Notes On Using Electric Guitar Loops Imported Into Kronos Drum Track

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Korg Kronos – Electric Guitar Loop Info

Kronos Electric Guitars V3 includes 16 guitar loops. There’s a few things to be said about how they work, so we thought it would be best to write a blog post about how to use them.

Each loop has been loaded into the Kronos Drum track and can be accessed from there. The loops are saved in the User-DD Program Bank, Programs 32-47. However, while the loops are stored in those program slots, the actual program is blank, except for when you turn on the drum track and you will hear the loop play. All you will hear is the loop. Nothing else is included in the program.

The real fun begins when you take those programs and add it to a combi. The loops are added to Part Ten, where the Drum Track usually goes. When you do this, you sync the loop to everything else in the combi. So, you can have drums, bass and guitar all playing at the same time. Any combi that has a guitar loop included will have the key that the loop is in as part of the name. For example, Combi #4 – Big Bad Guitarzan Eb LP, means the loop in that combi is in the key of Eb.

We let you know the key of each loop to give you a heads up on what key to play when the loop is running. The limiting thing about the loops (while they sound great), is that they will only play in “one key at a time”. So anytime the loop is playing in (for example) Big Bad Guitarzan Eb, you have to play in the key of Eb. The same goes for any combi that has a guitar loop included.

We have set all the combis that use the loops so that some of the eight KARMA scenes have the loop tuned on and some of them have the loop turned off. So, during the scenes that the loop is turned off, you can play in any key that you want. You can always mute part ten if you want to turn off the loop at any time.

Another thing to note is the tempo of the combi has to match the tempo of the program, or else the loop will not play correctly when inserted into the combi. So, don’t change the tempo of the combi while the loop is playing. Also note that when your creating you own combi using the loop that you have you make both the program and combi the same tempo.

Here’s a quick guide to the loops and tempos:

Chung Loop 1 – 93.13 BPM
Chung Loop 2 – 64.60 BPM
Chung Loop 3 – 67.39 BPM
Chung Loop 4 – 201.43 BPM
Chung Loop 5 – 96.35 BPM
Chung Loop 6 – 96.35 BPM
Chung Loop 7 – 226.24 BPM

Rock Loop 1 – 60.52 BPM
Rock Loop 2 – 65.72 BPM
Rock Loop 3 – 120.74 BPM
Rock Loop 4 – 56.16 BPM

Power Loop 1 – 70.22 BPM
Power Loop 2 – 66.26 BPM
Power Loop 3 – 55.29 BPM
Power Loop 4 – 87.91 BPM
Power Loop 5 – 68.45 BPM

Loops with the very fast tempos, like Chung Loop 4 – 201.43 BPM are should actually be set at half that tempo (100.71) to have everything sync up correctly.

Please note that not all the guitar loops have been used in our combis. The ones that were left out can be inserted into any custom programs or combis that you would like to make yourself. We choose not to use the loops in all sixteen combis, since we wanted to have a mixed set of both traditional and guitar loops set up in the drum track. Either way it’s something cool and new for Kronos. We hope you will enjoy the results.

For more info on how to turn any kind of loop into a drum pattern: Click Here

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How To Convert WAV File Sample Loops To Korg Kronos User Drum Patterns

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Lot’s of Kronos users have been asking me how we added the guitar loops to our Kronos Electric Guitar sound library. Here’s how…

Load your wav file loop into the Korg Kronos workstation via the disk load. Remember that wav files must be 16 bit. Go to “sampling” and choose the next available Multi Sample slot.

Choose Rename MS and give it a new name. Lets name it “Drum Loop 1”.

Choose page 2: “loop edit”
Go to top right and choose the arrow and scroll to “time slice” and choose it.
That will get you to the “set sample tempo” page:
Beat = how many 1/4 note beats in the loop (1 bar = 4 beats – 2 bars = 8 beats etc.)
Source BPM = must match the tempo of the loop. If you know how many 1/4 note beats are in the loop just set it to the correct amount and the BPM will automatically fill in the correct tempo.

Choose “ok”. That will bring you to the time slice page.

