velocity-router

velocity-router turns dynamics into orchestration: how hard you play chooses which instrument sounds.

Each note-on is dealt to a channel by its velocity: below low it goes to the soft channel, from high up to the loud one, and everything between to medium. Orchestrators have always scored dynamics this way, handing a swell from the strings to the brass rather than just asking anyone to play louder; here the handover happens under your fingers, and a crescendo stops being a louder piano and becomes a walk across the stage. Keys and velocities are never rewritten, only channels.

The multitimbral DAW setup is the point: this effect does nothing audible until the three channels point at three different instruments, so set up three tracks receiving channels of your choosing; see the DAW guide. Each note’s note-off, retrigger cut, and polyphonic aftertouch follow it to whichever channel it was dealt, so nothing sticks; pedals and other non-note events pass on their original channel.

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Default	Range
low	velocity	64	1..=127, less than high
high	velocity	96	1..=127
soft	channel	required	1..=16
medium	channel	required	1..=16
loud	channel	required	1..=16

Example

miditool.kdl

input "Roland"
output virtual="miditool Out"

velocity-router low=64 high=96 soft=2 medium=3 loud=4

In the DAW, put a felt piano on channel 2, strings on channel 3, and brass on channel 4: playing quietly is now a different instrument from playing hard, and one phrase can pass through all three.

Try this

Reserve the edges for extremes. With the thresholds pushed out, the medium channel owns almost everything and the outer instruments become punctuation:

velocity-router low=30 high=110 soft=2 medium=3 loud=4

Only a real caress reaches channel 2 and only a real blow reaches channel 4. Then chain a velocity-curve before the router to move the effective borders without retuning your hands.