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Old 05-16-2020, 09:09 AM   #1
valy
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Default Superior Drummer and e-drums hi-hat pedal issue

I'm having this strange problem with my Yamaha DTXreme III kit and Superior Drummer 3.

Basically, I can record some drums with the hi-hat pedal closed. It sounds fine during recording. But if I play it back, the sound of the hi-hat (open or closed) depends on the current position of the pedal.

For example, if I press the pedal down then press play, the sound is closed. If I release the pedal then press play, the sound is open.

So first: Is the current pedal position not recorded as MIDI data? It seems crazy to imagine that it isn't, but...

I need playback to be determined by the state of the pedal when the recording took place, not the state of it when I actually press play. Any ideas?
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Old 05-16-2020, 09:34 AM   #2
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Have a look at the clip in the MIDI Editor and select the pedal lane to check that the pedal events are captured.

Also, stop pressing the pedal when you play back. Or, at least, turn off Recarm or Input Monitoring. That new pedal message must be getting passed to the plug-in.
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Old 05-16-2020, 11:29 AM   #3
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Quote:
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Have a look at the clip in the MIDI Editor and select the pedal lane to check that the pedal events are captured.

Also, stop pressing the pedal when you play back. Or, at least, turn off Recarm or Input Monitoring. That new pedal message must be getting passed to the plug-in.
Thanks for the response.

What pedal lane should I be looking for? The MIDI notes being recorded are here. Lowest is the kick, above that is what should be a closed hat, and the top are actually open hats (as played).





The problem is that the closed hats don't "stay closed"...during playback, they will be open or closed depending on the current position of the pedal. Turning off Record Enable and Input Monitoring didn't have any effect on that.

I agree that the pedal message is somehow getting passed to the plugin. But what I can't understand is why the pedal position isn't recorded as a part of the performance. It's crazy to imagine hitting play then running over to the drums to physically press the pedal down to get the closed hat sound that you heard when you recorded it...
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Old 05-16-2020, 11:55 AM   #4
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You might need to add a Pedal_off (or ON) event at the start of the clip.

Loads of details are in the Reaper User Guide.
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Last edited by DarkStar; 05-17-2020 at 10:34 AM.
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Old 05-16-2020, 12:10 PM   #5
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Hmm, OK. I will check the user's guide in depth later.

Is this something I'm going to have to do manually for every recorded item? Or I can somehow make Reaper include it if I save it as a track template?
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Old 05-16-2020, 03:47 PM   #6
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I don’t know which CC Yamaha uses, but it’s more likely 4 (foot pedal) rather than 64. To check, insert ReaControlMidi on your track (might be necessary to have it before SD3 in case the data gets swallowed by the VSTi) and activate the MIDI logger. Wiggle the hihat pedal and you should see which CC you are dealing with.

What actually happens I have no idea, though. The messages do arrive at the plugin, so they should also be recorded. I’m stumped at this point.

I never recorded an edrum kit, hopefully someone in the know will chime in.

Last edited by gofer; 05-16-2020 at 03:55 PM.
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Old 05-17-2020, 04:24 PM   #7
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Adding a CC4 event at the start of the MIDI item did indeed force the hi-hat to be closed.

I then tried to record some new MIDI items on the same track, and they show a "04 Foot Pedal MS" lane with correctly recorded CC data...

I tried in a new project and it works there also.

I didn't change anything at all on the drums or in Reaper, so it makes no sense. But as long as it keeps working, I don't really care what was wrong I guess.

Thanks for the advice!
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Old 05-23-2020, 04:12 AM   #8
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Hi,
On my kit I have my hat pedal adjusted so I don't get a all the way open sound when I pick my toes up. Like I would adjust the hi hat clutch on an ac kit.

So if the track is still in record armed when I get off the kit sometimes there's spurious cc4 coming into reaper. Look for the red midi indicator signal on the track.

That's why when I'm recording I leave a bar of record go by and press the pedal down......its what I would subconciously do on an ac kit anyway. This way when the song starts there's always a cc4 with a value of 127(closed) at the head of the track.

Also I have a toolbar button on the midi ed toolbar that triggers a script I got long ago called....show all used cc's. Very handy. Don't know where I got it. Don't know if its in reapack because reapack doesn't work on xp.grrrr. At least they should make reapack be able to import packages offline from another computer.grrrr2

You might find that there is also some other ccs being recorded. Besides my td20 brain I have a dtxtreme iii brain around here. I seem to remember that some of the snares put out positional sensing and that usually is general purpose cc # 16.

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Old 05-23-2020, 06:23 AM   #9
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Quote:
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Hi,
On my kit I have my hat pedal adjusted so I don't get a all the way open sound when I pick my toes up. Like I would adjust the hi hat clutch on an ac kit.

So if the track is still in record armed when I get off the kit sometimes there's spurious cc4 coming into reaper. Look for the red midi indicator signal on the track.

That's why when I'm recording I leave a bar of record go by and press the pedal down......its what I would subconciously do on an ac kit anyway. This way when the song starts there's always a cc4 with a value of 127(closed) at the head of the track.

