I’ve got a question about reading the wav files with a particular way
I know how to trigger a wav file with a midi file, creating a drumset, it works perfectly.
So I’ve got an Intro Fill, the Mainloop and the Outro Fill. And this is my question : when the BB is reading the mainloop, I would like to press twice the pedal, so it reads the Outrofill.
BUT the BB reads the outrofill just at the moment when I press twice the pedal. Should it be possible that the BB waits the end of the loop, and then reads the outrofill ?
(I believe) The outro fill is queued the same way as the regular fills, and you have control over when that happens (immediately, next beat, etc) in the main pedal’s configuration.
Hi Joe,
thanks for your answer, and yes it helps me ! I’m on holidays, I don’t have the pedal with me, only BB manager, so I did not thought to look at the parameters of the pedal.
But on the manual, it says that we can change the cue fill period : immediatly, next half beat, next beat or next period. But not at the end of the wav file, which is much longer than a period … ;(
Not exactly. I play saxophone with a pianist, and we have recorded both bass and drums for each piece of music.
As we play jazz, we have cut those records in 3 parts : intro+theme / theme / theme + end
the intro+theme would be put inti introfill, the theme into the mainloop, and theme + end into outrofill.
Since the main loop turns, we can make improvisation on it. And when the improvisation is finished, I would press on the pedal, and then at the end on the loop, we play the theme + outrofill, but ONLY at the end on the loop !
I think I understand. What I do when I have an intricately-timed end or when the ends retards, is I build a final (main) part that includes the full pattern, the end, and then several empty bars with a note in the very last beat. Then, when we’re ready to stop, I transition into the final (let’s say) chorus, which plays the chorus and the outro, followed by silence during which I stop the BB. I don’t include an outro part.
I think I understand the way you do, but something I don’t understand : when we chorus, and are ready to stop, I press the pedal, but the final (chorus + outro) needs to be played only at the end of the pattern, which is in reality a wav file, much longer than 4 beats. So how to be sure that the BB will wait the end of the wav file before it plays the chorus and the outro ?
if I’m right, you have 2 main drum loops, one with the chorus, and the second with the chorus and the outro, followed by a silence.
And my question is how the transition occurs between those 2 parts ?
As you say, “when we are ready to stop, I transition into the final”, ok, but I want the BB waits the end of the chorus before the transition occurs …
Same way you transition through parts: Hold the main button for a couple of beats.
The way transitions happen is you trigger them by holding for two beats and BB jumps to the next part at the end of the bar. So, for a song like what you’re describing, it’d work like this (assuming you haven’t customized the controls on the main pedal):
Click once to start intro
Intro moves to Part-1 (main part over which you will play). That part repeats for as long as you want minus one progression. When you’re ready to end…
Press and hold the pedal for at least two beats to transition. NOTE: You must release the pedal before you reaches the last beat or BB will play another bar (or repeat the transition fill if you have one – which I suspect you might not)
BB plays Part-2 – the final progression into the outro into the silence.
Yes, that’s what I have understood, and that’s what I have done with BBmanager.
But once again, if I press and hold the pedal for at least two beats to transition, the BB will play the part 2, but won’t wait the end of the wav file part 1, which is much longer than 4 beats (depends of the songs, but can be between 1 and 2 minutes)
I have just made a test, and the part 2 is played, while the part1 is not finished, so we ear both at the same time !
Right: Transitions happen at the end of the bar in which you release the pedal. So if your part is 16 bars long and you transition in the 12th bar, well, you transition at the end of the 12th bar.
Also, you have a bit of a misconception here: BB is NOT playing a .wav file, it is playing a MIDI file. Because MIDI files are organized like music (notes and beats and bars, oh my!), BB transitions where you tell it to. But if you have assigned a .wav file to a note, it plays that .wav file in its entirety even if it crosses the boundaries of a MIDI transition. In other words, if you have a 16-bar-long .wav file and you transition at the 12th bar, BB will finish playing the .wav file even though the next bar has started.
The only way around this is to combine the notes that hold the various parts into choke groups that squelch the first .wav when the second one plays. that’s complex and fraught with errors, so I would cut the .wav files down to, let’s say, a bar a piece, and have the note that triggers it play at the beginning of each bar in the progression.
ok, imagine that the chorus is 16 bars.
So I would cut the corresponding .wav file into 16 parts.
When playing, and when the chorus is finished, I would press the pedal, but not at any time, precisely between the first beat and the las beat of the 16th bar Am I right ?
If that’s the only way, it’s very dangerous, because if I don’t click at the right time, it will be a mess !!
Yes. And it’s not hard – it’s how anyone using the BB as intended actually does it as a matter of course.
But might I suggest that, instead of adding such a huge .wav file to a custom kit for each song, that you take advantage of the MIDI capabilities? You must be creating a drum set for each song that is two or three huge .wav files. It must take a ton of time to load. And to get control of it, you will have sync the BB beat/tempo to the tempo of the .wav files (and never vary it or you will go out of sync).
In fact, that tempo sync might be what’s keeping you from accomplishing what you are trying to do the way you are currently trying to do it.
So let me ask you this: How are you constructing songs? Are they truly one to three huge .wav files loaded into a drum kit and triggered by notes in the song parts?
Thanks for your answer Joe, and for all the solutions you bring to me !
How we are constructing our songs ? We have recorded both bass and drum, in 1 file, containing intro+theme / theme /theme + outro.
Then, with a software, we have cutted it in 3 parts. The most difficulty is part 2 : as it has to be loop played, the end of this part must perfectly matches with the beginning of it !
Last thing, we use a looper, Boss RC-300, which does exactly what we need (it has 3 tracks, and we can configure each on of it : single play or loop)
But the RC300 is quite big, compared to the BB, and the idea was to have all songs in the BB (we also use the BB with included standard ryhtms). So only 1 device on stage, with minimum size !
Okay, that’s what I thought. The BB is intended to be a MIDI looper, not an audio looper. But there is no reason why you can’t try to bend it to your will.
The biggest challenge is making sure your audio tempo exactly matches the BB tempo so things line up. But if you get the beats in the audio file to match the beats in the BB tempo, then you should be able to transition reliably with the standard press-and-hold in the last bar of the progression.
What I would do is add a BB snare on the 3 of every bar (assuming 4/4 time) to test your files and make sure they align. If they don’t, you have a tempo problem you need to fix before you take it to the stage. You can delete the extra MIDI note later, but I’d make this part of your file development process.
If you do that, then you can have an intro (with a BB MIDI 4-count!), a single part that includes (for example) a verse and a chorus, a single part that has a bridge or a solo (or one of each), and a single part that has a final chorus and outro. If you can find the last bar (spoiler alert: you can!), then you can use the standard transition to cycle through the parts.
!