Deskins

I've had my XW-P1 for a little while, but haven't really made as much use of the sequencing as I would like, so I decided to start playing around a bit. I was trying to create a bass phrase that begins with a rest. While I realize that I could just play it in real time by hitting the key when I want the first note to sound, I was trying to sync it to other MIDI devices in a loop. Anyone know how to accomplish this? I feel like it should be obvious, but I can't figure it out.

I don't know if this in on topic or not, but I've searched the forums and haven't had any luck. I understand the basic way to change voices in Step Sequencer mode using the mixer. I'm having a weird glitch, however, when I try to change the voice on the chord part. For some reason, I make the change and it actually changes the voice of the last part that I edited. For example, if I enter a bass drum part in Drum 1 and then go to the Chord part, then change the voice to piano, it will change my Drum 1 part to a piano voice -- but NOT my Chord part. I've been playing with it for a couple of hours now and I'm not sure what's going on with it. Any help would be appreciated!