How to properly record electric drums

TMCchristian

Junior Member
I have both a Tama Imperialstar which I've had for a few years now, and I've had an electric drumset for about 6 years now which is a DD502 Mk. 1. I use the electric kit for silent practice and for recording drums to song demo's that I record. Here's a song I did a while back to show how they sound recorded:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uHr7C9FXcM

They work decently for the job, but the problem is that I record them out through the mono-out, and there is no way to edit the kit after the track has been recorded because the whole thing is put into one drum track.

What I'd like to do is have it so each piece is recorded onto a separate track (bass has its own track, snare has its own track, hi hats, etc) in my software program that I use which is Audacity. The module has MIDI in and MIDI out, so if I bought a MIDI to USB cable, would this do the trick? Do I need additional hardware/software? I have no clue about any of this so any help would be appreciated.

TMCchristian
 
I'm not familiar with your particular kit but I'll tell you how I do it with my TD20.

The TD20 has multiple audio outputs so I route these to my recorder (it's a stand alone hard disk system) and play live into it. I don't record MIDI messages. To do this on the computer you'd need some form of audio interface to plug the analog outputs of the drum module into. These range from inexpensive 2 channel USB units on up to expensive 16+ channel ones.

Your other option is to record the MIDI output stream into your software via a MIDI interface (some of the inexpensive USB audio interfaces have MIDI ports also). This would allow you to edit the MIDI data directly (to be honest, I don't know enough about Audacity to determine if it will record MIDI data vs. audio, but most commercial recording packages do). After editing, you then route the MIDI data back to the drum module and it plays the module, which you then run into your mixer.

Each method has its advantages/disadvantages.

Here is a tune I recorded a few years ago with the TD-20. I played all parts (drums, mallet percussion, bass). The Return of Wayne Dangre The MP3 quality isn't so great but you can at least get an idea.
 
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