"Hotel California" Harmony Preset

Johan Allard

Power User
Inspired primarily by @Mark Day's Hotel California Solo Preset from a few years ago, I'd thought I'd give it a go for the Ax8. The goal was to be able to get something that could be used live and play all the harmonies on one guitar. I configured 1 preset with 8 Scenes and 6 different harmonies using custom scales, here's my attempt at playing the whole thing, with the scene usage explained:



* EDITED: YouTube Removed the video, Trying Vimeo, and here's a direct link as well: **

https://imgshare.johanallard.com/Hotel-California-Ax8-Harmonies.mp4

Custom Scales:
To get the harmonies, I configured 6 custom scales (Setup -> Global -> Scales):

For Custom Scale #1, #2, #3, #4 and #5, set everything to -3, except:

Custom Scale #1 (Arpeggio 1-2):
  • A#: -4
  • B: -5
  • F#: -4
Custom Scale #2 (Arpeggio 3-4):
  • A: -5
  • C#: -4
  • G#: -4
Custom Scale #3 (Arpeggio 5-6):
  • B: -4
  • D: -5
  • F#: -4
  • G: -5
Custom Scale #4 (Arpeggio 7-8):
  • A#: -4
  • B: -5
  • F#: -4
Custom Scale #5 (last harmony before Arpeggios):
  • A#: -4
  • B: -4
  • F#: -4
Custom Scale #6 (the run just before the last harmony), set everything to +5, except:
  • A: +4
  • D: +4
  • F#: +3
Harmony Discrepancies:
In Custom Scale #3, in arpeggio 5, the D is -3 and arpeggio 6, the D is -5. I think it sounds fine with -3 in both but you might want to experiment.

Custom Scale #6 is the one I'm least happy with, it sounds ok but not great to my ears. It's the only harmony where I play the lower part (hence the + scale), It's a lot longer and has more mis-matches than the others compared to the real harmony. Played this completely accurate: E is +3 twice and +5 twice, B is +3 once and +5 once, D is +4 twice and +5 once, F# +3 twice and +5 once. You may want to experiment with the other values to see if you like it better, or just play this without the harmony.

Scenes
I've configured all 8 Scenes for this - first preset ever I think I've used 8 scenes.
  1. Beginning and main scene
  2. +Phaser
  3. Last harmony before arpeggios (Custom Scale #5)
  4. The run just before the last harmony (Custom Scale #6)
  5. Arpeggio 1-2
  6. Arpeggio 3-4
  7. Arpeggio 5-6
  8. Arpeggio 7-8
I've attached both the preset and the Guitar Pro tab showing what I'm attempting to play :)

Enjoy!
 

Attachments

  • Hotel California Solo.syx
    12.6 KB · Views: 941
  • Eagles - Hotel California.gpx.zip
    76.6 KB · Views: 725
Last edited:
Awesome work, Johan!

Just one question—when I load this preset into my AX8, the pitch blocks in each of the arpeggio scenes sound much lower than the video (and the song). They sound more like a bass octaver. Could these settings have been affected by the recent beta firmware upgrade? Or is there something else I need to do on my end to make it sound right?

Thanks.
 
Awesome work, Johan!

Just one question—when I load this preset into my AX8, the pitch blocks in each of the arpeggio scenes sound much lower than the video (and the song). They sound more like a bass octaver. Could these settings have been affected by the recent beta firmware upgrade? Or is there something else I need to do on my end to make it sound right?

Thanks.

Did you program the custom scales? Custom scales are global so doesn't get imported/added when you import the preset.
 
Awesome patch, very informative! I have a question though: I have been trying to reproduce this idea in another patch that switches between scales depending on the scene. But I have yet to figure out how exactly you made the switching happen. I can see in your patch that you are somehow using Scene 1 as a modifier for the Voice 1 Scale selection (1-5). If I try to do the same though, my scenes do not trigger any change in the pitch block at all making only an X/Y setting viable instead of me being able to, ideally, switch between 8 different scales through the 8 scenes. How did you get the scale selection to respond to the scene changes? Cheers for the input!
 
Last edited:
Awesome patch, very informative! I have a question though: I have been trying to reproduce this idea in another patch that switches between scales depending on the scene. But I have yet to figure out how exactly you made the switching happen. I can see in your patch that you are somehow using Scene 1 as a modifier for the Voice 1 Scale selection (1-5). If I try to do the same though, my scenes do not trigger any change in the pitch block at all making only an X/Y setting viable instead of me being able to, ideally, switch between 8 different scales through the 8 scenes. How did you get the scale selection to respond to the scene changes? Cheers for the input!

Scene 1 refers to Scene Controller 1.

AX8-Edit-Hotel-California-Pitch-1-1536727208.png


In this screenshot you can see Source as Scene Controller 1, the Min/Max value says that the minimum scale is custom scale #1 (value 0) and the maximum custom scale #6 (value 5). The value of Scene Controller 1 will the alternate between scales 1-6. If you have another song you want to use the same trick with, you can use the same and select min 6 and max 11 to use Scene controller 1 to go between Scale 7 and 12 with the same Scene Controller configuration.
AX8-Edit-Pitch-California-Pitch-2-1536727321.png


And here you can see the Scene Controller settings:
  • Scene 1,2 and 5: Scale 1
  • Scene 3: Scale 5
  • Scene 4: Scale 6
  • Scene 6: Scale 2
  • Scene 7: Scale 3
  • Scene 8: Scale 4
AX8-Edit-Pitch-Hotel-California-3-1536727493.png


Hope that helps
 
And here you can see the Scene Controller settings:

That actually helped a great deal. I was not aware of the intricacies of the scene controller page. After fiddling with the percentage values of Controller 1, I was finally able to link my scales to the scenes I wanted them linked to. Thanks a bunch for clearing that up!
 
Great Work Johan!!
Quick question, I mostly play the lower part of the solo during the arpeggios, would the scales just to the opposite of what you have?

For example:
Custom Scale #1 (Arpeggio 1-2):
  • A#: -4
  • B: -5
  • F#: -4

Would be:
A#: +4
B: +5
F#: +4

Is this correct??
 
Great Work Johan!!
Quick question, I mostly play the lower part of the solo during the arpeggios, would the scales just to the opposite of what you have?

For example:


Would be:
A#: +4
B: +5
F#: +4

Is this correct??

No, it's semitone offsets from what you play to what you want the Pitch block to play. So if the setting is -3 for E the pitch block will play C# when you play an E, if it's +3 for E the pitch block will play a G if you play an E. So A# -4 means that the Pitch block will play an F# when you play A#, and if you want to play the F# instead, you need to make the F# +4 so that the Pitch block plays A# when you play F#.

I generally find that when the pitch block plays the lower tone it's more convincing, and worthwhile to test what works best for you.
 
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