Relaunch GarageBand and attempt to record your drum set. The snare and the bass drum should now be mapped correctly! Note: If you have having difficulties with the pipe and would like to verify that the key mapping is taking effect, add a 'Keyboard' component to the pipe after the 'Key Mapper's. Use Drummer in GarageBand for iPhone. You can add a virtual drummer to your song that plays realistic drum grooves. You can choose drummers from different genres, each with its own acoustic, electronic, or percussion drum kit. A GarageBand song can have up to two Drummer tracks. 1) Select your drummer track, either through the (Option + Command + U) command or by selecting it manually. 2) Copy the track using the (Command + C) function, and then paste it into a new software instrument track. 3) Change the software instrument track to your drum kit of choice.

Using the drummer track in Garageband is really quite simple.

All it really takes is for you to make a riff/melody, and then load up the drummer you think sounds the best.

It doesn’t get more sophisticated than that, really. However, through the adjustment of some parameters, you can make a big difference in the way it sounds.

For the first few months of using Garageband, I almost never used the drummer track simply because I was trying my best to figure out how to make songs right from scratch.

I would recommend for you to do the same thing. And by “make songs from scratch,” I mean, creating drum tracks on your own.

Once you’re much further along, you can throw in the drummer track if you need something quick, or replace a drummer entirely.

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Garageband’s Drummer Track, whether you’re using it on your iPhone (here’s the one I recommend from Amazon) or with Mac OS, really is good, and most people won’t be able to tell the difference.

In other words, the drummer can be used as a more crucial part of your production tool-set, or it can just be a jumping-off point, so to speak.

Moreover, it’s a great way to quickly make a backing track to jam with if you’re a musician.

Before we begin…

First things first, if you want to access the drummers available in Garageband as well as the pre-sets, make sure you’ve downloaded all of the available sounds.

Just click on Garageband, in the top toolbar, then Sound Library, and then “Download All Available Sounds.”

In the image above, you can see that I’ve already downloaded all of the available sounds. As I’ve stated in other tutorials, you want to make sure you do this in a place with great internet.

Maybe even set it up while you’re sleeping.

How To Use The Drummer Track

If you want to throw in a drummer track, just go into your project or a New Project if you so choose.

Then, hit the (Option + Command + U) button to bring up a Drummer track. You can also do this through right-clicking on the track-pad and choosing the option manually as well.

From here, you’ll notice that Garageband gives you many drummers. I believe there are 28 of them in total.

It’s definitely worth noting that you can change the actual drum kit behind the drummer, but keep the style of percussion the same.

To do this, just click on whatever kit you want where it says “Sounds,” underneath the “Drummer” heading.

Three Main Settings of the Drummer Track

You can adjust the parameters of the drummer in three key ways, the individual drummer, the genre, and the sub-genre.

There are seven key genres to choose from: rock, alternative, songwriter, rhythm and blues, electronic, hip-hop, and then percussion.

Each sub-genre has between 3-6 drummers within it, depending on how big and popular the genre is. And each drummer name, for example, “Kyle,” or “Dez,” is classified using a sub-genre title within that genre.

Here’s the list:

Rock – Pop Rock, Retro Rock, Hard Rock, Punk Rock, Funk Rock, and Brit Pop.

Alternative – Indie Pop, