Splitting the Drum Staff into Individual Drum Staves |
In MIDI files, the notes for drum kit instruments are typically kept in a single staff. Even though most percussion instruments do not have pitches, the various instruments are assigned unique pseudo pitches to distinguish the multiple percussion instruments that can be simultaneously playing in a staff. To learn about viewing and editing the drum note pitches for a MIDI device, see Managing Drum Note Lists. When Composer first transcribes a percussion staff, it will display the drum notes as though they have pitches, as illustrated here:
NOTE: Most drum sounds do not have pitches. However, in MIDI files, different types of drum sounds are distinguished by pseudo pitches. Instead of displaying sharps and flats in front of the drum notes, Composer uses a upward triangle to indicate that the pseudo drum pitch is to be raised by a sharp, and a downward triangle to indicate that the pseudo drum pitch is to be lowered by a flat.
A drum player will not want to try to play from a part notated like the above. The drum player will prefer to play from a part in which the notes for each instrument are displayed on a separate staff line. Composer offers an easy way for you to change a drum pitch staff such as the above to one or more single-line staves, one per each unique percussion instrument. To split a drum note pitch staff into single-line staves, one per each drum instrument:
-- OR -- Type "qspld" for Quick Split Drums.
Composer will replace the original drum staff with one or more staves, one per each unique percussion instrument. For the above example, the result will look like this: Composer will assign each percussion instrument the instrument name (such as "Side Stick") that is associated with the pseudo pitch of the drum sound. For more information, see Managing Drum Note Lists. |