Is there any way to program the Montage so that when I play a single note I get 2, 3, or more instruments playing like a brass ensemble for example? I realize I can play a chord and get this with a brass ensemble pre-set, but I would like to play a single finger melody line and produce multiple horns playing in harmony.

The problem with building chords from a single key is that harmony would be parallel (meaning the interval between notes would remain static, and not move intelligently) — if you create a voicing of a chord on your guitar, imagine never changing the distance between notes as you play... quickly the “harmony” does not work. If you Voice a minor 7 chord, your single line phrase would be made of all minor7 chords.

You can build a chord from one note... but it would not work musically as a vehicle for harmony.

Options available:
Employ the MONTAGE’s ability to play an exact phrase triggered by an Arpeggio. This will require letting the MONTAGE become ‘aware’ of the Tempo. This ensures the precise timing playback of the phrase. By pre-recording the exact phrase you need you can trigger it on cue or, depending on your situation, just totally automate playback.

What's described seems to better fit an arranger. Where you can define a progression and do more single-note-type-stuff to make things happen. I'm actually not that proficient at what the arrangers can and cannot do - I'm just guessing that's more in those instruments' alley. ARPs work but with some limitation.

Note that you can get fancy with microtuning and make something that doesn't move parallel with single-finger chords. It'd be a lot of setup - limited in what exactly it could do (amount of chord types, on which roots, etc) - but possible to get a couple single-finger chords that didn't move parallel. It's probably not worth all of the effort to squeeze so little out of that option.

For non-fancy parallel chord stuff - something modal like So What fits that pretty well. 2 chord tune that moves parallel (minor second). Something tells me your desired harmonic roadmap is more complex than that.

Bad Mister and Jason, thanks so much for taking the time to respond and explain. The good news is, you both understood my question and I actually understood both of your responses. I will experiment some with the arpeggio option to see if I can use that for some of my needs. I guess the bottom line is that I am going to actually have to learn more of the chords for these backing parts in order to get the harmonic intervals right. Thanks again and cheers!!

If you settle for just the difference between major and minor you can create two scenes.

Select the voice you like as part 1.
Then you construct the chords by adding/copying three parts of the original part 1.
The 2nd part you detune by adding a major triad (performance - part select - edit - part setting - pitch +4)
The 3rd part by adding a minor triad (+3).
The 4th part by adding a quint (+7).

Then mute part 3. Store this as scene 1.
Then un-mute part 3 and mute part 2 and store this as scene 2.

Select scene 1 for a 1-fingered major chord.
Select scene 2 for a 1-fingered minor chord.

Of course you can do this within one part by adding elements.
The above is just a simple dirty trick to get you started.
You might even change the instruments: part 1 baritone sax, part 2 and 3 trombone, part 4 trumpet.

Yes, I was going to circle-back and add that you can add more PARTs to handle different chord types (so movement is not parallel). I was not thinking using scenes to flop between the chord types - but instead using note range so one PART (with one chord type) is played for certain keys and another PART (with a different chord type) is played for other keys.

I have set this kind of thing up where I use splits to get different chords out of different ranges of the keyboard. Slightly different than your 1-finger application (I use this to change the pitch-bend range so I can have pedal steel guitar morph between different chord types and I finger the full chord) -- but overall approach is the same. Divvy up the keyboard into regions and have the PARTs handle differences for each region. In this case, you can have a region of one chord type and a region of another. Setup your ARPs to do what you want. As you walk up/down the keyboard - your chord qualities can change. This "eats up" PARTs fairly quickly if you do this as one-PART-per-sound (one for trumpet, one for sax, one for ...). So you may want to look into building a PART with the mixture of instruments you want in a single PART. Or use the single-PARTs which already have a horn section.

I realize I can play a chord and get this with a brass ensemble pre-set, but I would like to play a single finger melody line and produce multiple horns playing in harmony.

Remember the original request...

Here's something more concrete.

