Importing Midi Bass Files into Beat Buddy

BeatBuddy General
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  1. Your Logic screen looks like each measure is a separate region. In Logic, try selecting the track, the go to Edit>Join>Regions. Then try that file as a song part in BBM.
    If that doesn’t cure it, export your midi file from BBM and open it in Logic to see what you really have. To export the file, Control + Click on the part in the song in BBM, and select Export Midi File. pick a location on your HD where you can find the file, and then open that file in Logic. See where the notes are, and how long the file is. If it is not what you intended, you are doing something incorrect in Logic, and I would need to see the midi file to guess at what might be the issue.

12 & 13. You should only use BBM for file management for the BB. Never move files using the Mac Finder. Tutorials - start here:

http://mybeatbuddy.com/forum/index.php?threads/bbmanager-1-64-video-tutorials.6431/

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Hello again! Ok, I’m making a lot of progress now! I’m really starting to like the Beat Buddy! Thanks again!

9 Ok, joining the regions worked! However, I had to shorten the notes after measure 2 going into measure 3 because the note at the beginning of measure 3 was dropping out. Same with measure 6 in measure 7 and all the way through the track. Shortening that note approx. 20 times throughout the track was a lot more work than I’d like to put into it. Any idea why that would happen? How can avoid this in the future when programming midi bass notes that may be side by side? (see Logic screenshot below)

12 & 13 got that all figured out. I had to go back to the basic tutorials for this stuff. Thanks!

14 (new question) I put in a 9 measure click track intro, BUT the bass main drum(bass) loop comes in too early. Any idea why? I suppose I could just make my click intro part of the main loop, but I was just thinking making an intro may be the proper way of doing things with the Beat Buddy, moving forward? (see Logic and BBM screenshots below)

Thanks again :slight_smile:

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  1. This is a BBM issue. Notes need to have separation or the second note will not sound. It probably has something to do with the idea that this pedal was only intended for percussion sounds. Midi Note Off was added as an afterthought. If I want to enter quarter notes, for example, I enter a note about 90% of the length of a quarter note.

  2. My best guess is that you had dead space at the end of the intro, and BB is actually moving it to the beginning of the intro. Weird, huh?, but yeah, it does that. To cure it, take the last DRUM note of your intro and lengthen it to go to the very end of the bar. Its percussion, so its length doesn’t matter, but getting rid of that dead space does. Likewise, do the same thing with your main loop. Always have a note going to the end of the last bar, otherwise, BB does weird stuff with the dead space. So yeah, looking at your track, that last F#2 that you have in the drum track, lengthen that to go to the end of bar 9.

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Dear Friends,

I’m brand spanking new to all things BeatBuddy, however I’ve been reading, watching videos and learning as much as possible lately, and aware now of how to create MIDI files with their bass parts intact, etc.

However, the final deciding factor for purchasing a BeatBuddy is the overall ease and effectiveness of incorporating any bass lines/patterns with the BB’s drums (to play set-lists of songs live), and the quality/authenticity of the bass sounds themselves.

I’m convinced of the BeatBuddy’s drum sound quality already, but have not yet heard any good examples of BB tracks/songs with high-quality, bass sounds with them on any YouTube videos or any MP3’s anywhere.

If I’m late to the party, I can understand that there should be at least a few somewhere by now, clearly demonstrating how good these BB drums + bass songs can sound - so I just need to be pointed in the right direction, please?

My intention is to utilize the BeatBuddy for both recording and live use. In fact, eventually I also want to import all the patterns from my Alesis SR-16 and Alesis SR-18 into the BeatBuddy as well, mainly for recording purposes. A larger sized SD card will most likely be necessary as time goes on.

Because right now it’s a coin toss between the BeatBuddy and the excellent Boss DR-880, of which the bass patterns, plus overall high-quality sound is not an issue at all, and in fact seems much easier to use in this particular case, and with my Boss FS-5U nonlatching footswitche’s. BUT, I’m really intrigued by the BeatBuddy’s ‘modern vibe’ which is the current dilemma.

BTW, can I use my Boss FS-5U nonlatching footswitche’s with the BeatBuddy instead of the BB’s own propriety footswitch?

Any help/advice would be greatly appreciated, much obliged and many thanks in advance.

