Someone was looking for an 808 kit, some time ago. They never actually did ask for one, but I’ve been considering this one for some time.
The original 808 produced the following sounds:
bass drum, snare, toms, conga, rimshot, claves, handclap, maraca, cowbell, cymbal, and hi-hat (open and closed).
I’ve taken a professionally sampled set of the Roland tones, and created a BB drum kit. The kit uses mostly 808 tones, but to add some Latin pieces, I also used tones from a CR 78.
Mapping is as follows:
33 Rimshot, two tones, one at velocity 0-113, and the other at 114 to 127. The 114 to 127 tone has been lowered a couple semi-tones to allow its use in metronome functions.
35 An alternate Bass drum, lower that the Bass at 36, with a longer decay
36 Bass drum
37 Claves -interestingly, there is no pure cross stick sound in the 808
38 Snare
39 clap
40 alt snare, similar to 38, but with a different decay
41 Low Tom
42 Closed hat
43 Mid Tom
44 Pedal hat, a different closed hat sound
45 Hi Tom
46 Open Hat
47 Hi Tom 1 - the 45 tom raised 2 semi tones
48 Hi Tom 2 - 45 tom raised 4 semi-tones
49 Crash Cymbal - stock roland cymbal - tone lowered
51 Ride cymbal - The stock cymbal
53 Ride bell - ride with a very short decay
54 Tambourine - from the CR 78
55 Splash stock cymbal, saturated, with a medium decay
57 Crash 2 stock roland cymbal - tone lowered, pitched differently from 49
58 Cowbell
60 Lo Bongo - CR 78
61 Hi Bongo - CR 78
62 Mid Conga
63 High Conga
64 Low Conga
65 High Timbale - CR 78
66 Low Timbale - CR 78
67 High Agogo - 808 Cowbell pitch raised
68 Lo Agogo - 808 Cowbell pitch raised
70 Maracas
73 Digital Guiro - CR 78
If you want to use this to build “with bass” kits, I recommend using the lower 0 through 31 range. If you want to add keys , change the guiro to an open slot, 72 or 58, and start the keys at 72.
Roland_TR_808_Expanded.drm (7.1 MB)
Enjoy.