RPPR - Real-Time Pattern Play and Record 

Korg's taken performance and function in affordable music workstations to an exciting new level. RPPR, Real-time Pattern Play and Record, lets you record and save musical phrases and ideas as patterns. You can play a pattern back by simply pressing the key you've assigned it to. 

The N364 was one of the first KORG keyboards to utilize this feature with 100 RPPR pattern memory locations. Now the Triton and KARMA have RPPR capabilities to help expand your creativity.

One of the challenges when creating a sequence has posed an big hurdle to a large number of musicians: drum grooves and rhythm tracks. This is supposed to be one of the fun and easy parts, right? How many times have you said, "I'll lay down a simple groove and build on that," just to find out that you can't get it to feel right, or you aren't satisfied with the parts you played? Then you have to develop the rest of the song, finding the parts that will work in the chorus, solo, and on and on...What if this process could be made easier? 

The function of the Pattern has been around longer than the Music Workstation. Patterns can be used to create and assemble drum grooves and rhythm tracks, but they haven't made the process all that much easier. 

With RPPR, Patterns take on a whole new meaning. The Real-time Pattern Play (RPPR) and Record function of these instruments gives you the tools to simplify creating those illusive rhythm tracks. 

The EXB-PCM03 (Future Loop Construction) is an expansion board, designed for use with the new KARMA Workstation or any model Triton. This is a board loaded with 16 megabytes of PCM recorded drums and drum loops, time-sliced to make them more useable. comes with a library of patterns. Along with the card comes a disk containing program (sounds) and sequences (RPPR patterns). This library is independent of any song and can be loaded and saved to disk as its own file. Using the RPPR function in the sequencer you can select up to 76 patterns and assign them to keys for playback. Press a key and the pattern starts. Release the key and the pattern stops.

Pick a basic tempo and press any of the keys that are assigned to patterns. Play with different pattern types. Or juggle the order. Once your ideas have taken shape, put the sequencer in record, and just play your patterns by pressing the corresponding keys (in real-time) into the sequencer. That's it! 

Gone are the individual drum hits, and the stubborn battle with timing and feel. Gone are the multiple passes for different drums and cymbals. Now you have a wide selection of patterns to choose from. And the ability to concentrate on the structure of the song.

The library of patterns is great for many situations, but sometimes you might need something a bit different. That brings us to second R in RPPR: the Record Pattern Function. 

With the N364, Triton or KARMA workstations, you can create your own patterns and add them to the library, from the ground up. Remember, you can save a pattern (as a sequence) along with the Program data, to disk so you can create as many as you like or need. 

So far, we've looked at how RPPR can be used to streamline the writing process, but how can it be used in a performance situation? As you will see, RPPR adds a considerable amount of flexibility to live application settings. 

First of all, a Pattern is not limited to drums and rhythms. Any program can be used in a Pattern. Each Pattern has its own tempo parameter, as well as a selection for the type of trigger mode. You can set the trigger mode to play a Pattern once, play continuously, or play as long as the key is pressed. 

The Triton/KARMA's RPPR feature is accessed only in the sequencer mode.

One can start recording RPPR's immediately simply by going to the "pattern edit" tab and pressing REC/Write and Start/Stop. The pattern will be looped until one stops the pattern. The default is a 1 bar pattern, but one can choose the length by touching the upper right hand of the screen and selecting "pattern parameters". There is also a time signature choice here within pattern parameters.

Once the pattern(s) is/are completed, one must assign these new pattern(s) to different keys so they may be triggered. Go to the RPPR setup tab. Choose the key that will trigger the pattern (the default is C#2, which is the lowest black key of a 61 key Triton), then check the box next to assign. Repeat procedure for any other patterns, selecting different keys on the keyboard as triggers.

If one would like to synchronize these patterns to the sequencer, be sure to select "Sync" to "Seq" for each assignment.

Finally, on Page 0 of the sequencer, make sure to check mark "RPPR".

Now you are ready to rock (or swing, or groove).