MIDI - Cubasis - 3.7

If turned on, this option limits MIDI input signals to record-enabled tracks only, e.g. if you are playing on an external keyboard, it will only be registered if its corresponding track has recording enabled.

Choose which coloring scheme is applied to notes in the MIDI editor: Track color, velocity value or key.

The MIDI over Bluetooth LE (low energy) functionality lets Cubasis send or receive MIDI data to or from other Bluetooth-enabled devices. The following combinations are possible:

• iOS device → iOS device

• iOS device ↔ Mac

• Compatible MIDI hardware ↔ iOS device

To set up a connection, first make sure that Bluetooth is turned on in the device's settings.

There are two ways to connect with another MIDI device:

• Host mode will open a selection window showing discoverable devices. Once paired with a client, the paired device will become selectable as MIDI input / output in the Inspector's Routing section. Best used when utilizing Cubasis as central DAW with MIDI hardware or a second iOS device as client.

• As Client, turning on Advertise MIDI Service makes your iOS device visible to other devices seeking a connection. Once you've confirmed the host device's pairing request and a connection is established, select the host device as MIDI input / output in the Inspector's Routing section. Best used when connecting to a second host iOS device or Mac.

Link is a technology that keeps devices in time over a local network. It provides tempo and beat synchronization between multiple devices, or between multiple apps running on the same device. More information and a list of supported mobile apps, desktop apps and hardware can be found here. To sync via Link, turn on WiFi and Bluetooth on all devices, enable the Ableton Link option on all devices, and optionally enable start/stop sync.

MIDI learn allows you to map any hardware button, knob, fader or other control that sends MIDI CC or MIDI note messages, to a button, knob or fader in Cubasis. This is useful if your MIDI controller doesn’t support the Mackie Control or HUI protocols (also sometimes called DAW mode), in order to create a custom mapping.

First off, make sure that your MIDI controller is in MIDI mode, CC mode, or sometimes called CTRL mode. If it’s in Mackie, HUI or DAW mode, it cannot be used for MIDI learn, but for Mackie control (see the next chapter).

To start mapping your controls, simply tap the Learn button (or press Alt-L on your keyboard) to enable learn mode. This will automatically enable MIDI Learn and create a new user preset if you had not created one yet. In learn mode, all Cubasis controls that can be assigned get a green overlay. There are even some additional overlays in the track list that map the action of selecting the previous or next track (see the green arrow buttons in the screenshot). Tap a green overlay (e.g. a volume fader) and it will turn red. Move a hardware control (e.g. a fader) to create a mapping. The overlay will turn orange and the MIDI key or CC value will be displayed. Tap the X icon to delete the mapping. All mappings are automatically saved in the currently selected user preset. In Learn mode, four global buttons are displayed in the upper right corner:

• Exit deactivates MIDI-Learn mode.

• Reset clears all mappings in the selected user preset. Be careful, this cannot be undone and the preset will be empty.

• Selected Track Mode will only show overlays on the selected track in the track list and the mixer. When you assign a control in this mode, it will always control the selected track. This is useful with controllers that have only one fader and knob, to always control the selected track’s volume and pan, for example. It can even be used to control the selected track’s effects (like StudioEQ) and instruments (like Micrologue). With selected track mode disabled, the assignments are made for a specific track number, for example volume of track number 7.

• Catch-Up Mode is only available for volume and pan. Imagine that you select a track that has its volume at 0 dB in Cubasis, but your hardware MIDI controller’s fader is currently at its min position. When you start moving the fader up, the track’s volume will immediately jump to a very low volume value like -100 dB. To prevent this, enable catch-up mode before assigning the mapping. This means that the track’s volume won’t change until the hardware fader’s value will match (or catch up to) the track’s volume, which is 0 dB in our case. This will result in a smooth volume change from the moment your hardware fader reaches its 0 dB position.

The Presets button brings up the list of presets. The top entry lets you create a new user preset. Below it, factory presets are listed first, and user presets are listed below. There is an important distinction:

• A factory preset contains a ready-to-use mapping for one specific MIDI controller. Double tapping a factory preset opens a list of MIDI input ports, because it must be mapped to a MIDI port. You have the option to either Create a new user preset from the factory preset, or to Merge it with the currently selected user preset. Imagine that you have 2 MIDI controllers connected, in which case you would want to map each one’s preset to its port, by merging them into one user preset.

• A user preset contains mappings to specific ports, which means that it could contain mappings to multiple MIDI controllers that are connected at the same time. For example, CC42 of MIDI controller A could be mapped to volume, while CC42 of MIDI controller B could be mapped to pan at the same time. However, port IDs are device specific and cannot be automatically matched to the ports of another tablet or smartphone. So, if you use the Share button to copy your preset (.cml file) to another device, make sure to tap the Apply to Port button on the other device to apply your user preset to one MIDI port. Mappings that are done in Learn mode are automatically saved in the currently selected user preset.

Many hardware MIDI controllers support the widely used Mackie “MCU” protocol, or its predecessor, the HUI protocol. In this case, doing MIDI learn manually is not necessary, since the Mackie protocol goes beyond MIDI learn by also sending MIDI output to the controller, like fader position for motor faders, or track information for controller displays.

To start off, read your controller’s user manual and set it to Mackie mode, HUI mode, or also sometimes called DAW mode. If there are multiple Mackie modes to choose from, select the Mackie Cubase mode.

Tap the Ports button in the Cubasis MIDI setup and tap both the input and the output port of your MIDI controller once, which will set them to Mackie mode. To switch to HUI mode, tap the ports again. Tap them a third time to disable Mackie control, thereby making the controller available for MIDI learn.

If you have a device with more than 8 faders, it probably has multiple MIDI ports. In that case, tap the first input and output ports to declare them as Mackie. Then tap the second pair of ports, which will declare them as “Mackie 9-16”, thereby changing the first ports to “Mackie 1-8”, which refers to the track numbers of course. The bank buttons can be used to move all faders 8 tracks left or right.

If MIDI clock is activated, the following signals are sent to all the connected MIDI devices and background apps:

• MIDI clock is sent continuously during playback.

• MIDI start, continue and stop messages are sent when playback is toggled.

• The MIDI song position pointer is sent when the playhead is positioned.

Depending on the audio app or external device you have synced with Cubasis via MIDI clock, you might notice an offset between both devices. Use the output latency fader to compensate for this offset. Positive values (up to 100 ms) will delay any outgoing MIDI events. Negative values (down to -100 ms) will add latency to Cubasis's audio output so that MIDI events are sent earlier than the internal audio output.

This setup option is only visible on Android 13, where a bug prevents audio input and output with USB hardware that features both audio and MIDI ports. As a temporary workaround until Android 13 is fixed, disabling MIDI I/O will fix audio I/O. Be sure to restart Cubasis and unplug and plug your USB device in again, after changing this setting.