Patches

In the world of MIDI music, there doesn’t seem to be a consensus as to how to refer to the different sounds available from any MIDI device. Different manufacturers may refer to a specific violin sound (for example) on their MIDI device as a sound, patch, part, voice, or program. This can be very confusing when all you want to do is change the trumpet sound to the saxophone sound. In the interest of consistency throughout SongWriter and its documentation, we’ll refer to a specific MIDI sound as a Patch. This term comes from the early days of the synthesizer, when you changed the sound of your synthesizer by switching the configuration of the various “patch” cords or cables.

A patch could be as simple as a basic MIDI program change message, but it might also include bank change information, which may be required on certain MIDI devices to access all available patches.

SongWriter both records and plays back the MIDI data that allows a MIDI instrument to change patches (that is, programs or sound settings and optional bank change information) during playback. Using SongWriter’s ScoreManager, you can create sets of your favorite channel/patch combinations and select them, by name, from the Sound drop-down list

SongWriter begins numbering its patches at 1, but not every MIDI device begins the numbering of its programs at 1 (some begin numbering at 0). Therefore, if you find that the numbers you enter in the following examples change your MIDI instrument to a program number that’s one off, remember to change the numbers accordingly by adding 1. (If your MIDI instrument isn’t responding to the program changes, make sure that program changes have been “enabled,” for those synthesizers having such a control.

The easiest way to set up patches is to select the instrument you want from the General MIDI drop-down list under the Sound column of the ScoreManager. This will automatically setup the Bank Select and Program Change for that instrument. If you prefer to setup specific Bank Select and Program Change information to, for example, play back through an external MIDI device using non-General MIDI sounds, use the following instructions.

To establish MIDI patch settings for a score Instrument

1. Choose MIDI > Device Setup > MIDI Setup. Select the desired MIDI Out device. (Click Advanced to choose the MIDI Out device for banks 2-8. Click OK.
2. Choose Window > ScoreManager. The ScoreManager appears. If you want to assign a program to a certain layer of a staff, click the triangle next to an Instrument name; the list expands to show you individual layer assignments.
3. In the Sound column, select the MIDI sound you want to assign to each staff. If the MIDI sound you want does not appear in the Sound column, click the drop-down arrow and choose Edit Patch. The Set Patch To dialog box appears.
4. Here, you can indicate the bank and program changes for an external MIDI device by choosing an option from the Patch drop-down menu and then entering the appropriate bank numbers. The ScoreManager gives you a great deal of power over MIDI channels and patch assignments. Click OK.
5. Ensure MIDI > Send Patches to MIDI Device on Playback is checked and click OK.

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