MasterKey

Master MIDI Mapper
By Thomas Tegeler
Released as SHAREWARE JULY, 2001

Atari-MIDI member Guido Goebertus told me about a program he had discovered called MasterKey. He contacted the programmer Thomas Tegeler, and soon I was contacted by him in which he explained he would like to release his program as SHAREWARE to the Atari-MIDI community.This shareware version is a fully functional version. It is not crippled in any way. Thomas only asks if after 30 days evaluation and you use the program to please register it. See Shareware conditions below. SUPPORT ATARI PROGRAMMERS!

MasterKey is what I would call a MASTER MIDI MAPPER.

Loading up the program, it seems to be very comprehensive. Basically you can turn your midi controller into a SUPER MIDI Controller by layering into 6 programmable zones, with settings for Volume curves, velocity , patch change, instrument, midi channel and much more. For those using a DX7 as a controller, it will allow you to get the full range of velocities (as a DX outputs only 90 or 100 or so) I can see layering 6 synths across the keyboard all with different sounds set up.It would be very useful in a live performance setup.I have tried this with a General MIDI module and it works well with this type of sound structure as well as any type of MIDI modules.

A typical example of MIDI mapping is having a bass only sound mapped to the lower octave of the keyboard, which fades into a string sound in the next octave, turning into a mirimba sound which fades out to a flute to the end of the keyboard. You can have all these settings as presets ready to change at the click of a button.

Another application is using an Alternate Mouse Controller such as Laurie Spiegels Music Mouse set up on another ST, which feeds into another computer with MasterKey set up. MasterKey greatly expands the sound pallete and textures you can create with these alternate mouse controllers.

MasterKey works on a TT030 computer, but not really on a Falcon: It does not work on the Falcon at ST HI, but works at 16 color Hi mode, but has screen redraw problems. No problems on the TT in ST HI res however.1040ST's STE's should work fine.

Clicking into the KEYBOARD RANGE row under any of the ZONE Columns (no's 1 thru 6) will bring up a keyboard graphic in which you can drag the upper and lower zones with the mouse, or by using you midi keyboard.This allows you to customize your zones and allow you to put any sound you want on the keyboard, even layer sounds on top of each other adding a rich texture.

Once you set up a Keyboard range you like, you can copy your work to the next "patch" by clicking on PATCH OPERATIONS on the menu and selecting SWAP/COPY ACTUAL PATCH. Selecting COPy in the dialog and selecting a destination PATCH, and OK will copy the keyboard ranges over, and you can now set it up with different program NR(program changes) which will set up different sounds or patches on your MIDI instruments.

You can also set up Dynamic curves for each zone using this graphic display available from the Menu under SYSTEM INSTALL.

What follows now is the ENGLISH Text file explaining in more detail about the program:

** MasterKey for ATARI-Computers - INFO: ***

The program MasterKey uses the ATARI-computer as keyboard- controller and MIDI-patchbay. There are hardware-devices for this purpose, they modify the data sent from keyboards to sound-modules and make it easier, to switch between complex MIDI-constellations. But those hardware-devices are often somewhat cripple to use and somewhat cryptic to program having only small displays. The computer offers his monitor to make it much clearer, what You are doing and simplifies to save and load data to/from disk or harddisk.

*** Some Features of MasterKey: ***

Using an external MIDI-merge-box the program can react upon the signals of 2 Keyboards sending on different MIDI-channels.

MasterKey holds its data in a "bank" with a "*.KBD"-extension. In this bank it stores 100 "Patches", which mean 100 complex MIDI-constellations.

These patches can be used in 100 "Chains", each of them a series of up to 25 "Steps", which can be "stepped through" with one click of a program-switch on Your keyboard, with a mouseclick or a keyboard-click on Your computer or even with a simple selfmade hardware-device connected to the joystick-jack of the ATARI-computer.

Each patch distributes the incoming keyboard-data between up to 6 "outputs". This means it sends the data after processing them to external sound-modules on their corresponding MIDI-channels.

For each of those "outputs" the following parameters can be adjusted:

1. Name of the appropriate MIDI-device
2. MIDI-Channel
3. Keyboard range
4. Transposition
5. MIDI bank-/program-nr.
6. Volume
7. Dynamic offset
8. Dynamic transformation curve
9. Use and transformation of pitch bend up/down, after touch, 3 special MIDI-controlers, all other MIDI-controlers

Each patch can give You a "count-in-metronome", that starts after selecting the patch and stops with the first note You press on Your keyboards. This metronome uses monitor-blinking, monitor-beep or an external sound-module via MIDI.

Several more functions can be released by program-switches of the keyboards or by the "joystick-device", for example changing the program-number of a sound module, selecting the chain, starting/stopping the metronome-function, panic.

The program can send MIDI-(sysex-)data at program start/end (each up to 100 bytes) and when entering/leaving a patch (each up to 40 bytes) for certain adjustments that can not be achieved with simple MIDI-commands.

Last not least, MasterKey provides a MIDI-Monitor to display the incoming MIDI-signals in hexadecimal form.

*** !! WARNING !! ***

An explicit hint shall be made because of the software's ability to overwrite adjustments You made at Your sound- or effect-modules. It is one of the softwares purposes to modify those adjustments using MIDI-exclusive data ! So, please backup all internal data of Your synthesizers etc. before working with this software.

Contact:

Thomas Tegeler
2t@nwn.de

Q: The DX7 only outputs velocities of 90 to 100. How would you get the full range of velocities to 127?

Thomas answers:

A: Should be easy, if You make a dynamic curve like a straight line from In-dynamic 1 to In-dynamic 90 where Out-dynamic 1 is 1 and Out-dynamic 90 is 127 and In-values 91 to 127 all result in Out-value 127. Go to Dynamic Curves, choose FINE, select Input-bar 90 and draw it up to 127, then click on LINE and afterwards (Input-bar 90 still selected) click on Input-bar 1. Then select bar 90 again, click on LINE and afterwards click on bar 127 - ready. Further adjustments may be necessary, depending on how linear the DX7 covers its 90 dyna-values, as far as I remember, it has a not so bad keyboard, so maybe thats really all You need.

Shareware Version
Evaluation and Registration

This is shareware, which is not free software. Subject to the terms below, you are hereby licensed to use this software for evaluation purposes without charge for a period of 30 days. If you use this software after the 30 day evaluation period, registration is required.

The price of a copy of MasterKey for ATARI is 25 Euro. $25.00 USD

The registration is via e-mail, contacting the author directly at his e-mail address (2t@nwn.de).

Distribution

Provided that you are distributing the current non-registered Shareware Version (select Info from the ATARI-Menu menu to check) you are hereby granted permission to duplicate and distribute the program, give exact copies of the original Shareware version to anyone and distribute the Shareware version of the software and documentation in its unmodified form via electronic means. There is no charge for any of the above.

You are specifically prohibited from charging, or requesting donations, for any such copies, however made, from distributing the software and/or documentation with other products (commercial or otherwise) without prior written permission.

Oldenburg 22.7.2001
Thomas Tegeler

Download MasterKey

Download MasterKey Docs in PDF format

Download MasterKey Registration Form

Here is Thomas Tegeler's home site with more information about MasterKey, as well as Docs in WORD format (German)

Home Site of MasterKey