Some questions

[Monkey Allen]

Hey,

1. I watched some guy on youtube once (can't find the video again)...but he dropped a well known song into his sequencer (Sonar I think) and just started builing a midi version bit by bit. He began with the drums and then the bass...etc

I was interested in his drum work because he basically got it hit perfect and I want to do something similar. Anyway...my friend wants to do a cover of Don't Let Me Down by The Beatles. He can sing it quite well. And anyway....I don't want to just do some 4/4 generic ezdrummer loop...I wanna try to build it hit by hit...toms, snare....all that. So my question is....do you think it can be done? (please note that OF COURSE I don't expect to get all the heart into it I can...just something that's an ok representation of the song on drums....somewhere between generic loop and the song itself.

If you had to do this....how would you go about doing this drum track? I have Sonar 6 and ezdrummer as my tools...plus an Edirol Midi Keyboard.

2. In an unrelated topic...can anyone tell me what these chords are:

a)

--4--
--2--
--2--
--2--
--x--
--x--

b)

--0--
--0--
--2--
--4--
--4--
--0--

c)

--0--
--0--
--4--
--6--
--6--
--0--


Ok, thanks

 

[gecko zzed]

I don't want to just do some 4/4 generic ezdrummer loop...I wanna try to build it hit by hit...toms, snare....all that. So my question is....do you think it can be done? (please note that OF COURSE I don't expect to get all the heart into it I can...just something that's an ok representation of the song on drums....somewhere between generic loop and the song itself.

If you had to do this....how would you go about doing this drum track? I have Sonar 6 and ezdrummer as my tools...plus an Edirol Midi Keyboard.

I hope I have understood your first question correctly. If I get it straight, you want to record a cover of "Don't Let Me Down", which you would do by recording a basic backing (maybe guitar and vocal, or perhaps piano and vocal), then build up a backing to suit, with your principle interest being in a drum track for the song that is more than a generic loop. Is that right? I hope so, because that's the basis on which I'll provde the following thoughts.

The simplest, and most unsatisfying, way of creating a midi drum track is to use a midi editor to make a single bar, adding a kick to beats 1 and 3, a snare on beats 2 and 4, and a high hat on all four, then set this to loop through the whole song. (I'll call this Loop 1 for now). This, of course, is not what you want to do.

The two most common ways of creating drum tracks that I use are:

1 Create a basic loop (such as Loop 1) to go through the whole song. Then copy this loop and modify it when and where the music dictates. For example, a verse might go for eight bars. So I might use Loop 1 for the first seven bars. For bar eight, I might copy Loop 1, edit it to remove everything except the kick and high hat on the first beat, and put this edited loop (which I'll call Loop 2) on bar 8. This then gives a steady beat throughout the verse, with a tacit at the end of the verse. Using this basic process you can progressively make the drum track more complicated (changing cymbals, adding fills, and so on).

This is a fairly slow and painstaking method of doing it, but you can get credible results from it.

2 Real time drumming. At times, the first method is too slow and too unvarying for my liking, so I go for real time drumming, using the keyboard as a drum kit. However, my two-finger drumming skills are not that great so I do it in two passes. First time through I do the 'feet'. I play the song from start to finish, and record the midi for kick and high hat that I play with fingers. Second time I do the same, this time recording the 'hands' (snare, cymbals and toms). I then merge these two tracks to get the complete kit. MY timing is rarely good enough to let this track loose, so I quantize it to get it rhythmically well-behaved. I can also get into and edit the resulting midi track to fix mis-hits and other errors (there are usually a lot).

In more recent years we have seen the increasing use of looping pedals and techniques, which are awesome to watch in live performances. They are generally advanced samplers, making use of real audio rather than midi. Unfortunately, it is an technological area that I am not familiar with, so I hope someone else can help.

 

[Monkey Allen]

Thanks for those ideas....I think that's (either way) is roughly what I want to do...but also I want to really try and mimic the drums for the original song. The original is in 4/4 and 5/4. The fills and the drumming on the song are obviously not something that ezdrummer can do.

It would be painstaking to try to midi mimic the original song.

My first step would be to get the drums plotted and then play along to it. I guess I could try for some basic 4/4 and basic 5/4...then go in after the fact and start to get the fills plotted just like in the song.

The only way I think I could do it is if I had the song imported into Sonar and then painstakingly lpot each hit...copying sections where I can. I think my approach wuold be to use the cursor to draw in the hits/ notes.

It's a big job and I don't think I can do it.

 

[up-fiddler]

....
2. In an unrelated topic...can anyone tell me what these chords are:

a)

--4--
--2--
--2--
--2--
--x--
--x--

b)

--0--
--0--
--2--
--4--
--4--
--0--

c)

--0--
--0--
--4--
--6--
--6--
--0--


Ok, thanks

Depending on the key and how many notes are played.... but played together in the same song they are most likely to be:

a. A maj7
b. D maj7 with E/bass and wierdness on the top
c. E maj7

 

[gecko zzed]

Thanks for those ideas....I think that's (either way) is roughly what I want to do...but also I want to really try and mimic the drums for the original song. The original is in 4/4 and 5/4. The fills and the drumming on the song are obviously not something that ezdrummer can do.

It would be painstaking to try to midi mimic the original song.

My first step would be to get the drums plotted and then play along to it. I guess I could try for some basic 4/4 and basic 5/4...then go in after the fact and start to get the fills plotted just like in the song.

The only way I think I could do it is if I had the song imported into Sonar and then painstakingly lpot each hit...copying sections where I can. I think my approach wuold be to use the cursor to draw in the hits/ notes.

It's a big job and I don't think I can do it.

It is a big job to start from scratch, I agree.

There is another way.

This site has a whole mess of beatles midi files, including 'Don't let me down':

http://www.beatles.ws/songa-e.htm.

RIght click on the icon for 'Don't let me down', and save the midi file.

Import this midi file into your program. Delete all the non-drum tracks, and use the drum track as the framework for your cover. I don't think it is a particualry good version, but I think there is enough there to provide the structure. YOu can then cut and paste bits where you want them.

 

[Monkey Allen]

Thanks for that up fiddler...and thanks gecko...I spose that's a start. I never would have found that site. I could use that as a guide and tweak, as you suggest.