Also I have a toolbar button on the midi ed toolbar that triggers a script I got long ago called....show all used cc's. Very handy. Don't know where I got it. Don't know if its in reapack because reapack doesn't work on xp.grrrr. At least they should make reapack be able to import packages offline from another computer.grrrr2

You might find that there is also some other ccs being recorded. Besides my td20 brain I have a dtxtreme iii brain around here. I seem to remember that some of the snares put out positional sensing and that usually is general purpose cc # 16.

GL

Guido
Thanks for the tips. It's possible that the pedal was already pressed down when I hit record, causing Reaper to not get a CC4 message at the beginning. I hadn't considered that. I'm going to do as you suggest and let the recording roll for a bar before touch the kit...maybe that will prevent this from happening again.
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Old 06-01-2020, 02:24 PM   #10
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This weekend I did some recording sessions with SD3 and the e-drum kit.

I had the drummer keep his foot off the hi-hat pedal until Reaper was recording, then press the pedal down. That seemed to force Reaper to create the CC4 event in the MIDI item properly.

But for some reason, it would create a bunch of additional CC4 events throughout the MIDI item, even though they all had values of 127. And sometimes during playback, the sound would mistakenly switch to the open hat. But I noticed that strangely, this seemed to occur when I had hi-hat notes selected in the editor area. I guess when you select notes, it selects the CC4 events associated with them...and when those are selected, sometimes they don't work properly.

That seems like a bug, and it wasn't a consistent one either. For example, I could play a MIDI item all the way through and correctly get closed hats, then play it again without selecting anything or changing any parameters and some of the same hats would now be open. It's bizarre as hell...

What I ended up doing on most of the items was just deleting all the CC4 events that got recorded during the performance then manually drawing in a single event prior to the first occurrence of the hi-hat. I could do this because all of the hats in these particular recordings were the same "openness," i.e., there weren't sections with mostly closed hats but a few open hats. For items like that, it seems drawing an event in manually after deleting all the crap that gets recorded is the most foolproof way.

Parts with variable amounts of open and closed hats can still be handled by drawing in the CC4 events, it would just be a little extra work. Better that than to constantly be bombarded with open hats even though the recorded CC4 event shows that the pedal is closed, I guess.
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Old 06-01-2020, 11:19 PM   #11
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This is also a function of how your Hi Hat in the kit responds to CC4 data.
In an ideal world your pedal would be able to generate various different cc4 numbers, each corresponding to a level of opennness or closedness & the VSYi you are using would be able to read interpret and change hihat sounds accdordingly.
But of course it all boils down to how your kit responds to varying pressure on the hihat pedal & if your VSTi is capable of following that data and generating sounds that work.

Certainly SD3 is very well equipped to handle Hi Hat pressure data & most all of the kitsd these days have aprproriate samples, but it would then come down to how your Yamaha kit generates its hi hat data. I only know Roland kits, unfortunately.
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Old 06-02-2020, 07:30 AM   #12
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This is also a function of how your Hi Hat in the kit responds to CC4 data.
In an ideal world your pedal would be able to generate various different cc4 numbers, each corresponding to a level of opennness or closedness & the VSYi you are using would be able to read interpret and change hihat sounds accdordingly.
But of course it all boils down to how your kit responds to varying pressure on the hihat pedal & if your VSTi is capable of following that data and generating sounds that work.

Certainly SD3 is very well equipped to handle Hi Hat pressure data & most all of the kitsd these days have aprproriate samples, but it would then come down to how your Yamaha kit generates its hi hat data. I only know Roland kits, unfortunately.
It does generate different values for CC4. But I guess the pedal is registering changes and creating multiple CC4 events even if the pedal is held down the entire time (for completely closed hats). What doesn't make sense to me is that even if all these events have a value of 127, meaning a completely closed hat, the hat sound will randomly become completely open upon playback. That just doesn't make sense. And I'm not sure what it could have to do with the e-drum kit itself.
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Old 06-02-2020, 07:34 AM   #13
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I mean, I'm sure I could just buy a better (newer) hi-hat pedal, this thing is like ten years old. But I'll draw in the CC4 event manually for now just to save money.
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Old 06-03-2020, 10:42 PM   #14
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(big assumption on my part) I have a roland hihat pedal that is at least as old as yours & I occasionally have to give it a clean-up/service because the ribbon gets dirty or somesuch.

Might be worth googling your pedal and how to maintain it just in case.

Mine tends to start "crackling" by randomly sending wrong values for CC4, so this COULD be your problem.
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Old 06-04-2020, 04:45 AM   #15
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Hi,

Some brains put out a cc4 value every time the hihat is hit.
Also it could be a note mapping issue.

When I trigger superior2 I have my td20 only putting out two midi note values...well besides foot chic and splash....A# for tip and another I can't rember for edge. In superior I have hat control mapped for those two instruments ,not the other articulations.

Look in midi editor to see if you have just three notes coming in. One for tip,one for edge and one for foot chick.
Then in superior look in mapping to make sure you have hh control mapped to the notes for tip and edge.

Hth

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Old 06-04-2020, 12:22 PM   #16
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(big assumption on my part) I have a roland hihat pedal that is at least as old as yours & I occasionally have to give it a clean-up/service because the ribbon gets dirty or somesuch.

