Project 1: Drum Loop

Your first assignment is to create three different drum loops in the step sequencer, and separate them with drum fills. In class, we discussed what constituted a "good" drum pattern, and what constitutes a "good" drum fill. Keep your repeated patterns simple, and save the flashy/ busy stuff for the drum fills. The fills should not repeat in the playlist.

Use different sounds from the browser in your patterns and don't forget to use the graph editor, panning and volume controls for each sound in your final mix. Once you have rendered your file to MP3, upload it to your blog and write your post.

This is a sample description of what I'm looking for in your post and embedded file:

I was inspired by the sounds of ZZ top, Justin Timberlake and Madonna. I have always been a fan of their music, and I guess it pours out of me easily. Anyway, I started with a straight four bass drum pattern with the snare on 2 and 4 and an eighth note pattern on the hi hat (al la "Legs" by ZZ Top). All of the sounds I used came right out of the FPC section of the browser. The A section morphed into something a little more syncopated in the B section where I used the ride cymbal instead of the hi hat and included two toms in the pattern. I was trying to make the B section strongly contrast to the simplicity of the A section by mixing up the rhythms with the toms. the ride cymbal has a darker color to it than the hi hat, so I figured it would contrast as well. Enjoy!




When you have finished your post, you need to go to the comments section of at least two other members of the class (all websites are on the chalkboard) and leave a comment. Click on the comments section of this post to see the sample comments I left about my piece.

By the way, this guy is a pro and uses the same tools you have to create something very high quality. check it out and be prepared to be humbled:
FL Studio - Phat Beats 101 from Andrew Aversa on Vimeo.

Welcome to Music Tech Class

To get started in music tech, you'll need a few things.  First, you'll need your own headphones.  Next, you'll need an email address you can check at school (a Gmail account or a yahoo account is fine). Together, we'll set up a Google account, a blog and a file sharing account at Divshare. Then we'll dive into our workstation software FLStudio 9 for your first project.

The first day of class is largely exploratory.  You should noodle with the software and explore the sounds in the browser, drag a few of them over to the step sequencer, put some dots into a pattern on the Step Sequencer and put a few patterns in the playlist. Once you've done this for a few minutes, we'll get serious.

What makes a good beat?

Only you can decide what you like, but there are a few basic guidelines and a few basic principles that all good drumbeats share. Now would be a good time to search your MP3 player for some of your favorite tunes. Listen to just the drums to find out what makes the groove work.  You'll probably find these basic groove principles:

1. Simple is better. Overly complex beats that use too many instruments are difficult to listen to, and ultimately distract from the rest of the music. Try to free your beats of clutter.

2. Repetition is essential. The pattern should not be too long, and should repeat in a predictable way.

3. Consider your tonal spectrum from bass (low pitch) to treble (high pitch).  The kick drum sound should create a steady pulse, the midrange sound should cut the bass pulse in half and the high pitched sounds (usually hi hat) should subdivide the kick pattern.  In traditional notation: Bass- on beats 1,2,3 and 4; Snare- beats 2 and 4; hi hat every other beat (1+2+3+4+).

here are some of my favorite classic beats to illustrate this point:
Kiss- Prince and the Revolution
Lust For Life - Iggy Pop
Billie Jean- Michael Jackson
Blue Monday- New Order
I Don't Wanna Stop- Ozzy