Keyboard basics (part 1) - White Keys

Congratulations! After 3 weeks of learning how to use the Redrum Drum Machine, we are all getting pretty good at making drum beats. Now we're ready to start looking at the other cool instruments and sounds that Reason has to offer.

There are two goals for today:
1) Learn the keys of the keyboard
2) Learn how to create an NN19 sample player and load sounds into it.
Keys of the Keyboard

OK, here's one thing you need to understand: there are only 12 notes that you can play!

Here is what they look like:


Now, you may be thinking, "But I've seen a piano before and I know they've got a lot more than 12 of those things on them". Take a look at this picture of a full sized piano keyboard:
Notice any patterns?

So, basically this whole keyboard is made up of sets of these 12 notes repeating. A set of 12 notes is called an octave. As you go to the right, the pitch gets higher, as you go to the left, the pitch gets lower, but there are always just 12 notes.

"What are the names of these notes, Mr. Runde?" you ask.

• The white keys are just the first 7 letters of the alphabet (A-B-C-D-E-F-G) repeating over and over.
• The black keys are extra things called sharps and flats.

We'll talk more about the black keys later, but for now lets concentrate on the white keys:
What is the name of the first note on the left? What happens when you go 12 notes to the right? What do you think the next white note to the right will be?

So, if you play each of these white keys in order, from C to C, you will be playing what is called the C Major scale. We will be working on this tomorrow but for now, just REMEMBER...

The white keys are just the first 7 letters of the alphabet (A-B-C-D-E-F-G).

The NN19

The NN19 is a type of instrument called a sampler. It lets you load the sounds of all kinds of instruments and play them with your keyboard.

Loading sounds with the NN19 is simple. Let's practice loading a piano sound into it:

1. Go to Create>NN19
2. Click on the folder icon in the upper left corner of the screen
3. Go into Reason Factory Sound Bank>NN19 Patches>Pianos and Keyboards
4. Find the patch called Bright Piano.smp and double click on it.
5. Now when you play some notes on your keyboard, you should hear the sound of a piano. Practice playing the C Major scale and pay attention to what it sounds like. What kind of feeling does it have?
6. When you are finished, try loading different sounds and pay attention to which ones sound cool.

Quiz 9/12

Super easy quiz today.

You are going to make me a beat that has 2 different 32-step patterns in the Sequencer Window.
For this quiz, please do the following:

1. Copy the Reason file called "Quiz 9-12.rns" to your folder. You can find it in the Pickupdropoff folder or get it from Mr. Runde.
2. Open the file and listen to the piano melody.
3. Create a Redrum Drum Machine.
   
4. Make a 2-bar (32 step) beat to go with the piano melody. Copy the pattern into the Sequencer window.
5. Copy both the drum beat and the piano melody so that they end on Bar 9.
6. Create a second 32-step drum beat on Pattern 2 in the Redrum.
7. Copy that into the Sequencer starting at Bar 9 and ending at Bar 11.
8. Now Copy the piano melody one more time so that it starts on Bar 11.
   
9. Copy your first beat so that it goes with the piano melody to the end (starts on Bar 11, ends on Bar 15.)The final song should look something like this:
10. Go to File>Save As and change the name of the file to (your name)_Quiz 9-12.rns.
11. Turn put a copy of the file in the pickupdropoff folder or turn it in to Mr. Runde.
12. Have yourself a lovely weekend!
    

More 32 Step Practice (Copying and Pasting Regions)

Today we're going to do 2 things:

1. Practice making beats that are 2 bars long (aka 32 steps)
2. Start to build our songs by copying and pasting regions in the Sequencer Window.

First of all, what are regions?

Regions are the building blocks you use to put together a song in Reason. They look like colored blocks in the Sequencer Window. Like this...

We have been creating regions everytime we did Copy Pattern to Track with the Redrum.

The cool thing is, once you've got a region in the Sequencer Window, you can copy it as many times as you want to quickly stretch your beat out.

To copy just do this:

1. Hold down the Option key on your keyboard.
   
2. Click and drag the region you want to copy to wherever you want to put it.
   

OK, so your assignment today is the following:

1. Get the file called "Calabria.rns" from either the Pickupdropoff folder, or from Mr. Runde's Jump drive.
2. Open the file and listen to the melody.
3. Create a Redrum drum machine and make a 2-bar (32 step beat) to go along with it.
4. Copy the pattern to the Sequencer window (Copy Pattern to Track).
5. Now Copy and Paste both the drums and the saxophone regions so that they end on Bar 9.
6. Save the file in your folder as (your name)_Calabria.rns and raise your hand to get the second part of the assignment from Mr. Runde.

Don't forget to turn off the Enable Pattern Section on your Redrum!!!

Making longer beats (32 steps)

Today we're going to work on making longer beats

So far, we've been making beats that are 1 bar long (aka 16 steps) with the Redrum. In the real world, a lot of beats are longer than that. It's easy to make a longer (say 2-bars) pattern in Redrum.

2 simple steps:

1. Increase the number of steps. Question: If you normally have 16 steps to work with and you want to make your beat twice as long, how many steps should you increase it to?

2. Use the toggle switch to choose which set of steps you are working on. If you normally work with Steps 1-16, but you just made your beat twice as long, which other set of steps are you going to need to work with.


And that's pretty much it.

Your assigment today is to make a beat that contains...

• A pattern that is 32 steps long.
• A pattern that is 16 steps long.

