Quick changes to favorite patches

[fishtaco]

Newbie to the forum here. Just got my Electro 6 73 this week.

I'm a little disappointed as to the ability to save favorite patches (or are they called 'Programs'?) that I can call up at a button press in live performance. Toggling through hundreds of patches from A11 to 044 is not exactly the way to make a quick change.

The only feature I am seeing for this is Live Mode feature where I can save a whopping 8 presents. (I have a $600 KORG synth that lets me save ten.)

And there's two drawbacks that come with Live Mode:
1. Any change I make on the fly gets saved forever (because the real purpose of Live Mode is as a scratchpad)
2. Limited in what the Program panel shows me...just A1/B2, etc, names of the patches comprising the hybrid...but not the preset letter name (H23, B12, etc) that was the point of departure.

The one remedy i can think of is to have a laptop on stage with me running the Sound Manager, and click on the saves I have made in in slots P11 and above. Are there any other possible remedies?

Also, maybe I bought the wrong Nord. Are there other models with more flexibility on custom saves? (I've seen a video about "songs", but for Stage models; Electro hasn't got that.)

Thank you,
(remember....newbie)

[maxpiano]

Hi and welcome to NUF,

having said that a keyboard specs are public and can (should?) be read before buying as I guess you did, so it should not be a surprise to not find what is not there, why don't you just sort your Programs with Nord Sound Manager and put your favorites in the first Bank/Locations (as it is has been the case with any keyboard not managing favorites or Song Lists).

The alternative of a computer/tablet or even just a smartphone with a SetList app that can also send Program Changes over USB MIDI is of course also OK and even more flexible, at the cost of an additional piece of equipment of course.

[Tasten-Bert]

Hello fishtaco

and a very warm welcome to this wonderful forum of nord enthusiasts. I hope you‘ll love it here - and your nord. I am in a similar situation as you are, having an electro 5D with only that one dial knob to switch between more than 50 programmes, and having a korg X50 on the other hand which offers me the 10 favourites at one fingerpress as you mentioned.

Firstly I tried the app „Program Changer“ on my iPad, no success. Then I found out that my app „Set List Maker“ allows me to add MIDI program change commands which can jump directly to any nord programme. So if I for example switch to my song sheet Runaway which I play with my nord program 1:28 it sends the MSB LSB Program code 0-0-27 to the keyboard, and there it changes as from ghost‘s hand to the according program.

If that‘s an option for you …

Cheers from Germany

[fishtaco]

I am the OP, and my question was just days after I opened the box on my Electro 6, so I've learned a lot since then.

There is definitely the ability dial up your saved programs quickly. The Live Mode approach I mentioned in my post is definitely not the way.

Before I talk about how I learned to make a desired program one-button-press away, there are a few fundamentals to learn about the Nord approach to organizing the programs:

(1) Every "bank" (letters A, B, C ... through Z) is divided up into multiple groups of four. The banks start at A11, then A12, A13 and A14. After A14 the next groups of programs is A21, A22, A23, A24. So there is no A15, A16, no A25, A26. Once you get to A44, that's all that's left in A bank, and B11 will be next. (*)
(2) Rather than being a limitation, the above strategy is clever. First notice that every group of four has a number that always ends in 1, 2, 3, or 4. Not coincidentally, four is the number of Program buttons you have. So if you are on A1, the four buttons are mapped to all the programs in that group (A1 = button 1, A2 = button 2, etc). If you are on A11 then A11 = button 1, A12 = button 2, etc. You want to go to program Q22? Go to the beginning of the Q bank Q1. Press the Page up button twice until you get to Q21. Now press Program 2, and you're there. You are never more than 3 Programs away from your target. (**)
(3) Next, you should learn the quick way to switch to a specific bank (A, B, C, etc). Say you are on P24 and you want to get to B bank. You're free to dial the knob forever to get there, but you want something quicker. Instead you can quickly scroll by letter by pressing the page key (up or down) while holding down the Shift key. That will scroll you rapidly from P11, O11, N11 .... C11, and finally B11.
(4) Using the above information, here's how you would quickly go from, say, L43 to C33. Press the Page down key while holding down the Shift key until L becomes C11. Then press the Page up key (no Shift) enough times to advance it from C11, C21, to C31. Then press preset 3 and you're at C33.

Now onto customizing your 4 Program keys to your 4 presets. Let's say that my band plays a song called 'Rock and Roll Highway' where I need to be able to switch quickly between organ, piano, voice and flute patches using preset buttons 1, 2, 3 and 4. And suppose that the organ I want to use is G13, the piano I want to use is F31, the voice I want to use is Q12, and the flute I want to use is program C34:

(1) Find an empty bank (they begin at letter R). Let's use bank T21.
(2) Copy G13 to T21, copy F31 to T22, copy Q12 to T23, C34 to T24. (***)
(3) In your setlist, write "T21" next to Rock and Roll Highway.
(4) When it's time to play Rock and Roll Highway, quickly scroll to T21 using the approach described above. There you have it: organ on program 1, piano on program 2, voice on program 3 and flute on program 4.

( * ) Why they chose 44 as the ceiling, has probably got something to do with how they could spread the total memory over programs while still using the entire alphabet.
( ** ) While this process sounds complicated when you first read it, once learned, it means you can get to programs with the minimum amount of thinking, allowing you to keep your mind on the music.
( *** ) Note enough room here to explain the copying process, please find that out elsewhere (manual or YouTube videos)

[maxpiano]

( * ) Why they chose 44 as the ceiling, has probably got something to do with how they could spread the total memory over programs while still using the entire alphabet.

Because the Program position naming concept in Nord keyboards is Bank-Page-Location and for each bank you have 4 pages with 4 locations (one per button)

This way so that you can use Bank/page as a container of 4 Programs you need to be accessed in sequence, with a single button press; how to interpret it depends on your needs, for example each Page can be a Song with its 4 Program, so that to switch to a specific Song you just select its "bank+page" and then you have its Programs all there to be switched while playing.

[cbluff]

The Electro 5 had the SETLIST feature, which I feel is the best organization feature EVER!
They scrapped it and went to Pages instead on the Electro 6 , so I never upgraded.
Maybe they'll bring back the SETLIST feature in the Electro 7 (if I live long enough to see it released...)