Welcome to email direct if it’s more convenient to randbowman @ outlook.com

1 Like
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[LIST]
[]To hear and see some good recordings by forum users, search this forum for postings by Diego, Joey (Scary Mary) or Joe Ellis (and Restless Ray). Starter links: http://forum.mybeatbuddy.com/index.php?threads/surf-medley.7283/#post-31467 http://forum.mybeatbuddy.com/index.php?threads/rio-bonito-original-rock-instrumental.7319/#post-31475 http://forum.mybeatbuddy.com/index.php?threads/beatbuddy-in-studio.6548/#post-35301
[]The BeatBuddy was never designed to include bass or other instruments. It uses multi-samples of the drums (one of the reasons it sounds good) but because the pedal is limited to use 100Mb of memory for the drums, it means that decent multi-sampling of other instruments forces some compromises. Perhaps if a BeatBuddy II is ever offered, it will include extra memory.
[]You can use up to a 32G Class 10 SD card.
[]You should be able to use the Boss FS-5U with the BB pedal.
[*]There are several other users that have also been Alesis or Boss drum machine users and they will weigh in with their own thoughts on quality-of-recording or ease-of-use.
[/LIST]
If you decide to become a member of the BB user community, you will find plenty of help here on the forum to transition to use of the pedal. Bonus points if you have and know how to use a DAW and have a basic knowledge of MIDI.

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You can also, without buying the BB, download the BB Manager software and the default pedal content. Then download a couple “with bass” songs and their corresponding drumkits, and you can hear how it sounds. The actual sound of the pedal will be slightly different, but BBM gets you close.

Regarding your FS5U, I have several of those, and honestly, I have not tried one in the BB. But, it does only have one switch, and uses a TS cable, not TRS, so it’s function would be limited.

And, if you decide to jump into this, I have the SR18 patterns as midi (I’d like to get ahold of the SR-16 patterns). I’d be able to set you up with those.

I do like the flexibility of the BB. You can set up a song to be simple or complex. You can set it up for just One Press and it plays through, or you can have multiple verses and choruses and allow those to repeat, if you wish.

One limitation of the BB is how it processes multiple fast notes of the same pitch, or very fast notes, like glissando. Due to the fact that it was not developed as a non-percussion instrument, it’s handling of the midi note off is not perfected. It thus tend to clip very short notes, like 32nd notes or faster, or, if the notes are consecutive, it may not process the note off and you get one long note. This is a limitation that I have had to work around, but it’s not a deal killer, and it’s made for some creativity in the arrangements to make them sound good. Sometimes, simplification works best.

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Many thanks to both of you - persist & Phil - for the quick and informative response. A nice surprise, and real rarity in comparison to most of my 20+ years experience as a pro-musician (live with bands, duos, solo + recording, covers and originals). Whenever I gig doing the soul-destroying solo route it’s using high-quality self-produced backing tracks converted to 320 Kbps MP3’s in playlists.

So it’d be very sweet to have the option to leave the entire bells and whistles of being a complete ‘one-man-band’, and to only perform solo with guitars, bass & drums for a healthier change.

During my ‘homework’ and due diligence, I’ve seen many YouTube’s of BeatBuddy users performing live, just not any videos with good, convincing bass parts in their songs. Perhaps I’ve missed something along the way, or at least couldn’t hear any bass parts clearly if there were. Love the clever ‘Scary Mary’ video by the way, even though he’s playing a bass in it.

But I still applaud the ingenuity of BB user’s like your good selves to create a usable workaround nonetheless, and still interested in the possibilities. I will take up Phil’s suggestion to download the BB Manager software and the default pedal content, then test the bass/drums potential out. Thanks for this great idea too.

I can understand the BeatBuddy’s current sampling and memory limitations, and how this can compare negatively to something like the Boss DR-880. Hopefully this type of feature can be incorporated in future firmware updates and/or the next generation model, like persist mentioned.

Because if/whenever this happens, it’s guaranteed to convert any remaining people sitting on the fence (like yours truly) to the BeatBuddy temple of sonic bliss (still sounds fantastic), as well as sell a gazillion more than ever before. The Digitech TRIO Band Creator is a nice idea in theory for practicing, but not live work, and a good start in comparison, but I’m sure the eventual bass-friendly BeatBuddy would leave everything similar in the dust and light years behind for versatility.

Phil, if you’d be so kind as to email me your SR-18 MIDI patterns I’d be very grateful. If or when you do come across the SR-16’s MIDI’s please let me know as well The thought of recording every single pattern from both units into my DAW, etc. is definitely not a pleasant walk in the park time-wise, as you probably already know. My email is randbowman @ outlook.com

As for the Boss FS-5U’s as a viable alternative to the BeatBuddy’s propriety footswitch; I’m inclined to agree with persist that it should be fine. Connecting two together and using a splitter cable should work very well, or using a Boss FS-6, also a non-latching footswitch, would be even easier with just one stereo cable. Please find a photo example I’ve made attached here for reference, hope it helps.