1. Copy the file Redrum 32 Steps.rns from the Pickupdropoff folder (or ask Mr. Runde for his jump drive) into your folder.

2. Open the file and hit spacebar to listen to the melody.

3. Now load some sounds into the Redrum and make a 32 step beat to go with the melody. Use Copy Pattern to Track to get the beat into the Sequencer window.

4. When you've finished with that beat, put the L marker on the 3 and the R Marker on the 4. 

5. In the Redrum, go to Pattern 2. Set the # of Pattern Steps to 16 and make a new beat.

6. When you finish, used Copy Pattern to Track to get it into the Sequencer.

7. Turn off Enable Pattern Section. 

8. Hold down the Option button on your keyboard and click and drag your first beat (32 steps) over to the right so that it starts on Bar 4.

9. Move the L marker to the 1 and the R marker to the 6.  

10. Hit Play (Spacebar) and listen to the whole beat.

Quiz 9/5

For today's quiz, all I want you to do is make a short beat that includes the two main things we've covered this week:

1. Loading individual sounds into the Redrum.
2. Getting your patterns into the Sequencer Window.

This beat can be super short (as short as 2 bars, if you want), but it should include:

• At least 4 different drum sounds (bass, snare, hi hat, etc.) not from a premade drum kit. (4 points)
  
• At least 2 different alternating patterns. (6points)
  

MOST IMPORTANT PART:

When you finish making the beat, you need to SAVE the file as (your name)_quiz 9-5-08.rns and then turn in a copy of the file to me.

You can turn it in in one of two ways:

1. Put it in the dropoffpickup folder (Dropoffpickup>Runde>dropoff>Period 5)
2. Copy it onto my jump drive. Raise your handand let me know you want to do it this way.
   

Thanks and have a great weekend!

Switching between two Redrum patterns

OK, so now we're familiar with making our beats in Redrum and we know how to load our own sounds.

Now let's take it a step further and make a beat that automatically switches up on its own. In order to make that happen, we need to start working with the Sequencer Window, which is the part at the bottom of your screen.

The Sequencer Window is the part of Reason where you can record notes and build a song.

For today's assignment, we're going to learn how to get your beats out of Redrum and into the Sequencer so that you can switch up the beat.

1. Open the file called "2 Redrum patterns" (check board for instructions on how to get the file.
2. Change the Tempo to 76 BPMs.
   
3. There should already be a Redrum created for you. Please load the following sounds into the following slots of the Redrum:
1. Slot 1 (Bass) - BD_Boomer
   
2. Slot 2 (Clap) - Clp_Boom
3. Slot 3 (Snare) - Sd3_SupaFunky
4. Start by working with the Clap: click on Boxes 5 and 13.
5. Now add the Bass: click on Boxes 1, 4, 7, 11 and 14.
6. Now we're going to work with a different pattern, so click on Pattern 2.
7. In Pattern 2, select the Snare (Slot 3) and click on Boxes 1, 4, 7, 10, 11, 13, 15 and 16.
8. OK, here's where it gets slightly tricky...you need to use the Left (L) and Right (R) Markers in the Sequencer Window to mark off a small section. All you need to do is move the R Marker onto Bar 5.
   
9. Once you've done that, click on the Pattern 1 button.
10. Now go to the Edit Menu at the top of the Screen and Click on Copy to Track.
11. Now adjust the L and R markers so that R is on 9 and L is on 5.
12. Click on Pattern 2.
13. Again, go to Edit>Copy Pattern to Track.
14. What you should have now is 2 different beat patterns of 4 bars each.
15. Set the L Marker back to the very beginning of the song (Bar 1). The whole song should be able to loop now, switching off between the two beats automatically.
16. For a final touch, unmute the Track called NN19 by hitting the Red M button and listen to the whole thing playing together. Sound familiar?
17. When you're done remaking this beat, go ahead and Save it in your folder as (your name)_A Milli.
18. IMPORTANT:  Please also put a copy in my dropoff folder (Pickupdropoff>Runde>dropoff>Period 5)

And you're done for today!

Creating custom drum kits in the Redrum

Last week, we got familiar with loading different drum kits into the Redrum. This week, we're going to be focussing on loading individual sounds.

Why would loading individual sounds be a cool thing?

So, we remember that to load drum kits, we just click on the folder icon in the bottom left corner and then go to Reason Factory Sound Bank>Redrum Drum Kits. From there you just go through the different folders' styles of music and find one you like, right?

Loading individual sounds is a similar process, but you do it from a different section of the Redrum. Instead of going to the folder icon in the lower left part of the drum machine, you click on the folder icon at the top of each indidual drum sound: From there, navigate to the following folder:

Reason Factory Sound Bank>Redrum Drum Kits>Xclusive Drums Sorted

What do you see inside this folder? What do you think are in these subfolders?

Using the Xclusive Drums gives you the freedom to mix and match all the best drum sounds Reason has to offer. This way, you can really start to make your beats sound the way you want them to without settling for the preset drum sounds.

Assignment:

Create a customized Redrum drum kit that has at least one instrument from each of the following categories:

• Bass drum
• Snare or clap
• Hi Hat
• one other instrument of your choice (Rimshot, Cymbals, Hi Percussion, Low Percussion, etc.)
  

Now make an original beat using your customized sounds.

If you finish making your own beat, click here to learn how to remake a famous beat.