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i have been using qsynth and rosegarden with my midi controller.
There are some good features in keyboards like (dual key and split key).
dual key plays two instruments simultaneously and split key lets one play different instructions for left & right hands.
Is there a way to get these functionalities just with midi controllers + qsynth? If not possible with qsynth is there any other synth on linux that would do these?
Good question. Sometimes you need a Midi kbd. that supports splitting it in 2 Midi Channels for the left-hand and right-hand side. And sometimes the software synth supports this by pressing the key on the Midi kbd. where you'd like to split it in two (the hardware synth 'Streichfett' by Waldorf supports both methods).
Playing two synths w/ one keyboard? Hmmmm. Maybe is you configure both synths to react to the same Midi channel?
Good luck and let us hear how it went. 
You can try Konfyt (https://www.noedig.co.za/konfyt/) which is specifically made to do this.
It includes Fluidsynth to play Soundfonts like QSynth, but also has support for SFZ instruments.
You can layer sounds and split it however you wish.
Thank you for all the replies. Dual Keys is what I really need. Can make do without Split keys.
So far there don’t seem to be a solution for Dual Keys
@noedig thought of trying out konfyt. It installed fine on my Debian 12, but the software doesn’t seem to work with pipewire yet, it looks for jackd. Wonder if it will be updated to work with pipewire.
I thought that Jack programs would work with Pipewire without modification, since Pipewire provides a Jack compatible server.
I'll try to test it on a Pipewire system. I'm not using Pipewire myself yet.
@noedig
I thought that Jack programs would work with Pipewire without modification, since Pipewire provides a Jack compatible server.
Note that some users (Debian bookworm / bullseye and related) are going to be running an old version of Pipewire (pre the 1.0 release which added true pro-audio support). Those older versions are likely to be problematic for keyboard players: I just upgrade a machine to Debian trixie in order to pick up a >= 1.0 version of Pipewire for just this reason.
I'm on Debian 12 (bookworm) and have the following packages installed.
ii libjack-jackd2-0:amd64 1.9.21dfsg-3 amd64 JACK Audio Connection Kit (libraries)
ii libspa-0.2-jack:amd64 0.3.65-3+deb12u1 amd64 libraries for the PipeWire multimedia server - JACK client
ii pipewire-audio-client-libraries 0.3.65-3+deb12u1 all transitional package for pipewire-alsa and pipewire-jack
ii pipewire-jack:amd64 0.3.65-3+deb12u1 amd64 PipeWire JACK plugin
konfyt reports that jackd is not found. Would upgrading pipewire to latest version solve the issue? I wonder how to get latest pipewire for Debian12
Can you try running it with the pw-jack wrapper:
Code: Select all
pw-jack konfytAlso, see https://wiki.debian.org/PipeWire
Under the Configuration section, see the Debian 12 / JACK section. It has a few notes and then points to the Debian 11 / JACK section.
You can either use pw-jack or follow the instructions given above to replace the JACK libraries with Pipewire's.
On my clean test installation of Debian 12, I simply installed:
pipewire-audio
pipewire-jack
as well as Konfyt's dependencies: liblscp6 and the KXStudio repos to get Carla and Linuxsampler.
tseaver wrote: ↑Sun Mar 24, 2024 2:13 am@noedig
I thought that Jack programs would work with Pipewire without modification, since Pipewire provides a Jack compatible server.
Note that some users (Debian bookworm / bullseye and related) are going to be running an old version of Pipewire (pre the 1.0 release which added true pro-audio support). Those older versions are likely to be problematic for keyboard players: I just upgrade a machine to Debian trixie in order to pick up a >= 1.0 version of Pipewire for just this reason.
Sorry to be negative, but they call that Debian "Stable". Shouldn't the Debian devs have opted to not yet include PipeWire per default? Quote from mentioned website:
PipeWire is the default sound server with GNOME Desktop
Thank you very much @noedig. I'm able to get konfyt working and like it very much.
Is there a way to configure konfyt to use the Keyboard Controller's Volume slider for over all volume adjustments. Looks like i have to control the overall volume only from computer volume control.
The Global Volume slider on the right controls the overall volume of everything leaving Konfyt.
You can assign a MIDI controller to this by going to Triggers, then moving your MIDI controller slider, and double-clicking on "Global Volume Slider" in the Actions list.
Thank you @noedig Your software is very useful to me.
I still would like to know if there is a way to do dual keys on the midi-controller itself. Sometimes i use a sound module like Midi Plus Mini Engine Pro. So, dual key mode need to be enabled at the controller itself. May be i should close this thread and open a new one.
@noedig does konfyt have a "sustain" feature, meaning the sound fades (not stops) once i take my fingers off the key.
I looked at the config/setup. Didn't find anything.
If it doesn't, please consider this as a feature request for a future version.
It sounds like what you're referring to is the ability to change the "release time".
Konfyt has no control over this. Release (fade out) and attack (fade in) depend on the soundfont, sfz or synth that you use. For a sfz, it is relatively easy to edit the text file to change this. For soundfonts, you have to use a soundfont editor. Synths - software or hardware - often allow ways to change this.