Ableton Forum

do i have to actually record the shakers as the drums are playing? is ave a one shot sample of it possible for me if i have a one shot sample of a shaker and then draw it on the grid and mess with the velocity? heres an example of the shakers in the background

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sm4hZQ9UrMY

take simpler, load a shaker sample and draw many 16th notes and adjust velocity. maybe play around with adsr in simpler so that it fits the other drums/groove. maybe try some different note lenghts. don't forget eq and then some sidechain on your shaker track. adjust attack, release and treshold

swing helps alot too!

Sounds like a small tambourine/jingle stick actually recorded, dirtied up, and looped.

random on velocity, use various different samples and trigger them randomly, select one sample that you use on the beats with accent (the 2 and the 4 in most cases)

there is good post on this subject on the forum somewhere, which actually breaks down the different velocities you should use on the different (16th) notes... i tried it and it sounds pretty good... have a search for it... wasn't that long ago.

...

I would also think that a shaker would make a different sound depending on whether it's going up or down so you would need at least 2 samples alternating, and then work with the velocities.

Hold a shaker in your hand and shake it in front of a microphone. easy and simple.

ShickerShackerSHICKerShacker

or

SHICKerShackerShickerShacker


SHICK > Shick > Shack > er

plus some randomness

lapieuvre wrote:Hold a shaker in your hand and shake it in front of a microphone. easy and simple.

It's a sad sign of the dark side of the software revolution that it took a few replies to get to the correct one. People are so out of touch with the wonders of sound.

Stick some rice in a small plastic container. Shaking this, even through your built in mic on your computer, will probably sound funkier than clinically messing around with one shot samples and velocities.

I remember reading years ago about a guy who used to get hired in by big bands in the 80s like Duran Duran, just to add shaker parts at the last minute, if the track just wasn't 'grooving' enough.

He had an attache case full of those old little plastic 35mm film canisters, all filled with differing sizes of grain for timbre. You know, salt in one, lentils in another etc. He used to come in, listen to the track, pick an appropriate cannister or two, and shake them into a mono mic.

Made a living out of that!

lapieuvre is right - the simplest solution is often the best. You can always warp the resultant loop if your timing is shoddy. That's the joy of Ableton!

If natural is your goal, buy a cheap egg shaker and record it. Those organic elements can breathe life into sequenced drum parts.

shuutobi wrote:Sounds like a small tambourine/jingle stick actually recorded, dirtied up, and looped.

Yeah, a tambourine, probably pitched down a bit - NO WARPING! Old Skool Stylee

Tambourines cost a bit more to buy, but anyone serious about creating grooves should spend the 20 quid and have one lying around. Well worth it.

this is a case when you do want at least a prerecorded loop and not just single-shot samples. though loops may work OK.

right now at esoundz you can get their 'world grooves' xpansion tank for $10, which has a good number of shaker loops (maybe 40-50 in it of different types + ~20 tambourine loops. (+ doumbek/shika/udu/etc. loops). it's not bad and it's very cheap. uses the free sampletank to play them back, but it syncs to tempo etc.

if you're willing to pay for them, this is probably the ultimate shaker library:
http://ninevoltaudio.com/products/shimm ... shake.html
you need a gigabyte of shaker samples, don't you? (i don't have this one, hard for me to justify as a hobbyist $70 for shaker loops, but if i ever get serious, it's a pretty impressive collection).

the best, of course, is to just do your own - shakers are cheap to diy, and they don't really require a perfect recording chain since they are noisy sources anyways - but if you're doing music on the train to work or something, then you could use one of the above.

1/4 cup of rice
pour rice in small container
Shake
Warp to taste
Enjoy!

lapieuvre wrote:Hold a shaker in your hand and shake it in front of a microphone. easy and simple.

+1