Confused re voices - DGX670

[MiddleC]

I'm working on a song I got from Musescore, which has several instruments. As you might imagine, I don't necessarily have the exact instrument in the list of voices on the DGX 6790.

As I search through them I'm left wondering more about this. There is a datalist document which lists all lthe voices. This is where I become confused. For example, looking for a bass clarinet, which of course there is none. I find in the data list...

• Clarinet. The chart says it is in the Reed section. I don't see any reed section on the keyboard.
• Further example, The data book lists a JazzClarinet in the Woodwind section. I have a group of voices lists as Brass&Woodwind. There is no JazzClarinet in that section
• I do see in the brass&Woodwind section a voice called Clarinet&Flutes. What? I thought maybe that would take me to a new page of just those instruments, but no, that is the instrument (although the description is plural)
• Last thing, the data sheet has a column titled Voice Number, under that 3 sub sections: MSB, LSB, AND pc # (1-128). I don't know what that is. I don't see any legends to indicuate this stuff. And it does't seem like there is no way to easily find the voice. On the DGX 660, the voice had a number that you could put in and it would get you to it.

Anyone have any thoughts?

 

[TedS]

On some Yamaha keyboards (and I guess the DGX-670 is one of them), the voices are grouped into a kind of hierarchy.

The newest, best-modeled voices are the ones you see in the top-level category folders. However, voices from older Yamaha keyboards are included in case you import a style or a registration from one of those boards. These are in a "Legacy" folder. Finally, there is a category called "GM & XG" which are the most basic sound samples that might be called up as defaults when you're playing a General MIDI file, or a MIDI file extended by Yamaha's proprietary XG specification. I'm not sure whether you can select these GM & XG voices from the panel or not.

Regarding the voice numbers: if you go into the Utility menu, Config2 you should see a user option to display the voice number. I guess it's off by default because it creates some visual "clutter." But if you're a veteran tweaker I agree that it's useful.

I definitely recommend downloading the .pdf manuals (all of them!) and using the Search feature in Adobe to find stuff like this. You could also ask on the PSRTutorial Forum; a lot of Yamaha experts hangout there. Hope this helps!!

 

[MiddleC]

On some Yamaha keyboards (and I guess the DGX-670 is one of them), the voices are grouped into a kind of hierarchy.

The newest, best-modeled voices are the ones you see in the top-level category folders. However, voices from older Yamaha keyboards are included in case you import a style or a registration from one of those boards. These are in a "Legacy" folder. Finally, there is a category called "GM & XG" which are the most basic sound samples that might be called up as defaults when you're playing a General MIDI file, or a MIDI file extended by Yamaha's proprietary XG specification. I'm not sure whether you can select these GM & XG voices from the panel or not.

Regarding the voice numbers: if you go into the Utility menu, Config2 you should see a user option to display the voice number. I guess it's off by default because it creates some visual "clutter." But if you're a veteran tweaker I agree that it's useful.

I definitely recommend downloading the .pdf manuals (all of them!) and using the Search feature in Adobe to find stuff like this. You could also ask on the PSRTutorial Forum; a lot of Yamaha experts hangout there. Hope this helps!!

Thanks for the reply.

JFYI, I have the following PDFs for the keyboard: Owners manual, Reference Manual, Data List, Compatible USB Device List, and Smart Device Connection Manual. Looking for voices, I presumed that the data list would be the right one to use. It lists all voices. But with no reference about how to find them by number, and with finding some listed that in fact weren't there, left me reaching out for help here.

I'll do some more browsing through the various PDFs, I haven't, up to this point, found anything like what you referenced. It'll give me more to search on.

Thanks for the guidance.

 

[SeaGtGruff]

The voice groupings were inherited from the GM1 specs, which has 16 voice categories with 8 voices each, for a total of 128 voices that are selected by the Program Change message. That's what the PC# values are for, except it's common to add 1 to the true data values and list them as 1 to 128, when in reality they are 0 to 127.

GM1 also has just 1 drum kit, which has no corresponding PC#, so channel 10 is used for drums, and Note messages on that channel play different drum and percussion sounds depending on the Note value rather than playing different pitches of an instrument voice.

Although GM1 was expanded upon by different manufacturers to allow for additional voices and drum kits, and the GM2 specs were introduced to establish some standardization on how that's done, not all keyboards are GM2-compatible, whereas most keyboards are GM1-compatible. For that reason, it's common for musicians to use GM1 voices in MIDI songs so the song files will be able to play correctly on most keyboards.

As far as expansions to MIDI, Yamaha created an expansion called XG (for Extended General MIDI), and Roland created an expansion called GS (for General Standard). These added two Bank Select messages for specifying a Most Significant Byte (MSB) and Least Significant Byte (LSB) to select a bank of voices. In theory, each bank has 128 voices, but in practice most banks don't have nearly that many voices in them. Also, in theory there are 16,384 banks of voices, but in practice manufacturers don't use nearly that many, and (I think) each manufacturer likes to use bank numbers which don't conflict with other manufacturers' bank numbers.

The voice groupings which you see in your Data List are not the same ones from the GM1 standard, but they are somewhat close. For instance, GM1 has a group more or less named "Guitars" and another group named "Basses," but Yamaha chose to combine those into "Guitars and Basses." The intention is to help the user find a particular instrument sound more easily. (Whether it has succeeded at that is another matter.)

Yamaha also chose to hide the GM1, GM2, and older "legacy" XG voices from the user on the DGX-670, but those voices are still there and can be used by MIDI songs. There was at least one thread a while back that included posts from one or more users on how to "add" those voices back to the DGX-670. Keep in mind, they were always there, you just couldn't find them in the menu, so to "add" them back you just need to create some User Voices which select the appropriate MSB, LSB, and PC# for the "missing" voices.

In fact, User Voices might be the way to go here. What you might want to do is explore the voices and see which ones you like-- for instance, figure out which one is your preferred Clarinet sound-- then create a User Voice for selecting that particular voice. You can even tweak the voice parameters, effects, and effect parameters and save them as part of the User Voice.

 

[MiddleC]

Wow, that took you a chunk of your time. I'm so appreciative of both you and Teds.

Between the information I gain from here, and the reading available in the PDFs, it's apparent there's a lot I can learn to add to the capabilities I can use to add a personal touch to the songs I learn.

 

[papasmurph]

In Data List:

MSB and LSB are Bank Change MSB and LSB, while PC# is Program Change.

PC# 1-128 is really 0-127 on a MIDI level, while Bank Change values are used as-is.

 

[gmeader]

A zip file containing voices and a PDF containing instructions on how to add GM, GM2 and XG voices to your DGX670 are downloadable at http://chromakinetics.com/dgx670/

 

[MiddleC]

A zip file containing voices and a PDF containing instructions on how to add GM, GM2 and XG voices to your DGX670 are downloadable at http://chromakinetics.com/dgx670/

I've downloaded the sheets re: voices. Thanks for that.

Also, I noticed a list of Styles. Are those custom styles that can be loaded up? I havent gone down that path yet, but plan to. If those are available, I may download them, but don't want to w/o checking with you.