Nord User Forum

I recently bought a Korg Volca Keys analogue monosynth and I decided to MIDI it up to my NE3 73. The first thing I found was that the Nord doesn't transmit key velocity when set to Organ mode (a good thing in my opinion - I don't like monosynths with velocity response). However, I also found that when I released a key on the Nord too rapidly (possibly causing a retrigger?) the Korg's release got abruptly cut off. Any idea what might cause this?

Best thing to do is to see with a MIDI monitor program what exactly is being sent out of the electro to the volca.

simonbeck wrote:I recently bought a Korg Volca Keys analogue monosynth and I decided to MIDI it up to my NE3 73. The first thing I found was that the Nord doesn't transmit key velocity when set to Organ mode (a good thing in my opinion - I don't like monosynths with velocity response). However, I also found that when I released a key on the Nord too rapidly (possibly causing a retrigger?) the Korg's release got abruptly cut off. Any idea what might cause this?

If it's only on the rapid release which might be causing a retrigger (which would indeed cut off the tail of a preceding strike on a mono synth), try setting the organ mode to its deep (low) trigger point, rather than the shallow (high) point, which will probably eliminate any retrigger that might be coming from a bounce.

Puzzling. If the Nord isn't sending velocity (or rather it's a fixed 127 velocity - I don't think you can send a note-on without some velocity), then the same goes for Note-off release velocity? This behaviour suggests the Korg understands note-off velocity but the Nord only fixes Note-on velocity in Organ mode. An Organ sound would never care about note-off velocity so the Nord might well still send a variable velocity on note-off.
Indeed, the Organ mode is using only the top key contact so cannot measure note-on velocity, but it could be that for note off, if it starts from the bottom contact, then it will still send a velocity.

As suggested, look in a Midi program with a midi event list display and see what is received from the Nord.

If you set the Nord's keyboard response in Organ mode to Low, it transmits velocity data. On the other hand, it doesn't do the retrigger/release cut-off thing either, so I guess I just have to make sure I release those keys gently...