Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Note Repeat in FL Studio, just like an MPC!

The note repeat function on Akai MPCs allows you to trigger a sampler at an interval you chose just by holding down a pad; you hold down a pad, a hihat plays eighth notes or whatever. I'm pretty sure that some midi pad controllers from Akai can do this, just by sending a bunch of note messages when you hold down the pad, but if you have a pad controller that can't do this, there's still a way. The Korg Padkontrol's roll function can sort of do this, but it kind of sucks.

To do this in FL Studio, I'm going to use a layer with the FPC and a normal sampler channel as children.Layer controlling FPC and Sampler in FL studio In the normal sampler channel, I've put a sample of a hihat in, and set the root note and note range to the note that corresponds to the pad I want to use for the hihat. What? Well, the pad I want to use on the Padkontrol sends out F#4 notes when I hit it. Since both the FPC and sampler channel are being controlled by the layer, both of them will recieve all of the notes from the Padkontrol. By left-clicking F#4 on the keyboard in the channel settings window, it will only respond to F#4, and then by right clicking F#4, I make sure it plays at the right pitch.Root note set to F#4 If you screw up, there's a reset button in the MISC tab.
Now that I'm triggering the hihat with the right pad, I can set it to repeat. In the FUNC tab of the sampler, turn the arpeggiator on. I don't think it matters which mode (ascending, descending...) you use, since it's only going to be playing one note. Set the CHORD to (none), this is pretty important. Set the TIME knob until it's playing the speed you want, .Arpeggiator set for note repeatand you're done, pretty much. Put some drum sounds into the FPC, make sure you have the Layer selected, and play away. If you really want to, you could make another sampler channel on a different note for a double time hihat or something.
Usually, I just play the hihats normally with my Padkontrol, but this could be fun, especially with super fast buzzing samples all over the place. Here's a zipped loop file, if you don't have a Padkontrol, you'll have to edit it.

And here's a bad example,

Note Repeat

9 comments:

  1. You know what would be sweet? We should go to the school sometime and sample like... every single percussive instrument there. We'd be so rich with good samples.

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  2. Is there an application for this if you don't have a padKontrol?

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  3. I'm not sure what you mean, if you don't have a hardware midi controller,i it's pretty useless, although you can use the typing keyboard as a midi keyboard.

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  4. I don't know what i"m doing wrong but for some reason it's not letting me play anything else in the FPC without note repeating that too and the pitch gets off. Any suggestions?

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  5. Just wondering what is the purpose of having the 'Note Repeat.zip'? Don't need it!

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  6. Nevermind that dumb question above. Just woke up!

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  7. I, of course, a newcomer to this blog, but the author does not agree

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  8. You can definitely get a different sound with this method, especially if you play with the time knob while playing.

    I like this tactile approach, instead of always clicking it in.

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