problem connecting usb-midi with softsynths in linux

[lostinpurdy]

Dunno if I put this in the right spot but here goes - I have this old midi keyboard - casio GZ-5 and I have it hooked up via a midi/usb adapter to my laptop - a old Dell Latitude 640 running Arch Linux . I just can not connect with soft synths/LMMS modules to save my life. The laptop itself does receive midi signals from the keyboard (verified using aseqdump) but it just won't get through to the application, even with midi channels matched up. Am I missing something there on my end?

[EdisonRex]

Are you using Jack along with it? Or Alsa? Or both? or what?

[lostinpurdy]

I tried them (Zynaddsubfx, Beast, Lmms) by themselves and in different combinations with Jack, Alsa and OSS. I managed to somewhat make it work with Beast only and without jack. Once I run Jackd with any of the Alsa or OSS as backend it seems to interfere with the other programs, e.g. in Zynaddsubfx I don't get a UI, and no sound in LMMS. I'm Starting to think it might be a kernel issue, unless it's something simple that I keep overlooking?

[lostinpurdy]

and? nothing? some help, please?

[EdisonRex]

Well perhaps we can step back and ask a few questions.

Which version of Arch are you on.
Second, what's your usb midi adaptor.
Next, can you set up Alsa alone and see what that does.

[jksuperstar]

If you can, get a midi monitor, like KMIDIMon (if you have KDE accessible), or GMIDIMon (for GTK). Or, for ALSA, there's the aspymidi. Any of them can tell you for sure when and what MIDI is making it in to your machine.

This is the equivalent of using MIDIOX on Windows.

[fengland]

try to install qjackctl then start that up and click 'alsa' - you can do your midi routing easily there - you should see your midi interface ports and you softsynths - just select them and click 'connect' - hope that helps - it makes life easier - otherwise, you can use aconnect - it's the command line utility to connect midi things together - try 'man aconnect'