I'm struggling with a very basic question about the capabilities of the BCR2000, which I'm trying to program using the excellent BC Control.
I'm unclear if it's possible to send a NRPN or Sysex parameter and value to the BCR so that a BCR encoder which is programmed to send that same format parameter will update itself (including its LED status), to reflect the received value.
Should this be possible, or not?
I know standard CC format parameters can work this way with the BCR, but I haven't been able to find an answer to the question of NRPN or sysex format parameters, despite a lot of searching and reading.
Many thanks for any illumination.
Hi,
I can confirm that the BCR2000 can send/receive NRPN including parameter feedback (BCR updates LEDs when receiving NRPNs).
Here's part of a preset I use with NRPNs (with parameter feedback) as seen in BC Manager:
https://i.imgur.com/iGfjln6.jpeg
I don't know about Sysex.
The answer is given in section 14.4 of BC MIDI Implementation.pdf:
"5. When the BC receives a MIDI message corresponding with the standard output (i.e. .easypar) definition of an element in the active memory preset, that element’s Value is updated to the received value. Note that this does not work for elements for which only custom output is defined."
So nofish is right: BCF/BCR elements with a "standard" NRPN definition indeed respond to incoming NRPN.
However, the BCF and BCR never respond to incoming SysEx, because SysEx can only be defined via "custom output".
Great to hear that the BCR should respond to incoming NRPN, thank you both.
I do remember reading that part of the BC MIDI Implementation pdf, but I wasn't at all clear on how 'standard output' or '.easypar' might relate to NRPN. Looking into this stuff opens up a lot of new information, so something like "The BCR/BCF can respond to CC and NRPN, but not to Sysex." speaks loudly to my struggling powers of comprehension :)
The reason I asked is because I'm trying to get a BCR2000 to have two way NRPN communications with a MKS70 (running the Vecoven OS). Initially it wasn't working at all from the synth to the BCR, but encouraged by your replies that it should work I then persevered and indeed it works delightfully!
The MKS70 can output patch parameter changes as NRPN so as nofish says, they update the relevant BCR encoder LEDs.
Now the question is how to trigger the MKS70 to send all its parameters as a dump of NRPN messages, so that the BCR2000 encoder LEDs can update all at once to reflect the current patch values at the beginning of a sound editing session?
I have feeling that might be more difficult.