Difference in mapping EZ drummer and General MIDI?

[BryanMichael]

Hello all,
I realize that EZ drummer has it’s own mapping scheme for the drum hits compared to General MIDI, but what are the differences? How far off is everything? Is there a simple guide one can use to convert an EZ drum track to GM compatible such as “transpose the snare track down a half step, transpose the ride cymbal up a full step, etc…” or even a map of which notes are which drums so one could revise it themselves?

I’d like to use EZ drummer tracks with Abbey Road drums, whcih will require some MIDI tweaking on my part, just looking for a resource.

-thanks!
B

Topic

[godprobe]

If you have EZplayer Pro (free with Superior), that has a mapping conversion from the Toontrack MIDI to other formats.

For the most part, things match up pretty well with GM in the first place though.
Here’s a spreadsheet of (nearly) all of Toontrack’s SD/EZ releases showing the basic default mapping for each…
https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AsWMEXuWvqSIdFBaNnBhTFBBZXJZb1F0UThzVXhibmc&hl=en

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

1

Thanked by: rpm-nj

[BryanMichael]

Hey-
Thanks so much for the reply. I don’t have EZ player, only EZ drummer, but it may be a moot point- I think Native Instruments may have issued a map for Toontrack mapping as an update to Abbey Road Drums. I have not purchased Abbey Road drums yet, I was just trying to figure out if I would have to do a lot of remapping of EZ drum tracks if I did. If anyone can confirm that Abbey Road drums has such a map these days, I would appreciate it- but I understand that is really probably a question for another forum. Thanks again for the response!

Cheers,
B

[Baritonedan]

Thanx so much for that godprobe. I’m workin’ on some new stuff right now that involves using Drumtracker and some Steven Slate stuff, and that little spreadsheet just became totally awesomely handy

[Greg Johnson]

I have Abbey Road 60’s Drums running through the Kontakt 4.1 player as a plugin in PTLE. It was the update of Kontakt Player from ver. 4.0 to ver. 4.1 that added the midi map selector for AR 60’s drums —- AR 70’s drums came with the selector already included (and I assume AR 80’s drums has it built in as well…)

Anyway, In the drop down mapping list in AR Drums, one of the choices is ‘EZ Player.’ Once that is selected, auditioning and selecting loops for your project inside EZ Player is pretty easy. I would spend the $49 for EZ Player immediately to use with AR Drums.

AR Drums comes with no midi files – just the incredibly fantastic drum samples….

So, using EZ player together with these samples opens up a great big, giant can of midi drum whoop-ass. Plus, you can buy the awesome additional Toontrack midi loop packs and your AR Drums will really come to life!

Hope this helps.

GregJ

GregJ

[drufix]

I`m using Abbey Road 70s together with the C&V from Toontrack. Mainly to get a little more room ambiance. I use it with kontakt 4.1 with the ez player mapping. I had to do some mappings but thats very easy to do in the kontakt 4 window.

[BryanMichael]

Forgive my ignorance, but I have Kontakt Player and EZ drummer (both the latest versions) and the Abbey Road 60’s drums (latest version)

and I don’t see a “drop down mapping list” anywhere on the interface! I’ve been clicking everything looking for it, and I can’t seem to find it. Is it only available on KONTAKT (full version not the Player?) Again, thanks for the replies- I really like EZ Drummer, and in all honesty I think I might prefer the sounds of the Toontrack Vintage Rock kit to the Abbey Road for what I’m doing but I’d like to at least get it working so I can have a straight comparison.

THANKS SO MUCH!
_B

[drufix]

I think it´s not present in the 60s maybe I´m wrong. I do have it in both 70s and 80s

[BryanMichael]

Yeah, I read that they added it in the “update” to the 60’s drums or the update of the KONTAKT player, both of which I have installed, but I still don’t see it! Anyone with any experience with this? If I get an answer from NI I’ll post it here as well.

B

[drufix]

When you open the abbey road set you must have the tab drums open and not the mixer. In the tab drums on the right side you´ll find attack, hold and decay. Just below it you´ll find the mapping.

[Greg Johnson]

Also, with the Abbey Road 60’s drums, when you update to the Kontakt 4.1 player, you must do a batch re-save on the .nki presets. This will enable background loading and will likely make the drop down menu appear.

There is some good documentation on the NI user forum regarding this. Sorry I can’t provide a more direct link right now.

Thanks,

GregJ

[BryanMichael]

Thanks so much guys, I got it sorted out.
It looks like clearing the samples, restarting the computer, etc… did the trick. I guess it just had to clear it’s head.

I’m still having some issues with AR drums though, although they are not with EZ Drummer, so I will ask about them in the NI forum.

For the record, after going through all of this, it just made me appreciate the ease of use of EZ Drummer AND the sounds of the Toontrack Vintage Rock kit even more comparing it directly to AR Drums. I think AR breathes a bit more, has those subtle nuances, etc… but it’s also a beast! The Vintage Rock kit seems to sit somewhere between the 60’s and the 70’s and has a really nice “tight” sound that I am really digging. If I could make one suggestion to Toontrack though it would have been to add an extra Tom and some tea towel dampening to this kit- Maybe a Vintage Rock kit PLUS.

Thanks for the help guys.
B

[Peter B.]

Hello, I play Drums with my Yamaha Keyboard. Yamaha has a GM-Drums Map. When I play with my EZDrummer 2 with standalone, the Sounds are very, very better, but I have no GM-Drumset!? What can I do? Is in EZDrummer 3 a GM-Drumset in it? Thanks a lot and musician greatings Peter Bengelmann

[John]

Hi,

EZdrummer 2 follows a GM Extended MIDI map, i.e. it should play back drum GM MIDI (not percussion unless you have a percussion EZX loaded) as expected but offers more articulations.

You can click the Menu in EZdrummer 2, then go to ‘About Sound Libraries’ and next the ‘MIDI layout’ for your EZX, to see which articulations are on which key.

BR,
John

John Rammelt - Toontrack
Technical Advisor

[Author]

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