recipes
Sketch a song fast with the brain
Build a tiny loop — drums, a one- or two-note bassline, one chord — then record a progression on the brain's keyboard ( in auxiliary mode) and the routed tracks transpose along; take a lead out of the routing on , and set the key by hand when detection gets it wrong.
The brain does the harmony work: write simple parts in one key, then let the brain move them as you play. Take any part that should stay put, such as a lead, out of its routing, and give the brain a key by hand when it guesses wrong on a sparse loop. The progression can also be written rather than played: one note per chord change on the brain's own pattern, which at track scale 4 lasts four times as long as the loop. Once it works, arrange it into a song with scenes.
How to
Turn a one-chord loop into a progression
before you start a short loop of drums · bass and one chord plays
- 1 the brain
- 2 four bars per brain sequence
- 3
- 4 play the progression within the shown scale
The bass and the chord follow the progression; drums stay where they are.
Keep the lead on T5 out of the brain's transposition
- 1 the brain's routing, tracks 1–4 on the encoders
- 2 tracks 5–8 on the encoders
- 3 counter-clockwise, T5 out
The lead keeps its notes while everything routed moves.
Set the brain to A minor by hand
- 1
- 2 counter-clockwise, manual
- 3 root a
- 4 scale minor
The brain's page reads a minor, and the routed tracks' step components move in that scale.
Details
- TE’s guide
Start in a new project with a drum beat, a bassline of one or two notes and one chord on a pad or pluck track, one or two bars long.
- TE’s guide
The brain is in auxiliary mode.
- TE’s guide
on the brain sets its track scale to 4, so its sequence runs four times slower and spans four bars.
- TE’s guide
The brain has already detected the key and scale of the recorded parts and shows them on screen.
- TE’s guide
Notes played on the brain's keyboard transpose the routed tracks, chords included, so the simple loop follows a progression.
- TE’s guide
Parts that must not transpose, such as a lead, come out of the brain's routing on : turn an encoder to add or remove its track, click to swap between tracks 1–4 and 5–8.
- TE’s guide
Only routed tracks feed the key detection.
- checked on a unit · 1.1.33
In a new project the lead is , the dissolve preset lead/gaussian.
- community
A new project routes tracks 3–8 to the brain, the lead among them, and leaves the drum tracks 1 and 2 out.
- worked out
The routing page draws the tracks the brain hears as boxes 1–8; on the replica an encoder turned clockwise takes its track in and counter-clockwise takes it out, a direction the guide does not give.
- checked on a unit · 1.1.33
The brain's manual mode sits at the counter-clockwise end of
E1(CC12 at 0 showed manual), and in manualE2sets the root andE3the scale.