- User's Manual - T H E * D R U M S (Ver. 1.00) Universal Drum parts Editor and Sequencer (C) 1991 - Fabio Marzocca - You can reach me: my phone: (39-6) 566 4448 on CompuServe: User ID 100015,2217 on BiX: User ID: fabio on McLink: User ID: mc3796 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS. Special thanks to my friend David Sparks for the basic MIDI I/O drivers, that have been the first brick upon which I've built The*Drums. To him I am exceptionally grateful. HARDWARE REQUIREMENTS. The*Drums runs on every XT/AT computer with 512 Kb RAM and at least DOS 3.1; a MIDI MPU-401 interface is required and, of course, any MIDI drum machine or synthesizer. The Drums does not use extended or expanded memory. PREFACE The*Drums is a complete universal sequencer/editor for all your drum parts. You can edit your patterns on the screen editor or you can directly enter the part by playing an infinite loop on your key- board. Customize your instrument table up to 25 different drum instruments, choose your right quantization (1/8, 1/16, 1/32, 1/64), define the 'intro' instrument, select the right MIDI channel and save the de- faults into the configuration file. You'll have up to 8 patterns to be played in the sequence you define into the Song Vector; then save the standard Midi file song and import the file in your personal MIDI sequencer, to add the rest of the orchestra. Experience the real-time recorder and evaluate the right quantization to fit the maximum human feel! Setting the quantization to 1/64th is almost like playing without any quantization. NOTE: Only registered copies are able to generate Standard Midi Files. GETTING STARTED What do I do first? 1. Copy the diskette on an hard disk directory. 2. Type THEDRUMS and press ENTER 3. Edit the instrument table to fit it with your keyboard (see the INSTRUMENTS section of this manual) 4. Set the MIDI channel where you have the drum part (see the SETTINGS section of this manual) 5. Set your favourite quantization (best is 1/64) (see the SETTINGS section of this manual) 6. Set the intro instument (generally the Rimshot) (see the SETTINGS section of this manual) 7. Set your preferred default tempo (see the SETTINGS section of this manual) 8. If you have a registered copy: 9. Save previous settings in the default file, so you will have them all each time you start The*Drums. (see the SETTINGS section of this manual) 10. Load an example file and press F1 to play the selected pattern, or Alt-P-S to play the whole song. THE SCREEN EDITOR The screen editor allows you to move all around the selected pattern with the arrow-keys. The instruments displayed at a time are 14 of 25, but you can sroll the pattern window up and down. The X-axis of the pattern window represents one full measure, and each dot is the beat allowed for selected quantization. In other words, if you select quantization at 1/32, you will have 8 notes available each quarter measure. When you want to edit the pattern contents, just place the cursor in the position you need to edit and press the INS key. If a note is al- ready there, it will be cancelled, otherwise a note will be placed with the selected loudness. Pressing the F2 key, your keyboard will play a sample from the instru- ment on which line is placed the cursor; in other words, The*Drums will send to the keyboard a request to play a short note on the se- lected channel, with the key setting of the selected instrument. To change from one pattern to another, use the CTRL-RightArrow or CTRL-Left-Arrow; you will switch through the patterns, cycling from 1 to 8. When you are in the screen editor, further to the Alt-menu keys, you have the following keys available: Arrows : Move in the screen INS : Place or remove a note HOME : Go to upper left corner END : Go to lower right corner F1 : Playback the selected pattern F2 : Play the instrument CTRL-Right: Move one pattern up CTRL-Left : Move one pattern down RECORDING (Alt-R) This is the best peculiarity of the program. When you press Alt-R you will hear a 4-beat intro played by the intro-instrument you have set (generally the Rimshot). Then the sequencer starts scanning the whole selected pattern in an infinite loop until you press a key on your computer keyboard. Each key you press on your MIDI keyboard will be recorded immediately and played back at the next loop. I suggest to add one instrument each time in order to hear the sequence growing. Exeperience this way: on the screen editor, activate the first tick of bass drum, to have the correct measure start, then press Alt-R. You will hear the bass drum playing at each first measure; now add two or three snare drum figures and let the recorder continue looping. Add the rest of the instruments step-by-step, so you can coordinate the right rythm. Another way to use Alt-R is to record special fill-in figures you play on the keyboard. Fill-in figures are hard to build in the schematic screen editor. Give them your human feel recording while you play them live. PLAYBACK PATTERN (Alt-P-P or F1) Pressing F1 or Alt-P-P will start playing back the selected pattern. The cursor moves on the playing beat and loops until you press a key. The playback may vary if you select a wider quantization after having recorded on a narrower one. PLAYBACK SONG (Alt-P-S) Before pressing Alt-P-S you should have set a song vector. After the definition of the correct sequence, this function will start playing the song following the pattern list in the song vector. The cursor will blink above the playing pattern in the Song window, and the pro- gram will stop playing as reached a '0' set pattern in the song vec- tor. SETTINGS MENU (Alt-S) This menu lets you modify all the defaults and temporary MIDI value assignements. Setting Intro Instrument (Alt-S-I) Each time you start a Recording (Alt-R), your keyboard will play a one measure count-in during which an intro instrument will act as a metronome counting off before recording actually starts. You can change the instrument using this option. Try with the Rimshot or the closed high-hat. The value can be saved in the default file, but it is not stored in the patterns files (.tdp) Setting Tempo (Alt-S-T) Resets the current base tempo. A window pops-up, then input the new tempo required (bpm). Even if a default tempo of 100 bpm is reasonable at the program-start, you can change this value and store it in the default settings. When you save a patterns file, the selected tempo is stored in it as, of course, in the Standard Midi File. Setting Channel (Alt-S-C) Change the selected MIDI channel connection with the MIDI keyboard. This value is stored in the defaults file, but is not stored in the patterns file. Setting Quantization (Alt-S-Q) Rounds off the timing values