[ddots-l] Re: Your Vote for most Accessible Drum Machine
- From: "Mike Tyo" <mtyo@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <ddots-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 4 Feb 2015 23:28:03 -0500
Hey there Bill and List,
To tell you the truth, I moved away from drum machines when I began using Sonar
- especially when I was able to get into the Superior Drummer plug. Obviously
the accessibility factor in Sonar, along with Phil's HSC set for Superior
Drummer kind of put the nail in the coffin for the drum machine. I had several
units over time; but as with most hardware gear, the newer the units, the less
accessible they became - at least in my experience. I used Roland and Boss
instruments ranging from the TR-909, R-8, up to the Boss DR-660, DR 770, and
their flagship at the time, the Dr-880. I may be slightly off with those
numbers on the Boss products; the bottom line was that each one of those units
presented their own challenges. Some machines sounded better than others, but
when I began dealing with things like Superior drummer, I realized very quickly
that the sound quality was so much more realistic in terms of getting closer to
a live drummer being in the studio.
This is certainly not a criticism of drum machines as they have their place. I
liked the sound of the DR-880, but compared to what's out there now, it's hard
not to notice. The R-8 was certainly no slouch in its time as it had a fairly
decent internal library of sounds; plus you could purchase ROM libraries for
it. I liked the sound of some of the Alesis and Yamaha boxes, but I didn't work
with them; so I can't speak to their accessibility.
When I was a Concert Artist for Technics Musical Instruments back in the '90s,
I was able to take advantage of their built-in accompaniment features to create
styles to use in whatever songs I was using in my performances. That meant that
I could build drum parts, plus other background patterns that would follow my
chord changes. It really enhanced what I was able to do live without having to
build tracks. This way I could use these styles on several songs without having
to create tracks for specific songs. I really miss being able to do this for
live performances nowadays. It turned out to be a time saver as I could plug
these styles in where I needed them; and, I did it on one instrument. For me, I
like having flexibility when it comes to live performances; and unfortunately
you don't have that with tracks.
Sometimes I have guest musicians sit in when I'm working at the local
restaurant. I can't transpose tracks on-the-fly, where as I could with styles
because they just followed my chord changes.
It took time to create the styles, but once I had them, it was a beautiful
thing. It takes a lot longer to do tracks because you have to not only do a
decent job with the creativity part of it, but you also need to make sure those
mixes sound good in the live gear. I thought about using loop stations, but
again, you're limited in what you can do on-the-fly. When I owned the DR-880, I
was hoping I could do some of what I used to do with the Technics instruments,
but between the accessibility problems and the limitations of the instrument,
that idea more or less went out the window. So I guess I'm stuck with doing
tracks if I want enhancements to my performances. Otherwise I have to consider
using live musicians. Not a problem there; except that they need to be paid for
their hard work. In my area, that can be a bit of a challenge as most places
don't want to pay decent money for good entertainment.
I don't know if that answers the original question satisfactorily, but I
couldn't resist sharing this bit of experience.
Mike
----- Original Message -----
From: Bill
To: ddots-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Wednesday, February 04, 2015 16:38
Subject: [ddots-l] Your Vote for most Accessible Drum Machine
A blind musician who is not subscribed to this list asked me to ask you:
Which drum machine do you consider to be most accessible to a blind user?
I myself do not own a drum machine and I really have no idea.
Thanks,
Bill
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