Window Reference Keymap Page |

Every Instrument includes one Keymap. The Keymap determines what Sample will be played for each received MIDI note number (pitch), so you can think of the Keymap page as a `digital voice' that plays a Sample and produces an audio output. The Keymap is displayed in two ways: as a list of Keymap Zones, and as a keyboard diagram.
The Keymap consists of one or more Keymap Zones, each linking one MIDI note range to one Sample, with instructions on how to play the Sample when a note in that range is received. The Beatnik MIDI Synthesizer doesn't support crossfades or velocity switching, so Keymap Zones can't overlap.
Since there are 128 MIDI note numbers, and a Keymap Zone can be as little as one note wide, a Keymap can contain up to 128 Keymap Zones. A very simple Instrument would have just one Keymap Zone covering the entire keyboard, whereas a more complicated Instrument (for example, Beatnik's General MIDI piano at Bank 0, Program 0) uses many Keymap Zones to provide many different Samples for different ranges of the keyboard.
On the keyboard diagram, adjacent Keymap Zones have different colors, and the selected Keymap Zone's name and Root Key dot appear on the keyboard. In the list, each Keymap Zones appears on a separate line.
The two buttons below the keyboard diagram apply to all Keymap Zones in the Instrument:
Always Play at Root Pitch controls whether the Instrument will act as an ordinary playable musical instrument, or as a bank of non-transposable sounds. When this button is turned on, the Samples will never be transposed by the pitch of the received MIDI notes, and will always play back at the same pitches at which they were recorded. Ignore Loops in Sample controls whether any loops stored with the Samples will be used. When this button is on, the loops will be ignored and the Samples will always play straight through from beginning to end - ending before the played MIDI note does, if the note is held long enough.
Each Keymap Zone contains the following fields:
Column
Sets
Low note High note
Lowest and highest MIDI notes in this Keymap Zone.
See Adjusting a Keymap Zone's Range below.
Sample name
Name of the Sample to use for this note range.
To open the Sample in a Sample Editor window:
Windows: Hold the Alt key and double-click on the Sample name. Mac OS: Hold the Option key and double click on the Sample name.
To replace the current Sample with a different one, either:
Drag a Sample in from the Samples tab of a Session window, and drop it on the Sample name, or. Double-click on the Sample name, then make a selection from the list of available Samples that appears.
Root Key
MIDI note that will cause the Sample to play at its original pitch. This Root Key isn't required to fall inside the Keymap Zone's note range, although for most conventional Instruments it will.
See Adjusting a Keymap Zone's Range below.
Volume
Volume to use for this Keymap Zone, so that you can balance zones whose Samples have different volumes.
Volume is expressed as a percentage of the Sample's normal volume. For example, a volume of 100 is considered normal, and 800 would overdrive the Sample volume eight times over.
Note: Excessive volumes may cause digital overload distortion.
To change a Volume, click on the current value in the list, then type a number from 0 through 800, and then press the Return or Enter key.
Working with Keymap Zones Adding and Removing Keymap Zones To add a new Keymap Zone, click the Add button above the list. The new Keymap Zone will fill the lowest available empty note range - or, if the whole keyboard is already covered with Keymap Zones, the largest existing Keymap Zone will be split in two, and the new Keymap Zone will take over one of them. To remove a Keymap Zone, select it and click the Delete button above the list. Selecting Keymap Zones
There are three ways to select a Keymap Zone:
On the keyboard diagram, click on the Keymap Zone you want. In the list, click on the Keymap Zone you want. In the list, use the cursor control keys on your computer keyboard to move to the Keymap Zone you want: up arrow, down arrow, left arrow, right arrow, Home, and End all work. Adjusting a Keymap Zone's Range
There are two ways to change a Keymap Zone's range - either visually, or by typing:
To type, click on the Keymap Zone's Low or High note in the list, and then type your new note name and octave - for example, D1. Note: For a flat, type a lowercase b (for example, Gb3) and for a sharp use pound sign (#) - but remember that the Beatnik Editor always displays the sharp version (F#3). To set the range visually, first select the Keymap Zone, then go to the keyboard diagram and click and horizontally drag the zone's low (left) or high (right) boundary. Note: Dragging a boundary will ordinarily also move the boundary of the adjacent Keymap Zone. If you want to open up an empty space instead: Windows: Alt-click the boundary, then drag left or right. Mac OS: Option-click the boundary, then drag left or right. Tip: Single-zone Keymaps always cover the entire keyboard. If you only need one Sample in your Instrument, but want to limit the note range in which it can be played, then add a second zone. This will let you adjust their zone ranges separately, and will let you leave key ranges uncovered. If you wind up with an unnecessary zone that you want to be silent, make it just one note wide and set its volume to 0. Adjusting a Keymap Zone's Root Key
There are three ways to change a Keymap Zone's Root Key:
On the keyboard diagram, first select the Keymap Zone, and then drag the orange dot to your desired note. On the keyboard diagram, first select the Keymap Zone, and then shift-click the desired note. In the list, click on the Root Key note and then type your desired note name.

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