MIDI foot pedal controllers

c hack · Post by **c hack** » Mon Aug 08, 2005 6:32 am

anyone recommend one?

Adam! · Post by **Adam!** » Mon Aug 08, 2005 9:51 am

If you want a continuous controller, good luck finding one. I tried and couldn't. Everyone wants to sell you sustain pedals.

c hack · Post by **c hack** » Mon Aug 08, 2005 11:37 am

I want something with a bunch of pedals that I can map to ableton live, so I can switch drum loops with my feet while I play guitar. I know there's a couple out there, but I don't know if one's any better than the others.

blue · Post by **blue** » Mon Aug 08, 2005 2:06 pm

I Tried The Behringer And It Sucked (TM). We wanted one just to trigger @#$%@#$ samples, and it seems impossible to find one that will send note on/off values without a ton of other crap. I guess most of those midi effects pedals operate on paramters which are alien to doing anything useful.

Post by **Lunkhead** » Mon Aug 08, 2005 5:37 pm

This guy, Andrew Chaikin, does some really amazing live looping using Live and a MIDI pedal board. You could try contacting him to find out what his rig is:

http://www.biggerbread.com/contact.htm

I asked him what software he used, so I know it's Live, but I didn't think to check out his pedal board. I think it had 6-8 buttons, and 2 expression pedals. I saw him do a cover of a Portishead song, all vocally, using loops he laid down live and controlled with his feet.

bz£ · Post by **bz£** » Mon Aug 08, 2005 8:33 pm

blue wrote:I Tried The Behringer And It Sucked (TM). We wanted one just to trigger @#$%@#$ samples, and it seems impossible to find one that will send note on/off values without a ton of other crap.

You can do that, but the Behringer is, at best, very difficult to program. If you're lucky, that is, and you get one with working firmware (big surprise- they shipped a whole mess of pedals that didn't actually work). I almost bought one just for that reason- note on/off, but the guy who was selling it flaked out at the last minute.

This is probably exactly what you want (the FCB1010). It'll take some serious effort to figure out how to work it (the manual will not help you at all, but there is a yahoo group for it which is a must) and there is a nonzero chance that you will have to open it up with a screwdriver to make sure that all is well inside the unit. Once you've got it going, though, it's ten switches and two expression pedals-- probably more than enough.

They also make a stand-alone expression pedal for about $20 which would probably work fine as a CC.