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Kontakt Multi Divisi Script

The multiscript takes incoming polyphonic midi data and splits it to (up-to) six (monophonic) instruments.

Contents (colour of each section refers to GUI colouring above):

1. Installation
2. Midi Channel & Part Controls
3. Global Ranges & Keyswitches
4. Humanising
5. Playback & Note Distribution (divisi modes)
6. Anti-phasing using transpose (divisi modes)
7. Saving & Loading Presets
8. Playback & Note Distribution (range mode)
9. Other Information

Copy the pictures & presets folders and blank NKAs to the following location:

Windows 7 onwards: C:/Users/%username%/Documents/Native Instruments/Kontakt *

Mac: StartVolume/Users/%username%/Documents/Native Instruments/Kontakt *
* = Kontakt version

Setup the input channel (In Chn) from a DAW/Keyboard and respective output
channels:
The number of Parts determines the number of output parts & channels.

The A-D Chns button switches the output chns between the A-D (1-64) chns or
B-D (17-64) internal Kontakt chns. This is useful to preserve chns 1-16 (A) for input only.

The script defaults to (up to) six consecutive midi output channels starting from the input channel, however these can
be changed manually.

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The Echo Chns are for layering and mirror exactly the Main Chns midi data. The Echo channels
have their own independent setting for output channel & transposition.

When set to 'In Ch Divisi' the input channel must also be the first output channel and becomes
one of the monophonic divisi voices. When set to 'In Ch Thru' the input channel is polyphonic (i.e. all midi
data is sent through unprocessed); it must not then be one of the output channels (to avoid duplicate data).

Example usages:

a. In Ch Thru

Layering a polylegato instrument with several monophonic instruments:

Input chn 1 In Ch Thru

Cinebrass Trumpet output ch [A]1
Berlin Brass 3 x Trumpets output channels [B] 1,2,3.

Cinebrass already has divisi built in to the instrument and Berlin is layered on top, split in divisi by the
script.

b. In Ch Divisi

Switching between a single player or divisi (a1, a 2 etc):

Input chn 1 In Ch Divisi

Berlin Flute 1 output on chn [A]1
Berlin Flute 2 output on chn [B]1

The script can be switched on/off to toggle between a single player (a1) or divisi (a2+)

The script will automatically assign midi channels to the outputs depending on the setting of In Ch, Parts, A-
D Chns, Echo Chns & In Chn Thru (above). If you wish to setup the channels manually you can change
Auto Set to manual (Man. Set).

If you are manually setting the output channels, ensure that there are no duplicate output channels. If you set to ‘In Ch
Thru’, the In Chn must also not be one of the output channels; otherwise duplicate midi data will be sent.

CC Divisi sends CC data to all output channels or just to the input channel (CC Thru). You can
also opt to include or exclude CC7/10 (Vol/Pan) when set to CC Divisi so that each instrument can
be balanced separately on its own channel.

To send individual CC7/10 data the output channels must be A1-16 (i.e. not the internal B-D (17-64) channels).

To keep the script in a playable range, the lowest note that can be set is midi note 34 (C0/1*) and the highest note is
midi note 108 (C7/8*) *depending on note naming convention (below)

You need to set the global playable range of all instruments to be included in the divisi by pressing the
range display and inputting the bottom/top notes. Notes outside this are not included in the
divisi logic.

Block OOR (out of range) will ignore notes played outside of this range. Play OOR KS (keyswitch) will play
keyswitch notes outside of the range.

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The type of keyswitch can be set

 Midi KS Note Off (normal manual note on/off keyswitch)
 Auto KS Note Off - for non-latching keyswitches (automatically plays a note off after a 16 th note)
 No KS Note Off - for latching kewswitches (no note off is played)

Information about OOR and KS is shown at the OOR/KS Display.

Midi note C-2 (0) is sent by most sequencers/notation programs when stop/play is pressed. It is also used as a note-
off in some software. Be aware of this if you are using C-2 (0) as a keyswitch.

Note Naming Convention

At the side of the keyboard display you can change the note naming convention . This came about
as a result of historical note naming differences with different companies. It does not make any difference
to the midi data; it is simply for display purposes only.

Yamaha: middle C note number 60 = C4

Roland/Korg: middle C note number 60 = C3 (default)

Kontakt uses the Yamaha convention for midi data (0-127) but the Roland/Korg convention for note naming! Most
DAWs use middle C note number 60 = C3, however notation programs correctly use middle C note number 60 = C4.