One last question; the MIDI connection on the BeatBuddy appears smaller than the normal sized connectors on MIDI cables. Am I correct assuming I should also buy its propriety MIDI Sync Cable to work with my DAWs? (Sonar Producer/Sonar Premium or currently testing the new PreSonus Studio One (an amazing Pro Tools killer) with a Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 on Windows 8.1 x64)

Thanks again for your expertise!

[ATTACH]7222[/ATTACH]

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I see no issue with 2 FS5U pedals and a TRS to dual TS. Should be fine.

I’ll get the SR18 stuff out to you tomorrow.

The breakout midi cable is necessary for connecting the B.B. to other midi gear. It take the mini din connector and breaks it out to 2 Standard 5 pin midi jacks, one for midi in, one for midi out.

The main use for the midi cable is to send BB’s clock to either a looper or to time based effects. It’s really not regularly hooked up to your DAW, although I do have a 2nd BB that I have connected to my midi interface so that I can use it as a sound module and hear the actual output of my drums, rather than just listening to it through BBM. So, it’s a good thing to get, but you’ll probably find you don’t use it with your DAW. It is needed for using songbook apps like OnSong with the B.B., which it how my #1 unit is currently configured.

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Re. “I can understand the BeatBuddy’s current sampling and memory limitations, and how this can compare negatively to something like the Boss DR-880” the opposite is actually the case. DR-880 will use way less memory for its samples as there really aren’t many multi-samples in there, just maybe the odd 2 samples per sound on certain drums whereas BB has quite a lot of samples per sound (10 or 12 or more per sound if I remember correctly). The comparison where BB loses out is with computer software like EZDrummer, Superior Drummer etc. where kits can be absolutely huge and usually at least a gigabyte per kit (BB has a max of 100Mb per kit). So don’t buy a DR-880 expecting better drum kit sound quality as I don’t know of any hardware drum machine (except samplers maybe) that has lots of multi-samples like BB has.

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Had a private conversation with Rand Bowman and thought I’d share on here what I sent him in case it’s useful info to anyone else out there -
There’s not a better drum machine than BB for drum sound quality out there, as none of the others use anything like the amount of memory per kit (& true multi-samples for realism, no ‘machine gun’ snare rolls where every hit is exactly the same sample being used). BB uses up to 100Mb per drum kit, Alesis SR-18 for example has just 32Mb total memory for all it’s kits!
However, bass usage has been added on by users and is a bit of a compromise and not as good as SR-18, DR-880 etc.
If you’re used to programming normal drum machines BB can be a bit confusing at first as you can’t program anything on the unit on its own. But it’s great sound quality (for drums) makes it worth persevering with to get the best out of it. For even better drum sound quality the only way to go is software like Toontrack EZ Drummer 2 or Superior Drummer 3 but once again it’s not like programming a hardware drum machine.

Why no other company (especially the large ones like Boss, Alesis etc.) has released a full on multi-sampled drum machine is a mystery to me. Something like Alesis SR-18/Boss DR-880 but with at least BB’s 100Mb multi-sampling per kit would be awesome for us drum machine nuts out there! The Boss has been out since 2004 and the SR-18 since 2009, it’s about time someone cornered the market here!

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Many thanks to you both - Phil & Klink - for your recent timely consideration and generosity. As I received an email from each of you with the SR-18 MIDI’s attached. Lovely how our www. world gets smaller and more convenient every day. I’m not used to such positive pro-active behavior from fellow musicians (or most folks in general anyway) so it’s a most welcome surprise;-)

The hunt is still on for the elusive SR-16 MIDI’s and they should be out there somewhere in digital land…and I’m obliged to return the favor to you both one way or another. Might still have to get my MIDI + DAW hands dirty and invest the time to do it myself.

Klink; no contest regarding your detailed expert opinion about the value of the BB’s higher-quality drum sounds compared to hardware-based units like the Alesis or Boss, I fully agree. Perhaps I should’ve made it more clear that my ‘memory’ comment was only targeting the BB’s current bass lines/patterns capability that persist mentioned, and nothing else. And yes, it should be interesting to combine the BeatBuddy with Addictive Drums 2’s samples, of which I’ve been using with both Alesis SR’s. I’d need a newer hard drive to justify getting/using Superior Drummer 3 - it’s massive in size.

