Hi-hat controller and MIDI question

Hello.
I use the MPC Studio for finger drumming, controlling the Superior Drummer drum sampler software.
I want to add a hi-hat controller now.

There is a MIDI in on the MPC Studio of course. I want to buy the Yamaha HH65 controller for use with my MPC. http://www.thomann.de/gb/yamaha_hh60.htm

My question is this: How can I connect the HH65 to the MPC? The hi-hat controller comes with a normal 6.3mm stereo plug cable which I can not plug into the MPC. Would it be possible to use a 3.5mm to 6.3mm plug adapter to send MIDI CC4 to the MPC?

I mean this kind of adapter:


Or do I use the breakout cable and then try to find some kind of cable to plug into the HH65 that has TRS in one end and MIDI 5-pin in the other end? I don't know if any such cables exist...

I feel hopelessly lost in the MIDI jungle and would appreciate some help! Thanks in advance!

kiahnlliya wrote:How can I connect the HH65 to the MPC?

You can't.

Those pedals do not send out MIDI messages.

You connect those pedals to hi-hat drum trigger inputs on some sort of drum module, and the drum module responds to the drum trigger input coming from the pedal, to operate the sounds within the drum module, and/or send MIDI messages out of the drum module into a MIDI device such as the MPC Studio.

Lampdog wrote:Midi is not audio. That is an audio cable.

Do you have a midi interface? Audio interface with midi ports?

The MPC Studio has a built-in MIDI interface, with 3.5mm TRS sockets on the rear of the unit for MIDI I/O.

You use 3.5mm TRS to 5-pin DIN adapter cables to connect those sockets to normal MIDI cables.

The OP is confused, thinking that you can just plug the 6.5mm output of the pedal into the 3.5mm MIDI input socket on the MPC Studio, using a 6.5mm to 3.5mm adapter, but that is not going to work, as the pedal does not output a MIDI signal.

These sorts of controllers are meant for use with Yamaha e-drum setups, where you have a 'brain' module which is a computer that turns impulses from drum pads and signals from pedals like this from an electrical/audio impulse/output to trigger a drum, and they also output the midi.

There are VSTs that exist that can convert impulses like this into a midi note, eg. a software version of the 'brains' that e-drums use. I can't find it right now but I am sure I've seen a vst that was designed to let you integrate peripherals like drum pads using any audio interface. Whether the MPC software could work with a vst like that is another question as it's handling of midi vst routing was basically nonexistant last time I looked into it (there doesn't seem to be any way to place, for example, a midi arpeggiator in front of a synth on a track as you could on a full DAW).

I'd also like to integrate hi-hat pedals and a snare pad for rolls/flams into my set-up, but I think I'm just going to wait until I have the cash to cop an alesis control pad: http://www.alesis.com/controlpad which you could easily map to the mpc software, and can be expanded with a foot pedal controller. That'd be my recommendation.

*I think the control pad might be outdated now, alesis confuse me with their names for all these perc/sample/control pad things. there are similar things out there anyway

SimonInAustralia wrote:The OP is confused, thinking that you can just plug the 6.5mm output of the pedal into the 3.5mm MIDI input socket on the MPC Studio, using a 6.5mm to 3.5mm adapter, but that is not going to work, as the pedal does not output a MIDI signal.

Well he is using the MPC Studio for finger drumming, controlling the Superior Drummer drum sampler software.

If not using the MPC Software then there are lots of better controllers with more control that he use.

Hey guys, thanks for all the replies

So the hi-hat pedals don't actually send out a midi message? What do they send out then?

When I had a Korg PadKontrol years ago, I connected an electronic bass drum trigger right into the "footpedal" input on the controller and it worked fine. But I'd like to do the same with a hi-hat as I feel having a bass drum pedal connected isn't really "finger drumming" anymore.

The world's best finger drummer in my opinion is David Haynes, and he is nowadays using an MPC Studio, and he also uses the HH65 hi-hat pedal with the MPC. He's using a PadKontrol in this video but I know for a fact he does the same with the MPC Studio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIPEphxP2Ic

I wonder how David has connected it. I'm not sure whether he can actually control MIDI CC4 with it, adjusting the level of open/closed sound on the pad assigned to the open hi-hat, but I know he at least uses the pedal to play closed hi-hat "chicks" with the foot and also open pedal "splash" sounds. This is what I am looking to do.

I do have an audio interface with MIDI in, but that's just the same 5-pin connector as the MPC breakout cable. So there's no difference in me using my audio interface as compared to me using the Akai breakout cable.

So if I want to do what David does, I need to find some kind of MIDI interface to plug the 6.3mm plug from the pedal into and then connect that to my Macbook?

