For pitys sake...I wrote this email to TC Helicon, and look at the response I get. Talk about useless advice...

Subject
About to buy a voiceworks, but before I do...transpose question?

Discussion Thread
Response (Brian Krawcykowski)12/13/2004 02:40 PM
HI,
The Voiceworks has two different modes for this purpose. One is the notes mode, where the unit responds to individual notes in realtime that you play. This doesn't matter wether or not the notes messages come froma sequencer or a keyboard. You can also set the unit to "chords" mode which will identify the Chords your midi device sends out. From what I could interpert from your description, I hope tihs explains the unit. We also have the manuals available free online at www.tc-helicon.com for your review. Please always feeel free to contact us if you have any further questions. Cheers!
Auto-Response12/13/2004 09:04 AM
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Dear Kendall,

Regarding the question that you are submitting, the Answers below were automatically selected for you by SmartAssistant™. If no solutions are listed or the solutions are not helpful, select "Finish Submitting Question" to submit your issue to our support staff:


Title: How do I achieve natural sounding pitch correction?
Link: http://tcsupport.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/tc...ated=1047290619

Title: How do I use the VoiceWorks to pitch correct my lead vocal?
Link: http://tcsupport.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/tc...ated=1047289736

Title: How can the VoiceWorks trigger harmony without using MIDI?
Link: http://tcsupport.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/tc...ated=1044479784

Title: The vocal I am trying to correct jumps to unwanted notes. What can I do?
Link: http://tcsupport.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/tc...ated=1047291162

Title: Interfacing AES/EBU to S/PDIF
Link: http://tcsupport.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/tc...ated=1067521162

Customer (Kendall Partington)12/13/2004 09:04 AM
I have an SD1 from Ketron. The onboard vocalizer isn't that great and I am anxious for a better one.

My concern is this though. many songs are transposed in different ways on my board and the onboard vocalizer has a "method" for interpreting it.

I better clearly explain or you might get confused:

In midi mode, I can transpose "globally" which means BOTH the song, and the keyboard are affected. If a song is in G and I put it up 3 keys, then it's now in Bb, and when I play a G chord on the keyboard, it comes out as Bb.

If I used "song" transpose then it would shift the key up 3, but leaves the keyboard alone, so if I play a G chord, it will still come out as G. I would have to play the actual Bb chord to match the song.

Lastly, I can transpose the keyboard alone, and it doesn't change the pitch of the song.

So the purpose of this is to say that for the SD1, in midi mode, a vocalizer track will automatically be transposed by either of the two tranposes affecting the song. But if I don't have a vocalizer track and I'm using the live harmony, for example as a "third" above setting following my voice and the keys I press, then it WON'T recognize transposition of the keyboard. I have to be playing in the proper key for it to work. Is this the same for the Voiceworks? Or will I have to adjust something..

Another example:

If a song is playing and I decide the harmony is too high, (maybe it's set for a female), I can go to that track and transpose it individually to -12 which drops the harmony an octave.

Will this be recognized on the voiceworks automatically or will it still play the actual notes on the track and ignore the -12?

Lastly, when playing styles, (repetitive live tracks that follow the chords you hit, with intro, end, fills, etc), the keyboard DOES recognize global transpose unlike the midi situation, and so If I play in G and transpose up to A, it will automatically adjust the harmony properly. Will THIS work the same way? This is particular would be a real problem if it didn't since I would have no choice but to forego harmony or relearn to play the song in the actual key I'm transposing to.

I'm just trying to see how labour intensive this will be before I buy the product. Sorry for such a long email, but if I don't explain carefully, you might get hopelessly confused.

Sincerely,
Kendall P


THEIR RESPONSE:

HI,
The Voiceworks has two different modes for this purpose. One is the notes mode, where the unit responds to individual notes in realtime that you play. This doesn't matter wether or not the notes messages come froma sequencer or a keyboard. You can also set the unit to "chords" mode which will identify the Chords your midi device sends out. From what I could interpert from your description, I hope tihs explains the unit. We also have the manuals available free online at www.tc-helicon.com for your review. Please always feeel free to contact us if you have any further questions. Cheers!