Learning midi key to play a cue clip

[pds (Pauls1024)]

I am using Ardour 7.5 on Ubuntu Studio. It is awesome. I can import mp3’s, add them to my clips, and create cues of the clips. Now I would like to get a keypress on my Akai MPKmini to start a cue or clip to playback.

I can use the MPKmini to record onto a MIDI track… so the device is recognised by Ardour.

I can place an audio file in the cue window and play the clip by clicking the play triangle beside the clip, or pressing F1 to launch the cue.

When I right click the clip name in the cue window I get the drop option down to “Learn Midi”. I then press a key on the MPKmini. It does not seem to work… pressing the same key again does not start the clip playing.

In Edit/Preferences/Triggering the “Default Trgger Input” is set to “MPK mini Mk II”

Any ideas what I have done wrong or how to debug this?

[pds (Pauls1024)]

Replying to myself with some more info.

You can ignore all reference to the Akai MPK mini… learning midi doesn’t work with the builtin virtual keyboard either.

I can control faders on buses using midi controls, so that part of midi learning works fine.

I just cannot cue learn midi to work at all.

I have opened the midi tracer window and I can see the keypresses on the “Cue Control in”. But midi learn on the clip still does not do anything.

Screenshot attached

[pds (Pauls1024)]

I think there must be a bug, so I have raised bug report 0009428: Cue Learn Midi does not work - MantisBT.

[pds (Pauls1024)]

It seems to work if I import a midi clip into a cue slot first and do a “midi learn” on that slot. I am currently running nightly build 7.5.243 and it is working very well right now… as long as I import a midi clip before an audio one.

Now I can drag and drop mp3 audio tracks eg my backing tracks into slots and assign pads on my Akai MPKmini to start and top (toggle) the backing tracks.

Volume controls on the Akai map to faders.
Keys on the Akai map to a synth in Ardour7

I have assigned a pad on the Akai to toggle record on the transport and another pad on the Akai to stop the transport.

So now I can toggle record on my mics, and the transport. And then when I tap a pad on the Akai, the backing track starts and so does recording… Stop and restart the backing track by tapping the same pad twice.

Awesome setup for practising and recording! Worth a bit of pain to get this working! Akai is beside my drum kit and very easy to control Ardour from there…Time for some practice with my new playlist.

Ardour7 is great!

[zettberlin]

I got the very same problem here with a Behringer UMX via a2jMidi in Ubuntu Studio.
Ardour 7.5.0
“Neroli”
(rev 7.5)

Connecting it to any control(middelclick or cue-slot) does not work, while it plays a synth as expected and controller messages show up in the Midi Monitor

24h later:
now I build from git:
Ardour 7.5.321
“Neroli”
(rev 7.5-321-gb354f41fc2)

same result: no midi learn for me…

[halfsoul]

I am having the same problem.
Opened new post before I found this one:

Cue Launch Clip by MIDI

I am trying to trigger Cue clips via MIDI, but it doesn’t seem to be working for me. According to the manual here: It seems like it should be straightforward: Ardour allows assigning arbitrary keys on MIDI controllers to trigger cue slots: Right-click on the trigger slot of interest Choose MIDI Learn in the newly opened window Press a key on your MIDI controller However, after completing the above steps, the clip doesn’t trigger. I have also tried: Add MIDI port to Cue track Assign i…

Ardour 7.5.0
“Neroli”
(rev 7.5)
Linux

I don’t understand the proposed workaround:

import a midi clip into a cue slot first and do a “midi learn” on that slot.

What is a midi clip, how do I make one?

[halfsoul]

Okay, I think I understand, can just use a built-in midi clip (click).
I too was able to get it to work by starting a new session, adding a cue dummy track by dragging over the click midi, then adding my real cue track, adding audio clips, and learning midi.
I also routed hardware midi to Cue Control in, although not sure if that was necessary.

I don’t think I have my old template anymore from before I started messing with cues (did some housekeeping cleanup), so I’ll have to remake my template starting from scratch with the above cue trick.

But yay, glad it is working!
Thanks @pds for the trick!