5 days ago - Cheat sheat on sequencing drum patterns for Push, Launchpad, or other MIDI devices. I made this free PDF download to help me use a step. It's around 500 Midi Drum patterns in various styles from Rock to Reggae to Bossa Nova etc, and the zip file is only just over 100k. So far quite a. Drum Samples, Drumloops, Royalty Free, Bass Drums, Snare Drum Samples, Drum Patterns, Breakbeats, Dance Loops.
Today's multi‑gigabyte drum libraries include some fantastic sounds and groove presets — but they haven't taken all of the work out of creating a great drum part. Travel back a quarter of a century, to the year in which the first copy of SOS hit the shelves: this was the golden age of the drum machine. Nobody in their right mind would tell you that those machines sounded realistic, even though, in most cases at least, that was their main goal. They had a charm of their own, of course, and they still do — but nobody would close their eyes and mistake the sound for that of a real drummer. We may not call them drum machines any more, but modern drum libraries such as FXpansion's BFD2, Toontrack's Superior Drummer 2, Steven Slate Drums, and XLN Audio's Addictive Drums have inherited a great deal from the humble drum machine. Just like many drum machines, these libraries provide you with both the sounds and the sequencer needed to create drum patterns. The difference is that this time, when you close your eyes it sounds like the real thing. Sample libraries have progressed in leaps and bounds since the days when Akais and Emus ruled the studio. There's practically no limit to the size of a sample library any more, because most software samplers stream their data directly from disk. Sample sizes are now only limited by the amount of hard disk space available — and hard disk space is cheap — so sample‑library developers can and do concentrate on recording everything, including the kitchen sink (quite literally: FXpansion's BFD Percussion expansion pack contains multisamples of a kitchen sink!). Take a snare drum as a typical example. A modern sampled snare in a drum library will comprise thousands of multi‑velocity recordings. A diligent drummer will have sat and hit the snare from very quietly to very loudly hundreds of times. There are different articulations, hits, rims, side‑sticks, drags, half edges and more, each multisampled in the same painstaking way. ![]() There may be different hitting implements, such as sticks, brushes, hot rods and mallets, too, and all of this will have been recorded using multiple mics, perhaps with three direct mics (two top and one bottom), overheads and room mics, and there may be recordings of the snare bleeding into other mics, too. 123 web messenger. The recordings are made in extremely high‑end studios using top engineers, an amazing array of microphones, a huge mixing desk and a list of outboard effects that most of us could only dream of using, never mind owning. ![]() ![]() Midi Drum Patterns GridMany manufacturers also include vast MIDI drum‑pattern libraries (often based on performances by world‑class drummers), as well as creating dedicated mixing environments, high‑class effects and processors, and a ton of presets. All of this means that it should now be easier than ever to come up with a good, solid drum sound using nothing more than software — but getting a great drum sound doesn't necessarily mean you get a great drum track. You'd be forgiven for thinking that all the work had been done for you. After all, you have your expensive drum sound, your mixing tools and a bunch of great-sounding presets — but assembling the various sounds, patterns and processors into a realistic sounding drum track, and one that works for a particular song, is where a lot of people become stuck. In this article, I'll show you how to harness the power of your drum library to create a realistic performance that sits well with your music. The first tip is a simple one: step away from the presets! There is a place for presets, but most are designed primarily to sell the product. In the world of synthesizers, this is known as 'Preset Zero Syndrome'. Midi Drum Grooves![]() Midi Drum Patterns Ezdrummer![]() Preset Zero is the first preset that comes up when you switch on a synth, and when auditioned in a shop it will be the first sound you hear, so a lot of effort is put into making it impress. In a drum library, the same syndrome manifests itself in different ways: mixer presets that fill the entire audio spectrum, too much reverb, too much delay, over compression, and in the case of the pattern library, patterns that are far too complex and showy (if the drummer played like that in a recording session, he'd be replaced rather quickly!) to work in your track. If the goal is realism, the most logical approach to creating a drum track is to follow the same steps you would in a real studio — so let's start with building a basic drum kit. Most libraries (though not all) offer a large range of kit pieces, and the collection can usually be augmented by purchasing expansion libraries. Having the choice is great, but when the time comes to create a track, you probably want to be able to get up and running quickly. Building a kit or two and saving them as your own custom presets is a great way of getting to know your sample library — and although you probably won't use exactly the same sounds in every song, it should speed up the creative process. Some drum libraries, such as FXpansion's BFD2, shown here, include useful preset browsers where you can rate the drum kit parts after auditioning them.Each library has its own way of auditioning the sounds, and some have a way of recording your favourite pieces. Midi Drum Patterns For BfdBFD2, for example, includes an iTunes‑like browser that allows you to rate kit pieces using a five‑star system, so that you can easily find your favourites later on. When auditioning kit pieces, I find it useful to mute (or pull down the faders for) any room or ambient‑mic signals, so that you hear the kit itself, rather than the sound of the room (if you like the kit sound but not the room, it's easy enough to add some ambience later on). Aside from some very basic volume balancing in the mixer — much of which will already have been done for you — there's no need for any real mixing at this stage. The goal is simply to have some natural‑sounding drum kits, to provide a starting point — just as you'd pick the right kit pieces in a studio. With your kit choice made, the next step would be to sit the drummer down and get him or her to perform while you chose and placed mics, set levels and so on. Midi Drum Patterns Included In Logic XThankfully, the messy business of miking the drum kit has been done already! In this case — unless you're handy with a set of V‑Drums — we don't have a real drummer, so this is where your 'programming' skills need to come to the fore. The best way to build a track will depend on the order in which you like to record or program the various instruments in your composition, and which need to be most prominent in any given song. For example, if you tend to record bass and guitar parts first, you're more likely to spend time creating a pattern where the kicks and snares hit in just the right spots to support the bass and any rhythm guitar, whereas if you prefer to start by laying down a drum track to provide a solid foundation on which to build the track, you have a much blanker canvas. The easiest — though not necessarily the most fruitful — way to commence is to browse your pattern library for a MIDI loop that will serve as your starting point. This is the only time I'd suggest using a preset, and it's a perfectly valid way to begin. Indeed, starting with a well‑played pattern of one or two bars can often provide inspiration and take you in directions you might not otherwise consider.
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