hey hey hey. here are some of the ways i use Live 4 with my drumkat (3.5, i need to upgrade, eh?). for traditional acoustic or electronic drumming, i use the pads on the kat for the main kit along with 2 triggers for crash cymbals. i have created user kits for the Live drum sampler called "Impulse." i set up the some of the kat pads on one midi channel (10) and the remaining pads and 2 additional triggers on midi ch. 11. the "impulse" plug in only allows for 8 samples per midi track and the note numbers are fixed in Live, so, since there are more pads and triggers than 8 on the kat, i make use of another Impulse by creating another instance of it on another midi track set to another midi channel. i then assign the remaining pads and, if desired, triggers to the second Impulse's midi channel (11). i usually reserve 2 trigger inputs for changing kits via control mode and one for my kick trigger. the others i use to trigger loops in Live slots set to "toggle" with quantization set to "none." I use the Impulse mainly for electronic kits as opposed to acoustic ones.
for acoustic kits i use a few things within live. the best of which would be Drumkit from hell Superior (dfhs). it's amazing! however, it needs about a gig (preferable 1.5 to 2) of RAM to load and play one good kit effectively (35GB of samples!). i have also tried the plugsound "drums and percussion" plug in and it is very good and efficient for my machine (mac 1.33 ghz powerbook).
in both these scenarios, i have recorded the performances to midi clips in live and played them back with various arrangement or triggered them as audio OR midi clips.
one of my favorite things to do with the kat and live is to use softsynths (textural drumming) on one midi track for part of a "song." i then switch to a new kit on the kat which is assigned to a new midi channel (corresponding to another track or 2) in live that has a drumset plug in on it for other parts of the "song." that way i can instantly go from being the drum voice, to being the bassline, to being the melody or support in one "song!" this rules. it's really so much fun to do.
i have built a bunch of small round 2 inch triggers that sit in 2 rows of 6 right above my kat and i use those to trigger audio loops in live. i picked up an old casio dz-1 trigger to midi interface for $20 (!) at a local used gear store and i use it to hook up the additional triggers for toggling loops or scenes on and off (an alesis d4 or dm5 would work well, too for cheap). i just midi the dz-1 straight into the kat and put it on it's own midi channel (16).
i also picked up a peavey 1600x midi fader controller for $50 (!) at a pawn shop (they couldn't verify that it really worked) and use it only for its cv pedal inputs. i use the left pedal mainly for pitch bend and the right one for filters, etc. when using softsynths (or electric pianos, etc.). i then use the hatkat pedal for sustain. this works great!
this last show was performed with another musician (great laptop artist) running live simultaneously. i set this up so that his machine is the master sync (midi clock). we run a midi cable out of his usb interface (midiman oxygen 8 usb midi out) into my interface and set my computer to sync to incoming clock (live preferences- sync in). that way all of our loops and tempos are synced as well as any delays and time based fx i use. this also triggers my click (a drum machine playing quarter notes in my little earphone)) which is receiving the same clock via midi. sounds kinda complex but it's actually pretty easy to set up once your figure out the plumbing : )
i hope this helps you and/or somebody else out there to experience the greatness of the drumkat with ableton live. it's truly inspiring to play this way. i love it! how are you using your kat?
mckay
