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My percussion is garbage

Fenicks

Bedroom Producer
Percussion and I are not well acquainted. I'm a singer and have always been more about melody and harmony than anything else. I'm trying to produce my own songs and want to include drums and other percussion but every attempt I make is embarrassingly bad. I've had to admit to myself: I have no idea what I'm doing when it comes to making a beat. To remedy this I've been listening to songs and watching live videos with percussion I love and they're not always that complex, but I find it hard to replicate for some reason. Seeing the musicians playing the instruments really helps. I tend to like repetitive ritualistic kind of percussion. Some examples:





Are there any videos or tutorials or exercises on drumming and percussion y'all can recommend me to help a newbie find her rhythm? Thank you.

I'm using drums and percussion from Dark Era and Moonkits.
 
My advice would be: buy a Djembe and have a look at some YT tutorials.
This will help to get some basics straight in a much shorter time as if you're only programming them, it also helps you getting a real physical connection to the kinetic part of how rhythms work.

(also, since you can't buy & practice every percussive instrument: watching videos that are practical drum tutorials give you more insight than most of the midi-programming tutorials)

The interesting thing with drums is that patterns that seem to be extremely simple (and indeed are quite simple when played slowly) can be very efficient and groovy.
Like some in this (more or less random) examples:



 
My answer to this is the same as just about any music question about "how to get better at x". listen to music you like and learn how it happens. Copy it in as much detail as possible to get into the fine little things that make a good groove. The more you do it the better you get at listening and the listening will transfer into your playing and writing as you have a more diverse palette to work from.
 
If you are writing songs, there are quite a few "pre-made" drum tracks that you can use. They come with full songs all laid out and various sections -- intro, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus2, ending.

There are lots of song-structured libraries like this for drum kits but there are plenty for other kinds of percussion (less song-based).

Is that what you are talking about?

It may sound canned and uncreative but actually many of these libraries sound great and you can get back to your vocals and chord changes quicker.

Steven Slate Drums, EZ Drummer -- there are quite a few. Not to mention third party midi sets that can be played back on these various drum engines.
 
Percussion and I are not well acquainted. I'm a singer and have always been more about melody and harmony than anything else. I'm trying to produce my own songs and want to include drums and other percussion but every attempt I make is embarrassingly bad. I've had to admit to myself: I have no idea what I'm doing when it comes to making a beat. To remedy this I've been listening to songs and watching live videos with percussion I love and they're not always that complex, but I find it hard to replicate for some reason. Seeing the musicians playing the instruments really helps. I tend to like repetitive ritualistic kind of percussion. Some examples:

Are there any videos or tutorials or exercises on drumming and percussion y'all can recommend me to help a newbie find her rhythm? Thank you.

I'm using drums and percussion from Dark Era and Moonkits.
I'm not sure about tutorials but, as a drummer/percussionist myself, I tend to think of the parts in layers. Something like: low drums, mid drums, high drums, ticky/shaker stuff, and any sub bass hits. I'll create a separate instrument for each layer, starting with your fundamental rhythm, then experimenting rhythmically in each layer. It's just a starting point really. The thing I like about layers is you can take a bunch of simple rhythms and make it appear/sound more complex than it really is (if that's what you're after).

Depending on what other libraries you own (like NI's West Africa) you can listen to full percussion loops, then hear individual instruments play their parts solo. Other libraries may do this as well. Alternatively, if you have an iPhone, check out an app called Djembefola! (https://apps.apple.com/us/app/djembefola/id1093859891)

This app is used to practice playing djembe in many styles but also allows you the ability mute AND solo each layer of the full practice loop. It also has a built-in metronome allowing you to slow things down as well as the music notation to follow. I don't think it's free (I'm not on iPhone) but might be worth it for your cause. Here's a video of someone using the app:

I hope this helps a little!
 
If you are writing songs, there are quite a few "pre-made" drum tracks that you can use. They come with full songs all laid out and various sections -- intro, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus2, ending.

There are lots of song-structured libraries like this for drum kits but there are plenty for other kinds of percussion (less song-based).

Is that what you are talking about?

It may sound canned and uncreative but actually many of these libraries sound great and you can get back to your vocals and chord changes quicker.

Steven Slate Drums, EZ Drummer -- there are quite a few. Not to mention third party midi sets that can be played back on these various drum engines.
I could try this but I think it would be better in the long run to figure out how to make my own drum tracks, no? It's not that I'm averse to using pre-made midi drum tracks but I worry about how it would encourage me to not strike out on my own. I will look into it though.
 
I'm not sure about tutorials but, as a drummer/percussionist myself, I tend to think of the parts in layers. Something like: low drums, mid drums, high drums, ticky/shaker stuff, and any sub bass hits. I'll create a separate instrument for each layer, starting with your fundamental rhythm, then experimenting rhythmically in each layer. It's just a starting point really. The thing I like about layers is you can take a bunch of simple rhythms and make it appear/sound more complex than it really is (if that's what you're after).
The method you describe is what I've been doing, though it's yet to yield anything good, hah! I will persist at it. It's easy enough to lay down a fundamental drum beat but filling it in with all the other interesting stuff is where I flail most. It often sounds chaotic and unmusical. Part of my problem I think is that I'm writing the percussion after I've tracked the chords and harmony, without having given any thought to the drums before, and as such these different parts of the music don't 'glue' together as organically as they should. I want to try writing some tracks with the percussion finished first.
My answer to this is the same as just about any music question about "how to get better at x". listen to music you like and learn how it happens. Copy it in as much detail as possible to get into the fine little things that make a good groove. The more you do it the better you get at listening and the listening will transfer into your playing and writing as you have a more diverse palette to work from.
Good idea. I will attempt to recreate some of my favourite percussion patterns as practice.
You could always use the cheat code of polyrhythms to make your percussion interesting.


