how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

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Musicmatters
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how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

Post by Musicmatters »

Good day to everyone. I loaded a midi drum loop into sunvox and I then replaced the midi module with the drumsynth module to get the drums to play, but unfortunately the loop doesn't sound anything like the original. It sounds horrible! So my question is how do you make drum sounds from a midi file sound exactly the same as the original?
Musicmatters
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Re: how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

Post by Musicmatters »

Anybody here?
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Keres
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Re: how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

Post by Keres »

sounds like you don't have the individual instruments of the drum mapped correctly. you can use a multisynth in place of each note... for example if you bassdrum is note C-1 in the midi file, then you would just plop down a multisynth and replace the instrument number in the pattern for all instances of note C-1. might take a while.

OR, you could do what i did to test different MIDI music output scripts which is make a pre-configured MIDI drum kit with the sampler. I can't say where i found these samples... just googled. It is generic and for testing purposes for sure. hope you see the dl link before it goes away... file is too big to post here.

https://www.sendspace.com/file/bp5z4b
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SolarLune
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Re: how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

Post by SolarLune »

A Midi drum loop is just a drum loop pattern, so it doesn't have any information regarding the "sound" of the original loop. If you want the sound, you'll want to either get a sample of the loop itself, or get the same or similar instruments to map them to the individual notes of the drum loop pattern.

As an aside, a DrumSynth is a synth drumset. You'll can tweak the parameters, but generally it's not going to sound the same as a live drum set. A midi drum loop also assumes that certain notes are mapped to certain sounds (i.e. C-3 in an individual loop might be a kick drum in the pattern), but you probably won't be able to simply drop a drum set Sampler or DrumSynth into the pattern to have it play logically. You might have to adjust the notes to make the pattern play the "drumset" properly.
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Keres
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Re: how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

Post by Keres »

lets see if my sample quality reduction works... nope. this board doesn't let me post the file since it is still over 1mb.

well here is the reduced file quality version that is under 2mb. thing is about this kit is that it starts at the SUNVOX C-1 for the bassdrum, as should it be for a standard midi kit. I noticed that some outputs of MIDI files transpose the position of the drums by an octave or so, this could also be an issue. but again, learn to use the multisynth, using it as an effect to transpose any MIDI or pattern data.

here is the link to that general midi sampler kit...

https://www.sendspace.com/file/bwhmc7
Musicmatters
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Re: how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

Post by Musicmatters »

Thanks for the helpful replies. I also noticed that sunvox doesn't recognize other midi sounds as well like guitar midi loops for example. Will the fix for that be the same as the midi drum sounds?

Also @solar lune do you have any tips on how to create quick random music for when you're stuck and can't think of any new ideas from scratch? I know sunvox has effects 20-29 that's supposed to be used for that type of thing, but it doesn't do what I'm trying to do. Or maybe I'm just not doing it right? What I'm looking to do is create random chord progressions in sunvox that gives me new song ideas and inspiration. I need something that generates new random chords into the sequencer that can give me new ideas when i need them. I prefer to be able to do it directly in sunvox. Please keep in touch guys, thanks. Jay.
Musicmatters
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Re: how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

Post by Musicmatters »

That midi issue goes way beyond a simple drum track. For example there are midi tracks that have different instruments playing together within the track, and also there's multi track midi files with various instruments. How is it possible to recreate all those sounds accurately? And find all the spots where the drums need to be etc.?

Also in my last message regarding sunvox not recognizing other midi sounds, what I think is that it actually recognizes other midi sounds like guitar etc. But the problem is it doesn't sound the same when it's played back. It sounds like all of the octaves are off and it sounds terrible.

Do all daws have this problem of inaccurately playing midi files and not recognizing certain sounds or is this just a sunvox problem?
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queries
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Re: how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

Post by queries »

Part of what you may be struggling with is misunderstanding what a MIDI file contains. It contains ZERO information about what an instrument's actual sound will be. A MIDI file is basically timestamped control messages for synthesizers. Some of those messages are in the form of "play note X on channel Y". Others might be "set the value of controller A to value B on channel Y". Or "change the program code for channel Z to 33".

It is up to the synthesizer to interpret these messages and make the actual sound.

There are standards such as "General MIDI" that suggest things like "program code XYZ should generally sound like a guitar" or "notes on channel 10 are drums". This is why you can load many MIDI files into MIDI player apps and hear music that sounds close to what the composer intended.

However, the actual sounds used by the player app are NEVER included in the MIDI data. This is why you can also take the same MIDI file, play it on an old 1992 era PC with an Adlib sound card, and hear the same music notes being played, but the instruments will sound different.

SunVox has the ability to load MIDI files which translates into patterns, but it does not give you a set of standardized sounds. You're responsible for that part in SunVox.

And that's a good thing! SunVox was not made to be a general MIDI player. It's a modular synthesizer, with a tracker-oriented sequencer that happens to be able to import MIDI data. How you make those notes sound is up to you and the synth.
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SolarLune
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Re: how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

Post by SolarLune »

Musicmatters wrote: Sun Feb 24, 2019 10:00 pm Thanks for the helpful replies. I also noticed that sunvox doesn't recognize other midi sounds as well like guitar midi loops for example. Will the fix for that be the same as the midi drum sounds?

Also @solar lune do you have any tips on how to create quick random music for when you're stuck and can't think of any new ideas from scratch? I know sunvox has effects 20-29 that's supposed to be used for that type of thing, but it doesn't do what I'm trying to do. Or maybe I'm just not doing it right? What I'm looking to do is create random chord progressions in sunvox that gives me new song ideas and inspiration. I need something that generates new random chords into the sequencer that can give me new ideas when i need them. I prefer to be able to do it directly in sunvox. Please keep in touch guys, thanks. Jay.
Yo! There's no such functionality in SunVox - there's only the ability to randomly play specified notes, not play random chords.

If you can't think of any ideas, try just making songs in the style of other songs that you like, or selecting a style that you rarely do and making a song in that style.
Musicmatters
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Re: how to get a midi drum loop to sound like the original

Post by Musicmatters »

Ok thanks for your reply. Actually as I learn more about the note probability effect I find it very interesting and useful. It actually gives me that random song generator feel I was looking for. But the problem im having is that I can't get the effect to work when I'm using precorded midi and wav loops. Is it possible?

And @queries thanks for the midi explanation, you're right it is better that sunvox allows us to add our own inatruments for midi sounds. :)
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