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In a recent thread a user made these comments regarding the classic Montage
There's only one set of switches on the hardware. An [ASSIGN SW 1] and [ASSIGN SW 2]. So when you press the switch to light it up from the normal no-Part-selected mode pressing the switch sets the switch settings for each Part to the same values. The same for every Part for switch 1's state and the same for every Part for switch 2's state. However, if you set these with an external source (that isn't limited by having only 2 physical buttons) then you can toggle the switches differently for each Part. And when you select an individual Part you can see the pattern of A.SW1 and A.SW2 change for each Part according to how you set them through MIDI (because they are set with CC and CC is on a MIDI channel basis - you're not (necessarily) setting a "global" A.SW value through MIDI).
Can't figure out how to do that on an M8X. Might be missing something or it might be due to the many changes Yamaha made in the 'Zone' area.
1. There is no 'ZONE' or 'INT SW' anymore
2. There is no 'multi mode'
3. There is a MIDI I/O Channel that is the only channel used for midi messages
4. A part is either 'Internal' or 'External' but can't be both as it could be on the classic Montage
You can send a CC command for CC#86 (sw #1) or #87 (sw #2).
But you have to send it on the MIDI I/O Channel so if you send the CC to channel 1 it will change the switches globally.
If you send the CC on channel 2 (to try to change the switch for part 2) part 2 won't receive it if the midi i/o channel is set to channel 1. And if it is set to channel 2 then you can't get the CC messages to parts other than 2.
Are we missing something? Or is this an issue due to the zone changes that were made in the M models?
Posted : 29/04/2025 12:00 am
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Keyboard Control must be OFF to use MIDI for part level changes.
If keyboard control for part 4 is ON then you can't send a MIDI message on channel 4 to change the assign switch settings. And if you send the switch CC (86/87) on channel 1 it will only affect parts with Keyboard Control ON.
The front panel assign switches work the same way. Changing the setting only affects parts with Keyboard Control ON.
So if you want all parts 1-8 to have keyboard ON but only parts 2,4,6,8 to have assign switch 2 ON you can:
1. turn keyboard control OFF for parts 1,3,5,7 but ON for parts 2,4,6,8
2. press the COMMON button to make sure no part is selected
3. press the assign switch 2 button (assuming you are in 'latch' mode)
4. turn keyboard control back ON for parts 1,3,5,7
Now checking each part in turn will show that assign switch light is OFF for parts 1,3,5,7 and ON for parts 2,4,6,8
Posted : 29/04/2025 9:34 pm
This is likely the same way it works in Montage classic. I added "(necessarily)" in the original text because I knew there were some corner cases I wasn't spelling out. Most of this stays in my head - but there's lots of details to just about everything that are difficult to keep track of.
This kind of thing (unique per-Part A.SW settings) does open up some possibilities that are not readily apparent. Although in practice I think I saw it could be done but never really made any actual use out of it. Mainly because my usage is live performance and I don't drive the keyboard with MIDI at all when I'm playing live.
The Montage M sure could use a lot more A.SWes (or equivalent). With all of those potential elements per Part - you may want to switch off elements in an XA Control manner (where held notes don't cut off when you switch off an element). There's only two switches so XA Control is a little out of step with the new increase in elements. Or some kind of way to take a look at all of the previous things you could do with only 8 elements and think of how to retain the flexibility when you expand the number of elements. Can't multiply every resource/control by 16 - but it's an interesting problem (opportunity) to look at.
Current Yamaha Synthesizers: Montage Classic 7, Motif XF6, S90XS, MO6, EX5R
Posted : 30/04/2025 7:40 am
