This is the second part of synthesizing drum sound. The first part covered the kick drum and the snare, now it’s time for the hihats and the hand clap. Let’s dig right into it.

Synthesize Hihats

There are several ways to create a metallic-sounding hihat and it can be rather complex. A simple way though, is to use a pure noise source with HPF, or a square wave with ring modulation. (It’s also possible to mix these two sound sources.)

Set the envelope of the VCA to a slow decay and a quick release time. Play staccato which should render the closed hithat, while a held note produces the open sound. You could of course save two patches with different decay and release to finetune both of the variants.

Add presents to the hihats by boosting at 3 kHz on the EQ.

It’s very hard to mimic recognisable, convincing, metallic percussion. This quest have defeated many before me, thus I’m just letting it be. Still, if you insist of accepting a sound you could use as a cymbal – though it sounds totally unrealistic – then grab a hihat patch, accentuate the high-pass filtered white noise, add a longer decay and release time and put some flanger effect to it.

Synthesize Hand Clap

To achieve something that can be called a hand clap, try to run white noise through a band-pass filter and use two individual EGs to shape the VCA. Modulate the first envelope with a LFO; set to sawtooth and the frequency to about half way, to and render a clap effect. Then set a second envelope to a long decay to add reverb. You should tweak these parameters as you se fit.

Boost the mids on the EQ to make an aggressive snap.

This is the first of two articles about creating drum sounds with a synthesizer. While many of the popular vintage Roland TR-x0x sounds are generated by analog circuitry, it is possible to achieve a variety of drum sounds using a common monosynth.

My aim is to give you some basic ideas and guidelines of the concept – presented as simple as possible. These are, after all, quick and dirty tips and tricks of a rather complex subject.

First off, you can use an analog or a digital synth, even a softsynth, it really doesn’t matter, although it needs to meet the given specifications, like noise source, voltage-controlled amplifier (VCA), preferably a faster envelope generator (EG) and so on. The output will of course differ from different synths.

Ideally, the synth should have a couple of oscillators (VCO, DCO et cetera) with different waveforms, a ring modulator, a white noise generator, high-pass (HPF) and low-pass filters (LPF) able to self-oscillate, ADSR EGs, separate for filter and amplifier, and in a few cases, e.g. hand claps, a low-frequency oscillator (LFO) with selectable waveforms.

Synthesizing the Kick Drum

Use a LPF that can be sent into self-oscillation. Set cutoff to zero, turn up the resonance almost to max. Use a filter envelope to modulate the cutoff in a quick downward sweep, that is, turn up decay, just a little bit. Also give the sound a little release time. The VCF envelope amount should be just over half.

Combine this zap or thud sound with a VCO sine wave or a sub oscillator played on a low note. On the amplification envelope, set a short decay and some release. Go ahead and contour these EG parameters; a slightly longer decay and release time can introduce a tonal quality to the sound (but keep attack and sustain at bay). To get it right, you might need to reduce the VCF EG amount and raise the cutoff frequency just to let the lowest harmonics pass.

You could boost a little in the 50-150 Hz range on an EQ to add some bottom depth.

Synthesizing the Snare

Use a white noise source and two oscillators, i.e. triangle wave, at different pitches. Run the noise through an HPF to add more snap.

For a more complex sound, you could use individual VCAs, filters and contour generators for the noise and the oscillators, and then mix the levels of the three sound sources. If you use a separate HPF for the oscillators, try sending it into self-oscillation, to get that extra tone and resonance.

Contour the VCA (or multiple VCAs) with a just little decay and release (as always, the attack should be instantaneous and a snare drum should never sustain).

Use an EQ and cut the low-end. Boost the mids around 500 Hz to add body to the sound, and raise some at 2.5 kHz for extra snap and attack.

That’s it for now. Here’s a sound example of drums made on the microKORG using this concept, https://soundcloud.com/johaneckerstrom/suffix.