Thanks for this! I found this video informative. I think I've accidentally used polyrhythms before, so knowing some of the theory behind it will help me to be less clumsy. :)

Thank you to everyone for your responses, I have read them all and appreciate each one! I have so much to learn.
 
If you don't have natural rhythm, I would avoid the advice to buy a drum and practice, many people are just not drummers. Thankfully there are many instruments that can help.

Personally my favorite is Addictive Drums, just because I've found fabulous beats for it and they can be mixed or unmixed to your hearts content. It does drums and percussion, but more of the former.

For Percussion help I would suggest Stylus RMX, in that it has many built in grooves that can be manipulated. So finding the right groove or changing what's there to fit is easy.



It's not cheap but Spectrosonics is great and I believe an update to Stylus is coming soon.

If you could use something cheaper I can suggest Rhythmus ($60):


Sometimes these libraries can fill the rhythms, other times they are a starting point and by adding simple hits and fills you can quickly get a great sounding rhythm section.
 
If you play an instrument you have rhythm. You're just telling yourself you don't.

100% agree with buying a drum, or two... Percussion is just as much about feel as it is about skill. I picked up drums by ear as a toddler so technique isn't required necessarily. (Obvioulsy technique helps!!! Don't misinterpret that! I'm great at putting my foot in my mouth :P) I'm just emphasizing that it's also very much instinctive, to the point of a toddler picking it up by ear, and it's a tactile, if not primitive experience... Having something physical and tactile would almost certainly help you feel more connected with rhythm... A skill you already have even if you think you don't.

And although this might be the pricier route in terms of MIDI, if you find that having a hand drum helps, you might look into something like a percussion multipad down the road...

https://www.roland.com/us/products/handsonic_hpd-20/
Finally there's a whole niche of composers that collect and prefer to record percussion despite having an arsenal of beautifully recorded and mixed percussion in Kontakt... For some it's a physical thing, a different musical mindset, etc.
 
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I enjoy using a Maschine controller alongside the Expansion packs to create rhythms.
I may start with a preset performance but once I mute half the parts, change the instruments assigned and add my own parts it sounds completely different.
That can be a good source of inspiration.
Having the physical controller helps a lot for me as opposed to using a keyboard.
You can also quantatise some of the parts and not others, play around with the feel.
 
Hooey. Nobody has "natural rhythm". It's a learned skill like anything else.
I disagree. Of course, like any other talent, there are people who are from the gitgo more or less good with rhythm than others. You see it in videos of children less than one year old.

But one can develop a better sense of it by listening and study. I did.
 
Sometimes these libraries can fill the rhythms, other times they are a starting point and by adding simple hits and fills you can quickly get a great sounding rhythm section.
This ^^is a good way of putting it.

drums and drum kits are a lot more subtle and elusive to emulate than might at first appear . Of course most drum loop engines also include kits you can use to start from scratch, so maybe you could “meet in the middle.”

It depends partly on your focus, but also what your audience is.

Sometimes it’s ok to use pre-made drums the same way one often works with a live drummer. You can notate every last hi-hat or you can write “smooth ballad feel,” indicate fills and maybe where verses and choruses are, and let him do his thing.
 
Part of my problem I think is that I'm writing the percussion after I've tracked the chords and harmony, without having given any thought to the drums before, and as such these different parts of the music don't 'glue' together as organically as they should.
I think there's truth in this. The best compositions have space written into the phrases for percussion, almost like melody, harmony, and percussion are all just facets of the same thing (!). If you're adding percussion after the fact, you either have to stick with simple patterns and minimal fills or find the gaps that your composition naturally left and see if those are better off being filled in or not.
 
I would second the idea of trying out some MIDI grooves with the instruments you have. I have a lot of groove monkee loops that I go to from time to time. When you find something you like, try playing a couple of parts over it to get the feel, and then turn off the original loop. What you are going to discover eventually is that groovy rhythms are seldom very "quantized." That said, if you have LinnDrum or other groove quantizing capabilities in your DAW, experiment with those to see what you like. Sometimes just a 52-53% swing groove can make an amazing difference.

I find it hard to play percussion grooves on a MIDI keyboard, so you also might want to think about a pad controller and some sticks or mallets. A djembe (already mentioned) or a cajon are also good for getting the feel, and audio loops can be converted to MIDI, if you are going back to samples.
 
I disagree. Of course, like any other talent, there are people who are from the gitgo more or less good with rhythm than others. You see it in videos of children less than one year old.

But one can develop a better sense of it by listening and study. I did.
Nobody is born a good drummer (except maybe those with some physical advantage like long feet for the pedals or whatever). Perhaps they learned earlier than others, but that does not make the skill unlearnable for anyone else, nor does it mean that someone picking up the skill later can't be as good or even better than that kid who started at 6 months or whatever.

Even if some people are just born with some innate talent (I don't really believe this myself in this scenario but I will entertain it for now), the value of this talent is nothing compared to dedicated and focused practice.

Even with that said, our OP here doesn't want to be the best drummer in the world. They want to write better percussion parts in their music. And for that I don't think you need to hit the woodshed with a drumset for 10 hours a day or worry about what some 2 year old on youtube can do. Quite honestly I think just focusing in on the drum parts in whatever music you already listen to will go a long way here, with not much extra practice time needed to learn the basics of a good groove.
 
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