Latin EZX question

[Mark Williams]

I know I’ve asked a couple questions about the Latin EZX in the past, so forgive me for asking a couple more.

What I’m wondering about is the included MIDI files. I’m looking for some very basic, no-frills shaker and tambourine parts. Parts like http://www.mark-williams.com/dbdshakerloop (this is a copyrighted loop by a friend, btw, so please don’t steal it.)

I’m sure the other stuff is nice, it’s just that for my day-to-day productions, I need much more basic stuff, and I need stuff centered around as many different shakers as possible, as well as a few tambourines. I mostly use these types of grooves as layers alongside of more “traditional” drumkit stuff, not as ethnic percussion. When I listen to the stuff on the Toontrack site, I just can’t tell if the Latin EZX MIDI files are going to fit what I need. All the examples there are much busier and more ethnic in nature, which again is great, I’m sure, it’s just not what I personally need. Note that I’m especially asking about the included MIDI files.

Thanks for the help, everybody.

MBP 2.4 GHz | 4GB RAM | OSX 10.6.8 Logic Pro 9.1.5 | Metric Halo LIO-8/4P | Apogee ONE SD 2.3.0 | EZP 1.1.0 | Drumtracker 1.0.2

Topic

[godprobe]

Not sure if you own Superior or EZ Player Pro or not, but if you do, there’s an option in the groove players where you can ctrl-click (Windows, not sure on Mac) on each instrument that’s used in a MIDI file, to include/exclude each individual instrument in the clip, which might be helpful on the ensemble included MIDI files.

And then there’s the MIDI files that are just the solo instrument… and man… there are a lot… I won’t even consider going to the trouble of listing them all, there’s so many! 😀

But I’ll come close… here’s all the category listing under “Shakers” (and the Tambourines, added at the end)

Caxixi
Additional Caxixi
Small Shaker
Additional Small Shaker
Large Shaker
Additional Large Shaker
Afuche
Shekere
Maracas
Additional Maracas
Tambourine
Additional Tambourine

…for each of the non-“Additional” ones, there are 8-12 grooves, the ones common to all(?) of them being…
8th OnBeat
8th Backbeat
8th OnBeat Shuffle
8th Backbeat Shuffle
16th OnBeat
16th Backbeat
16th OnBeat Shuffle
16th Backbeat Shuffle
…and then additional Crescendo and Hard hits, depending on the instrument.

The Shekere has a few more with “basstones.”

And then, for the ones listed under “Additional”…
…there’s a lot…
For the Caxixi, there are 34 additional grooves grouped into “8th”, “8th Triplets”, and “16th”
For the Small Shaker, there are 29 additional grooves grouped into “16th”, “8th Triplets”, and “16th Shuffle”
For the Large Shaker, there are 29 additional grooves grouped into “16th”, “8th Triplets”, and “16th Shuffle”
The Shekere has additional Straight Martillo and Swing Martillo grooves (16 each)
The Maracas have 7 additional grooves, “4th and 8th”, “8th and 16th”, and “basic pattern variations” 01 through 05

…the Additional Tambourine…
…oh man…
18 grooves under “8th Notes”
13 grooves under “8th Triplets 2”
13 grooves under “8th Triplets 2 and 4”
13 grooves under “8th Triplets 4”
12 grooves under “8th Triplets All 4”
15 grooves under “8th Triplets”
10 grooves under “Shuffle”
20 grooves under “8th Hard”
15 grooves under “8th Hard Swing”
3 grooves under “16th Notes”
and lastly…
1 groove under “16th Hard Swing”

…so… if you copy/paste the MIDI from the solo tambourines into the solo shaker stuff… there’s a lot. 🙂
I have no idea if that actually helps you at all, though.  What strikes me most about your clip compared to the shaker samples I’m hearing in Latin Percussion is how *relaxed* your clip sounds.  The LP samples, to me, nearly all sound more “urgent.”

WinXP | Fireface 800 | Variax | Axe-Fx | Toontrack | Komplete | Reaper http://www.godprobe.com/projects/notemaps/

[Mark Williams]

Thanks so much, godprobe.
I do own Superior and EZPP, so I know exactly what you’re talking about in terms of selecting certain elements of a groove and excluding others.

All the stuff you included is very, very helpful, actually. Just knowing that all those grooves (8ths, 16ths, etc.) are in the included MIDI is great. I wish Toontrack had that kind of info on the product page, actually, but maybe it wouldn’t be as useful to others, I don’t know.

The only thing from your post that might concern me a little is that you said the LP samples sound more “urgent” to you. Hmmm. Very interesting. Is it the samples themselves that sound more “urgent,” or the MIDI grooves? If it’s the samples, is that “urgency” sound due to a certain kind of close-miced, emphasis on transients, brightness? Is it that the shakers in LP are all brighter shakers? I tend towards darker shakers and tambourines in my productions. If it’s the MIDI grooves, is it just that the player was right on top of the beat? I can imagine the kind of thing you might be referring to, which seems present in a lot of Latin music to me. It can sound like a lot of energy and precision and intentionality with the percussion–like the whole song is driven by the percussion section, and it’s usually pretty in-your-face percussion, too.

