Randomized Hits
Chance Options in DAWs and Apps
The Time Guru metronome (see methodology section) uses a random slider with a percentage setting to select the probability of drum hits being played. A gradual fade option is added to this “random mute slider”:
Many DAWs and plugins offer functions to set the play probabilities although as a standard for some DAWs this is a recent1 evolution.
Drum Kit Mutes
The next exercise applies this idea to a drum kit by randomly fading out certain parts of the drum kit, limited for the sake of this example to bass drum, snare, and hi-hat. Although fades happen randomly, the exercise was constructed so that there are no long blanks with every element of the kit being muted. This silence setting is one key element in finding the right difficulty level for this exercise.
The objectives can be varied—for example, as in the previous exercise, use a simple exercise and play along without losing time, or for more advanced players, increase the fade times and play more advanced improvisations or exercises.
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A chance setting for notes was only introduced in Ableton 11 in February 2021. ↩︎