Is there any adapter that transforms a 6.3mm plug into a 5-pin MIDI connector? Are you SURE the pedals aren't sending MIDI signals? I would think the MPC would be able to interpret the signal sent from the pedal in a similar way that an electronic drum brain can...

I can't say this has made me any wiser but I appreciate all the replies. If I can't find a way to do this soon I might contact David and offer to pay for him to explain his setup to me. I know people ask on his Youtube channel but he always replies with "I give full disclosure to my students" or something similar. I am starting to get desperate enough to pay for this info though. God, it's so confusing…

kiahnlliya wrote:So the hi-hat pedals don't actually send out a midi message?

No, they don't.

kiahnlliya wrote:What do they send out then?

Not sure, maybe they just close the connection between the tip and the sleeve on the plug, not sure how the drum brain interprets the 3 positions (open/half closed/closed), whether it is closing the tip to sleeve for one position, and the ring to sleeve for another position, or something like that.

But it is not MIDI.

kiahnlliya wrote:When I had a Korg PadKontrol years ago, I connected an electronic bass drum trigger right into the "footpedal" input on the controller and it worked fine. But I'd like to do the same with a hi-hat as I feel having a bass drum pedal connected isn't really "finger drumming" anymore.

The PadKontrol has a pedal input, which can be assigned to MIDI notes or MIDI CC messages.

The MPC Studio is not a PadKontrol, it doesn't have the same input.

kiahnlliya wrote:The world's best finger drummer in my opinion is David Haynes, and he is nowadays using an MPC Studio, and he also uses the HH65 hi-hat pedal with the MPC. He's using a PadKontrol in this video but I know for a fact he does the same with the MPC Studio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIPEphxP2Ic

That video is of a PadKontrol, which has a pedal input, which can be assigned to MIDI notes or MIDI CC messages..

If you know for a fact that he does the same with an MPC Studio, where is the video of him doing it with a HH-65?

kiahnlliya wrote:I wonder how David has connected it. I'm not sure whether he can actually control MIDI CC4 with it, adjusting the level of open/closed sound on the pad assigned to the open hi-hat, but I know he at least uses the pedal to play closed hi-hat "chicks" with the foot and also open pedal "splash" sounds. This is what I am looking to do.

He has connected it to a PadKontrol, at least in that video.

kiahnlliya wrote:I do have an audio interface with MIDI in, but that's just the same 5-pin connector as the MPC breakout cable. So there's no difference in me using my audio interface as compared to me using the Akai breakout cable.

You can not connect the HH-65 to the MIDI input on your audio interface, or the MIDI input on your MPC Studio.

kiahnlliya wrote:So if I want to do what David does, I need to find some kind of MIDI interface to plug the 6.3mm plug from the pedal into and then connect that to my Macbook?'

You need to use a PadKontrol, to use it the way he does in that video, or show us how he is using it in other videos, where he is using it with an MPC Studio.

Maybe he is using a drum brain, or some sort of software like fdodds mentioned, to convert the drum trigger signal fro the HH-65 into a MIDI signal, if he really is using it with the MPC Studio.

kiahnlliya wrote:Is there any adapter that transforms a 6.3mm plug into a 5-pin MIDI connector? Are you SURE the pedals aren't sending MIDI signals?

No, Yes.

A simple electrical adapter is not going to work, it would have to operate like a drum brain, reading the pedal position and sending out a MIDI message in response to that pedal input.

kiahnlliya wrote:I would think the MPC would be able to interpret the signal sent from the pedal in a similar way that an electronic drum brain can...

You would think wrong, it doesn't have an input to do that.

kiahnlliya wrote:If I can't find a way to do this soon I might contact David and offer to pay for him to explain his setup to me. I know people ask on his Youtube channel but he always replies with "I give full disclosure to my students" or something similar. I am starting to get desperate enough to pay for this info though.

**** paying for someone to give you simple info like that, I wouldn't do it, but what you do is up to you.

In this video, in the studio part, he is using a couple of drum pedals, but you can see that they are not plugged into the MPC Studio.

He is not using the pedals when he is outdoors, with just the MPC Studio and his laptop.

In the studio part of the video, the pedals are plugged into some sort of rack mount drum module, so that the drum module is either sending a MIDI message into MPC Software, to trigger those pedal sounds, or the sound that the pedals are controlling are coming out of the drum module, and not out of MPC Software.

SimonInAustralia wrote:In this video, in the studio part, he is using a couple of drum pedals, but you can see that they are not plugged into the MPC Studio.

Thanks a lot, you cleared things up for me with your posts (not an easy thing to do!)

You are right, he does seem to use some kind of rack mount drum module to plug into. I need to dig around more and see what hardware is available out there that will do something like this.

Now I know I really can't just "plug and play" with the hi-hat pedal. Thanks again so much, I understand a bit better now...