KARMA 2: Using KARMA to create open voicings

Scenario

You would like to play simple 3 and 4 note chords on the keyboard, and have KARMA send them out as traditional "open-voiced" chords.

Procedure

Since we don't want KARMA to generate riffs or arpeggios, but just a sustained chord, you need to first find a GE that is capable of playing all notes that are pressed at the same time. The "Gated" GEs fit this requirement: they will generate all notes that you press at the same time, usually chopping them up or repeatedly striking them. So we are going to set one of them to generate a single long chord, long enough that it doesn't seem to be repeated (but it actually will be, if you hold it about 8 beats. But long enough for our purposes). Then we will tell it to space the notes out with Open Voicing.

Korg Kronos/OASYS

1. Select Program I-C015 Stereo Octave Strings (Kronos) or A003 Stereo Oct Strings (OASYS).
2. On Page 7-3 KARMA > Control, set Note Map Mode to Off - this will interfere with what we are doing.
3. On page 0-6 KARMA GE, select GE 1258 Dr. Chopper 1.
4. Turn KARMA On, Latch OFF, and you will hear chopping going on.
5. Set Switch 3 to On, so that it is Restriking instead of Chopping.
6. Set Switch 5 Bend On/Off to off.
7. Set Slider 5 Rhythm Pattern to 127, so that it selects KARMA Value 50, which is a template consisting of whole notes. Play a chord, you will hear it repeat the chord at whole note intervals.
8. Set Slider 4 Velocity Accents to 127 so that all chords are the same level.
9. Set Slider 3 Duration Control to 63 (KARMA Value 98) so that each chord sustains until the next chord.
10. Set Switch 1 Rhythm Multiplier to On, so that it is twice the rhythm, yielding half notes. Try playing a chord. The chord sustains for quite awhile.
11. Now, turn on Switch 4 Chord Voicing. This causes it to do standard open voicing, which basically pops up every other note by one octave:

If you play C3 - E3, you get C3 - E4.
If you play C3 - E3 - G3, you get C3 - G3 - E4.
If you play C3 - E3 - G3 - B3, you get C3 - G3 - E4 - B4 and so on.

Korg M3

1. Select Program A003 Stereo Strings Legato.
2. On Page 7-1-7 KARMA 1 > Control, set Note Map Mode to Off - this will interfere with what we are doing.
3. On page 0-5 KARMA GE, select GE 1275 Dr. Chopper 1.
4. Turn KARMA On, Latch OFF, and you will hear chopping going on.
5. One page 0-6 KARMA RTC, set Switch 3 to On, so that it is Restriking instead of Chopping.
6. Set Switch 5 Bend On/Off to off.
7. Set Slider 5 Rhythm Pattern to 127, so that it selects KARMA Value 50, which is a template consisting of whole notes. Play a chord, you will hear it repeat the chord at whole note intervals.
8. Set Slider 4 Velocity Accents to 127 so that all chords are the same level.
9. Set Slider 3 Duration Control to 63 (KARMA Value 98) so that each chord sustains until the next chord.
10. Set Switch 1 Rhythm Multiplier to On, so that it is twice the rhythm, yielding half notes. Try playing a chord. The chord sustains for quite awhile.
11. Now, turn on Switch 4 Chord Voicing. This causes it to do standard open voicing, which basically pops up every other note by one octave:

If you play C3 - E3, you get C3 - E4.
If you play C3 - E3 - G3, you get C3 - G3 - E4.
If you play C3 - E3 - G3 - B3, you get C3 - G3 - E4 - B4 and so on.

Tips

As you can hear, this is especially effective on string voicings, which are almost always done in some sort of variation of open voicing.

You can also experiment with page 7-5 GE RTP (Kronos/OASYS) or 7-2-1 (M3), and change 08 Note Series Voicing (the Max value). 001 is the standard open voicing I have just described, while the other settings give some other variations including various inversions you wouldn't normally think of yourself.