Re: drum machines and looping

[Kim Flint <kflint@chromatic.com>]

At 04:53 PM 4/23/98 +0100, you wrote:
>Thinking about bringing the old HR-16 out of retirement.  Now, I could be 
>wrong
>here but:
>
>1)   I am under the impression that one can, with a JamMan, have the old 
>beast
>drive the midi time to the drum machine
>
>2)  I am also under the impression that one can have the looper slave to 
>the
>drum machine and have the loop lengths determined by the length of the 
>drum
>loop, but:
>
>        a) the JamMan will occassionally pop because the audio loop is not
>sample accurate             in relation to the HR16.
>
>        b)  Odd time signatures are a problem.
>
>Now, I like the idea of having the tempo of the hr-16 vary slightly (by 
>setting
>the time with tapping the JM).  It would seem that option #1 would be the
way to
>go.
>
>Now the question is-  am I deluded?  Will this work?  and more 
>importantly- has
>anyone here done this (considering the midi prowess of those on the list
here, I
>would think that (if this is possible) many of you guys have.  Does 
>anyone else
>out there still use the HR-16 at all, or in this type of rig in 
>particular?


well, I don't use a jamman of course, but it happens I still use an HR-16!
(HR-16B, actually, which had a different sample set...) I primarily use it
for the sort of thing you are talking about, as a way to generate and
receive midi clock in conjuction with the echoplexes. It's worked 
flawlessly
for me in that role for a long time. (in fact, that's what I used to test
midi clock sync on the echoplex....) 

I especially like that I can use the slider control for tempo adjust, as
well as the arrow buttons, and the nicely backlit display tells me the BPM.
Very handy for setting tempos to other devices, and the midi clock tempo
seems to remain very stable. I'll probably keep mine around forever just 
for
that purpose. When it's receiving clock it works great, locks right into 
the
tempo defined by the loop. It's really nice to play something into the loop
and have the drum machine jump right in at the correct tempo, with minimal
effort on my part. Too bad realy drummers don't do that. :-)

The samples are kinda limited, of course, but if you use the tuning to 
shift
them way out of their range, and maybe play around with distortion, eq, or
other effects on the different outputs, you can get some pretty interesting
results. Having four outputs is nice, too.


>PS: Kim Flint (a rock and roll name if there ever was one) 

I'm clearly missing my rock star calling....

>is the cat's pajamas.

hey, I don't even have a cat!

kim
________________________________________________________
Kim Flint                      408-752-9284
Mpact System Engineering       kflint@chromatic.com
Chromatic Research             http://www.chromatic.com