Sonar X3 and NI Kontakt player 5.

If their is anyone out there that is familiar with the subject softwares, I would greatly appreciate your input.
Here is my problem: I have installed NI Kontakt player in a Sonar project. I have put in Sessions Horn on one of the tracks.
On that same track if have copied and pasted the MIDI track from an other track because I want the Sessions Horn sound.
Everything seems OK; track transfers, in piano roll mode the notes are shown, but when playing their is no sound coming from the
track.
I was told the following by NI: '' The DYNAMICS needs to be moved to have the horns express in the way intended. You may want
to record the automation on that to have it play as you desire.''
 
As I am fairly new at this, I would appreciate if someone could guide me in doing this, if that is the solution or is their a better
way in accomplishing want I need.......HAVING THE HORN SOUND COME OUT ON THE TRACK.
 
A great thank you in advance for any help as I am sure the same process would apply to the other instruments I have from NI.
 
Gerry

Thank you. But like I said earlier, I am kind of new at this. I know certain things, but not all. There is a lot to absorb.
Where can I find the MOD wheel. I checked in the Event list but could not locate it.
Cannot even locate the Events Manager dialog box where I presume this wheel would be.
 
Thank you again.
 
Gerry

Hi Gerry,
Let's check some basic stuff first and see if this helps.
 
You said you were dragging the midi file over to Kontakt to play session horns right?
 
Is session horns using the same midi channel as your previous synth? If the first synth was channel 1, put Session Horns' midi channel on #1 as well.
Hope that makes sense. 
 
  

Gerry, 
Still sounds like the midi track (or midi clip from Band in a Box) is not on the same midi channel.
I think that you should try this.
 
Go to the PRV (piano roll view) and highlight one of the notes.  get to the note properties so that you can see the midi channel (you can also use the event list for this as well).
If the midi channel is NOT the same as what Session Horns is (which more than likely is 1), change them.
Then try it.

Gerry, still sounds like a routing problem.
 
Check out the following thread, it may help.
 
http://forum.cakewalk.com/Success-Thanks-to-the-Forum-m3310730-p6.aspx#3327684
 

Hi Gerry, I use X3 and Kontakt 5 Player.
 
If you do the following steps, do you get sound?
 
1. Create a new (test) Sonar Project.
2. Sonar menu>Insert>Softsynth>VST2>Kontakt 5 (simple imstrument track should be fine for now).
3. From Synth rack, open synth properties to view the Kontakt GUI. Select desired Instrument in Kontakt.
4. Play keys on virtual keyboard? Any sound? If yes, proceed ...
5. Sonar menu>Views>Piano Roll View. Draw a few notes on piano roll and hit play on transport. Any sound?
6. Right click on track in the clips pane>Import Midi>select your MIDI file (or drag MIDI file from the media browser onto the track in the clips pane). Hit play on the control bar. Any sound?
 
If this test works, you should be able to work out the differences between your original project setup and this test.

Thank you very much ABACAB. Very simple explanation ( not complex at all ) and everything seems to work fine.
Greatly appreciated this type of explanation from a novice. Simple and direct to the point.
Cannot thank you enough. Have been trying for a while to get NI Kontakt to work. Was getting discouraged and tought I had purchased the different softwares for nothing. Now I can go and spend more ......
 
Thank you again.
 
Gerry

YES.

Gerry 1943
Thank you very much ABACAB. Very simple explanation ( not complex at all ) and everything seems to work fine.
Greatly appreciated this type of explanation from a novice. Simple and direct to the point.
Cannot thank you enough. Have been trying for a while to get NI Kontakt to work. Was getting discouraged and tought I had purchased the different softwares for nothing. Now I can go and spend more ......
 
Thank you again.
 
Gerry

Glad to help.  I tried to focus on your original problem statement "when playing their is no sound coming from the
track".  I hope I was not being insulting by beginning at the very basics (sort of like, "is the power light on, haha!) :-)
 
As several others have taken the time to assist, it might be welcomed if you elaborated a little bit more about why this was not working for you in the beginning, and how this solution resolved it.  The group benefits by lessons learned as well :-)

Hello Gerry, glad you got over the hump. I interpret your comments as you wish to use Kontakt in a multi-timbral mode (i.e., one instance of Kontakt, with multiple MIDI tracks, each on their own channel, each with their own sound).
 