All of this assumes playing something in the key of C maj. If you're playing in a different key (and sticking to one key) - adjustments will need to be made to the microtuning step, but this will still work. If you modulate keys - this is not going to work as well and another approach may be needed. Including maybe extending this so you add a 3rd PART which would handle the "3rd above" but work for the modulated key. Then you'd want to possibly use scenes to switch keys -- but I'm not getting into all of that here. Assume single key - and playing diatonic primarily within that key.

Start with "Brass Section". It already has multiple horns in one PART - so I don't have to "burn" many PARTs to set this same thing up. That horns will be doubled when harmonic intervals are played is "fine". That's something you'll have to decide. I choose conservation of PARTs over other factors. You could have one instrument in one PART and a different one in another PART if a smaller ensemble is what you're after.

PART 1 will be the unison sound. Meaning when I play the melody line - PART 1 will play the same note I'm playing in the melody. That's set and done. Moving on ...

Touch PART 1, choose "Copy" and select to Copy PART 1 --> PART 2. Now PART 2 is another unison PART. That's a good starting point, but not what I want. I want the 2nd PART to play a 3rd above (major or minor depending on the note). We'll get there.

Touch PART 2 to start editing what will be my "3rd above" PART. Choose "Edit" select the "Part Settings" -> "Pitch" menu and change the "Note Shift" to +4. What this does is play exactly a major 3rd above any note you play. Play a "C" you get an "E". Fine. Play a "D" you get an "F#". Not so fine. F# isn't in the key of C -- well, maybe for a lydian sound -- but I'm going to adjust this to F natural so all harmony notes are diatonic. That comes with the next step: microtuning.

Same menu, change the microtuning to "User 1". Then choose to edit the user microtuning. Setup the microtuning values to:

C: +0
C#: +0
D: -99
D#: -65
E: -99
F: +0
F#: -99
G: -99
G#: +0
A: -99
A#: +0
B: +0

Now, if you're always playing diatonic, you'll never play accidentals (C#, D#, F#, G#, A# - and the enharmonic flats). So it doesn't matter what the adjustments are to these notes if you're not playing any accidentals. You'll notice I have some adjustments - D# and F#. This is subjective. I did this so runs with accidentals sound better. The microtonal treatment of D# may not be "hip" to you. You can adjust these how you see fit - or not worry about them if you're always playing melody lines within the key.

That finishes PART 2 - which is our harmony note. You could keep going with more copies and do the same sort of thing to add more PARTs adding different harmonic intervals. Maybe adjusting PART 1 so it isn't a unison - but rather a different interval above or below the melody. The same sort of approach could be made. In microtuning -99 is close enough to meaning down a 1/2 step and +99 is close enough to meaning up a 1/2 step.

PART 1 and PART 2 above are both the "harmony" PARTs - not the melody "lead". The melody "lead" PART would be PART 3 (not discussed) in the above example.

Keys and such - you can do more with this setup if you wanted. At some point it becomes hard to play. But say you have the above - and your tune is in C major. Say it goes to C minor for a bit. This can be accomplished by playing D dorian (all of the white keys starting from D ) and push your pitch-bend all the way down so when you play "D" you get a "C". Now all the white keys - although you're playing a "D" - to start - will play the "C" scale in dorian mode - which is a minor key. You'll hear C, D, Eb, F, G, A, Bb, C (playing a D scale - all white notes from "D" to "D" ). You'll also hear PART 2 with the harmony notes which are all in the key of C dorian. Eb, F, G, A, Bb, C, D, Eb. You can set the pitch-bend range for up and down to make it "easy" to play in some other mode. Playing only white keys - but some other tonailty is presented. The hard part of this is keeping track of what the effective note is (the note you hear) vs the note you play. Guitarists have it easy with the capo. Even though the position changes - the shapes do not. Keyboards - if you put the virtual "capo" on - since the keys are different patterns with white/black - the shapes do not stay the same.