unwanted patterns

[gckilla]

Happy New Year!

Okay, my question:

I created a pattern in rhythm generator, saved it, and loaded it up in rhythm editor to a specific key. I was only modifying an existing rhythm.

When I trigger that key, some times only half my pattern plays before going on to some other pattern.

I have unchecked most of the options in "additional" when I have tried this.

I don't get the same behaviour when I clear the rhythm and start from scratch.

Problem #1 I don't want to start from scratch and would like to modify existing rhythms with my own patterns...however I want to my midi key to trigger one pattern only at a time.

Problem #2 If I have to start from scratch, how many patterns can I map to the keyboard before mdrummer starts playing other patterns other than my own?

Cheers,
Hasan

[MeldaProduction]

Happy new year to you too Hasan!

I'm afraid that I don't understand the questions
First why did you use rhythm generator, when you were modifiing existing rhythm? Purpose of rhythm generator is to edit the "essential beat" (the pattern in the loop editor in the bottom). It creates then the entire rhythm based on this loop and various settings.

If you want to edit a rhythm, just load it and use rhythm editor to modify it. You can edit any loop (or pattern, but I rather use word loop, terminology), add more loops etc.
If you edit it and MDrummer cannot play it, please send me the rhythm (it is located in MDrummer/Rhythms path), so I can check it out.

[gckilla]

Well the main point is this:

I trigger the midi note to for a loop (in this case a break) and mdrummer plays half that loop and then also plays a loop from the short break section with no input from me. This is undesirable. I just want to play a specific loop.

Mdrummer has no problem playing the loop, it's just that it only plays half of it before playing another loop (that I didn't want it to play).

Hope this is more clear.

I was using rhythm generator to create a new loop, but in this context it isn't really an issue. Even if I am using a pre-existing rhythm, I can't seem to get mdrummer to play specific loops without playing extra unwanted loops.

I have song structure set to "off"

Cheers,
Hasan

[MeldaProduction]

Okay, so please send me the rhythm, tell me key you use to trigger the loop and if you use VST plugin, please send me the project if possible (if you think it is related). Btw. how many bars does the loop have? Do the other loops have the same length?

[MeldaProduction]

So guys I'd like to explain a few things about the rhythms:

1. Purpose of loop types is to give MDrummer some idea of what to play. The important thing is, each loop must follow some principles to be understood by MDrummer - intros and short breaks must be one bar long (or more, but you have to set the "Break length" value in "Edit" panel in rhythm generator),
long breaks and outros must be twice as long. Actually this is not necessary, but I strongly recommend it, otherwise some features like automatic breaks may not work correctly.
Intros should start at the first quarter - this is just a convention, but the thing is, that when you trigger intro, MDrummer starts playing and listener should immediately recognize the first quarter. That's the purpose of intros and the only difference between intros and short breaks.

2. When you trigger a loop using a MIDI command (from VST host, external controller or just anyhow), MDrummer may select a different loop box (the entity assigned to each MIDI key that contain loops - see loop selector). This is because you will rarely fill all of the loop boxes. So if particular loop box is empty MDrummer chooses the nearest one.

This way you can have a single beat loop in the rhythm and it will be triggered by any key in octave -1. However the rhythm level will be set correctly when you press particular key from that octave, so you can still use note minimal and maximal levels. This way you can create the entire rhythm based on a single loop that will still have many complexity levels.

3. If you want to make your own rhythms, I suggest you use rhythm generator, because creating so many loops will keep you busy for hours. You can for example use rhythm generator only to generate intros, breaks and outros. Editing beats may not be so time-consuming.

4. If you still want to edit the entire rhythm by yourself, you should be aware of some interesting property: Any loop may not start at the beginning of the loop. This does not have any use for beats and is not recommended for intros, however it may be very very useful for breaks and actually even the rhythm generator uses this fact.

For example when a short break in 4/4 has only a few notes in the last quarter and you trigger it, MDrummer continues playing beat for first 3 quarters and after that it switches to the break.
This way the same loop may be compatible with any beat. If you are familiar with MIDI drag & drop, you may noticed that the breaks must fill the entire bar. That is another great advantage of MDrummer against the other drum machines. Well and it makes the MDrummer rhythm system very complicated heh.


Well I hope this helps a little. We have to release the MDrummer DVD now and then I hope there will be many more tutorial videos, that makes all those features easier to understand.

[gckilla]

Hey Vojtech,
Thanks, I recieved your email. I'm all sorted out now. I just wanted mdrummer to do something it's not designed to do, but that's okay! It's still a great piece of software!

[MeldaProduction]

Well, if I can help somehow anyway, please let me know!