MIDI controllers - Shadow Rack Docs

Any MIDI controller with knobs and buttons can run the rack - you map it once in Setup > MIDI. No WING needed.

A small MIDI controller next to the laptop - an X-Touch Mini, a Launch Control, anything with knobs and buttons - can run Shadow Rack: turn the selected plugin's threshold, bypass it, jump to the next channel, tap the tempo, take every plugin out in a panic. It works with any interface; no WING needed.

You map each knob and button once, in Setup > MIDI. Shadow Rack remembers the mappings on this Mac, whatever session you open.

How it's organised#

Shadow Rack has three pages of controls, each with 4 knobs, 4 upper buttons and 4 lower buttons:

Page	For
FX	The plugin you're on: its parameters on the knobs, bypass, previous / next plugin
NAV	Moving around: channels, plugins, adding a plugin, presets, undo
SHOW	During the show: New York sends, SPEECH, PANIC, TAP

You map a knob or button of your controller to one of these places – "FX knob 1", "SHOW lower button 3". You don't switch pages on the controller: each control you map always does its one thing. Map only the ones you need.

Setup > MIDI since 0.4#

Open Setup (⌘,) and click MIDI.

Setup > MIDI: two controls of an X-Touch Mini mapped, a third one waiting

The section at the top, Wing control, is for the WING's own custom controls; you can ignore it without a WING.

Under MIDI controllers, check that your controller is in the list. Move something on it: its chip lights green.
Click + LEARN. A menu opens with the three pages: FX - the plugin you're on, NAV - channels, plugins, presets, SHOW - New York, SPEECH, PANIC, TAP.
In a page, pick a place: Knob 1-4, Upper button 1-4 or Lower button 1-4. Each one says what it does right now (Knob 1 - THRESH -18.0dB); the ones already mapped are ticked.
A red bar says Move a knob or press a button on your controller - it goes onto FX knob 1. Do it.
The control appears in the list: CC 21 ch 1 → FX KNOB 1 THRESH -18.0dB.

CANCEL on the red bar stops waiting. Leaving the page stops it too, so a knob turned later in the show can never get mapped by mistake.

In the list, a row lights up while you use that control. The x forgets one; FORGET ALL forgets every controller (it asks first).

Knobs: ordinary and endless#

Endless knobs (encoders) are recognised by themselves after a couple of clicks - both common ways they send steps.
Ordinary knobs never make a value jump to where the knob happens to be: Shadow Rack takes how far you turned it, and moves the parameter by that much.
One step is 1/127 of the parameter's range. FINE on the FX page makes the steps ten times finer.
Switches and lists (a mode, a filter type) move one choice per step, so none gets skipped.

What's on each page#

FX - the plugin you're on (the plugin selected in the channel view):

	1	2	3	4
Knobs	the four parameters of the current bank (you choose them, below)
Upper buttons	previous bank	next bank	FINE	BYPASS the plugin
Lower buttons	previous plugin	next plugin	WINDOW (own window on / off)	TAP

NAV - channels, plugins, presets:

	1	2	3	4
Knobs	CH: go through the channels	PLUG: go through the plugins	ADD: go through your plugin list	PRESET: the plugin's own presets
Upper buttons	CH BYPASS	BYPASS the plugin	INSERT the plugin picked with ADD	LOAD the preset picked
Lower buttons	UNDO	WINDOW	DELETE the plugin	REDO

INSERT, DELETE and LOAD need two presses within three seconds, so a stray press does nothing.

SHOW - during the show:

	1	2	3	4
Knobs	the selected channel's New York send levels, one per bus (on a New York bus: each channel's send into it)
Upper buttons	that send on / off
Lower buttons	CH BYPASS (on a New York bus fed by more than four channels: MORE 1/2, the next four)	SPEECH	PANIC	TAP

SPEECH bypasses every reverb and delay and switches every New York send off, for talking between songs. Press again and everything is back as it was.
PANIC is BYPASS ALL: every channel without its plugins. It asks with two presses; switching it off again is one.

Your knobs on each plugin#

What the four FX knobs turn is up to you, per plugin: there are no ready-made maps, and a plugin nobody set up has nothing on its knobs. Once a controller has something on the FX page, a strip with the four knobs appears under the plugin in the channel view. It's tagged WING KNOBS - the same strip serves the WING - but works with any controller.

The knob strip while learning — LEARN: knob 2 is waiting for a control in the plugin

Select the plugin and click LEARN on the strip. It turns red and the button reads DONE.
Touch a control in the plugin's own interface - the threshold, say.
Click the knob on the strip it should go on - or simply turn that knob on your controller. It flashes green.
Repeat for the other knobs, then click DONE.

The other order works too: click a knob first, then touch the control.
‹ › go through the banks of four; paging past the last bank gives a new, empty one.
Right-click a knob for a list of all the plugin's parameters; Nothing on this knob empties it. The ⋯ button has Empty this bank and Empty every bank.
Parameters that change the plugin's delay can't go on a knob - turning one mid-show would put the channel out of time. They're greyed out.

The maps are kept per plugin (mono and stereo versions share one) for every session, in ~/Library/Application Support/Shadow Rack/Wing knobs.xml.

While you turn an FX knob, a small read-out floats over the top of the plugin - the knob, the parameter, its value in big red figures - and fades out a moment after you stop.