Hello,
I’m enjoying my first week with the OP XY. There are things I really like and others not so much, but I still have a lot to learn. My main concern right now is the Brain. It was one of the reasons I bought the OP XY, but now I’m not sure if I fully understand what it does or what it’s truly capable of.
I thought that if you transpose an arrangement (or a chord progression, a single chord, or even just a note), the Brain would transpose it according to the selected scale. For instance, if I’m in C major, it shouldn’t allow me to play a G#. Or should it?
I’ve found that if I place a C major triad in the sequencer and select the C major scale in the Brain, it behaves as I expected: pressing C (on the Brain track) gives me a C major chord; pressing D transposes the chord, but it also makes the D chord minor, which makes sense, given that we’re in the C major scale. The E chord is also minor, the F is major, and so on. However, if I change the scale to C Dorian (a minor scale), I expected it to change the chord to C minor. But it doesn’t seem to do that. So, what is it actually doing? And what’s the point of this behavior? I’m not saying this as a criticism (well, maybe a little), but I genuinely don’t understand. If I select a C Dorian scale, shouldn’t a C major chord be “forbidden”?
Let’s say I want to jam with a Digitakt and an Ableton Push. I can select a D Phrygian scale on both devices and play notes and chords that stay within the scale. They won’t allow me to play notes outside of it. That’s very convenient for me because I’m not a trained keyboardist, and my music theory is a bit rusty. I thought the Brain was “intelligent” and that all transpositions would stay within the selected scale, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Or am I missing something?
Another question I have is about the text that appears above the keyboard when you’re in the Brain track. When you press C, it says “C major”; when you press D, it says “D Dorian”; when you press E, it says “E Phrygian,” and so on. Of course, that happens when C major is selected. If you change the scale, the labels also change. I understand what it’s doing, but I don’t see how this is useful. I really feel like I’m missing something here.
Sorry for the long post (it’s also my first), but it’s hard for me to explain the issue. And the manual isn’t helping. Could someone explain what the Brain is actually doing or share how you’re using it? Many thanks!