Setting Up MIDI Devices

Configuring MIDI-Devices

You can connect external MIDI devices to Renoise to play notes or record controllers (automation). This is often done with a MIDI master keyboard or an external synthesizer which also can send MIDI. You can also use the computer keyboard to enter notes in Renoise, so even without a MIDI keyboard you will be able to edit and create songs in Renoise. But the computer keyboard is not velocity sensitive and can also only map two octaves, so a MIDI keyboard is highly recommended when you want to record what you play.

With Renoises MIDI Mapping function, you can map things like starting/stopping the song or changing sequences, leveling tracks and FX without using the computer mouse of keyboard. This can either be done by mapping regular notes from a master keyboard, or with MIDI hardware which is dedicated to this task, like MIDI mixers, controllers.

Via MIDI clock you can sync other external MIDI capable devices to Renoises timing clock or vice versa.

To play your external MIDI instruments from Renoise, you use MIDI instruments in Renoise which don't need to be set up in the preferences. Please have a look the the Instrument Settings for more information about those.

Default Setup

By default Renoise is set up to use the first two devices it finds as input devices. If you don't have more than two devices, MIDI IO might work right out of the box for you. So the first thing you should try out is if Renoise recognizes your MIDI keyboard or controller. The easiest way to do so is to load up a sample and plying around with the keyboard. If you can't hear what you play, you should open up the preferences and have a look at the settings.

Monitoring MIDI-IO

On the top right of Renoises interface are two or four small LEDs, red and green. Two for the MIDI clock sync, two for general MIDI in- and output. Every message that is sent from Renoise will blink the red LED, every messages that is received by Renoise will be green. When no devices are set up for MIDI sync you will only see two icons for the general MIDI input and output.

MIDI Preferences

Changes in the MIDI setup are done in the preferences. This is don in Renoise by clicking the main Edit menu → Preferences. On OSX you will find the preferences in the Renoise menu, the one on the menu bar on the very left. Alternatively you can hit the shortcut Control/Command + ","

In the preferences menu, select the MIDI tab:

Device Setup

Clicking on one of the device drop downs brings up a list of MIDI devices that are currently installed. Simply select the one you would like to use then.

On Windows, you maybe will find the same entry twice, one with a WDM behind its name and one not. If that's the case, then your sound card or MIDI device offer two different drivers for the same devices. WDM is a new kind of driver, which offers better timing, so you should prefer using this one if it works.

On Linux, you will also see some generic names (Renoise Input A/B and so on). Those devices are virtual ports which Renoise registers, so that other applications can connect to them easily. Or to do all the MIDI routing outside of Renoise with the ALSA MIDI patch-bay applications Please have a look at the http://www.faqs.org/docs/Linux-HOWTO/MIDI-HOWTO.html for more information about this and ALSA in general.

In the above picture, you can see three configuration panels:

• MIDI Master Keyboard / Mapping: Connect your external MIDI master keyboard or MIDI controller to Renoise

• MIDI Clock Master: Send MIDI clock timing information to other MIDI devices

• MIDI Clock Slave: Sync Renoise to external MIDI devices

Setting up the devices is basically all you need to start. For a detailed description of the other advanced settings, have a look at the Preferences pages in this manual please.