Note the “sensitivity” parameter is set to 25. For most loops it’s OK to leave it at 25. However some loops require you to lower the sensitivity. If you find that your loop has a “gap” in it (Usually one measure) then you need to lower the sensitivity parameter. Usually lowering it to about 10 should work, however we have used loops where it had to be lowered to as low as 3 to get it to work right. Experiment to find the correct setting for your loop. Remember that the higher you set the sensitivity, the more slices your loop will have and the more you will be able to change the tempo of the loop without affecting the pitch.

Choose “save”. That brings up the “save samples & ms” page.

The top section should be the same: Beat & BPM that you already set at the “set sample tempo” page. Do not use the time stretch function or change anything over there. The “save with” parameters must be set as follows: Check program and choose the program slot where you want to save the time sliced loop data. You must also save the program and set it’s category to “drums”. Then it will be visable to the drum track parameters. You can do that later.
Check “seq event” and “pattern” Below you can keep the song, pattern and meter the same unless you already have something else stored in the song or user pattern memory. The meter should stay at 4/4 unless your loop happens to be in another time signature.?Leave the RPPR settings as is: C#2 – Track 1
Choose “save”. That brings you back to the time slice sample page. Choose “exit”

Note that your next available multi sample slot will be filled in with the time slice data. Before moving ahead you should also rename your multi sample. Name it: Drum Loop 1 Time Slice.

Go to “sequencer mode” – Page 10 “Pattern/RPPR”. Hit the start/stop button and if everything has been set correctly you should hear your loop playing. If the loop plays and there is a gap then you have to go back and lower the sensitivity parameter as stated above.

If the loop plays smoothly then first give your drum pattern a name and then choose the arrow in the top right corner of the page and choose “convert to drum track pattern”. Pick where you want the pattern to live and choose “note only”. Leave “all patterns available” blank.

If you have done everything correctly, your sample loop has been converted to a drum pattern and the extra bonus from time slicing the loop means that you can now change the tempo of the loop without affecting the pitch. Note that some loops do this better then others. Large changes in tempo usually affect the sound of the loop.

To get the new user drum pattern into the program or combi that your working with just choose the program that you assigned the time slice data to and the user drum pattern that you assigned the loop to.

After your done, don’t forget to “save sampling data” as a KSC file and also save your new programs/combis as a PCG file. Check out our “working with samples” tutorial for more info.

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Korg Kronos Tutorial – Creating New Drum Kits Using Custom Samples

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When programming our Kronos “Hit Factory” collection, I created six new drum kits using new samples. I quickly found out that there are several steps involved in creating the drum kit and that they all must be done in the right order for everything to work as planned. I figured it would be a good idea to take some notes!

First assemble all your wav samples into one folder. My kits all contain 88 samples and I’ve mapped each sample to one note across the entire 88 note keyboard. The samples that make up the kit usually consist of several kicks, snares, toms, open and closed hi hats, ride and crash cymbals and assorted percussion. Then depending on the style of music your making you can do just about anything. A typical Hip Hop Drum Kit would also have voice samples, orchestra and horn hits, noises, scratches etc.. After everything is prepared your ready to start.

1- Save your folder with the wav samples to your USB hard drive or memory stick. Connect your drive/stick to the Kronos USB port.

2- Choose “disk”, find your USB drive and then your wav folder. Choose your folder and choose “open”. Choose “multiple select”, select all your files and choose “load”. All your files will load in a few seconds.

3- While still in disk mode choose the save tag at the bottom, then choose the save arrow on the top and choose “save sampling data”. You are now about to create a Korg .KSC file – which will save all your samples into one easy to load file. Name your .KSC file, choose “all samples” and then choose OK. Depending on how many samples you have and how fast your drive/stick is, it should take a few minutes for all the samples to be saved to your drive or stick.

