I have a few of the Groove Monkey sets here, also quite a few of the EZX expansions. But you can do quite a bit with just the basic set that ships with EZDrummer, as David mentioned it is very easy to tweak the existing patterns to add or remove hits.
I've used it exclusively for a year or so. I really like being able to split the drums out so that each piece of the kit is on a separate track in my DAW, makes it very easy to have separate processing for each piece.
I've used it exclusively for a year or so. I really like being able to split the drums out so that each piece of the kit is on a separate track in my DAW, makes it very easy to have separate processing for each piece.
Dave, having each drum on a separate track is how I like to work also. Sometimes I will merge the toms, the hi-hats and the other cymbals so the same effect will be equal to those tracks. YMMV
The bumper sticker said "I'm a veterinarian, therefore I can drive like an animal". Suddenly I realized how many proctologists are on the road.
64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
Keep in mind I'm working backwards - I'm looking for the drum to inspire musical ideas, not fit a drum track to a song. So it's probably a bad use case for JamStix.
Keep in mind I'm working backwards - I'm looking for the drum to inspire musical ideas, not fit a drum track to a song. So it's probably a bad use case for JamStix.
You get a lot of drum kits and you can make your own kits.
On the plus side the all of the kits sound great. You also get a lot of different sounds like ride bells, hitting a cymbal at its edge, center and bell, etc. GrooveMonkee's MIDI loops will work with no problems.
On the down side the kits are not GM, so you will have to convert BiaB drums to the SSD-5 format. What I do is to put each BiaB drum on a separate track with GM drum mapping, place SSD-5 on that track, and find the same drum/cymbal. It doesn't take that long and the resulting drums sounds are well worth the effort IMHO. YMMV
HI Mario, Do you happen to know of any good instructions for incorporating SSD 5 for use with BIAB?> Also, is SSD better to use than Trigger 2 from Steven Slate? T2 is a drum replacement and SSD is more a drum creation tool if I am understanding correctly. Thanks in advance for any help you can provide - Rich
Re midi drum traks. Assuming your on pc check out lots of neat ways of creating midi (and audio drum ) traks using realband that comes free with biab…you can do things like… ..generate drum traks ..generate drum fills ..create the illusion of 2 drummers or more playing together. ..lots of further crazy things to be discovered by experimenting.
In PARTICULAR go to RB BARS VIEW and discover ease of moveing/copying/pasting bits of or whole drum midi traks around...you can use vst/vsti plug ins etc etc.
Much as i love reaps and have been a user/advocate from nearly day 1 of the product…there are some neat features to discover in building traks in realband. I could go on for pages…but gotta keep this short…cant write an essay..lol...just read rb manual etc etc...lots of midi info. plus experiment with bar markers to create drum fills.
Years ago i used to enjoy showing friends in big studios, and watching their jaws drop , when i demoed how to build drum tracks in realband , and before that powertraks.
I suspect some new pg users might not realise the neat things one can do in realband. I encourage you to experiment in realband building drum tracks…particular genning and use of bars view... and various editing features.
Hth. om
Last edited by justanoldmuso; 05/06/2201:57 PM.
my songs....mixed for good earbuds...(fyi..my vocs on all songs..) https://soundcloud.com/alfsongs (90 songs created useing bb/rb) (lots of tips of mine in pg tips forum.)
HI Mario, Do you happen to know of any good instructions for incorporating SSD 5 for use with BIAB?> Also, is SSD better to use than Trigger 2 from Steven Slate? T2 is a drum replacement and SSD is more a drum creation tool if I am understanding correctly. Thanks in advance for any help you can provide - Rich
SSD5 drums do have a mapping feature that is very easy to use; I just learned how to do it in order to answer your question!
Open SSD5 and click on map; note a drum kit does not need to be open. Google/Bing GM drum maps to get the GM note for a drum, lets say B0 for a kick drum. In SSD maps right click on B0 and select the kick drum you want. Do this for all of the GM drums then save the preset. When you load SSD5 into BiaB you would also load the GM drum map into SSD5, that is unless you name the GM drum map as the default map. Then it would load automatically.
