The “BeatBuddy” is a drum machine produced by Singular Sound. This app is not affiliated nor endorsed by Singular Sound.
Main View, Left and Right Panels
Main View L&R Cheatsheet
Drums and Credits panel
Drums and Credits Cheatsheet
Main View L and Blueboard
BlueBoard CheatSheet
Drums and Main View R
Main View L and Credits panel
BeatBuddy Wireless MIDI Controller
Full tactile control over your BeatBuddy using MIDI over Bluetooth or MIDI to USB connections.
Bidirectional communication between your BeatBuddy and your iPad.
Features:
Includes all the BeatBuddy MIDI and SYSEX implementation based on the current firmware
Single Tempo knob capable to send a range between 40-300 BPM (this single point has proven to be really tricky, but this layout finally solved it in the most elegant way possible)
Capable to operate in any MIDI channel and remain operative (something great if you have some others MIDI Devices in your setup)
Saves your spine! Almost any usual operation can be done from the controller side, and provides many advanced features almost impossible to replicate with a physical controller (unless you use a very big one)
Wireless option: connect a Yamaha MD-BT01 to your BeatBuddy MIDI Sync cable and begin to enjoy a tangle-free life
Includes 6 octaves of Pads to play any individual drum sample. They also receive MIDI notes (turn On “MIDI Notes Out” in your BB settings), so it shows the notes playing in Real-Time)
Easy Folder/Songs navigation, with support for 128 folders X 99 songs.
Eight Transition Part buttons, allowing for easy non-correlative part changes
User Setlist: Store up to 128 user presets (Select Folder and Song, then press the “S” button to enter a name and store the preset in the desired location)
Drum Set selector: Store up to 128 user presets (Select the Drum Set number, then press the “R” button to enter a name and store the preset in the current location)
SYSEX receive: shows the Time signature of any song (Range [1-32], [1,2,4,8,16,32])
MIDI receive: shows the current part after a transition (only on channel 1 due to an BeatBuddy Bug. Please read post #7 on this same thread)
Embedded support for the iRig BlueBoard: 100% Plug&Play! Preconfigured and ready to use.
Includes a small MIDI implementation to emulate the BlueBoard behaviour using different devices (Airturn, Airstep, etc)
Hardware and Software Requeriments:
Singular Sound BeatBuddy
Singular Sound BeatBuddy Midi Sync Cable
Apple iPad (Also for old devices! Even a 7-years-old iPad Air first gen will work)
MIDI Designer Pro 2 (IOS app, sold separately)
This MIDI Layout (Now Available!!) Recommended MIDI Interfaces:
Wireless: Yamaha MD-BT01
Wired (MIDI to USB): Roland UM-ONE MKII + Apple CCK USB3
Recommended Bluetooth LE pedalboards:
Singular Sound MIDI Maestro (the BeatBuddy companion)
iRig BlueBoard (embedded support)
Airturn BT200 series
Xsonic Airstep
Changes Log:
V1.0 Released on September 17 2020
V1.1 Released on September 19 2020
Songs number limited to 99 (as it is in the BeatBuddy)
New “R” button (Rename) to easily label your Drum Sets on the controller side.
New Drum Set “Reorder” feature (it’s also on the Drum panel). Associate any Preset to any Drum Set number, then press the “R” button to rename and store it.
Minor graphic fixes
V1.2 Released on September 22 2020
User Setlist: 128 user presets to store and rename Folder+Song combinations.
V1.3 Update - Released on October 01 2020
Global MIDI Channel Selector
Plug & Play Support for the iRig Blueboard Mode C (2)
Small MIDI implementation to be used with different BLE devices (Airturn, etc)
I don’t use BeatBuddy, but I use Midi Designer Pro on iPad. I’ve started a layout for Aeros, just waiting for more midi commands to be implemented. Glad to see another MDP user here. Cheers!
I think I have found a BeatBuddy bug while doing my final tests:
BeatBuddy seems to be sending the CC102 (sent after a part change) exclusively over the MIDI channel 1 (B0), no matter what Output channel is selected on Settings/Main pedal/MIDI settings/MIDI-OUT/Channel/
I can see the notes being sent on any selected channel, but the BB keeps sending CC102 on channel 1.
Can anyone confirm this, so it can be reported as a bug?
EDIT:
Well, forget it. Now I can see this is an old bug, reported at least since 2018 and still broken on the current Firmware 3.8.0:
So we are stuck on MIDI Channel 1 despite all my efforts to get a 16-channels bomb proof MIDI layout, and it’s all due to this horrid bug.
Yes, this is a very irritating issue! To get around this problem, I need to put a computer in the MIDI loop to look for that CC102 message (on channel 1) and then send it out again on the proper midi channel (channel 4 for my and the Ditto X4)
hmmm, I’ve been using Unrealbook (chart reader on iPad) to send commands to BB - I have used several different channels (according to the one I am using on BB - mostly 15 or 16 iirc) in sending data - not sure if I’ve used 102, but I use volume control, drumset change, tempo change and song change, among others…hahaha just checked, and 102 does not even appear in the MIDI commands used by BB on my data sheet .
It’s in the midi commands document on the Singular BB downloads. It’s listed as Next Part CC102. It gets sent by the BB after a transition. I believe this is what @JoeInOttawa uses for his lights command. It’s shown in the midi document as an Enable/Disable choice.
What about CC110? (Triggers an accent hit). It is documented as if it were velocity sensitive [0-127] where 100 is the original recorded volume.
However, only the values 0 (mute) and 127 (maxed) seems to work. Any intermediate value sounds the same than max.
This renders my accent hit volume slider looks like wasted space. It was intended to determine the velocity sent by the accent hit button. And it works as intended, it just again the BB acting unexpectedly.
One thing I have noticed in the settings, is that turning 102 to enable is only available in the MIDI Out section, not the MIDI in section?? Seems it would need to be enabled for MIDI in…unless my firmware is also out of date??
EDIT: After checking the doc that Persist kindly gave the link to. Looks like this is the only way it works. It SENDS a part change??? Why would you need to send it, shouldn’t the BB receive it?
I think the idea was that the 102 was an unused CC, so that having it sent upon part change allowed the user to create some kind of special effect, like Joe’s lights. The downside was that if some other midi device on the same channel actually used CC 102, you could have an undesired result. Thus, the ability to Enable or Disable the send.
It will also receive next part commands of some sort, because you can switch parts via MIDI from the Aeros. A quick check of the MIDI manual tells me if you send a transition (CC113) with a value of 127, it goes to the next part.
If you haven’t seen it, that manual is online, here: Support.