You can humanise the outgoing velocity by a random or fixed amount, or the midi CC data by a fixed
amount only (to avoid unpredictable leaps, particularly in CC#1).

Humanising timing is not possible in this script due to the loagic. Another
humanising/delay script can be opened next to the Multi Divisi script.

A constant/fixed note delay script should be opened in a slot before the divisi script (so that
the divisi script also gets delayed). A humaniser/variable delay should be opened in a slot
after the divisi script (so that each part output from the divisi script is humanised separately).

Mode

Part Mode: splits chords and each part only plays its own note/voice (simple chord splitter).
Chord Mode: all parts play all the time and chords are intelligently split.
Fixed PL Mode: number of divisi voices determined from the initial number of notes played.
Auto PL Mode: Automatically adjusts the number of voices during performance. (The default mode)
Range Mode: see section 8 below

Chord (ms) is the chord collection time, notes played within this time are detected as a chord.
25ms is a good setting when using sequencers/notation programs and at least 40ms when playing live/by
hand (as physical playing is not as accurate and can cause hung notes).

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Note Off Delay (NOD) will add the chord time in ms as a delay to the note off; this can sometimes
help when heavily scripted instruments cause hung notes. It is turned off by default

Assigning notes to parts (not in Unison mode)

The number of actual chord notes played are 'voices'; the number of instruments playing are 'parts'. A part
will always play its own voice; starting with the highest note being assigned to the first part and sequentially
(top to bottom) through the remainder.

Filling empty parts

There are a number of options for filling the empty parts (i.e. instruments that do not have their own voice
or chord note). Each option fills the next empty part (top to bottom) with the selected fill sequence voice or
chord notes, designed to always keep a balance across the parts:

Fill hi/lo:

Fill lo/hi:

Fill hi/2nd:
(default)

If the above options do not suit you can set the fill notes manually:

Manual Fill (set note preferences by pressing the 'set man fill' button):

Voice and fill part movement

When a voice moves with a legato transition, a fill part with the same voice will follow, however if a chord
changes size (e.g. 2 note chord to 3 note chord or visa versa etc), the fill parts will be rebalanced so that no
one note/voice overpowers the chord.

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The bottom line is that this is designed for true divisi (i.e. multiple players of the same instrument playing
one note each). It will work in other situations (across an entire section of different instruments e.g. strings),
however parts can sometimes swap and chord distribution is not always vertical, which means instruments
could end up out of their playable range. (i.e. the lowest note is not always at the bottom)

Retain Upper/Lower

There are situations when the voice movement is ambiguous as to which is the nearest note; in this
situation you can select whether to retain the upper or lower* voice:

*Retaining the lower voice is most common in other divisi scripts (Cinesamples etc) and is selected by default.

Voice Leading

The script will detect legato notes and automatically determine which note(s) to move. This can either be
the nearest note or using voice leading (only in Auto Mode). The voice lead range is set by VL Interval (in
semitones); notes outside of this range will be dealt with by the nearest note logic.

*Voice Leading is common in other divisi scripts (Cinesamples etc) and is selected by default in Auto Mode.

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Anti-phasing

To avoid phasing on multiple instances of the exact same instrument you can use the re-tune trick* (this
trick may not work with some instruments due to the instruments original in built scripting)

*set the corresponding instrument's 'Tune' knob to the opposite value of the script transpose setting to avoid phasing
on unison notes. The transpose amount depends on whether the instrument is sampled in semi-tones (+/- 1&2) or
whole-tones (+/- 2&4)

Examples:

Instrument sampled in semi-tones:

Script Part 1 no transpose (original)
Script Part 2 set to +1, instrument 'Tune' knob set to -1.00
Script Part 3 set to -1, instrument 'Tune' knob set to +1.00
Script Part 4 set to +2, instrument 'Tune' knob set to -2.00
Script Part 5 set to -2, instrument 'Tune' knob set to +2.00

Instrument sampled in whole-tones:

Script Part 1 no transpose (original)
Script Part 2 set to +2, instrument 'Tune' knob set to -2.00
Script Part 3 set to -2, instrument 'Tune' knob set to +2.00
Script Part 4 set to +4, instrument 'Tune' knob set to -4.00
Script Part 5 set to -4, instrument 'Tune' knob set to +4.00

Saving & Loading presets in a multiscript is very clunky as there are no snapshots, data folders or resource containers
available. There are also no default factory or library directory folders available to save/load.

