Using PICKED NYLON

To change melody articulations, use the keyswitches from C1 to D#1 to select between open, muted, flageolet, and tremolo styles.

The "Open" articulation is the most commonly used articulation: Plucking individual strings with the fingernail.

The “Muted” articulation is created by resting the palm of the picking hand on the very end of the strings, very close to the bridge of the guitar while plucking the strings.

The “Flageolet” articulation is also called “harmonics”. It is created by dividing the string into sections of equal length by lightly touching the string at specific points. As a result, higher overtones are sounding instead of the original note. In this case, you will hear the octave above the played note, which is the first overtone.

The “Tremolo” articulation is created by repeatedly plucking the strings.

To change the fret position value of the selected melody articulation, adjust its “Fret Pos” value. Choose higher values to have the instrument perform notes in higher fret positions on lower strings, resulting in a more mellow tone. You can control the fret position for the first three melody articulations in real-time with the MIDI CC#114. For more information on MIDI controllers, refer to Further MIDI controllers.

Poly / Mono switch: The monophonic mode creates smooth transitions between notes, which sounds best when playing solo melodies. The polyphonic mode enables you to play multiple notes at the same time. This mode is perfect for playing sustained chords or for playing your own arpeggios. However, the transitions between single notes sound best in monophonic mode. In both modes, you can use the sustain pedal just like on a piano.

To apply vibrato or pitch bend, use the pitch and modwheel of your keyboard. When playing patterns, the pitch wheel doubles as an Impact controller, modifying the velocity and accent intensity of performed patterns (for more information, refer to Controlling the Dynamics of the Performance). From the Vibrato drop-down menu, you can choose between three different vibrato styles. The bend drop-down menu offers the standard pitchbend mode (All), as well as a unique mode where only specific notes (lowest, highest, softest, loudest, latest note) in a voicing are affected by the pitch bend. This enables the emulation of specific playing techniques on guitars where only some of the played strings are bent and others, e.g. open strings, retain their original pitch.

To switch from melody to pattern, hold down one of the pattern keyswitches from E1 to G1 with your left hand, while playing notes with your right hand. The instrument will temporarily perform those notes as a pattern. If a voicing (refer to

The Voicing Generator and Auto Chords) is selected for a pattern, triggering its keyswitch will cause the pattern to be played back using the notes contained in the selected voicing rather than the very notes you play.

To switch back to melody, release the pattern keyswitch with your left hand. If you still hold notes in your right hand at that moment, the instrument tries to sequence one more note that would have followed had you continued with the pattern playback. For example, if you release the pattern keyswitch shortly before the next downbeat while still holding notes with your right hand, the instrument will switch back to melody mode with one last note onto that downbeat.

To play patterns instead of melodies by default: If you are mainly intending to use the melody instrument to play back patterns, you can change the default mode from Melody to Pattern on the Playback page (refer to The Playback Page ). When Pattern is selected as the default mode, holding down one of the Melody keyswitches (C1 to D#1) will engage the melody mode temporarily.

To select a pattern, press the corresponding keyswitch MIDI note or click on the pattern you wish to use.

To play a pattern, play chords on your MIDI keyboard. After releasing the keys, playback will be stopped within a specified note duration (see the Latch Mode section in The Playback Page). By default, each pattern comes with a set of suitable voicings. To deactivate the voicing feature, choose As played in the voicing drop-down menu for the respective pattern slot. If you want to permanently stick to the As played mode for all patterns and songs, select OFF from the menu.

To stop the playback, either trigger one of the three endings (refer to Playing Endings and Slides) via keyswitch or release all keys on your keyboard.

To load a different pattern into a slot, click on the magnifier icon in the current slot. This will open the pattern browser (refer to The Pattern Browser).

To cycle through all available patterns within one slot, click on the little left or right arrow buttons in the current slot.

To remove a pattern (i.e. clear a slot), [Alt] + click on a slot.

Strumming patterns: Strumming patterns are based on recorded loops. If you play more than one single note, additional single notes will be added on top of the originally recorded loop. For best results, do not play too many notes at a time.

Picking patterns: When playing picking patterns, the playback engine analyzes the incoming or generated chord and allocates the individual notes to different strings of the guitar. The more notes you press on the keyboard, the more sophisticated the resulting picking pattern will sound. Therefore, playing up to six notes at a time can lead to interesting variations. Depending on the selected pattern, several notes of a voicing will be performed as hammer-ons and pull-offs.

Riffs: Riffs come as pre-recorded performances. However, they adapt to incoming chords by chromatically adjusting individual notes of the riff to the incoming chord. For example, if the preset riff contains minor thirds and sevenths, pressing a Cma7 voicing on the keyboard will cause the playback engine to adapt the pattern such that the minor third is replaced by a major third and the minor seventh is replaced by a major seventh.

To activate or deactivate the voicing generator, select a pattern, and then click on the Voicing drop-down menu.

Choose from one of five included voicing presets for the selected pattern. The number of notes contained in the voicing may affect the rhythmical structure of the pattern. If you press only one single key, you will hear the unaltered voicing preset. If you press thirds, sixths, seventh, and/or other options, the voicing preset will be adapted accordingly. This way, you can easily convert a major to a minor chord or vice versa. To deactivate the voicing generator, choose As played. The voicing will then be an exact representation of the incoming MIDI notes.

To take full control of your voicings, deactivate the voicing generator by selecting As played and also deactivate the auto chords mode (see below). If you want to permanently stick to the As played mode for all patterns and songs, select OFF from the menu.

To activate or deactivate the Auto Chords mode, click on the little power button next to the Auto Chords button. The Auto Chords mode will always be combined with the voicing generator and provides the most basic chords (major and minor as well as some options), auto-mapped and auto-transposed on the white keys.

The Auto Chords Panel with the key set to G major. Therefore, the root pitch G is mapped to the original C key; all other pitches are mapped (transposed) consequently.

To show or hide the Auto Chords Panel, click on the Auto Chords button.

To set the key of your song, select the key and mode from the drop-down menus. This will transpose/shift the chord layout such that, in case of a major key, the root pitch will always be assigned to the original C key; in case of a minor key, the root pitch will always be mapped to the original A key.

To play chords in the Auto Chords mode, simply play a single white key anywhere in the blue chord range (see keyboard layout of section Pattern Selection and Playback). This will play the chord labeled on that key. In other words, no matter which key and mode you choose, you can always play the seven diatonic pitches (plus the diminished seventh pitch) with the white keys from C to B (plus the B flat key, which is represented as a white key as well).

To add options or suspensions, click, or play and hold, any of the labeled black keys. To remove an option or suspension, click the corresponding key again, or release that key on your MIDI keyboard.

To exclude the Auto Chords settings from Songs or snapshots, click the lock icon in the top left corner of the Auto Chords Panel (refer to Locking Parameters When Loading Snapshots or Songs).

To load a factory or user sound preset, either:

To save a new user sound preset, enter a preset name into the field and click on the floppy disk icon. This will store the current sound settings (refer to chapter The Guitar Settings Page), including the Voicing and Impact slider positions, into a new user preset.

To overwrite a user sound preset, click on the floppy-disk icon again, after you've changed sound settings, without changing the preset name itself.

To delete a user sound preset, select it from the drop-down menu, then click the circular Delete button.

Linking sound presets to Song presets: If the Link to Song switch is activated, selecting a song preset (refer to The Song Browser) will also load its corresponding sound preset. Deselect to change songs without altering your guitar and effects settings.