31
Song Prod uction:
The Basic s
✇
This paragraph deals extensively with all
aspects of CS1x song production and
makes no attempt to filter out any ‘spe-
cialist knowledge’.
This doesn‘t mean though that it is necessary to fully
explore each aspect in order to create songs with the CS1x.
Our earlier chapter “Song Production – An Easy Start”
made that obvious. Everything you need to know for a quick
start into multi-timbral applications with the CS1x can be
found there in compressed form.
However, should you wish to take a more informative but
less comfortable route through the following, often complex
material, we recommend plenty of patience. Please take the
time to work through each of the successive subjects and try
out as many of the accompanying examples as possible.
After all, your song productions are bound to benefit from it.
What is “XG”?
If you are planning to use the CS1x to play back or record
sequencer songs, you should already have heard something
about “XG” and be familiar with its most important proper-
ties.
The XG Standard is a format developed by YAMAHA and
is used to control tone generators. Although XG is based on
General MIDI (GM), it represents many qualitative and
quantitative improvements over this standard. XG sup-
ports greater musical expression: the total number of sounds
available in GM is drastically increased in XG. Furthermore
individual sound settings and real-time control of a multitude
of parameters are now possible. Finally, compatibility
between different XG models is guaranteed despite differ-
ences in tone processing.
The XG voices are organised into banks which, with the
exception of the GM compatible Bank 0, are not fully allo-
cated. This may at first seem confusing. A quick look at the
supplied XG-Voice List however clears things up: Bank 1 and
all following Banks (with the exception of the SFX-Bank) are
variations of the foundation sound. The different sound char-
acteristics can be found from each bank‘s column label (e.g.
Stereo, Single, Slow, Fast Decay etc.). This should greatly
simplify a search for a particular sound. Please take a look
also at table “XG Voices” in section “Decisions, decisions …”.
Another property of XG is that the Parts’ (i.e. the MIDI
channels’) sound and effect settings are integrated as Con-
troller and System Exclusive data in each sequencer track,
rather than stored in the keyboard itself. This has both
advantages and disadvantages.
One advantage is that songs recorded in the XG
standard are always played back correctly, regardless of
which XG model the song is being played back on. Total
compatibility between a whole product range is guaranteed
by the standardisation of all sound settings down to the
smallest detail. Time consuming sound bank transferrals and
the accompanying risk of data loss are thereby avoided.
A M P L E :
You have recorded the foundations of a song on your CS1x
and now wish to pass on this embryonic composition to
another musician, so that he can develop your ideas or add
further tracks. Without a common standard your partner
would have to spend a lot of time in preparation – he would
have to assign MIDI channels, find correct sounds and trans-
pose octaves correctly, or even modify the drum map. Not so
with XG: your partner can use your files with a MU-50 sound
module, the QS-300 synthesizer, the DB50XG sound card or
any other XG model without modification. He will hear the
song exactly as you recorded it. This greatly aids and encour-
ages co-operation between musicians.
One disadvantage of the standardisation of XG voices is
perhaps that it allows too little ‘elbow room’ for the creation
of specialised sounds. The CS1x however offers a user-
friendly solution to this problem:
The CS1x can be used multi-timbrally in not just its Multi
mode, but in its Performance mode also. Both modes lend
themselves well to song recording or smaller arrangements.
The Multi mode follows the XG model completely, however
in Performance mode you can combine the usual Layers (1 to
4) with up to 12 Multi Parts. The Multi Parts are XG compat-
ible, but they can also make us of Material Voices. These are
the Performances’ Layers, which can be selected with spe-
cific Bank and Program Change commands.
Is doesn‘t really matter whether you choose the Multi or
Performance mode for song production – the actual record-
ing procedure with external sequencers is fundamentally the
same and follows the XG standard. This is particularly true
for sound changes using controllers or System Exclusive
messages. We will therefore cover this subject for both
modes simultaneously.
Before we begin though we should take a quick look at the
principal differences between the two modes. This will help
you to get a better grip on which mode to choose.
Performance Mode or
Multi Mode?
The Performance mode is selected with the PERFOR-
MANCE key, and the Multi mode likewise with the MULTI
key. This is of course self-explanatory. The consequences of
this simple key press however aren‘t quite so obvious to the
user – something you should know about right away. Every
mode change re-initialises all of that mode‘s parameters, in
other words they are ‘reset’ to their standard values. In Per-
formance mode this applies only to the Multi Parts (5 – 16)
and doesn‘t affect the actual Performance (Layer 1 – 4). XG
experts will be familiar with this initialisation, termed “XG
On”.
Which mode is preferable depends on how you plan to use
it. The rule-over-thumb is: if you wish to incorporate the
above mentioned CS1x facilities into song production (real-
time control using Knobs, Scenes, Arpeggio…) you should
work in Performance mode. If however you need to be able
to record or play back XG songs you should choose the Multi
mode.
The following overview will clarify the main properties of
each playing mode, and the differences between them.