To be able to recall saved presets/names you can just re-save the script, or save the presets & names to
separate NKAs and subsequently load them in another script slot/Kontakt instance.
n.b. values (presets) & text strings (preset names) can’t be saved in the same NKA!

If you open the script in another script slot/Kontakt instance or re-load, and want to save more new presets, make sure
you load the previous saved NKA first. This is to avoid overwriting previously saved presets.

To save a preset , select the relevant ‘Save’ in the menu, you will also be given the
option to rename it .

Displaying renamed presets in the menus only happens when the script is loaded (yet another Kontakt quirk!). To see
your renamed preset, (load the NKAs if already saved), click ‘edit’ (bottom left), then click ‘apply’ (right).

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Range mode does not split chords via divisi, rather it sends all notes to all channels, but based on the
individual part ranges set in the keyboard display. This can be useful to send all notes to all string patches
(instead of using an ensemble patch). It can also be used for playing one note chords (see below).

The ranges of each part can be altered with the (very!) small knobs at each end of the display, the global
range will adjust accordingly. You cannot alter the ranges in ‘Global’ or ‘Outer’ as these use the ranges already set
in the other range groups.

There are several range groups that can be selected:

You can change the number of parts and add echo channels in the Unisons groups. If you adjust a part
range, the no. of parts or turn on echo channels, these will be remembered in range mode by the script (however you
must resave the script to recall later). These range mode settings are not saved by the presets (section 7 above).

The Chords groups have a fixed number of parts/echo, but an adjustable range, and you can play chords
by pressing just one key (see chart below). The chords utilise typical voicings
for the instrumental groups. These chords can be altered by using the chord
type, chord voicing and chord variation buttons:

The above chord alteration buttons can also be changed by using keyswitches . The first/lowest
keyswitch is set by the note number. The keyswitch note positions will appear (in blue) on
the bottom of the display (if in the range of the keyboard display). The keyswitches are laid out as follows:

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chord types:

chord variation

chord voicing

The chord variations are not based on inversions, but by which note appears at the top
of the chord (tonic, third, fifth). True inversions can be achieved by adding a bass
instrument (Bassoon/Bass Clarinet/Tuba/Bass Trombone etc) on an unused channel to
play the bass note of the inversion.

When part ranges, number of parts and echo chns (on/off) are adjusted in range mode, they will
be remembered by the script (as these can be different for each Range Group). To recall, either re-save the script or
save to an NKA (see section 7 above). If you adjust any other setting (like midi channels etc) then save as an
individual numbered preset.

All controls are explained using the info button and hovering over the controls.
The Panic button sends all notes off on every output channel, it also performs an internal note logic reset, but
does not alter any user GUI settings. This reacts instantaneously unlike the main Kontakt panic button.
The On/Off button also performs an internal note logic reset, but does not alter any user GUI settings.

The limit of played/held notes is ten (all fingers, both hands) the script will ignore any further notes.

Key/label colouring
Use the Display On/Off button to turn on key/label colouring

Default CCs
CC#32 scrolls the Modes (in increments of 25)
CC#33 toggles the ‘On/Off’ button.
CC#34 toggles the ‘CC# Divisi/Thru’ button.
CC#35 toggles the ‘Voice Leading/Nearest Note’ button.
CC#36 toggles ‘Retain upper/lower’ voice button.
The above CCs can be changed with the greyed-out CC# selectors next to the relevant control
CC#37 Panic Button (fixed CC, any value will activate this)

Notation Software
If you are using this script inside notation software (Sibelius, Finale, Dorico etc) be aware that these programs can
alter note lengths, velocity and timing with their own built-in logic.

I would suggest the following settings when using this script inside Sibelius:
Performance - Set un-slurred notes to 90%
Live playback – OFF (because it adjusts note lengths and timing which can cause stuck notes)
Dictionary/Staff Lines/Slur (above & below) 102% (fast 16th notes can be up to 150%); adjust last note 90%
CC#121 (reset all controllers) sent by Sibelius will reset all internal script data (but not user/GUI settings)
n.b. Midi note C-2 (0) is sent by Sibelius when stop/play is pressed (this can cause an issue when using this midi note as a keyswitch)

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