The Akai Advance controller features an arpeggiator that can run on either its own internal clock, or an external clock source. When used with DAW’s set to transmit MIDI Clock sync, the arpeggiator works as expected as long as the DAW’s transport is playing.
If I set Cantabile’s master transport to Metronome, and push play on the transport, Advance’s arpeggiator works.
If I set Cantabile’s master transport to “Sync. to MIDI Clock” (in this case the Fantom G6), the transport starts playback when I push play on the Fantom G6 (as would be expected), but the Advance’s arpeggiator doesn’t respond to the MIDI clock.
I know the Advance is receiving MIDI clock data (or at least the accompanying VST plugin, called VIP), because if I load a tempo-synced preset, such preset will sync to the Fantom G6’s tempo.
Like I said, this situation is probably kind of obscure, and I won’t hold my breath for a solution, but I got nothing to lose by asking.
Thanks for reporting this - sounds like a bug and I’ll check it out.
Could I get you please clarify what the connection between Cantabile and the Advance is - I presume it’s via MIDi, but your comment about the accompanying VST makes me wonder if you’re actually sending the clock sync via a plugin in Cantabile.
Thanks, Brad. I don’t think it may be necessarily a bug. I posted a very similar question to the Akai forum, and an employee said that the same thing happens with Cubase, where the MIDI clock behavior doesn’t “daisy-chain”, and that ideally both the Advance and the Fantom G would be slaves to Cantabile. But, since the Fantom G is the one running the sequences in this scenario (and a few other things dependent on it being the MIDI clock master), I can’t run that setup.
The Akai Advance is a specialized MIDI controller that works in two main scenarios: directly controlling VIP (its accompanying VSTi Host), or controlling VIP via a DAW, where VIP would be loaded as a plugin. In this second scenario, Advance can then also control other plugins and the DAW itself.
With Cantabile, the Advance controller is connected via USB, and VIP is loaded as a VST plugin. VSTi plugins are then loaded inside of VIP. For example, I have VIP in slot 1 with Kontakt and Loom, then I have a rack with RealLPC and Guitar Rig, and then another rack with Reaktor running a vocoder. Advance can control all 3.
I’m still running Cantabile in trial mode (I found out about it after Forte 4 started crashing on me, and I’m falling in love with it). I am still trying to find a way to run everything using only VIP, but Cantabile is looking like a great option if I do not accomplish this.
I think that sounds like a problem with their VST not forwarding timing information to the Advance correctly however…
I ran some tests on Cantabile’s MIDI clock pass-through and did find some issues. I’ve just put up build 3125 which should resolve this.
Specifically if you have Cantabile synced to MIDI clock and you have any MIDI output devices enabled for MIDI clock, any incoming MIDI clock events should now be passed through to those devices.
