Qtractor for live setup

[bluebell]

A friend asked me if I felt like playing with him live. I did recording-stuff only with my Computer so far and I sold all my synthesizers. I have just some MIDI master keyboards.

Idea:
Use a Qtractor-"song" per song.

MIDI master keyboard -> Qtractor Midi Master In. From there Midi Aux sends to max 16 Midi buses, each with a synth plugin configured to a different channel.

Now I can load a Qtractor-"song" and select the different sounds/instruments by changing the Midi channel of the master keyboard.

How do you switch between sounds at live gigs?

[bluebell]

I am testing another approach:
One track (not bus) per synth/sound. Each one may have the same MIDI channel so this setup is not limited to 16 sounds.

The track having the focus gets the keyboard's input. Works fine by now.

[j_e_f_f_g]

Have you tried backupband? It has a sound module built into it. If you add the Instruments.zip pack, you've got a useful set of gig patches including acoustic and electric pianos, strings, brass, organ, sax, trumpet, clavinet, bass guitars, electric/acoustic guitars, etc. And since bb uses standard midi program change messages to select those patches, you can use the buttons on your keyboard to instantaneously change among patches.

You don't need to use the auto-accompaniment features. You can disable all that, and just use it like a midi sound module.

[bluebell]

Have you tried backupband? It has a sound module built into it. If you add the Instruments.zip pack, you've got a useful set of gig patches including acoustic and electric pianos, strings, brass, organ, sax, trumpet, clavinet, bass guitars, electric/acoustic guitars, etc. And since bb uses standard midi program change messages to select those patches, you can use the buttons on your keyboard to instantaneously change among patches.

You don't need to use the auto-accompaniment features. You can disable all that, and just use it like a midi sound module.

That's not enough for me. I use Fluidsynth, Linuxsampler, Whysynth, Yoshimi, Dexed and others. And I might add some effect plugins per sound.

Rui has improved Qtractor's Midi learn for keyboard shortcuts, so I can scroll up and down the tracks with my Midi keyboard's programmable keys.

[bluebell]

Next level:

Place the synth plugins into Midi buses.
Use tracks with Midi Aux Sends to the buses, some with Midi keysplit plugin and 2 Midi Aux Sends for Split sounds.

Should be possible with 2 Midi keysplit plugins chained and 3 Midi Aux Sends.

[noedig]

You have a few options to switch between patches (i.e. change where MIDI is sent):

Mididings
http://das.nasophon.de/mididings/
Specifically look at scenes, and the Livedings interface.

MIDI Layer
https://sourceforge.net/projects/midi-layer/

Backupband
If I am not mistaken, I read somewhere that Jeffg's Backupband can output MIDI to other applications, so it may yet be a solution for you.

Konfyt
http://www.noedig.co.za/konfyt/

[j_e_f_f_g]

Backupband can output MIDI to other apps

Yeah, but it's more efficient to load all those synths/samplers as plugins in Carla (or QTractor here) than to chain them together via QJackCtl and BackupBand. BackupBand is meant to be akin to using something like a Yamaha Tyros, where it's a tightly integrated all-in-one instrument designed for live gigging. It's not meant to be supplemented with plugins, especially written by different developers. Otherwise, you too often need to deal with compatibility/stability, user interface, and configuration issues. And those are things that I never want to deal with in front of a live audience. I've been using BackupBand on gigs for over 10 years, and just like my Roland, Yamaha, Korg, Alesis, Fatar, etc hardware, it has never crashed or otherwise failed on a gig. Personally, I'd never gig with a setup as complex and varied as what BlueBell is considering. There are too many "points of failure". That's fine in the studio, but live, you have to get it right the first, and every time. I'd recommend he choose either fluidsynth or linuxsampler -- whichever proves more stable -- and only one of those synths. Beyond that he's getting minor additional benefits, with greater risk.

[thebutant]

I've actually used Qtractor for live stuff quite a few times. Whenever I need to perform live (not my favourite).

Well, bluebell, you suggest using a qtractor song (I understand that as a project) per song. That might work nicely, depending on what you need.
I've actually used the same project for all songs, rather having 1 track per song. Simply turning synths, effects etc on and off as the performance develops.

For instance:
If I play the guitar in the first song, then track 1 has a few plugins (let's say a flanger + reverb + amp) as a rack for making the wanted guitar sound.
In song 2 I might use NoizeMak3r and some delay, so track 2 is a midi track with midi connected, and a little rack of NoizeMak3r + eq + delay.
If song 3 is with Dexed, then I simply toggle NoizeMak3r off and Dexed on. If the effects are the same in song 2 and 3, maybe they use the same eq + delay, then they can both be on track 2. If not, maybe Dexed is on track 3 with its own effects. And so on.

This is of course not the most elegant way of rigging for a live perfomance, and I'm sure it's not what Qtractor is primarily aimed for, but it is actually a rather efficient way of making different configurations for diffferent songs and getting easily from one to the next. For a Qtractor fanboy like me, this has been the simplest way of doing it.

It's smart to strip things down as much as possible, share plugins between songs and so, as you'd probably want a real low latency without any xruns.