e-mu module, I heard both, then I paused my regular music activity. When I returned, great surprise, I found NI B4, which I later replaced with VB3 and so on.
In 2005 I built a 2UR PC (not very powerful, a VIA processor Pentium4-like), running windows XP and these standalone programs:
NI B4 II.
NI Prophet 5.
GeForce Minimonsta.
Still clearly remember people asking me where is all those organs and synths. At time my keyboards were Kurzweil K2600 and Roland XP-80.

[Derek]

Memory lane time…

In 2008, I auditioned for Pure Floyd, and my organs where coming from a Yamaha Motif Rack ES, which I thought was a vast improvement on my Yamaha EX5, as you could vary the Leslie speed, which you could not do on the EX5.

After a few rehearsals, Pete, the Gilmour clone, sidled up to me and said “I love your synth sounds (Nord G2 Engine and the Yamaha EX5 AN engine) and EP sound (Yamaha EX5 FDSP Engine and its EP model) and piano (Yamaha EX5) but your organ sound sucks…”

After getting over my upset, I learnt that my predecessor had been using a Korg CX3, and to address the critique I looked into and moved onto using NI B4II on a laptop, which apparently was better than the CX3, so Pete was happy. Fast forward 12 odd years and my organ sounds are vastly better again with either my Korg Kronos CX3 engine, VB3 II with IK Leslie or the IK Hammond. I just hope I get a chance to use them again…

[dsteinschneider]

Hi Torsten (H) I decided you were going to make me an offer on my MicroB/Spin but came to your senses

[TorstenH]

Nope - I wrote that I had one, too, plus a Viscount Expander and a KeyB Expander laying around. Plus a Hughes & Kettner Rotosphere :-). Then I noticed that Corky mentioned this was kind of off topic, so I decided to delete the comment. But now you got it, anyway …

[Corky]

Again…glad I wasn’t the only sucker!! They made it sound so good on the demo.

You guys can move this discussion to the organ page if you want.

[Torsten]

Hmm, looks like this thread has gone completely wild, as usual …

But we also haven’t heard from the OP (@PianaTuna) in a while - have your questions been answered, Greg?