A word of caution; GM drums contain also percussion instruments. Drum kits do not. You would only get the drums and cymbals of a given kit. I use the Brio Percussion Ensemble https://www.indiginus.com/brio-percussion-ensemble but there are others, some free, available.
I have no experience with either Trigger or using SSD5 drums in BiaB. I do all of my drum work in my DAW Studio One Pro because I can add MIDI drum loops if needed and, more importantly, separate each drum on individual tracks. That way I can process each drum separately.
I hope this helps.
{edit} I see om posted just prior to me. If you have a PC your have RealBand. You should be able to do in RealBand what I do in Studio One Pro 5. A DAW does offer a lot of options not available in BiaB. I do not use RealBand so others would have to help you.
Last edited by MarioD; 05/06/2202:11 PM.
The bumper sticker said "I'm a veterinarian, therefore I can drive like an animal". Suddenly I realized how many proctologists are on the road.
64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
Jamstix..... back in my Cakewalk forum days I was almost an expert in the use and programming of JS. For whatever it's worth.....
I had started programming drums by mouse.... one hit at a time.... build a measure..... copy and paste.... build the verse, build the chorus..... but it was not what a decent drummer would play. Then I found JS. It created the measures for you and allowed a semblance of control and the ability to edit and change the kits as well as the drummer and style. I used it for quite a time but again.... still not like a real drummer would play. One of my drummer buddies called it to my attention. Dude, that's not real.
Then I found BB and RT's and now.... well, lets just say, I haven't loaded JS in forever.
If I was going to want to use a specific kit, or synth, I would use BB to create the drums in midi or convert it to midi and use that to drive a synth running a sampled kit. That's how I'd do it if I wanted to go that route. I'm generally perfectly fine using the Real Tracks drums and adding EQ and Compression to pull a bit more out of the track.
You can find my music at: www.herbhartley.com Add nothing that adds nothing to the music. You can make excuses or you can make progress but not both.
The magic you are looking for is in the work you are avoiding.
This may be repetitive of some stuff before, but I will share what I enjoy doing.
One of my favorite tips is that for most BIAB Real drums you can save the drums to a midi (as I guess others have stated). If you see a drum notation, you can solo that drum track and do a save as midi from BIAB.
I have had a lot of fun importing midi files this way into Session Drummer 3, an oldie but goodie still free in Cakewalk I believe.
Anyway, you can select numerous drums sets, such as a Steven Slate, and create your own stems, by going to the mixing board and silencing everything you don't want.
You can mix these stems with Real Band drums to get lots of variety, and you can record crashes, and rolls and all kinds of fills with your mouse to spice up the real drums tastefully.
I have had much fun and much success doing this and have not spent an extra dime.
P.S. The Real Band screenshot shows one track of Real Drums, and one track of something I generated in Session Drummer that can be edited, mixed, and sampled to provide an infinite variety of percussive extras. That second track was created by simply inserting the midi I created into the Session drummer track.
P.S.S. If you have the input to Session drummer set to your keyboard, you can play that Session Drummer kit with your fingers on the keyboard and CAPTURE your own midi that can then be sampled through any kit you like, including the one you were listening to when you created it. (A sample kit is on the last screenshot.)
This will work for all the virtual kits, but I like and use Session drummer. The sounds you can produce and sample like this are limitless, and it is also a whole lot of fun.
David Snyder Songwriter/Renaissance Man Studio + Fingers
As mentioned by several, I have learned a lot by just reviewing the midi of drum tracks I like whether they started as real drums or as midi. There are plenty of source files out there that can give you a lot to learn from. Once you see it laid out it starts to make more sense.
My wife asked if I had seen the dog bowl. I told her I didn't even know he could.
I guess Cakewalk magically integrated that from my Sonar folders then.
Lucky I guess.
Yes, those of us lucky enough (or unlucky?) to have bought Sonar Platinum before Gibson destroyed the company get to keep using all the goodies we had when they (Cakewalk) went bust. As a matter of fact you can still use the download manager, Cakewalk Command Center, if you ever lose anything and need to get it again. At least last I checked you could.
My wife asked if I had seen the dog bowl. I told her I didn't even know he could.
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