I think my well intentioned learned colleagues are complicating this. You can create a main loop 1 before the audible body of your song starts. Have a four count beat on a non-supported note in a midi file as this main loop. Ex. Any drums and bass only kit without a note at midi 127. When you start this loop, you will have no sound, but will have a visual count going on in the pedal. The main audible body of the song would start in main loop 2. Just transition out if main loop 1 to start the audible part of the song.
Well what I have found to be very useful is the Soundbrenner Core or Pulse. A wearable metronome that gives vibration instead of a addible tone.
cheers
I always have the Visual Metronome (bottom of the Main Pedal tab options) set to Stopped & Playing. That way I can visually follow the metronome (as @Phil_Flood suggested via a different approach) and start the BB (roughly) in sync.
But not good enough for looping with the BB as Clock Master. In this case I need to hear the metronome from my looper (Voicelive 3) via the headphones output.
To make a multi-part song flow without gaps, you need to have a drum note at the end of each section so that the BeatBuddy (BB) can play each section or loop seamlessly. If there isn’t a drum note near the end that I can stretch, I place a drum note with a velocity of 1 to meet the need.
@persist - Can you elaborate on this? What do you mean by “near the end of the track”. I am new to this, but have 12 songs with multiple parts, and none of them have a beats at the end of the part. Some of them I created and some of them are premium. Most of them have a hi-hat or other cymbal on 3, but very few of them have anything in beat 4. (4/4 tracks)
Perhaps, as phil_flood has stated above, there’s probably an easier (read, “correct”) method that will help you create your loops. If he doesn’t reply, I’ll work up an answer for you but it’ll have to be later this week.
BBM alters midi parts that are created in some midi editing programs. I can’t speak to every program, but it does mess with parts created in Logic Pro. Essentially, it moves any blank space at the end of a midi track to the beginning.
This:
Will get altered to this:
To solve this, when working with drums, since the note will play its full sample regardless of the midi note length, you can extend the last drum note to the end of the clip:
This will keep the timing correct. You can do the same thing by using an unsupported note at a low velocity. Here, since the kit has a kick at C1 and not a B0, I have inserted a dummy velocity 1 note at B0.
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I am finding BB Mgr Editor to be very cumbersome. Can’t copy, insert, delete, etc…
Is there a list of reasonably priced, simple to use, DAW software for Windows that you could recommend?
I did look at Ableton (recommended in manual) and way more functionality than I will ever use.
Just need to somehow export BB main loop, fills, transitions, for example into something to then organize, insert measures, delete measures, copy, etc…
Some Windows users report liking MIDI Editor. Not really sure that there’s a simple DAW. Presonus offers a free version of Studio but I didn’t think it was quite user-friendly enough.
I did try PreSonus and Reaper demo versions this week to test, but they only seem work w/ 1 measure midi files.
I tried my multi-measure midi files that I created, but neither DAW likes the multi-measure. Leaves too many blank notes.
Back to tedious editing in BB Mgr. Copy, past, insert and playback from highlighted section would be sooooooooooo helpful.
Try Reaper again. Their trial is a full version that you are asked to pay for after a time.
Is there a trick to being able to import more than 1 measure into Reaper?
My 1 measure patterns import fine, anything larger imports w/ blank notes, silence, etc…
Open Reaper, and then drag and drop the MIDI file into the first channel. Reaper may ask how you want it imported (all parts combined into a single channel or broken out into multiple channels is the big one), and it should import. I’ve never used the File menu to import MIDI files.
What is your MIDI source?
Midi Drum file from my Beat Buddy Drum Machine - created various length patterns and only the 1 bar patterns import correctly.
Based on what you’ve written in your two previous posts, I’m assuming that you created something in the BeatBuddy Manager (BBM), exported to MIDI and brought it into a DAW for further editing? If this is the case, it could have more to do with the BBM export process corrupting the file.
If my assumption is wrong and you’re creating the file entirely in a DAW, it would be hard to guess what’s going on without seeing the MIDI file. If you’d like to attach the file in reply, then perhaps someone could tell you what’s going on.
Yes, Created in BB Mgr and tried importing into Studio One and Reaper for further editing or combining into less parts or OPB.
Not seeing where I have the option to upload the midi files here.
I’ve had issues with “Export as MIDI,” but I don’t think my problems are your problems. If I had to guess, you are right-clicking on a part and selecting “Export MIDI file.” If that’s what you’re doing, then BBM will export the selected part. That is, if the part is a one-press song, it should export the whole thing; if it’s a multi-part song, BBM exports the selected part.
Did that resolve it?
I am only exporting a part - (a bridge or an outro) that I created in BBM but want to edit in either Reaper or Studio One. These parts are more than 1 measure, and while the @ of measures exported, imports correctly into both, most of the data (beats) are missing - long periods of silence.