Using electric drums, MIDI?

Reckless Abandon

Reckless Abandon

New member
I have no knowledge of MIDI. This May not work. My brother is moving out west. He got a cheap Simmons kit. We want to be able to send stuff to each other and keep recording. I assume the drum sounds will be sub par. Some people use kits like these to trigger Sounds on their computer or iPads. How does that work? Assuming he has proper software/app does it send a file or track that could have better drums sounds added? Like he sends me his "clicks" or whatnot and I can make them sound as I please?

Thanks in advance.
 
Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

As long as the Simmons kit has a USB or midi out, he will be able to record the midi signal to a midi-capable program. Midi is a pretty simple process; midi has a set of universal voice types like piano, fake electric guitar and drums. Each kind of voice is a number. Midi also can assign volume and uh...oomph per note, which is velocity. So, in essence your bro hitting his snare at medium power could look like 46, 64. Number 46 voice, 64 out of 128 levels of velocity. Its literally a document, not a sound file.

A program will take that 46, 64 and play a sound from a wave table. From the "46" sound folder, with probably the 64 velocity/ half power sound file. That sound file will either be a synth produced sound or a recorded snare drum with a half-power drum strike. Some wave tables suck, like a computers stock one. Some wave tables are great, like the Roland sound brain.

You can literally convert midi feeds to physical movements via a robotic controller into solenoids to hit real, actual drums.

You can use midi foot pedals to control lights, sounds, effects setups...from one pedal board. Midi is powerful.

So, tldr your brother can play midi in and record, and you can open up a drum program like strike, session drummer, ezdrummer, superior drummer or the free superdrumfx to run these midi files through via a vst player and get all of what he plays. The Simmons brain may suck, but he can get a different brain or play directly into a vst client and into a drum program and get better sounds.

It'll be awesome.

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Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

He should send you a raw midi file, you should open it in your DAW usually as a midi track with a sampler plugin across it, of course with appropriate libraries of sampled sound already loaded in your plugin. Then the thing will know that instead of playing cheesy 1997 nokia ringtone polyphonics, you'll have a realistic drumkit. Of course some intermediate skill is required in order to manipulate that pile of software and at least make sure you are both using the same midi mapping and preferably same samplers and libraries.

For example, Cubase with Native Instruments Kontakt sampler + their sample libraries like Abbey Road and Studio Drummer.
 
Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

Yea, and when you get that raw midi file and drop it into your DAW, you can also open it up in a piano roll and modify it, fix timing issues, add more in...

This works with midi piano too. Midi can do bass pretty well too. The electric guitar tends to suck but monophonic bass lines can sound great thru the proper vsts. So, it can be midi drums, midi or programmed bass, recorded guitar.

Metronomes at certain bpm are super important. Everyone records on a click track at a specific beat. You can program DAW clickers to run time changes too, or you can make a click track both of you play to.

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Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

The most basic way I have heard it explained is midi is like a player piano roll. There are no notes or audio transmitted or saved only performance information. Put the roll on a upright piano it will sound one way put the roll on a grand piano it will sound different. So to answer your questions the drums will sound as realistic as the midi program you are using on your end. If you use Microsoft's built in midi engine it will sound like an old Casio keyboard. If you use something like Sonic Reality Drum Masters you will be hard pressed to tell the track was played on a Simmons kit.
 
Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

Securb said:
The most basic way I have heard it explained is midi is like a player piano roll. There are no notes or audio transmitted or saved only performance information. Put the roll on a upright piano it will sound one way put the roll on a grand piano it will sound different. So to answer your questions the drums will sound as realistic as the midi program you are using on your end. If you use Microsoft's built in midi engine it will sound like an old Casio keyboard. If you use something like Sonic Reality Drum Masters you will be hard pressed to tell the track was played on a Simmons kit.
Click to expand...

Yep. Midi is nothing but a series of numbers. I'm positive you can sit down and write a midi song in notepad like one can code a website in notepad.

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Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

Herein lies the problem. MIDI is a serial data transmission system, primarily designed to work with keyboards. This can introduce tiny timing errors that will send an advanced drummer nuts.
 
Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

Funkfingers said:
Herein lies the problem. MIDI is a serial data transmission system, primarily designed to work with keyboards. This can introduce tiny timing errors that will send an advanced drummer nuts.
Click to expand...

only if you quantize. The midi recording will be true to whatever the drummer plays. I've had first-hand experience in this as I've sent midi from my Alesis DM8 and found my ability to keep time within a single measure to be uhm...artistically creative in it's uh...reference to a metronome. Which I didn't use.

The nice thing is that it's latency is practically nil on playback. You run the midi file through a drum VST/AU/etc. plugin, and it spits out nice and pretty for the next musician to play their part to. It's a pretty sequential process, but I'm also aware of people who have used low latency midi server thingamabobs to do stuff like this:
Set a web camera up on a midi outputting piano on one side and your own midi keyboard on the other. Whatever you play will be immediately (well, as fast as the network will go) played in as much intonation as the midi data depth is set for. It's possible for OP to buy another drum brain and find a software solution that will set the drum brain as a midi output that's network accessible and his brother can play drums on his side and it will be relayed through the drum brain and into monitors.

I'm wondering if ohmstudio will do that. I should look into that...
 
Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

This is me just screwing around but I love the way the midi drums came out on this track.

 
Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

Thanks great info. This will take me some re reading. We have been playing together for about 20 years never tired anything lime this. He will know less than me about this stuff.
 
Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

Funkfingers said:
Herein lies the problem. MIDI is a serial data transmission system, primarily designed to work with keyboards. This can introduce tiny timing errors that will send an advanced drummer nuts.
Click to expand...

The Crown's last album had the drummer using an e-kit from home and sending his MIDI recordings out for samples. Worked just fine.

 
Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

dominus said:
The Crown's last album had the drummer using an e-kit from home and sending his MIDI recordings out for samples. Worked just fine.

Click to expand...

I have my doubt about if those guys were really playing in the rain.
 
Re: Using electric drums, MIDI?

jon the art guy said:
I have my doubt about if those guys were really playing in the rain.
Click to expand...

Official video, studio recording. Just posted to show what the drums sounded like. As for if they were playing in the rain, they probably were. Swedes are hardcore.
 
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