A program that lets you create a rhythm by tapping your keyboard?

A

AnomalyFour

New member
Im looking for a way to create complex drum beats digitally without too much effort. I hear awesome beats in my head, but by the time I can transpose them to notation they are gone.

I dont really know how to explain that any better. Im new at producing and dont know the terminology yet. "Virtual keyboard" maybe, but with drums.

Are there any programs out there that let me create a rhythm by just tapping on the keyboard? And then maybe let me edit those beats into different types of sounds/instruments? Maybe even produce ALL instrument tracks like this?


(also, I know about Cubase, but that keyboard is difficult for me because Im not sure you can re-assign the notes after you record them, making it just like a regular keyboard. My problem with that is the drum beats i have in mind are way too fast for me to create with only one key per sound (where as with a real drumset you get two sticks, and can create beats that are twice as quick and intricate. So I'd need a virtual keyboard that lets me reassign the types of sounds after Ive created the base rhythm/beat. Again I hope that makes sense lol)

Thanks
 
Midi is the way to go for this. I use a small midi keyboard (can be found for cheap) for tapping out the drum hits, then I can move them around and even auto-align them with the tempo/beat (called 'quantizing') using the digital recording software. There's a learning curve to doing this but plenty of info to be found once you decide what software packages you want to use.
 
You should get a MIDI drum pad or a keyboard that has little velocity sensitive finger pads on it. You could also try playing it on the keyboard keys, but that can be difficult compared to drum pads. If you go for the keyboard route, try to avoid a weighted keyboard as it won't be responsive enough for doing drum parts.
 
Do you have Cubase or have you just used it? If you've got it then it should have come with a demo of one of Steinberg's synth packages that should have enough of a rudimentary drum patch to get started with. If you're looking for a piece of equipment for actually tapping it in, MrUserNameIV hit the nail on the head with the velocity-sensitive pads over keys. I would recommend THIS piece of gear for affordable pads. Then, if you want to get a little better drum sound, play around with demos of EZdrummer, superior drummer, BFD or any other libraries of sampled drum sounds until you figure out which is best to your ears.
 
You have some excellent suggestions here. On top of that, consider "singing them" to a little hand held recorder of some sort so that you never forget them. Then, you have all the time in the world to work them with a midi editor. I do this with vocal and guitar ideas all the time (yes, I have been known to sing a guitar melody to my phone - quite a few have turned up in finished songs).
 
Yep, I'm for the using a drum pad with sticks as the better option...they don't have to cost a lot. I've used many methods for getting drum parts down, and by far the best option is a full eKit....but a table top multi-pad thingy, or even a finger drum type midi module unit are the next best options.

I've used my keyboard/synth to get quick parts down, or use a drum VSTi's premade midi beats (EZDrummer etc). Two sticks with trigger pads give a far better drum performance than tapping it out on a keyboard...though as said above, ANY keyboard with midi can be used to get quick beats into a DAW.

I used to play/record my eKit directly into the DAW as audio, but especially since I started using drum VSTi's & learned the use of midi, I only record as midi now, as VSTi's samples are a lot better...even though my drum trigger modules sounds decent. I can edit my midi tracks in the midi editor until the cows come home..no matter how or what they were created on.
 
Ableton (not cheap) has convert analog to MIDI drums and convert to MIDI melody. So technically, you could thump anything into a recorder or do it by voice and it would covert to drums and melody.

How well does it work? I have only used it a few times in experiments, like taking a guitar riff and see what comes out of it, so it does pretty good. Just would depend on your expectations. Good starting point sometimes.
 
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