Drummers Unite!

[Dyne]

And give us a crash course in drum programming, or resources for the drummer within us sequencers! Writing actual percussion, especially for me, is a serious challenge. I'm one of those types of people that wants to actually "hand" program the percussion in the piano roll in programs like FL Studio (my primary software is FL Studio, btw).

What I'm looking for is help from a drummer or a person who has percussion experience with programs such as FL Studio, and the like, to help us n00bs who just don't get it. Suggestions, comments, ideas, whatever you can help with, that'd be great!

Thanks!

[Tensei]

http://www.ocremix.org/forums/showthread.php?t=11413

Fair Enough?

[zircon]

My best suggestion - and how I come up with a lot of my own drum patterns - is to try and emulate the drum patterns of other people. It also helps to try to enact rhythms using your own body, with a combination of beatboxing and hand drumming/finger tapping. This can help to solidify an idea, and is more natural than trying to mouse in or sequence an idea when it isn't quite 'there' yet. Once you have something in your head and you're "performing" it aloud and it sounds good, then sequence it.

[Tensei]

My best suggestion - and how I come up with a lot of my own drum patterns - is to try and emulate the drum patterns of other people. It also helps to try to enact rhythms using your own body, with a combination of beatboxing and hand drumming/finger tapping. This can help to solidify an idea, and is more natural than trying to mouse in or sequence an idea when it isn't quite 'there' yet. Once you have something in your head and you're "performing" it aloud and it sounds good, then sequence it.

I'd like to add to this, that if you 'tap out' a rhythm, you automatically place accents on the parts where they should be (at least, that's the way it works out for me), so if you listen to yourself tap out a rhythm, you can generally tell how you should edit the velocities of the sequenced beat to make it sound natural.

[DarkCecil13]

My best suggestion - and how I come up with a lot of my own drum patterns - is to try and emulate the drum patterns of other people.

As a drummer of 7 years, I can attest to this being effective -- I've learned all I know from listening intently to other drummers. The more you're aware of the drums/percussion in other peoples' music, the more know-how you'll have in creating your own beats. Try to make a habit of paying close attention to the drum licks of artists in whatever genre you're trying to make beats for.

[Kanthos]

Ditto to zircon and DarkCecil. I'd like to add that if you're trying to sequence drums in a style that uses a lot of fills, like rock or jazz, you're probably best off to sequence a straight part first, and add fills afterwards. If you're really not inspired, you can possibly use instrumental fills over very basic drum fills (the standard bar of 8th notes on the snare comes to mind) to distract from the fact that your drum part is weaker than your instrumentals. A drummer's primary role in a band is to provide rhythm (it's the bass player, really, who should be keeping time), and I'd far rather play with a drummer who can only do basic fills, if any, but is solid at what they can do than play with someone who tries to do too much and fails.

[statas]

[Wiesty]

Aside from buying a midi drum pad, the best thing to do for humanizing a sequenced drum loop is definatley velocity. You'll know mostly which hits you would play louder and which sound good soft or loud. But also remember to add in some human error when it comes to the volume, because they all wont be the same. A bit of velocity editing goes a long way.

[DrumUltimA]

tool tip: drummers have no more than two hands and two feet at a time.

[Lunahorum]

any bands with more than 1 drummer live lol? (besides orchestral)

[Fray]

I saw Powerman 5000 open up for Primus one time... they had two drummers at the time (this was circa 1996). And I think I've seen or heard of other people doing it -- a lot of times the second kit will focus more on latin instruments.

[Lunahorum]

sweet. that is cool

[Kanthos]

It's fairly common for a lot of more modern jazz bands (from the fusion era onwards) to have one person on a drum kit and several other percussionists. Some examples are the Pat Metheny Group and Weather Report.

[The Pezman]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTHJUXUNo3E

One of the best prog rock songs in existence.

drummers have no more than two hands and two feet at a time.

QFT.

[zircon]

It's fairly common for a lot of more modern jazz bands (from the fusion era onwards) to have one person on a drum kit and several other percussionists. Some examples are the Pat Metheny Group and Weather Report.

Agreed... also a cool drum pattern does not necessarily mean a playable or realistic one. Limiting yourself to only what a real drummer could play is not really that useful unless you're very specifically doing a live performance emulation. The majority of remixes on the site aren't like that though. So I'd say don't limit yourself unless you really intend to emulate the real thing as much as possible (which is not always desirable.)

[suzumebachi]

Agreed... also a cool drum pattern does not necessarily mean a playable or realistic one. Limiting yourself to only what a real drummer could play is not really that useful unless you're very specifically doing a live performance emulation. The majority of remixes on the site aren't like that though. So I'd say don't limit yourself unless you really intend to emulate the real thing as much as possible (which is not always desirable.)

i'd stick to realistic drum patterns for rock/pop stuff. or pretty much anything with an acoustic kit. my brain hemorrhages when i hear a tom, cymbal, and hi-hat at the same time. it's not that hard to just take out the hi-hat strike (or tom or whatever).

but for electronic stuff, go fucking nuts.

as far as actually coming up with drum patterns, it's not at all difficult once you understand how accents work. like others have mentioned, play along with your track either in your head, or tapping your fingers, banging on things, or whatever. unless you're rhythmically retarded (see: xerol) you should pretty much naturally be able to feel where the accents are. then build your pattern around these accents.

the hard part is articulation and nuance and all those fun things, but that comes with time and experience.

[DrumUltimA]

Agreed... also a cool drum pattern does not necessarily mean a playable or realistic one. Limiting yourself to only what a real drummer could play is not really that useful unless you're very specifically doing a live performance emulation. The majority of remixes on the site aren't like that though. So I'd say don't limit yourself unless you really intend to emulate the real thing as much as possible (which is not always desirable.)

screw you man i'm hoping to find work after college

[SnappleMan]

I just use whatever drums come with the midi from VGmusic.

[The Legendary Zoltan]

A more basic version of Zircon's technique: If you feel like you can't seem to make a good drum beat with your hands and feet simply because it's difficult, you can try this really basic way. Just use one hand for the bass drum and the other for the snare drum and tap them on two different items so you can somewhat emulate the sound and create just a simple bass and snare beat. Since those are basically the most used drums in the set you'd be surprised at how well it works. Once you get the fingers which are tapping the bass drum parts used to this kind of thing, you'll see that you can basically make almost any beat you can think of. But of course it won't be a complete beat with just a bass and snare, so input what you tapped out into your sequencing program and then add a high hat to it. Just make the high hat play quarter notes. Then later you can add decorations like toms and cymbals and stuff.

The only thing is, your drum beats will get stuck in your head for real!