Jamstix 4 Tutorial

[Otilia Mojarro]

WhenI started experimenting with computer-based drum production, more than two decades ago, the field was rudimentary and everything sounded terrible. Apps like Groove Agent and EZ Drummer weren't stable on my system, and getting plug-ins to work effectively was a struggle. Although the major drum production packages are much more stable and robust today than they were at the time, my frustration led me to experiment with Jamstix. And I loved it. I also knew that I needed to share my knowledge of this software with a wider audience, so I produced the tutorials that you'll find on this page.

These tutorials were produced in Jamstix 3. Version 4 is out now, but you'll find that the interface is fairly similar. I'd like to upgrade my tutorial series to show Jamstix 4, but for now, it's not really necessary. This page will feature an installation video (which some people will skip), plus four detailed tutorials. There's also a lot of written info on this page, which you can review if you want.

If you already know a few basics about music production, such as how to insert an effect onto a channel or how to use a VSTi (virtual instrument on a computer), and you have an audio editor on your computer, you can probably learn how to use Jamstix in an afternoon. And I don't mean just making a simple, static, rigid, and boring kick/snare combination that remains unchanged throughout the whole song. I mean something that sounds like it was played by a real drummer. Incidentally, I have no affiliation with Rayzoon, the company that makes this software.

I know a fair amount about music production, and I when I first started to play with Jamstix, I was able to get up and running and produce my first Jamstix song in about two hours, start to finish. After I spent a week getting familiar with it, I could accomplish the same thing in perhaps twenty minutes. I already had some familiarity with several other drum production software packages, but I liked Jamstix better almost immediately. The other software that I had used before sometimes had some pretty good sample libraries, but I needed to do a lot of work and technical programming to create a drum track. Jamstix, on the other hand, has an Artificial Intelligence engine that they call the AI, or sometimes call "The Brain," which acts like the brain of a human drummer. You give it some simple instructions, and then the Brain composes and plays the track for you. No tedious programming, or adding notes onto a MIDI grid. Yes, you are still able to do that to enhance your drum track if you want, but if you want something simple, you can set about a dozen parameters and the Brain will do everything for you.

- Jamstix simulates a real drummer.

- Most drum modules output static MIDI patterns or pre-recorded patterns. Jamstix doesn't. It has the Brain which simulates a human drummer.

- The Brain's performance is based on rules (but with some random variation added in) to provide a unique output every single time, rather than being based on static patterns.

- As an example, the Brain knows how long it takes for a drummer to move his/her arm to a certain piece of the kit. If you move that piece further away from the drummer, the Brain will compensate by playing it less often or not at all.

- Everything that Jamstix does is playable by a real human drummer, unless of course you specifically tell it to ignore human rules. You can do that if you want to pretend you have a ten-armed drummer.

- Useful for everyone from hacks to studio engineers, novice to professional.

- Create a quick backing drum track, for a songwriter.

- Create and tailor a complex track, for professional producers.

- Good for students learning about drumming styles.

- Even if you're not doing production work, it's very good for casual use, for example if you just want a "jam partner" to practice with.

- Jamstix is fully functional on its own. However, it's also good if you have any other existing drum modules, because Jamstix can take advantage of their libraries.

- Similar to Steinberg's Groove Agent in some ways, in the sense that it's easy to make a quick "out of the box" backing track. Disclaimer: I used to love using Groove Agent, versions 2 and 3. However, Groove Agent 4 is very different than GA3 and I wasn't really that impressed by it. Steinberg did a terrible job with the user manuals on GA4, and the learning curve is difficult.

- If you're used to using EZ Drummer, Battery, Addictive, or BFD, you can still integrate your kits from those modules into Jamstix to take advantage of high quality samples. Now I need to make a clarification here: the quality of the Jamstix sounds is quite good. But some of the other modules have absolutely amazing samples, and if you already own one of the others, you don't want it to go to waste. So a good option is to combine the Brain and simplicity of Jamstix with the strength of the samples from your other module(s).

- There are three types of plug-ins, 32bit, 64bit, and AAX for ProTools 11+. As I write this, I'm currently running version 3 of Jamstix and version 11.2.2 of Pro Tools. They do work together quite well. This was not the case with previous versions of Pro Tools. There is one slight limitation with audio output for Pro Tools users (single stereo master instead of eight lines) but I'll discuss that and a workaround later on.

- Jamstix works with all other VST hosts, as long as they fully support the VST specification properly AND can handle VSTi's. VST's and VSTi's are very related, although a few editors can only handle effects and not instruments. Jamstix works just fine with Ableton, Cubase, Sonar, FL Studio, Digital Performer, Bitwig, Reaper, etc. Please note that two popular audio editors, Audacity and Audition, do NOT currently support VSTi instruments, and you cannot use Jamstix with these two editors (Audition temporarily supported VSTi's in a previous version, but that functionality was removed because it wasn't working well). The fact that Audition and Audacity don't support Jamstix is unfortunate. Some packages will support VST plug-ins but not VSTi instruments. Make sure you know the difference, and check before you buy! I suspect that the Rayzoon website probably lists some other lesser-known working DAW hosts which I haven't listed here.

