For years now I continue to be astonished at how little hardware and software support exists for program and bank change messages. There are article after article about the history of MIDI, and yet this one seemingly simple task: send bank and program change messages from a midi controller to a software VST continues to perplex, confuse, and confound people (myself included). I understand the need to perform an automated program change as a part of a sequencer or pattern, but why should it be so incredibly difficult to map a simple controller button (or two) which allow those of us who aren't in a touring or recording band, to easily navigate the presets menu of soft synths? I own an Arturia KeyStep Pro and Arturia Pigments. I also own a Novation 61SL MKIII. One would think that KeyStep Pro could navigate the presets of Pigments out of the box. Not only is KeyStep Pro not even listed in the list of "standard" MIDI controllers in the Pigments, but the KeyStep Pro doesn't seem to be able to send Bank and/or Program Change messages at all. Pigments will allow you to map a controller to the Up and Down preset navigation buttons in Pigments, but the KeyStep Pro doesn't have any buttons that are "mappable" in this way. I can map a KSP knob to the up button, but not to the up and down at the same time. Of course, when you map a knob to the Up button in Pigments, the preset changes in the same direction (up) no matter which way you turn the knob. The octave up/down buttons can't be mapped to anything on the KSP. Even on my SL MKIII, which is a much more capable MIDI controller, I can't seem to find a way to navigate the banks and presets within banks using a knob on the controller. This particular controller has knobs that have a press function, which seems ideal for navigating a menu such as most soft synth preset menu's. As an engineer myself, I can't figure out why this simple feature is so poorly implemented across so many MIDI controllers and soft synths. After that long rant, I suppose it's more of a cry for help. Maybe the KSP is a mismatch for Pigments and my hopes for navigating the presets with a button will go unanswered. It's not even clear whether Pigments would respond to a change program message - there's not even a mention of it in the manual. Botton line: if anyone knows how to get the KSP to send a bank AND a program change message from either the pads or knobs so that the Pigments presets menu can be navigated, I would greatly appreciate the guidance. Likewise, if anyone knows whether or not Pigments will accept Bank AND Program Change messages, I would greatly appreciate detailed guidance on how to make this happen along with what type of MIDI controller supports full navigation of the menus. Even the Arturia Minilab I own does a terribly clunky job of navigating Pigments presets menu - constantly resetting you back to the top. Why is this so difficult?
