Region Settings
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The Region area of the DLS Designer Window contains the following settings:
Wave
Choose a wave for the region from the drop-down list, which displays all waves in the Waves folder of the DLS collection. Stereo waves have three entries: one mono wave for each channel and one stereo wave. Unless you want to achieve some special effect by using the channels in different regions, select the stereo wave. To create an instrument that works on both DLS1 and DLS2 synthesizers, use only mono waves in the bottom layer and set conditions so that they are not played on DLS2 synthesizers. For more information, see Conditional Regions and Articulations.
Click the Edit button to edit the wave using Wave Editor.
Root
The root of a wave is the pitch at which it plays back at its original speed. The default root is set in the Wave Component Properties window. For example, when you create a region based on a wave that has a root of C5, the wave plays at its natural pitch when a C5 note is played. You can change this value for individual regions. This is especially useful for sound effects, which you might want to assign to pitch ranges outside their default root notes.
For musical instruments other than drums, it is best to select a wave with a default root that fits in the region, and not alter the root. The default root represents the pitch at which the wave sounds most natural, and the wave will sound appropriate for all notes in the region. You can override the default root, but doing so causes notes to be transposed. For example, if you change the root note of a horn sound from C5 to C4, the wave plays at its original pitch when C4 is played, and at an unnaturally high pitch when C5 is played.
When designing a drum instrument, you use up to 128 wave samples, with a different sample assigned to each note of the keyboard. In this case, you adjust the root note of the waves so that they match, or nearly match, the note that triggers them.
Condition
Select an existing conditional statement, or click Edit to create a new one. The condition determines the circumstances under which the region will be downloaded to the playback device. For more information, see Conditional Regions and Articulations.
Note Range
Enter or select a value in each of the two boxes to specify the lowest and highest pitches in the range of the selected region. Values can be entered using either the MIDI notation or as numbers in the range from 0 to 127. You can also enter these values by using a MIDI keyboard.
A range can be from 1 to 128 pitches in size. Regions within a layer cannot overlap.
You can also change the note range of a region by moving or resizing it in the graphical display, using the mouse.
Velocity Range
Enter or select low and high values in the two boxes, in the range from 0 to 127, to specify a range of velocities at which the region plays. Using multiple layers with different velocities, you can create an instrument that responds to various MIDI note velocities with different sounds. You can also set overlapping velocity ranges on regions in different layers, to play multiple waves when a note is played.
Note Overlap Allowed
Select this check box to allow multiple notes of the same pitch to play. Some instruments, such as those whose notes sound for a long time, can monopolize system resources if the synthesizer plays repeated notes for the instrument. For such instruments, clear the Note Overlap Allowed option so the synthesizer stops the first note if it receives a second note-on message for this note.
Use Instrument Articulation
If this check box is selected, the region uses the default instrument articulation.
Key Group
Assign the instrument to one of four key groups, or to No Group. Waves in the same key group never play together. For example, if an instrument is simulating a conventional drum set, the open and closed hi-hat cymbal sounds should never occur together. Assigning the two waves to different regions and making both regions members of the same key group enforces this restriction.
If the software synthesizer is playing a note from a region in a key group and receives a Note On message from another region in the same key group, it turns off the current note and plays the new one.
If the wave associated with this region can be played with any other wave, select No Group.