If you started with another DAW to work with MIDI (like I did), then trying to work with it in reaper can be quite foreign. I have struggled with this for quite some time, but I had my eyes opened to how they do things from this one video. It has to do with "build 16 tracks", and have them fed to one. Once I tried what this video tells us to do I began having the control I so desperately sought, even after having read the manual. Once I tried this method it became much easier for me. Reaper is not real intuative with regard to MIDI because it is so damned complex. Still, now that I have seen this, it makes things much easier for me, and I finally am more at home with reaper with regards to MIDI. I still have some questions but I am persistent and I will find all of what I need. Maybe watching this will also help you. The part about "build 16 tracks" to be fed into one is what has helped me. Once I tried this with hypersonic 2 (using reapers bridge) it came to life.

 

Here is a question I have about reaper's routing scheme for MIDI. I probably already know this after some thought, but this sort of thing tends to throw newbies for a loop. I am new to reaper, not MIDI. I've been using MIDI with sonar for a long time with no problem. I know from experience that I can map a MIDI output to just about anything I want in sonar. I can send it to any port I want, and any channel. I can send it to hardware or softsynth alike just by configuring it. I know that the same MIDI output will trigger hardware,or softsynth alike just by my sending the MIDI data to it. I do not need to tell sonar whether it is going to softsynth or hardware, because both use the STANDARD of the MIDI protocols. So why then does reaper's routing find it necessary to differentiate between sending MIDI to hardware and sending MIDI to softsynth? MIDI is standard, so the device will respond how it should even if we do not tell reaper we are addressing hardware will it not? Why do they find it necessary to make this so complex? They didn't need to do this in sonar and MIDI devices respond with no problem without me telling sonar the MIDI data is going to a hardware device. What's up with that? That is for human use more than the software isn't it? It's like they have made a permenant note that "these MIDI sends are going to hardware". Is this just to keep it straight for the human? In the end this seems to me to make it even more complex for humans. I know it threw me because never in decades of using MIDI, have I needed to tell the DAW "this MIDI is going to hardware". I knew it was going to hardware because it's my device and I configured it to get certain MIDI data. Does this really help the DAW to tell it certain MIDI is going to a hardware device? I could take the same MIDI and send it to a softsynth and it will respond just as I wanted. AM I wrong about this?

 

Last edited: Jun 12, 2019

That sounds really weird. Even more if you take into consideration that Reaper doesn't even care if you play MIDI or audio on track. You can even play first MIDI and then audio on the same track and Reaper doesn't care.
So yes, this looks weird, unless there is a logical reason for it that I don't know of. But maybe the Reaper forum or the support can answer this question.

 

Just a curiousity. I've just decided to ignore this part of it. I know first hand you do not need to tell the DAW whether the MIDI is going to hardware or software for it to work, so why then do they have hardware sends in the routing in reaper? Just to confuse us? LOL No I found what I have been looking for in the video above so I don't even care why they speak of hardware vs softsynth. Once I learned to "build 16 midi tracks" connected to a single device, it came to life for MIDI. The point here is that while reaper is very powerful, they tend to make things more complex than they need to be. Maybe I will become informed about this later but so far.......

 

It's hard to say this in case I miss something but often times it is good to ignore certain parts of a system, because they just tend to muddy the waters up. Maybe later it will become more clear the correct useful purpose, but right now THAT is one thing I will ignore. "Hardware" in the routing does not help me at all. They all use the same MIDI protocols as far as I know.

 

I don't think it's just a Reaper requirement nor I think it's that complicated to handle.
What I guess is that when you route a midi track to an internal synth/vst, it's just a VIRTUAL connection using midi protocol.

To be clearer, you could do a midi track without any attached real midi interface or keyboard, just with the help of the computer keyboard OR pencil tool, and still get a whole working composition.

To route a midi track to an external synth, daw needs to speak to the driver of the real midi interface, and that must be specified.

It's just like in Ableton Live, where you must specify that midi is external, see as example step 5 of this link (I SUPPOSE Reaper works the same way):
https://help.ableton.com/hc/en-us/a...ternal-hardware-with-MIDI-#externalinstrument

 

Thats the "beauty" of Reaper. If you want to go complex, you can. The competition is limited.
Btw if you need hundreds of MIDI actions in Reaper, search and download Reapack plugin, then thru it download thousands of actions(scripts made by professionals).

 

I think that complexity is more of a necessity, not an hindrance deliberately put by developers to attract users.
But yes, despite its lightweight Reaper seems to be very powerful, and can be complicated at will.

Actually, I jumped to Reaper because of some lack in Ableton (I'm not going to specify), but I'm discovering many very interesting features.
The only thing it can't do (to my limited knowledge) is a live improvisation as Ableton was able to perform (maybe they called it Live for that reason ).

 

Last edited: Jun 12, 2019

Search yt Reaper mania Super 8.

 

Reaper has already mentioned, basic to advanced MIDI functionality. Some are in the the track/item menus. Some in the track routing window. Some in the MIDI editor. Some in the Reaper preferences.

Then there are the included Rea & JS plugins as well as the scripts that are available.

Make sure that you have the latest SWS & ReaPack installed.

As with any software, you need to set aside time to learn & understand what it can do for you.

The Reaper manual.

Reaper videos (categorized on Reaper site).

Reaper Mania (youtube).

The Reaper Blog (youtube).

 

Yes. I suppose that is the point here. Don't give up. I was frustrated for many months before I found what I needed to make it come to life. If I had given up it never would have happened. Since I found this, it seems Reaper will be my DAW of choice.

 

I acknowledge what you are saying. This is new to me, because in the past the MIDI protocol didn't know if it was addressing hardware or softsynth. It acted the same way regardless without specifying. I will look into this further. I remember back in the early 80s, when we first started using MIDI, there was a lot about MIDI that confused us, and would rarely if ever be used. It got easier the more we used it. There is a small subset of "often used" functions. I am sure it is the same with reaper.