Making a backing track - MIDI help

[skycruiser]

I'm trying to figure out how to make the best use of gear I have to make a drum track with backing keyboard chords. I have a drum machine with MIDI sync output and a digital piano with standard MIDI ports and also a MIDI port that connects by USB. I think the way I can use these is to compose the piano part in some software that can take a MIDI sync and send output instructions to the piano. Can anyone recommend software that does this? I'm thinking a simple chord pattern that can be looped to work on bass lines. Is there free software that does this? I have MuseScore that does have sync capability but in my reading it seems that it can't send keyboard driving outputs.

If this fails I could fall back on a looper - I had a Ditto X4 that would work perfectly but I stupidly sold it.

 

[TheLowDown33]

Any basic DAW will have a way to input MIDI tracks. You won’t even have to play them since it’s all programmable. You just need some VSTs for drums and keys, which can also be found free (if not for very cheap). Syncing hardware peripherals through a DAW can be a little cumbersome since now you’re dealing with clocking, and for you use case I think it would be more trouble than it’s worth.

 

[skycruiser]

Any basic DAW will have a way to input MIDI tracks. You won’t even have to play them since it’s all programmable. You just need some VSTs for drums and keys, which can also be found free (if not for very cheap). Syncing hardware peripherals through a DAW can be a little cumbersome since now you’re dealing with clocking, and for you use case I think it would be more trouble than it’s worth.

Thanks for the help. I'll look into what you suggest but honestly I was hoping to avoid generating any audio with the computer. I prefer the drum machine audio output and the native output of the keyboard. Just looking for a way to compose the keyboard parts and drive it through MIDI, synced with the drum machine MIDI sync (which I think is basically a sync pulse at the BPM rate of the DM, synced with DM playback). I'm planning to run the drum machine output and keyboard output to a mixer, along with the bass guitar, and record the combined output.

 

[TheLowDown33]

If that's the case, you should be able to do it fairly easily, providing each MIDI device has clock settings where you can set it to receive external information for it. Without knowing the specific models though, it's tough to get more helpful than that simply because each company follows a slightly different MIDI protocol as far as what messages correspond to what, whether they use 0 or 1 for their first messages, etc.