of the events. You have 4 choices to define the quantization 1/8, 1/16, 1/32 and the incredible 1/64! Upon changing the quantum, the screen editor will change look, shrinking or expanding the time interval between the beats. This function is useful either in the screen editor mode, or while re- cording alive. The quantization value can be saved in the default configuration file and in the standard Midi File Format, but is not stored in the patterns file. The pattern file is always saved in the minimum quantization (1/64th) to allow storage of the best information possible. The user can then experiences in reducing the value to fit his feeling. Setting Pattern Name (Alt-S-P) Each one of the 8 patterns available has a 20 character field to store the name of the pattern itself. The name will appear just on top of the pattern, in the center of the screen; defaults values are "Pattern 1" ...."Pattern 8". On the same line of the pattern name, at the right end of the line, the pattern number is always displayed to help you in realizing on which pattern you are. The pattern name is stored in the patterns file. Setting Loudness (Alt-S-L or F3) To simplify the screen editing, the loudness of the note (MIDI velo- city) has been quantized into three possible values: 60, 90 and 127. Changing the selected loudness, will change the density of the sym- bol representing the note on the pattern screen. While in the screen editor you have to choose between 3 fixed loudness values, in the recording mode the program will take care of the exact MIDI velocity for the note. If you play one note at velocity=53, The*Drums will store 53 for the loudness of that note, until you will change it in the editing mode. Setting the Song Vector (Alt-S-S) When you need to build up the drum part for your song, you have to enter the pattern sequence into the Song Vector (lower left corner). Each pattern is represented with its one-digit number, while the end of the song is indicated by pattern '0'. You have up to 30 pattern sequence in the song vector. Example: my song requires pattern nr.3 to be played 4 times, then 1 time of pattern nr. 1, then 3 times for pattern nr. 2 and then again 4 times of pattern nr. 3. The song vector will be: 333312233330 Pressing ENTER will quit the song vector edi- ting. Save Defaults Settings (Alt-S-D) When program starts, it reads the file td.cfg which contains: - Instruments key settings - the MIDI channel of the drum parts on your keyboard - the default quantization - the intro instrument for the count-in - the default tempo Customize this file by setting up your defaults ad saving them with this option. THE FILE MENU (Alt-F) This is the menu of command related to file storing and retrieving on/from the disk. File/New (Alt-F-N) This blanks the current workspace and re-load the default configu- ration file. If you have made changes to your work that have not been saved to disk, you will be asked if you would like to proceed with the command. If you choose to proceed, the work in memory will be completely erased. File/Load (Alt-F-L) Load a "The*Drum" file (.tdp) from the disk into the workspace. If you have made changes to your work that have not been saved to disk, you will be asked if you would like to proceed with the com- mand. A dialog box will pop-up with a list of files. Move the cursor over the name of the file you want and press ENTER. If you press ESC you will cancel the command. File/Save (Alt-F-S) Updates the current opened file with the new changes. If no file has been opened, you will be prompted to enter the file name. File/Save As (Alt-F-A) Save the current workspace into a new file. You are prompted to input the filename (without any extension). On the new patterns file, fol- lowing data will be saved: 8 patterns data the tempo setting the instrument settings Quantization and channel are not saved; the drums data are always saved at the minimum quantization (1/64th). File/View (Alt-F-V) If you don't remember the contents of a patterns file, this will display you the 8 pattern names, so you can decide to retrieve. Standard MIDI File (Alt-F-M) Save the current song in a Standard Midi File - format 0. The format 0 has been choosen because the file will always contain only one track of MIDI data, and almost all the sequencers on the market are able to read from format 0. To allow this function you have before to set the song vector pattern list. The resulting standard MIDI file will take also care of the quantization setting, channel and tempo. File/Quit (Alt-F-Q) Quits the program. THE INSTRUMENTS MENU (Alt-I) With this menu you can customize, save and load your instruments key settings. If your drum machine or synthesizer is not present on the directory list (.kbr), edit the key settings and save your new instrument file. Edit Instruments (Alt-I-E) Press Alt-I-E to enter in the instrument editor. The cursor will be placed on the first instrument on the screen, in highlight mode. Scan the instruments with the up/down arrow keys (you have 25 instru- ments available), and when you are placed above the setting to edit, press ENTER. The name field will be blanked, allowing you to input the instrument name (max 9 characters). Press ENTER and the cursor will highlight the MIDI key setting; this field is mandatory (see your synthesizer manual for corresponding pitches), but you can enter 0 if you want to silent the instrument or if you have less than 25 instruments available on your synthesizer. Save Instruments (Alt-I-S) This will save the current instrument settings in a file. You will be prompted to input the file name (without extension). Load Instrument (Alt-I-L) Load an instrument file in the current workspace. A dialog box will pop up with a list of files. Move the cursor over the name of the file you want and press ENTER. If you press ESC you will cancel the command. ============================= DISTRIBUTION AND REGISTRATION ============================= Under the Shareware system you may freely try out this program, but if you continue to use it you are expected to register with the author and pay the $50 registration fee. When you register, please let me know what version you have and I'd also be interested in knowing where you got it from. Please, make sure to put your name and address on the letter! It's amazing how many people don't do this. Or, you can use the instant registration form in the file "order.frm". Just copy the file to your printer. To obtain the current release of THE*DRUMS with all of its latest enhancements, register by sending the order form with your money order for $50.00 per copy plus $4.00 for materials, postage and handling, to: Fabio Marzocca Via Canale dello Stagno 40 00124 Casalpalocco (ROME) ITALY