Note: There are a couple of different methods of saving your KSC file, depending on which OS your running. To be able to use the best features, including creating your own “User Sample Banks” that will stream from the Kronos SSD, you need to be running version 2.0.2 or later. We recommend that you update to the latest Kronos OS whenever a new OS is available at korg.com. Please check page 154 on your Kronos Operation Guide pdf file that comes with the 2.0.2 download folder for more info on saving KSC files. The 2.0.2 OS will also let you transfer the sounds via ftp in certain set ups. Check your Kronos manuel for more info.


After you have saved the file, remove your drive/stick from the Kronos, connect it to your computer and copy the .KSC file to your computers hard drive. Then you will have a back up in case anything happens to the file on your external drive or stick.

4- Go to Program Mode and pick any of the factory drum kits. You can find them in the INT-F and USER-A banks. Pick the one that comes closest to the style of drum kit that you want to recreate with your new samples. For this example, lets stick with the Hip Hop style and pick Program UA-026 – Urban Hip Hop Kit. Choose the main arrow and choose “write program”, rename it “My Hip Hop Kit” and write the kit to any empty program slot in your Kronos. Essentially you are making a copy of the Urban Hip Hip Kit to work with so you will not change the original program.

5- Go to the “My Hip Hop Kit” program that you just created in the empty slot and go to “global/drum kit”. On the top/left arrow your should see – Urban Hip Hop Kit. Highlight it.  Under Drum Kit choose the next empty drum slot. It should be C06. Under the “sample setup” arrow choose “write drum kit”, then choose OK.

If you have done everything correctly the Urban Hop Drum Kit will now get written to C06. Go back to your kit and choose “rename”, give your kit a new name (something like “my hip hop kit”), choose the sample setup one more time and choose “write drum kits”, choose OK and your new drum kit has now been added into the Kronos internal memory.

Now your almost ready! But first, go to Program/OSC/Pitch to change the multi sample to your new sounds.

 
I have our Drum Kits stored in the Global User-EE Bank.

 

6- Before you start to assemble your kit, you must do one more very important thing. Go back to program mode, find your new “My Hip Hop Kit” program and under OSC/Pitch change the “multisample” from “Urban Hip Hop Kit” to “ My Hip Hop Kit”. Under the main arrow choose “write program” and your all set. If you don’t do this and then begin editing your kit you will be changing the settings on the factory Urban Hip Hop Kit and any program or combi that uses that kit will also change therefore creating a big headache for you!

Fear not. If you happen to change one of the factory kits you can always reload the factory settings.

7- Go back to Global mode – Drum Kit and now your ready to begin assembling your new drum kit. Start with Key A0 if your working on a 88 note keyboard or C2 if your on a 61 note – 5 octave keyboard. You can have up to eight samples on each note. Each with different velocity settings if you wish, Just change the ROM Mono Setting for each sample to RAM Mono if your new samples are in mono or RAM Stereo if they are stereo samples. There are several parameters that you can tweak for each sample to get the sound just the way you want it.

One last thing to note is which samples to put on which keys. This is important since the Kronos internal drum patterns and GE’s use midi note numbers to trigger the samples in each pattern. The easiest way to deal with this is to go through each sample one at a time and simply replace the factory sounds that’s in the Hip Hop Kit to a similar type of sound in your new “My Hip Hop Kit”. In other words, if there is a kick drum on note C1 of the factory kit, then replace the factory kick drum with one of your custom sample kick drums. A snare would replace a snare and so on. Doing this will assure that everything will sound right when triggering your new kit with the factory drum patterns or GE’s.

After you have done some editing don’t forget to again go to the sample set up arrow and choose “write drum kit” to save your new kits changes into memory. Then for safe keeping go back to media mode and save your program and user drum kit as a PCG file. Don’t forget to choose “user drum kits” and the User Bank you have stored the kits into when saving your PCG file.

Remember that while the PCG file stays in memory until you load in something else, you must load in the KSC file each time you power up your Kronos. Just load in the .KSC file that you created with your new samples and you should be ready to start making beats in a couple of minutes. You can also solve this problem by saving your KSC to the Kronos internal hard disk and setting your KSC file to autoload when Kronos starts up. That’s all done in global mode and makes it even easier to start working right away.

If you need any info please contact us at: support@kidnepro.com or just post a reply on our blog.

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