Korg Forums Forum Index Korg Forums
A forum for Korg product users and musicians around the world.
Moderated Independently.
Owned by Irish Acts Recording Studio & hosted by KORG USA
 
 FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   MemberlistMemberlist   UsergroupsUsergroups   RegisterRegister 
 ProfileProfile   Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 

need help with using different drum tracks

 
Post new topic   Reply to topic    Korg Forums Forum Index -> Korg Kronos
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Author Message
ranger



Joined: 15 Sep 2020
Posts: 1

PostPosted: Tue Sep 15, 2020 3:17 pm    Post subject: need help with using different drum tracks Reply with quote

I need help in trying to get different drum tracks to accomplish my playing. I have a Korg Kronos and have studied Korg's Kronos tutorial as well as studying the manual. I have viewed other online posts, but still can't get it. My problem is that they do not walk you thru it step by step. They get to steps but do not explain steps in between. When I turn on drums thru Karma, I do get a beat that I can work with, but I would like to be able to choose a different beat, because that beat is always the same. I am reading the manual daily, but that only helps to a degree. Thanks for whatever help you can provide.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message AIM Address
GregC
Platinum Member


Joined: 15 May 2002
Posts: 9451
Location: Discovery Bay (San Francisco Bay Area)

PostPosted: Tue Sep 15, 2020 7:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I have success with drum kits and patterns and karma in seq mode.

there are over 400 patterns, lots to play with.

are you able to view this variety ?

in seq mode, you can switch to another pattern when creating a song
_________________
Kronos 88. MODX8
Achieve your musical dreams Smile
https://soundcloud.com/user-898236994
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
Lightbringer
Senior Member


Joined: 07 Jan 2018
Posts: 356
Location: USA

PostPosted: Tue Sep 15, 2020 7:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Great topic. The Kronos has a ton of tools for creating drums, and I have yet to see any kind of tutorial that ties them all together into "how to create a great finished work drum track." I don't have all the answers but I'll type some thoughts and hopefully others will add to it. I assume what you're saying here is that you can find a groove you like, but you want to vary it up for different sections of the song. Make the verse sound different from the chorus. Change the fills up. Add some accents. Etc. Is that right?

The Drum Track / Preset Patterns
This is the easy button. There's one on every program already set up and you can use them in combis and the sequencer. You just pick from the list of like 700 loops. There are a lot of great sounding loops. But that's what they are - loops. They repeat every 8 measures, give or take. Most suitable for jamming or a song in "sketch" mode. You probably aren't going to JUST leave this one repeating loop in place for your finished song without doing other "stuff".

Hand Crafting
Probably the most time consuming method, and might not be suitable if you don't know a lot about creating drum tracks. You can hand record (or step record) every beat of every measure.

User Patterns
You can use these to record your own short drum loops. Or you can copy a preset pattern into a user pattern and modify it. You can "put" or "copy" these into the sequencer timeline. You can also copy user patterns to other user patterns and modify them slightly (or a lot).

RPPR
This is a specific use case of user patterns, but I think it deserves to be called out separately. You can do some interesting things with RPPR including perform unusual timings and sync, embed control movements into it. You can record RPPR performances into the sequencer.

KARMA
The KARMA GE defines the overall feel of the groove - and there are TONS of drum GEs. And the performance controls (sliders, buttons) etc change what it generates. You can save up to 8 scenes of these performance control settings so you can switch between them rapidly. Conceivably, these 8 scenes could be enough to use for all the parts of the song. Much easier than hand crafting. But less control than hand crafting.

External
Some external drum machine hardware, VST, or app. You could use its built in sounds, or if it generates MIDI you could use it to drive the Kronos drum kits.

Some Combination of the Above
In my experience so far, this is probably where the sweet spot is. Combining more than one of these above methods to create a finished, polished final drum track. I'm not sure that doing so is all that intuitive though. You won't find any mention of it in the manual. Would be a great tutorial, wouldn't it?
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Peas&Carrots
Full Member


Joined: 25 Jun 2013
Posts: 158
Location: UK

PostPosted: Wed Sep 16, 2020 7:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

You could always make your own using the Karma Kronos software. Each of the 8 Karma scenes can then be allocated a completely independent user specified drum pattern (i.e. not just Karma tweaks) with the user template banks feature. This isn't an easy option though I must admit!