- If you're already familiar with using VST and VSTi plug-ins with your DAW, even if you consider yourself to be an amateur, I predict that after an afternoon of learning the software, you'll be able to put together good sounding complete drum tracks in about twenty minutes. Of course, you can spend hours doing fine tweaking of your drum track, if you're comfortable with that sort of technical detail, but the basics are fast and easy and don't require a tremendous amount of skill, as my videos will demonstrate.

- I just said that Jamstix is very simple and easy to use. I should clarify that that's true for what you see on the surface. For those of you who are technically inclined, you'll keep learning new stuff and capabilities for weeks. Under the hood, Jamstix is quite complex and powerful.

- For really top-notch results, a lot of professionals might want to feed in a basic MIDI track, let Jamstix generate a proper new track based on the simple MIDI submitted, then route the audio to a different module or sample library of their own.

- The strength of EZDrummer, Addictive, etc., lies in the quality of their sample libraries or sounds. They great if you're comfortable with playing pre-recorded patterns, or if you're a professional drummer yourself playing through a MIDI kit. Only Jamstix has the Brain. And also, you can mix and match parts of kits from Jamstix and other drum modules. For example, you could use a basic kit from EZDrummer combined with cymbal and percussion sounds from Jamstix. Tons of flexibility.

- One drawback: Jamstix does not operate in standalone mode (as of version 3.x). That won't matter to all producers, etc., but it could be a weakness for someone that just wants to use it as a jam partner, but who doesn't own a DAW. So you must have some sort of audio editing software (partial list above) and let that software act as the host, and then have Jamstix as a VST plug-in (or AAX plug-in for Pro Tools). Probably the cheapest DAW software that I can recommend which is still a high quality software package would be Reaper, by Cuckos. Only $60 for a personal license, and you can try it as a full-featured trial for a month for free. Reaper is highly praised. Maybe Jamstix 4 will offer a standalone mode.

- First of all, if you don't know anything about drums, it would be helpful if you know the basic terms and parts of a drum kit. A couple of my recommendations would be to read a book like "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Drums" by Michael Miller, or "Drums For Dummies" by Jeff Strong. You can also find lots of YouTube videos that teach you the basics of what's involved with a drum kit.

- If you want, Jamstix can work like a traditional drum module. You can send it MIDI notes from your DAW (Digital Audio Workstation, or audio editing software) and it then plays. Where do you get the notes? Three choices: random MIDI clips that you've downloaded from the internet, stuff that you've played in with a MIDI drum kit or on any other type of MIDI controller, or MIDI that you've programmed by hand. Your choice, all of those options work if you want to give MIDI to Jamstix. But you don't have to.

- Jam Mode is pretty cool. When you're using Jam mode, Jamstix will synchronize automatically to the position, tempo, and time signature of your DAW host, and play right along. So you use your DAW's controls to start and stop play. When your host plays, Jamstix plays. If you already have a bassline programmed or recorded in your DAW, Jamstix will play the drums along with it and you can sing and play guitar. Or whatever.

- You do NOT need to record the Jamstix performance in your host. It's possible of course, but not necessary. In fact, sometimes recording the performance might be a weakness, because it means that you're "stuck" with that particular version. Remember again, although I haven't explained this in detail yet, that Jamstix takes the parameters you've given it and generates a slightly different performance every time it plays. So if you're using it as a jam partner, you might appreciate hearing a slightly different performance each time. Now of course each performance will be pretty similar, because Jamstix is paying attention to the parameters you've given it, and also paying attention to a complex set of internal rules.

- Further to the above point, what about saving a performance when you're going to shut down your DAW session? Well, you can save that particular "performance" (set of parameters and Jamstix settings) as a unique song, if you want. But if you've got Jamstix all set up within a session, and you save the session, the Jamstix parameters are automatically saved. This is slightly different than some other situations. For example, if I'm using Reason as a slave within Pro Tools as a host, using ReWire technology, when I save my Pro Tools session I need to remember to also save my Reason session separately, and re-load both next time I come back to work on the project. This is not the case for Jamstix. If I have Jamstix inserted on a track in Pro Tools (or whatever DAW) and all the parameters are set properly to perform the way I want along with other tracks in my project, when I save the Pro Tools session, the Jamstix information is all automatically saved within the Pro Tools session. I don't need to save the Jamstix information separately. I guess I might want to save it independently on rare occasions, if I want to use a copy of that Jamstix setup in another project. But in my experience so far, I find it's probably easier to just create a new Jamstix track from scratch, tailored to your new project. It's that easy.

- If you do happen to decide to save a particular unique song from Jamstix, instead of just saving the settings in your host's session, you can save it in the "songs" folder if you want and if so, it will automatically be added to the Quick Start list in the Wizard.

3a8082e126