KVR Audio

Ogg Vorbis · Post by **Ogg Vorbis** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 1:00 pm

I've noticed certain pitched kick or conga sounds can be very "ringy" and can clash with the tonality of a track. Seems like the worst thing that can happen is to try retuning the perc and listen to it. Does it sound better? If not, perhaps it can sound better if you deaden the ringing.

wrench45us · Post by **wrench45us** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 1:24 pm

a 'real' drummer will tune their kit to sound good with other elements of the kit -- some sort of multi-tom fill would otherwise be quite jarring. And I've occasionaly seen drummers switching off snares in studio for a particular sound, but never tune a kit to a particular song

and the idea of tuning a hi-hat or cymbals has very limited application in the real world

I think cryophonik has a valid point about if it's all in tune with the key of the song, it's going to lose some punch and all those overtone series are going to get reinforced

otoh, with an orchestra and ringing tympani, they best be in tune and playing the proper notes

dark_virus · Post by **dark_virus** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 1:58 pm

I discovered it's interesting to tune snares and kicks when layering them, but I never tried to tune drum hits to the song.

But also I've noticed that certain kik pitches sits better in the mix.

mail1234 · Post by **mail1234** » Mon Sep 14, 2009 6:55 pm

I dont really see the point in doing this, just try and find a sample that fits your sound as it is. Messing about with your sample's pitch might just end up screwing up the sound of the drum completely.

jancivil · Post by **jancivil** » Wed Sep 16, 2009 8:41 pm

Ogg Vorbis wrote:I've noticed certain pitched kick or conga sounds can be very "ringy" and can clash with the tonality of a track. Seems like the worst thing that can happen is to try retuning the perc and listen to it. Does it sound better? If not, perhaps it can sound better if you deaden the ringing.

Yeah, timbales for instance can be really out in some keys, or with some sonorities, what-have-you and there's no help for it. To damp some things like a timbale much at all goes against the sound of that drum, & if it doesn't sound good, it may not be a good choice to begin with.

Things like congas, LP in general, in samples are often going to be tuned Just Right, and you need to approach this as choosing the right drum for the track or section rather then retuning the whole drum. NB: to tune a drum is to go around the head, and tune a number of spots by tightening or loosening a screw. It's very subtle. & it's not approached globally, like just raising a fundamental and all harmonics equally. So, if you have to go much more than say ten cents from the orig. sample, it's prob'ly the wrong hit for the gig, ya know?

@ Tony Ostinato: I would only ever really tune melodically or to a harmony specifically as a pretty special effect, such as I mentioned above, the timpani quality of the toms I had gone with occurred to me; I had chosen them in general as fitting with a number of things in the track quite well, and when I doubled them with two timpani I tightened them up just a touch to make the effect jump out some more.

arielgraff · Post by **arielgraff** » Wed Sep 23, 2009 5:22 pm

So given that some people do tune their drums and I read in future music that for example Deadmau5 kicks are tuned to the key of the track, where he attenuates 20-300hz and uses a sub-bass to drive the kick.

Working mostly with Vengeance samples and Ableton Suite 8, if I have a kick, how would I go about:

1. Finding the key my sample is on.
2. Tuning it to the key of the tune?

I use Sampler, but how would I got about finding the root on the sample?

ned5ram · Post by **ned5ram** » Wed Jul 21, 2010 5:18 pm

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From experience I think that tuning drums can be very productive, especially in more tribal/latin/percussion heavy house tracks...

Here's a simple way to go about it.. Find the frequency of the percussion using a spektral analyzer then you can get the note from this. This helps... http://www.podcomplex.com/images/keyboa ... -chart.gif (http://www.podcomplex.com/images/keyboard-note-frequency-chart.gif))

Then from that you can do what you want, tune up/down etc... On thing i would say is that massive amounts of tuning can sound wierd (or can be the desired effect?!) but slight tweaks can help give more groove to a percussion loop...

Play around and see whats best for you but if you want to have a go this works... (or just get melodyne

jancivil · Post by **jancivil** » Wed Jul 21, 2010 10:48 pm

arielgraff wrote:... how would I go about:

1. Finding the key my sample is on.
2. Tuning it to the key of the tune?

I use Sampler, but how would I got about finding the root on the sample?

1) by ear
2) by ear

Use it enough, and then you'll understand. If you use software in lieu of your ear, you won't.

Tuning your Drum/percussive parts in dance music to match the songs original KEY??