With everything you’ve given me, I guess that’s the remaining question for me, then. I’m looking for sounds that aren’t overly “present,” generally. Sounds that are secondary (or tertiary) to other elements, whether they be acoustic guitar, pads, or an already-realized drum kit.

godprobe, thanks so much for your help so far. I really, really appreciate it. Anybody else have some thoughts, or even some audio clips in the neighborhood of what I’m talking about?

MBP 2.4 GHz | 4GB RAM | OSX 10.6.8 Logic Pro 9.1.5 | Metric Halo LIO-8/4P | Apogee ONE SD 2.3.0 | EZP 1.1.0 | Drumtracker 1.0.2

[John]

I often use the LP EZX and its MIDI files for Shakers and Tambourine in my songs.
If you check out some of the demos on http://www.rammeltsoderstrom.com, I have definitely used them on the songs “Chico Girl”, “Rescue Me”, “A Brand New Day”, “Living The Better Me” and “Tonight I Come Alive”.
Or do you need isolated audio file examples?

BR,
John

John Rammelt - Toontrack
Technical Advisor

[Mark Williams]

Wow, thanks for all that, John. I’ve been listening to your songs this morning in the studio while getting warmed up for the day.
You’ve got some nice tunes there, man! Thanks for sharing that.

Everything I listened to on your site seemed to be using the tambos (and shakers) as a background layer (esp. tambo during the chorus), which is totally in line with the production of those tunes, of course. Do you have anything (or know of anything) with shakers (and maybe tambourine) being more exposed in a production? Like maybe a ballad or something?

What you shared is definitely helpful, but I’d love to hear something where the shakers are a more prominent mix element. I just pulled up Peter Gabriel’s “Solsbury Hill” as an example–there are two “sandy” sounding shakers, hard panned L and R, that are really obvious all the way from the beginning through to the second refrain. Likewise on Shawn Colvin’s “Climb On (A Back That’s Strong)” throughout the first verse. Different idea, but also very much present on the choruses of Sam Phillips’s song “All Night.” Or the beginning of “The Pearl” by Emmylou Harris. Or the shaker in “Put It There” by McCartney on Flowers. No idea if Chris played that part or not.

Sorry for a strange, random listing of songs. Just trying to hit several options in case anyone knows any of these tunes.

Thanks for the continued help, everyone!

MBP 2.4 GHz | 4GB RAM | OSX 10.6.8 Logic Pro 9.1.5 | Metric Halo LIO-8/4P | Apogee ONE SD 2.3.0 | EZP 1.1.0 | Drumtracker 1.0.2

[Greg]

John, very cool songs on your page,

Intel 13900K, Windows 11 , Cubase Pro 12.0.50, Studio One 5.2.1.64495, 64GB RAM, UA Apollo x4 Thunderbolt, RME UFX – USB 96K, 64 sample buffer size, Radeon 570, 42″ 4k monitor

MIDI controller: Roland A-37, Jamstik Studio, MCU Pro + expander
Drum Brain: Yamaha DTX 900, RHH135 hihat, 2 crash and 1 ride cymbal, 4 toms.

[reginaldtarkington]

Hey guys – you’ve mentioned all of these ‘additional’ MIDI files under shaker, tambourines, maracas, etc. – but my Latin Percussion doesn’t have any of the additional patterns. They have the normal tambourine, shaker, maracas, etc. patterns – but there’s nothing that says ‘additional’.

Am I not looking in the right place – or is it possible I have a different version of LP that you guys do? Is there somewhere I could download the additional MIDI files? They would really come in handy. While I think the normal tambourine patterns are great – it would be really cool to have more options.

[godprobe]

I do see one Latin Percussion update in the downloads area…
http://www.toontrack.com/downloads.asp
…but I’m not certain that’s where the “Additional” grooves came from.  Here’s how they appear in my grooves listing…

WinXP | Fireface 800 | Variax | Axe-Fx | Toontrack | Komplete | Reaper http://www.godprobe.com/projects/notemaps/

[Robshi]

Hi guys. 

Came across this thread on a search. I have similar needs to markham with regards to tambourine for going alongside rock/pop drums. 

I already have the original percussionist vst which came with dfh superior so kind of reticent about buying Latin ezx as the audio is the same just with the midi files. 

I am interested in the claustrophobic ezx though which also has tambourine kit pieces and so I guess some midi for tambourne too. Would this midi do the job or do the songwriters packs have any of this kinda stuff?

There is a sale on ezx in the uk at the mo so if needs be I can buy the latin ezx and at least be paying less for the same audio and convince myself its just the midi I’m paying for but as I like the claustrophobic set anyway it maybe better to just get that. 

Toontrack have you any plans for a rock percussion midi pack?

Cheers guys

Rob

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