Sustain Pedal not working

[ricardoming7]

Hello,

I recently adquired an Arturia Minilab MKII with Analog Lab Lite (versions 4 and V) included. I'm a big fan of the Pianos preset of the Mellotron on both versions, however, the virtual instrument does not recognize the sustain pedal I plug into my controller. I'm sure that it's not an issue with the controller or the pedal, since other virtual instruments do react to the sustain pedal normally.

I would appreciate the help!

[MajorFubar]

Welcome.

The Mellotron does not respond to a sustain pedal. I don't think it's a bug, it's designed that way. A real Mellotron plays upto 7 seconds of tape when you hold down the key and immediately stops playing when you lift your finger off the key. While some of the Mellotron presets in Mellotron V / Analog Lab take certain 'liberties', such as having a decay or looping the playback, the piano preset works just like a real Mellotron would.

[ricardoming7]

Welcome.

The Mellotron does not respond to a sustain pedal. I don't think it's a bug, it's designed that way. A real Mellotron plays upto 7 seconds of tape when you hold down the key and immediately stops playing when you lift your finger off the key. While some of the Mellotron presets in Mellotron V / Analog Lab take certain 'liberties', such as having a decay or looping the playback, the piano preset works just like a real Mellotron would.

I assumed that every instrument supported the sustain pedal. Oh well, I hope Arturia considers supporting sustain pedals for the Mellotron in the near future.

Thanks for the feedback!

[MajorFubar]

I'm not sure they will.
You're wanting something to simulate the effect you get from a real piano when you press the damper pedal. In the synth world, confusingly that's called 'release', not 'sustain'. On synths, pressing the sustain pedal usually just mimics the action of keeping the keys depressed. So if you hit the same key again with the sustain pedal pressed, the sound wouldn't re-trigger.
A better option for you would be to use one of the Piano V presets, where the Sustain pedal does work like a piano's damper pedal.
(I'm not trying to be condascending or contradictory, just trying to help you understand why the Mellotron instrument doesn't support sustain.)

[LBH]

Hi.

Possible workarounds solution down the line.

It's not possible to assign the midi CC64 to anything in Mellotron V.
I assume it's because midi CC64 is a reserved parameter in other Arturia applications.
And in Analog Lab you have Sustain on/ off function for Multies.
But precisely becasue of this, i also think midi CC64 should work in all applications in one way or another.

I think a modulation matrix that include the sustain pedal - or a button that by user choice can switch the Midi CC64 to control either The Macro Release or a Hold note as the samples can be looped in Arturias version - should be added in Mellotron V.
The added Release and sample loop functionality does make an added sustain and hold note functionality make sense.
It should not be that hard to do. It's a more than resonable request and assumption that the functionality would be there allready. I prefere to look at this lack of sustain pedal functionality as an oversight from Arturia.


As it is now, then it's possible to either have a pedal that use a midi CC, that you can assign to Mellotron Vs controls and use it to control the Release in the Advanced window, to create a Piano style sustain.
By default Factory config then midi CC83 is set to control the Release.

Also you maybe have options in your DAW or whatever to assign even midi CC64 to the Mellotron Vs Release by controlling the Macro Release automation parameter.
Or perhaps a way to map Midi CC to another midi CC like Midi CC83.
You can create different Midi configs.
And you can also use a Mellotron Macro.
Just find a way, that works for you.
But yes, it would be much easier, if Arturia made a solution to use the midi CC64. It would match other  Arturia applications to do so.

I have different options to make a Piano style sustain by using the above mentioned workarounds.