Store Yamaha reface Presets with Soundmondo
If you have one of the four Yamaha reface keyboards, you need Yamaha’s Soundmondo platform to store and retrieve your presets and create set lists.
- What Does Yamaha Soundmondo Do?
- How Can You Use Yamaha Soundmondo?
- Soundmondo on Mac or Windows PC
- Soundmondo on iOS and iPadOS
What Does Yamaha Soundmondo Do?
Soundmondo is a web browser–based editor/librarian system and more. By themselves, the Yamaha reface CS virtual analog synthesizer, Yamaha reface YC combo organ, and Yamaha reface CP electric piano have no means of storing or retrieving presets and no visual editor. The Yamaha reface DX FM synthesizer can store presets internally, but it also benefits from Soundmondo, which provides an easy-to-use editor for all four reface models.
When you create an account and profile on the Soundmondo website, you can create, store and retrieve your private presets and set lists for all reface keyboards. Because Soundmondo is also a “social sound-sharing community,” you can share your presets with other users and access libraries of thousands of other users’ presets sorted by category tags.
You can load any preset from Soundmondo into your reface. You can then use the front panel controls on your reface to modify any preset and then save it to your Soundmondo profile as your own.
Soundmondo also supports Yamaha’s bigger siblings and flagship keyboards, the CP stage pianos, YC stage keyboards, the Montage synthesizers, and the ModX+ synthesizers.
How Can You Use Yamaha Soundmondo?
Soundmondo exists in two forms:
- As a web-based app that runs in your browser on Mac or Windows PC. The web-based Soundmondo provides a visual editor for all reface models, which is particularly helpful for the reface DX.
- As an app for iPhone and iPad. The Soundmondo app does not provide the visual editor available in the web-browser version, but it enables you to save presets locally on your device.
Soundmondo on Mac or Windows PC
The Soundmondo home page in Google Chrome
Soundmondo is a cloud-based web app that you access through a web browser that supports the Web MIDI standard. These include Google Chrome, FireFox, Opera and Microsoft Edge. (Apple Safari does not support Web MIDI.)
To use your Yamaha keyboard with your Mac or Windows PC:
- Go to the Yamaha Firmware/Software Updates page. Search on your instrument name.
- Download and install the USB-MIDI Driver for your version of macOS or Windows. Follow the instructions with the download.
- Connect a USB cable from your keyboard to your computer.
- Launch Google Chrome or another Web MIDI-compatible browser and go to https://soundmondo.yamahasynth.com/. Bookmark that link.
The first time you go to the website with your keyboard connected, your browser may prompt you with a message saying, “soundmondo.yamahasynth.com wants to use your MIDI devices.” Click Allow.
On the Soundmondo home page, click the Sign In button. Create a user account. From the home page, click the gear icon at the far right of the top bar to open your user profile settings. If you wish to participate in the “social sound-sharing community” and publish your presets to share them with other users, you can upload a profile picture and provide links to your pages on SoundCloud, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter. But you don’t need to fill any of this out to use Soundmondo.
Downloading, modifying, and saving presets in Soundmondo
Click Browse next to the Soundmondo logo.
Click the Sync button. The red Disconnected light will change to the green Connected light. Soundmondo can now read the positions of the sliders and switches on your reface keyboard and can download presets to the keyboard.
Soundmondo preset selection by instrument and style tags
Under Browse by Instrument, by selecting your instrument and clicking on the Style Tags, you can search for presets for your instruments shared by users from around the world.
When you select a preset and click the Sync button, that preset is downloaded from Soundmondo into your reface. A new page which displays the reface slider and switch positions for that sound opens in the browser.
Soundmondo editor view for the Yamaha reface CS, showing slider positions for each parameter
At this moment, your reface will play the preset according to the slider and switch positions displayed in the browser window for that preset. However, the physical sliders and switches on your keyboard’s hardware will not match those values. If you simply play the keyboard or adjust the volume or octave setting, nothing will change.
On your reface keyboard’s controls, if you move any slider or change the position of any switch, you will see the corresponding slider or switch move in the display in the Soundmondo browser window. By moving a slider, you are, in effect, creating a new preset, so the browser window displays the settings with a blank Voice Title and Voice Description. You can save the preset by giving the preset a new title and description, tags, and values for other fields. Scroll down to the bottom of the page. Under Accessibility, choose Public or Private, and click Save.
Go back to the gear icon to go back to your user profile. At the bottom, you will see the list of Sounds (presets) that you have saved. You can drag and drop to reorganize them. You can also create Set Lists and drag and drop Sounds into them.
When playing your reface, you can use the Soundmondo Set List to recall presets one at a time. Select the preset in the browser window, click the Sync button at the top, and the sound’s parameters will be transmitted to your keyboard.
Soundmondo with the reface DX
Soundmondo editor view for the reface DX
The Soundmondo editor is particularly useful for the reface DX, which has many programming parameters that are entered using a combination of buttons and touch sensors. This way, you can see all the parameters in one view rather than looking at only a few parameters at a time on the DX keyboard’s small display screen.
Soundmondo on iOS and iPadOS
The Yamaha Soundmondo app for iPhone and iPad
If you have an iPhone or iPad, you can use the free Soundmondo app. Download it from the Apple App Store.
If you are using an iPhone or an iPad with a Lightning connector, you need an Apple Lightning to USB Camera Adapter. Connect a USB-B to USB-A cable to your reface keyboard and connect the other end of the USB cable to the Lightning Camera Adapter. Then connect the Lightning plug to your iPhone or iPad.
If you have an iPad with a USB-C connector, you can use a USB-B to USB-A cable and a USB-A to USB-C adapter and connect that to your iPad.
Power on your reface and launch the Soundmondo app.
The Yamaha Soundmondo app with the reface CS connected
Sign in to your Soundmondo account with the username and password you created on the website or click the Open Signup Page button to create a new account.
It will automatically recognize which model of reface you have connected and provide you with a short list of built-in presets. In the iOS app, presets are called “Voices.”
You can click on the “S” icon in the lower-right corner to search the Soundmondo library and select and download from the thousands of shared user presets in the cloud, as you would from the web browser on Mac or Windows.
Capture mode in Soundmondo for iOS
Clicking Capture takes you to a new view where you can upload your current reface sound to your device. You will be prompted to save this as a Voice. You can also generate a QR code representing the saved Voice which you can text or email to other reface owners so that they can recall the preset in Soundmondo and load it on their instrument.
You can create local Set Lists and save presets to them for quick recall.
Locally saved Set Lists and Voices can be recalled from the iOS app and loaded into your reface keyboard even if you are not connected to the Internet.
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