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playing midi controller into drum apps then recording/sequencing midi

dan151dan151
edited December 2018 in General App Discussion

Hey i'm trying to figure out how to manually play and 'record' midi controllers into the sequence of drum apps the ones from @luismartinez or patterning . Could you please help?

I just tried Rock drum machine 5 and really like both the sounds and the preset sequences/rhythms as well as the abilities to modify the rhythms, but would also really like the abilities to:

a) play the drum sounds with pads on the screen
b) play the drum sounds external hardware midi controller

and then also

c) 'record' the sequences that i play into the 'midi sequence' in the app, so that the pads that i play while 'recording midi into the sequence' continue to loop with the rest of the midi notes in the sequence

Patterning 2 has exactly the functions A and C in it's record page and works perfectly. The only downsides is that i don't yet know how to play sounds with an external controller in patterning 2 and also it doesnt seem that patterning 2 have a lot of preset rhythms like Luis Martinez's drum apps. Please let me know if i'm missing something here @benkamen or anyone who knows. I see alot of kits that i can add in Patterning two but not preset rhythms. I also tried midi routing in the patterning 2 record page to an external controller but wasn't able to make any sounds with it.

With Rock Drum Machine 5, i haven't been able to figure out any of A, B , or C. I tried using the live pads mode after going into the midi mode switching it to notes, and also setting the external midi controller as the midi source, but haven't succeeded with any of it yet.

Is it possible to do these things in these apps? If so, could anyone please provide some guidance or tutorial?

Or if its not possible, is there any other way to do this kind of thing in other apps? Either in other drum apps, or in different sequencing applications like modstep, cubasis, photon, GB, etc...?

Comments

  • wimwim
    edited December 2018

    @dan151 said:
    Patterning 2 has exactly the functions A and C in it's record page and works perfectly. The only downsides is that i don't yet know how to play sounds with an external controller in patterning 2 and also it doesnt seem that patterning 2 have a lot of preset rhythms like Luis Martinez's drum apps. Please let me know if i'm missing something here @benkamen or anyone who knows. I see alot of kits that i can add in Patterning two but not preset rhythms. I also tried midi routing in the patterning 2 record page to an external controller but wasn't able to make any sounds with it.

    Patterning doesn’t come with many preset rhythms. There’s not really anything you can do about that., unfortunately. You should be able to get you external controller to work with it though. Assuming you have the midi routing set up right, then the next thing you need to do is map the notes coming from your controller to the pads. Tap the midi learn button at the top, next touch the plus sign on the pad you want to map, then hit the pad on your controller. If midi is connected properly, it will bind that mapping to the pad.

    With Rock Drum Machine 5, i haven't been able to figure out any of A, B , or C. I tried using the live pads mode after going into the midi mode switching it to notes, and also setting the external midi controller as the midi source, but haven't succeeded with any of it yet.

    Did you hit the Sound Module switch at the upper-right of the main screen? This is what switches it over to responding to external midi notes from your controller. Also, you don’t want notes on for the live pads. Live pads isn’t referring to playing sounds, but to triggering patterns from the Live pads screen.

    All that said, though, you can’t record incoming midi to patterns in The Luis Martinez apps. You can play the sounds from a controller or other midi sending app, but not record the. Into patterns in the app.

    Or if its not possible, is there any other way to do this kind of thing in other apps? Either in other drum apps, or in different sequencing applications like modstep, cubasis, photon, GB, etc...?

    You can play the sounds in Patterning, the Luis Martinez apps, and most other drum machines from other apps. There are too many options to guess what is best for you. Most of us are still casting about looking for the best workflow for ourselves. Some have settled on what they like best. I float between various options.

    I recommend starting with what you have or is free or inexpensive, asking a lot of questions, and most of all recognizing up front that making music on iOS requires a lot of trial and error, figuring things out, and most of all patience.

    Since you have Xequence, you could maybe take a look there again as a start. If you don’t have the drum pads IAP, it’s worth considering.

  • dan151dan151

    Thanks so much for the detailed response @wim .

    Glad to hear that both Patterning and Luis Martinez applications allow me to play the sounds from a controller . Just tried patterning and now it works perfectly, i had overlooked the midi learn button.

    Still haven’t been able to play the sounds from a controller in Rock Drummer 5. I turned on the sound module button, then clicked the midi button in corner to open the midi page and set me controller as the MIDI in source. Also tried changing the midi channel to 8 on the top of this page because that’s the midi channel that my external midi controller sends out on (tested this with Snoize midi monitor on mac). I see and have tried touching a lot of other controls on this page like “drag”, “send notes” and notes and velocities for each drum piece, but haven’t been able to get any of them to make it receive midi from the midi controller. Haven’t been able to find a manual or tutorial for this.

    What am i missing here?

  • wimwim

    @dan151 - hang in there, you’re getting closer. B)

    If the midi channel is set correctly in Rock Drummer then the most likely culprit are the notes being sent. On the midi page there is a table relating sounds to the notes that play them. In my case, I had to change everything up one octave.

    This can be confusing because different apps identify the octave differently. For instance, according to my controller the kick pad is sending a C3. Ape Matrix midi monitor sees this as C4, and Rock DM needs to be set to C2! So the best thing is to see what notes your controller is sending, then experiment with the octaves in Rock DM until you zero in on it.

    Keep in mind that there are three note settings for each drum, depending on velocity. Set the same note in all three columns or you’ll get unexpected results. Once all mappings are correct, you can save that mapping for later use.

    Hope that helps.

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