Organ MIDI Controller - Poor implementation or Expected behavior?

[studerje]

Background
Earlier this year, at the request of the Stake President, FM installed a MIDI device on the organ in 2 of our buildings. We have an Allen MDS-8 organ and an Allen Protege AP-16 organ.

This appears to be the MIDI sequencer: https://churchorganworld.co.uk/products/midi-sequencer/ but has "Global Organ Group" printed on it.

Before FM installed this device, someone in one of our ward's contacted Allen and bought this one: https://www.allenorgan.com/products/mid ... stant.html
FM removed it when they installed what I will refer to as the standard model in the rest of this post.

What is interesting is that the Allen brand device actually set all the stops on the organ when the songs were selected and it worked very well. The down side is that it only included Allen's hymns, which were a bit different than LDS hymns and missing LDS specific hymns.

The Problems
The standard model seems to have the same issues on both of our organs:

1. It does not set the stops, which is a bummer as it still requires someone knowledgeable about organs to set the stops. Relying on saved presets is tough as anyone can change them. At this point, I'm thinking of working with an organist to come up with a matrix of stops based on song name that I would leave at the organ. I'll need to create separate matrix per organ model and likely a third for Spanish hymns.

2. You have to let the hymn play all verses to the end. If you press the stop button the standard model, it holds the last note and does not stop playing it unless you power off the organ. If you cancel the stops, and then set stops again, the last note is still being held. Also tried pressing the power button on the standard model, but it never stops playing the last note unless you power off the organ.

3. The hymn names show up on the screen abbreviated with truncated name in alphabetical order, which makes it hard to know for sure which hymn you are picking. Thought about renaming the files to start with the hymn number, but that won't work as one of our buildings has a Spanish ward and the Spanish hymn numbers don't line up with the English hymnal. Not sure there is a fix for this one.

I brought these problems up with FM, via an FIR, and they closed it out stating that this is expected and known behavior.

I'm wondering if this is just poor implementation or expected behavior.

Has anyone else run into these issues and do you have a solution?

Thanks,
-Jon

[studerje]

while searching the internet, I ran across this site: https://www.organassist.com/wp/
Their manual has this information about Allen organ MIDI https://www.organassist.com/downloads/U ... c156403566
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Allen – Some Limitations
Allen organs are (as far as I know) unique among all organ manufacturers. In every other case, when you change a stop, the organ sends some form of MIDI message communicating this fact. This happens regardless of whether the stop was changed by hand or as a result of using a combination. Unfortunately, Allen organs do not send MIDI data identifying stop changes when a combination is used. This makes it impossible for any third-party MIDI software to know which stops are being used.

In the new test version 3.3 I have improved the support for Allen combinations as much as it technically possible. This means that you have a choice of three ways of using OrganAssist with an Allen organ.

Note – Use of Alternative voices (if available) may produce unpredictable results.

Stops Only.
You can set up a layout for an Allen organ including only the stops. This will record and playback accurately provided combinations are never used. This should support all features in OrganAssist. However, any use of combinations on the console will cause the recorded stops to be incorrect.

New Experimental Features
The following features are experimental – please contact me to report how this works for you (good or bad). I have “bench tested” these features as far as possible but do not currently have access to an Allen instrument for final validation.

With Combinations.
You can now add combinations to your Allen layout. Please see below for some tips on easily creating combinations. Once you have learnt the MIDI for these combinations you can now record pieces including both hand registered stops and combinations.

NOTE - OrganAssist only receives information on which combination was used. This means the stops displayed on the screen, until you do a General Cancel, do not reflect the state of the organ console. However, tracks should record and replay correctly. Please contact me if this is not the case. Other features in OrganAssist may be impacted by the use of combinations – please report any issues you find.

NOTE – if the combinations are changed on the instrument after a track is recorded then the playback will use these new settings. If Combination 6 is recorded, 6 will be used during playback even if the resulting stops may be different. This is due to the way MIDI is implemented on Allen organs and is the limitation for all MIDI software.

Using this approach tracks should play correctly on the same instrument but will not play correctly on other organs.

OrganAssist Internal Combinations.
OrganAssist now supports saving combinations internally to override the Allen Combinations. Right-click on the General Cancel button to enable them. Set the stops and then right-click on the relevant combination button to save.
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This makes me think that the Allen organs don't do MIDI well and that going with a 3rd party controller like the Global Organ Group controller, instead of the Allen branded controller, might always be problematic.

I'm not an organist, but I do have an amateur music background, and MIDI is completely new to me. As an STS I'm purely looking at this from a technical standpoint. Hoping that someone will be able to chime in with more insight.

Regarding the Allen branded controller, apparently it came with a USB drive that has software on it for creating and editing songs. I'm waiting on someone to get it to me in the next few days. I'm hoping that I can figure out a way to combine / edit the church songs. This USB is supposed to also have the songs that come built into the Allen controller. I'm going to try to see if I can get any of those songs to play on the Standard controller.

The journey/search continues.

[russellhltn]

Our stake center has an Allen G350DK, which given the large historic building it's in is probably a bit above the standard catalog offering for a stake center. The player is integrated and most certainly selects the stops when playing.

That said, I've found it to be a bit quirky. It feels like beta software. You can select the number of verses, but you can't change it on the fly. It does have the option of playing the intro, but if you turn it off you still have to hit "play" twice. (It pauses after the intro). While the pedals are functional, you can't really change the volume once you start it. I've had even more frustration with the app as once it played the wrong hymn because I hadn't selected the song properly despite having the right song on the display. Probably a good thing we rarely use the player.

If you still want it, I'd work with your stake president to let FM know that their solution is not meeting the needs. If nothing else, they need to budget for it.

[studerje]

Found another quirk.
There are no introductions in any of the songs, so when the song starts, everyone better be ready.

Still doing some testing, but will post results on which way we decide to go.