MicroKorg MIDI Sync Issues in Logic Pro: When the Synth Ignores the Clock

A client’s first-generation MicroKorg wouldn’t sync its arpeggiator to Logic Pro, and after checking Logic, his USB MIDI cable and the MIDI settings on the synth, I suspect a hardware fault on the MicroKorg itself.

The client has a Korg microKORG, one of the first generation of the synth from the early 2000s. He wanted to connect it to Logic Pro and run its arpeggiator from Logic’s tempo. He’d followed tutorials and researched online how to send clock from Logic, and he’d bought a USB-to-MIDI cable for the job. He was frustrated because he couldn’t work out what he was doing wrong, or why the clock never registered on the MicroKorg.

Getting the MicroKorg’s name into Logic

We connected as usual over WhatsApp and AnyDesk, and he showed me what he was trying to do. His first question was how to get Logic to show the synth as MicroKorg rather than the name of the MIDI cable. I showed him the MIDI Studio window in Audio MIDI Setup, which is in the Utilities folder inside the Mac’s Applications folder. There we created a new external device and linked it to the cable with virtual cables. After that, Logic showed the name MicroKorg instead of the cable’s name, and he was happy to have that one answered clearly.

Sending clock from Logic

The second job was getting MIDI clock from Logic to the arpeggiator. He showed me what he’d set up in Logic’s Project Settings, under Synchronization and then MIDI. He’d turned on clock send in the first MIDI clock destination and set it to the MicroKorg, but the clock wasn’t getting through.

He told me he’d also been into the MicroKorg’s global MIDI settings and set the clock to External, and he’d noticed that when he did, the arpeggiator stopped making any sound. I explained that this was because the arpeggiator was waiting for an external clock instead of using its internal one. I thought the right setting was probably Auto, where the MicroKorg uses its internal clock until it receives an external one, so he switched it to Auto.

We set Logic running and could see MIDI being sent, because the indicator lights on the USB MIDI cable were flashing. Strangely, the MicroKorg still didn’t recognise the clock.

Clock sync between Logic and a hardware arpeggiator came up with a different synth too, which I wrote up in doubled notes and arpeggiator sync with a Prophet-6 in Logic Pro.

Testing the cable

I noticed the cable was a smart cable with a built-in filter setting, and I wondered if that might be stopping the MIDI getting through. So I downloaded its app and tried to run it on the Mac, but the app wouldn’t recognise the cable. I took that as a possible red flag that the cable might be at fault.

To test it, I asked him to plug in his Oxygen 61 MIDI keyboard and send MIDI from it into Logic through the same cable. Logic received it. We checked the data in Logic’s MIDI monitor, and I also downloaded MIDI Pipe and set up a MIDI reader so we could see exactly what was coming in, and there was nothing wrong with it. So it was looking like the cable was completely fine.

Checking the MicroKorg itself

With MIDI leaving Logic and the cable passing MIDI from the keyboard, the MicroKorg was the one part of the chain that wouldn’t receive or send anything.

We went through everything else we could think of:

• Swapped the cable’s input and output connections around on the MicroKorg.
• Checked the MIDI channels matched on both ends.
• Sent MIDI from Logic through an external MIDI plug-in and also from a standard MIDI track, to try different ways of sending.
• Went through every MIDI option on the MicroKorg with the manual, guiding him where to click. You can turn off certain MIDI functions, like SysEx or pitch wheel data, but there’s no option to stop it sending or receiving MIDI altogether.
• Ran the MicroKorg’s factory reset procedure, which made no difference.

I also researched online as much as I could. There was plenty of advice about troubleshooting MIDI on a MicroKorg, all things we’d already done, but I couldn’t find anyone describing this specific problem as a hardware failure on this unit.

Where we left it

We’d reached the end of what we could realistically do with remote troubleshooting, and it seemed this MicroKorg may have a hardware failure. The only other variable I thought was worth checking was a standard DIN MIDI cable, which he didn’t own, running from the MIDI out of his Oxygen 61 into the MIDI in on the MicroKorg. There’s a possibility of an incompatibility between his USB MIDI cable and the MicroKorg. I think that’s very unlikely, because the cable seems to be working properly and MIDI is a robust standard that hasn’t changed since it was invented in the 1980s, but we’d double-checked every other variable and it was the only one left. I gave him a few reputable brands to choose from.

He was disappointed not to have the MicroKorg playing from Logic yet, but he did appreciate being able to confirm he wasn’t doing anything wrong. He knew which part of the chain wasn’t responding, and he had another option to try. If the DIN cable doesn’t work either, it’s possibly a hardware fault on the unit, and I’ve recommended Matt at Logarhythm, a friend of mine and the best person I know in London for repairing this type of synth. Hopefully it won’t come to that, but for now I’m marking this case as unsolved.

If Logic’s clock isn’t reaching a hardware synth, sending MIDI from a keyboard through the same cable and watching it in a MIDI monitor is a quick way to check the cable is passing MIDI into the Mac.