I do wish that the Kronos sound library designers would consider user template banks to enhance their patterns and accompaniment. You can pretty much do a whole song on Kronos to your full specification with this feature but nobody has bothered with it - such a shame...
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Lightbringer
Senior Member


Joined: 07 Jan 2018
Posts: 356
Location: USA

PostPosted: Wed Sep 16, 2020 9:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

That’s actually pretty fascinating, Peas&Carrots. If I had realized you can do this, I’d forgotten it, and I’ve certainly never done it personally. But I did a quick skim of the Karma manual and looks like you’re right!

Speaking just for myself, I wouldn’t want to use the Karma software to program an entire drum track for a specific song. There’s way too much going on in there and it would distract me from my goal. Also one of my personal goals for buying a Kronos was to further get that pesky PC out of my music making workflow.

However I’d definitely be willing to fire up the Karma software to create some kind of GE or performance that I could use over and over again on lots of different projects. So the user templates seem like they have some real potential for making a library of “my kinda beats.”

Have you ever programmed a drum track this way?
Do you know of any factory combis or programs that use scenes to switch out Karma drum templates?

Ranger - are we helping in any way with your question or just confusing things further?
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Peas&Carrots
Full Member


Joined: 25 Jun 2013
Posts: 158
Location: UK

PostPosted: Fri Sep 18, 2020 7:04 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hi Lightbringer, I've compiled drum tracks using the GE drum grid (very similar to a standard polyphonic step sequencer) and I've also imported midi files using the midi import feature. I'm not very good at staring from scratch either so the import feature is good but beware as Karma converts the mid file into its wider architecture so that needs additional fettling.

From memory some programs already use templates but you probably wouldn't notice because of all the other Karma magicery going on.

This is an overlooked feature, each program can contain 3 sets of polyphonic step sequencers of up to 7 polyphonic notes each (or combinations of). On the Kronos that equates to 8 scenes of up to 3 separate user specified patterns per scene per program! Combis can use 4 Karma modules simultaneously which is 4 x 3 x 8 patterns per combi Shocked Shocked Very Happy And that is before you consider the Karma variations if you wanted to add that... mind blown...

I've recently tried a Montage and it is in theory LESS capable in this respect BUT Yamaha make much better use of the arps. Also Montage only has 256 user patterns that can be imported at once - I quickly used 8 just faffing about. The other thing I noticed (same as Motif) is that many of the Montage patterns/arps are a subset of the main arp so frequently all 8 arps need to be activated to generate the main pattern - the 10,000+ arps is in my view a gross exaggeration of the total capability although it is technically correct. Plus Montage user arp editing is poor - I struggled recording anything that didn't require adjustment and so I would have to rely on recording to a DAW and then importing the mdi files...

Having said all of the above, I've not spent much time with Krons for several years now due to limited time. My patterns were a "work in progress" and I lost all of them after a computer reset (didn't save into Kronos after a cleanup). If there were user template pattern banks available then I would definitely consider purchasing them but nobody has bothered with it.

edit: this probably isn't helping Ranger so apologies in advance for that.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Lightbringer
Senior Member


Joined: 07 Jan 2018
Posts: 356
Location: USA

PostPosted: Sun Sep 20, 2020 12:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks for the insight on this! It looks like there are 63 (+as stored) drum pattern templates x 3 drum template banks x 4 user banks per KDF... That’s quite a bit of storage for custom patterns. And then of course there are a couple of ROM banks that are presumably filled up with who knows what kind of goodness already.

One of these days I’d like to get a much better handle on Karma. It seems to me that it’s quite possibly the most powerful performance sequencer ever created. But for the most part I’m still just “playing the presets.”
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Peas&Carrots
Full Member


Joined: 25 Jun 2013
Posts: 158
Location: UK

PostPosted: Tue Sep 22, 2020 6:56 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Indeed! and those patterns can be used in any combination you want and are interchangeable between each of the the drum template banks.

PLUS let's not forget that templates can be used for melodic patterns/arps that follow user chord input.

What we need is someone to do a version of this for template banks http://www.korgforums.com/forum/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=94919&highlight=enigma

edit: I just spotted the Greg C's posts are currently running at 8,999 ---- 9K posts deserves a celebration - Does that win a prize?! Very Happy
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Display posts from previous:   
Post new topic   Reply to topic    Korg Forums Forum Index -> Korg Kronos All times are GMT
Page 1 of 1

 
Jump to:  
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum


Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group