I think the reason why the big boys on the block (Roland/Boss, Alesis, Zoom, DigiTech, etc.) haven’t given birth to a higher quality, full-sampled drum machine yet is simply because they’re ‘older’ more traditional boys on the block, stuck in their ways, and just too big and busy to realize the niche market that the clever folks at Singular Sound have seized upon. Though it’s probably safe to hold one’s breath that any of these companies will typically jump on this bandwagon eventually. The Boss DR-01s[/URL] and [URL=‘https://digitech.com/en/products/trio-plus’]DigiTech’s TRIO+ at least seem to be getting the hint.

I took Phil’s advice, installed the BBM, etc. and tested out a few user-created songs with bass line/patterns and, although I’m not impressed with the actual bass sample quality of them at present, or the pinpoint timing accuracy of actual notes (some skip, some are cut-off, some sustain too long - Phil commented on this issue earlier as well.), for the moment at least they’re usable enough until things will naturally evolve and get even better. Did I mention I’m a cursed perfectionist with unrealistically high standards? If I had the money, I’d hire someone to slap me every 20 minutes as a reminder.

BTW, I think the Aerosmith - Walk This Way with Bass 2017.11.1 by Guitar Stu is the best of the bass-based song examples so far.

To be honest, I’m very impressed with this new, entire BeatBuddy experience. Not just the unit itself (seen nearly all the YouTube’s, etc.), but the Singular Sound website, User Forum, the striving for constant innovation and improvement, complete customer satisfaction ethic, plus all the great people using it generously sharing their efforts, ideas and help, as well as my having the recent pleasure of communicating with. It’s all pretty consistently outstanding compared to anything else I’ve experienced regarding musical products.

So apart from my usual over-zealous due diligence and typically over a month’s headache inducing homework on anything gear-related before buying something, and that persist, Phil and Klink deserve a healthy commission from Singular Sound for their salesmanship, I’ve taken the plunge and ordered a fabulous BeatBuddy + MIDI Sync Cable for my very own today - WhooHoo!

Thank you for allowing me into your BB world, and I shall endeavor to hopefully be as innovative and creative as the fine examples on this Forum, then share the fruits as you are all doing.

If I can help anyone with anything at all, don’t hesitate to contact me.♫

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Maybe I missed it, but how do you lower the key of the bass for a song? I play everything a full step down, need to get bass to that tuning.

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In the manager software right click on the song section you want to edit. Then right click on the note number you want to change and select move all notes to…and then select the new note number. You’ll have to do this for each bass note you want to change. There are other software programs that will transpose all the notes at once, but this is the easiest way using the B.B. manager software.

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This will not work universally. It might work for some songs, but you need to know the range of the bass in the kit before you can move notes around in the BB Manager midi editor. If you run out of bass range, you will need to transpose up or down an octave first, and then muck about in the BB Manager midi editor. I would suggest that if you see a song in Resources that you would like in another key, ask the author if they could transpose it. Aside from that, the best bet is to open the affected track in a midi editor, select all the bass notes (which should be in the 0 through 31 range, or 63 though 91 range depending upon the kit), and then move those notes only down two half-steps. if you then go out of range, i.e., below 0 or below 63 as the case may be, then you would need to move the notes up an octave. (Obviously, you couldn’t go below 0, so you would need to move any notes at zero or 1 in the original up to 12 or 13, respectively, before lowering by a whole step.)

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This actually has given me an idea. Do you find yourself gravitating toward a particular “with bass” kit or kits, or are using all of ‘em?

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NP Standard Pro w/bass is the goto for a majority of my songs. Within that majority, I have found Standard Pro w/bass 63-91 works in my range better than the lower w/bass. I would like to try more w/bass kits, just not sure what’s out there and how much hassle it would be to drop the tuning on the bass by individual note in each song.

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That works with my idea. I thought I could just drop all the bass notes in the kit by 1 step, and then you wouldn’t have to mess with the songs. Instead of altering songs, I can alter the kit, and then it would work with any songs that use that kit.

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Th

That’s a great idea. I’m sure I’m not the only person here that plays all or most of their songs in full-step down tuning. Us lower register voices gotta stick together. If you have the itch to alter a kit, I’ll be your test subject!

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Cool. I’ll try to get to dong that before the end of next week.

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Awesome ! This should be an interesting project.