velocity

I'm interested to know the use of velocity in programming my drums. How does it improve your drums and what are different ways of using it.

My mate said he always changes the velocity of hits when programing beats. he uses software though. When I knock my beats out on the pads does having full level switched off make every hit a different velocity?

mr bleeps wrote:I'm interested to know the use of velocity in programming my drums. How does it improve your drums and what are different ways of using it.

My mate said he always changes the velocity of hits when programing beats. he uses software though. When I knock my beats out on the pads does having full level switched off make every hit a different velocity?

The pads are velocity sensitive. Try it. Turn off FULL LEVEL and hit the pad with different strengths, it will be louder or softer depending on how hard you smash it......... Velocity adds character, and is sometimes necessary for certain samples/drums.....

Also, try the velocity param using the 16 levels feature. Great way to emulate an echo....... good for programming snare rolls, hihat rolls, etc.....

velocity? the third key to groove (after note placement and gate/decay times) not only used to emulate proper grroves with ghost notes, grace notes, flams etc but also can be utilised to make your drums sound change at different volumes- trying setting filter to respond to velocity, pitch, or get it to change samples.....velocity is your friend

greg

what are grace notes?

my understanding was that grace notes are often unintentional but still add something overall...ghost notes are subtle intended notes, grace notes are subtle unintended notes...i guess in actual melodic performance grace notes mean something slightly different- i just said grace notes cos i couldn't think of another name

greg

I guess everytime its a different case but do you think its better to have full level off? The tune I'm working on now, all the kick, snare, hats have full level on. Bad move?

i always use velocity when doing my drum and sublim tracks. this makes for a more natural sound. i hardly never use the full level.

To really understand how important velocity is you need to listen to alot of acoustic drums, not just drum programming. Listen to jazz and funk. I mean really sit there and listen. Then try to emulate what the drummers are doing with how hard they hit each piece in their kit. When you get good enough at actually playing the MPC pads like a drummer, you'll realize the importance of velocity.

For example: I like to hit the notes that fall on the 1 2 3 4 of the beat alot harder than the notes that fall on the off beats. A nice exercise to try is to program the bass drum on the 1 and 3, and the snare on the 2 and 4 of the beat at full level. Then as the beat is playing, use the pads (not at full level) to fill in notes that fall slightly before the 1 2 3 4. You'll notice how nicely those extra notes will transform the beat from sounding stagnant and boring to giving it some life. After you finish programming the bass and snare, try the same thing with the hi hats. Hi hats really benefit from velocity.

The funny thing is, I learned all this from real drummers and tried the same techniques on the MPC. You have to realize that the MPC is not just a sampler, it really is a full percussion instrument.

My advice would be, and this is a little off topic but I feel like it applies to a lot of the questions asked on this board, is to not be scared of your MPC. If you want to know what turning the full volume button does, do it. Don't come to the message board and ask everybody's opinion before you try anything. The only way you're going to learn how to use your MPC in your own way is to get in there and spend time on it. It's almost impossible to really screw anything up permenately, so just mess around and make some mistakes, it's amazing what you'll stumble upon.

I understand asking questions and asking how other people do things, but try it out yourself first and see if you can come up with your own answer.

I've learned a lot from reading the tutorials on this board, but I've learned more by experimenting and trial and error.

sorry for the rant

Thanks for all the tips n advice everyone.

Just one more thing then. How do I change the velocity of my notes in step edit if they've been recorded using full level? I try going into step edit but can't seem to bring up the data for each hit.

firstly stay away from full level- if you think about it in terms of dyanmics if you start your tune at full level where can it go? i use 100 as my 'full level' so i can go that little bit louder should the tune need it....

anyhoo go into step edit and the velocity value will be the last figure on the event line (on the right side) from there you can change the velocity of the hit with the dial.....step edit is your friend....

greg