I am usually lazy and just open several simple instrument tracks, each with their own instance of a synth that I want to hear. I like to stack several different synths, and rarely use just one synth in a project. My CPU & RAM is OK with this method :-)
 
But multi-timbral instruments are possible! If you have not already done so, please go to this Cakewalk Knowledge Base page and download the "Sonar X3 Reference Guide".  It has some great tutorials, using sample projects that come with Sonar. Get the big one!
http://www.cakewalk.com/S...and-Quick-Start-Guides
 
See Tutorial 4 – Playing and recording software instruments. On page 130, there is a guide for "What if I already have a project that contains MIDI tracks?". It uses a tutorial MIDI project with the multi-timbral Cakewalk TTS-1 instrument.
 
Did you read the manual?  Great!  Here is a quick summary of how to set up some tracks with one instance of Kontakt:
 
1. Open a new project, choose Template "16 Channel MIDI", this will open a project with 16 MIDI tracks.
2. Menu>Insert>Softsynth>VST 2>Kontakt 5.
3. On the "Insert Soft Synth Options", check the following: "First Synth Audio Output"; "Enable MIDI Output"; "Synth Property Page".
4. Go to the KONTAKT properties, select the instruments you wish to use.
5. Assign the MIDI channel to each instrument in Kontakt that corresponds to the Sonar track with the MIDI data for that instrument. Import or create the MIDI data for each instrument you are going to use, track by track.
6. You can check the Sonar MIDI tracks, and you should see that each of the 16 tracks are already assigned to the MIDI channel that corresponds to the track number. You can rename the tracks to "friendly" names here, also.
7. Hit play!
 
Good luck, and have fun!
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Hi Gerry, just a quick note to clarify the last method I posted regarding the Kontakt multi-timbral use. This solution can be useful if the simple instrument track seems too limited, because it allows more control without much more complexity.

It is possible to use just ONE instance of a VST such as Kontakt, with multiple MIDI tracks and instruments, routed to just ONE audio track. In my last post I tried to outline, step-by-step, this easy version of a multi-timbral setup.

I agree that it seems some of the instructions out there can seem very confusing.  I suppose we could use a [MIDI track] + [audio track] per instrument, but I think we would all lose our minds keeping up with the routing options, etc.

BUT fortunately, it is not necessary to add an audio track to each MIDI track.

After starting a new Sonar project using the "16 Channel MIDI" template, just insert the soft synth after the MIDI tracks, using "First Synth Audio Output"; "Enable MIDI Output" options, and the routing is completed for you. The MIDI tracks and channel numbers will be setup automatically in ascending order, by default, and routing to the VST is complete. All you need to do is match up the instruments in your VST with the desired MIDI channel numbers. All the audio sound from Kontakt routes to the Sonar output "Master", by default.

Thinking through this question has been a benefit to me as well, as it has clarified a few more details in my understanding of this feature.

Just a quick note as an update to my previous comments in this thread. I had outlined a simple way to use multiple instruments on their own MIDI channels from Sonar, using one instance of Kontakt, with the resulting mix coming back into one audio track in Sonar.  This provides all the MIDI control you need, and is acceptable if you can get the mix working within Kontakt. 
 
For me this was a more CPU/RAM friendly way to run a multi-timbral Kontakt setup, then to run a stack of separate Kontakt simple instrument instances within Sonar. But it does limit the audio effects in Sonar to working with a Kontakt Master track only.
 
So I would like to add that I recently ran across an awesome thread where Robert E Bone explains in an easily understandable way how to assign multiple audio outs from Kontakt.  This is well worth looking into, as it gives you the power to use any Sonar audio effects on any instrument in the Kontakt multi, on it's respective audio output.
 
http://forum.cakewalk.com/Sonar-X3-and-Kontakt-5-per-Bob39s-request-m3030422.aspx
 
Well done Bob!