User manual

360
The MIDI editors
Ö All settings in a drum map (except the Pitch) can be
changed directly in the drum sound list or in the Drum
Map Setup dialog (see “The Drum Map Setup dialog” on
page 361).
Note that the changes you make will affect all tracks that use the drum
map.
About Pitch, I-note and O-note
This can be a somewhat confusing area, but once you’ve
grasped how it all works it’s not very complicated. Going
through the following “theory” will help you make the most
out of the drum map concept – especially if you want to
create your own drum maps.
As mentioned earlier, a drum map is a kind of “filter”,
transforming notes according to the settings in the map. It
does this transformation twice; once when it receives an
incoming note (i.e. when you play a note on your MIDI
controller) and once when a note is sent from the program
to the MIDI sound device.
In the following example, we have modified the drum map,
so that the Bass Drum sound has different Pitch, I-note
and O-note values.
I-notes (input notes)
Let’s look at what happens on input: When you play a note
on your MIDI instrument, the program will look for this note
number among the I-notes in the drum map. In our case, if
you play the note A1, the program will find that this is the I-
note of the Bass Drum sound.
This is where the first transformation happens: the note
will get a new note number according to the Pitch setting
for the drum sound. In our case, the note will be trans-
formed to a C1 note, because that is the pitch of the Bass
Drum sound. If you record the note, it will be recorded as a
C1 note.
O-notes (output notes)
The next step is the output. This is what happens when
you play back the recorded note, or when the note you
play is sent back out to a MIDI instrument in real time
(MIDI Thru):
The program checks the drum map and finds the drum
sound with the pitch of the note. In our case, this is a C1
note and the drum sound is the Bass Drum. Before the
note is sent to the MIDI output, the second transformation
takes place: the note number is changed to that of the O-
note for the sound. In our example, the note sent to the
MIDI instrument will be a B0 note.
Usage
So, what’s the point of all this? Again, the purposes are
different for I-notes and O-notes:
Ö Changing the I-note settings allows you to choose
which keys will play which drum sounds, when playing or
recording from a MIDI instrument.
For example, you may want to place some drum sounds near each other
on the keyboard so that they can be easily played together, move sounds
so that the most important sounds can be played from a short keyboard,
play a sound from a black key instead of a white, and so on.
If you never play your drum parts from a MIDI controller (but draw them in
the editor) you don’t need to care about the I-note setting.
Ö The O-note settings let you set things up so that the
“Bass Drum” sound really plays a bass drum.
If you’re using a MIDI instrument in which the bass drum sound is on the
C2 key, you set the O-note for the Bass Drum sound to C2. When you
switch to another instrument (in which the bass drum is on C1) you want
the Bass Drum O-note set to C1. Once you have set up drum maps for
all your MIDI instruments, you don’t have to care about this anymore –
you just select another drum map when you want to use another MIDI in-
strument for drum sounds.
I-note This is the “input note” for the drum sound. When this
MIDI note is sent into Cubase, (i.e. played by you), the
note will be mapped to the corresponding drum sound
(and automatically transposed according to the Pitch set-
ting for the sound).
O-note This is the “output note”, i.e. the MIDI note number that is
sent out every time the drum sound is played back.
Channel The drum sound will be played back on this MIDI channel.
Output The drum sound will be played back on this MIDI output.
If you set this to “Default”, the MIDI output selected for
the track will be used.
Column Description