Might be worth googling your pedal and how to maintain it just in case.

Mine tends to start "crackling" by randomly sending wrong values for CC4, so this COULD be your problem.
Could be, yeah. I'll check that out
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Old 06-04-2020, 12:23 PM   #17
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LugNut View Post
Hi,

Some brains put out a cc4 value every time the hihat is hit.
Also it could be a note mapping issue.

When I trigger superior2 I have my td20 only putting out two midi note values...well besides foot chic and splash....A# for tip and another I can't rember for edge. In superior I have hat control mapped for those two instruments ,not the other articulations.

Look in midi editor to see if you have just three notes coming in. One for tip,one for edge and one for foot chick.
Then in superior look in mapping to make sure you have hh control mapped to the notes for tip and edge.

Hth

Guido
I have noticed that it creates extra hi-hat notes sometimes for other articulations, and they are usually very low in level (basically inaudible, like 10 velocity or so). So you just delete all those other articulations from the SD3 MIDI mappings?
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Old 06-05-2020, 03:29 AM   #18
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Hi,

No I don't have that issue, but I are you sure its not a threshold deal from other pads? Are those small notes consistant? I mean, could it be an adjacent pad?

I'll find my dtxtreme manual and look at what the hihat settings are.
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Old 06-05-2020, 01:54 PM   #19
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Hi,

No I don't have that issue, but I are you sure its not a threshold deal from other pads? Are those small notes consistant? I mean, could it be an adjacent pad?

I'll find my dtxtreme manual and look at what the hihat settings are.
No they aren't consistent, it's random and there aren't a lot of them. It has to be false triggering from other zones on the pad, but the options on the drum module itself are quite limited. I'm sure there's a way to blacklist them or something on SD3, but honestly deleting them is as simple as a drag selection and hitting Delete so I'm not as bothered by them.

Not sure if or how they are related to the weird CC4 events being created.
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Old 06-07-2020, 12:49 AM   #20
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Did you try seeing if your hihat pedal is cleanable like the roland ones? That is my bet on this one.
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Old 06-07-2020, 11:49 PM   #21
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Did you try seeing if your hihat pedal is cleanable like the roland ones? That is my bet on this one.
Yeah that's what I'm leaning toward given the symptoms. I need to look more into how it actually triggers mechanically, just haven't had time since then. Gonna dive into it soon. Thanks
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Old 06-08-2020, 04:34 AM   #22
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Just to encourage you, I found a "how to" on youtube for my Roland that was very easy to follow & worked pretty well. Hopefully there is the same or similar out there for your Yamaha

Here`s a typical one

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dn48dXFUcGY
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Old 06-08-2020, 08:29 AM   #23
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Hi guys,

As I understand it, valy now has spurious notes of low velocity during a recording. If that is correct , then its highly likely cross talk from another pad.
I've had my fd7 hh pedal since like 2001 and it still functions correctly. It could a been from the 90s.
No offsense intended Ivan:-)

Valy, is the original problem of unwanted open sounds fixed?
The dtxtreme111 was yammys top line module at the time. I have the dtxtreme..the first one.

If you can identify the pad that is being cross triggered when you hit the hh pad, you can use a higher value specific rejection on the offending pad.

Gl

Guido
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Old 06-08-2020, 10:02 AM   #24
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none taken, mate. My Roland one was used when I got it so it`s at least 10 years old.

Maybe the FP8 was a bad luck purchase as there does seem to be a fair number of users posting youtube videos on how they fixed theirs.

I keep hankering after one of those "proper" Hihat pedal/cymbal arrangements but then I get The Look from the household management when I even hint about it.

On the cross talk issue, I don`t know about Yamahas but I solved that issue by dumping the cheap plastic stand that came with my TD8 and replaced it with a VERY inexpensive used Gibraltar rack. I also added a little extra rubber/neoprene inbetween the clamps on the rack end.
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Old 06-09-2020, 01:20 AM   #25
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LugNut View Post
Hi guys,

As I understand it, valy now has spurious notes of low velocity during a recording. If that is correct , then its highly likely cross talk from another pad.
I've had my fd7 hh pedal since like 2001 and it still functions correctly. It could a been from the 90s.
No offsense intended Ivan:-)

Valy, is the original problem of unwanted open sounds fixed?
The dtxtreme111 was yammys top line module at the time. I have the dtxtreme..the first one.

If you can identify the pad that is being cross triggered when you hit the hh pad, you can use a higher value specific rejection on the offending pad.

Gl

Guido
Could be crosstalk on the extra hits, although it's strange that it could cause the pedal to register as open. What I'm really not understanding is how the CC4 event works in Reaper with SD3.

I can have two CC4 events in the MIDI item, for example. Both will have values of 127, which means a fully closed hi-hat. But when Reaper plays the item, sometimes the events will be closed hat, and sometimes they will be open. That just makes no sense!

There's no reason that I should be able to hit play, hear closed hats, then hit play again without changing anything at all or touching the drum set and hear open hats in the exact same MIDI item!!
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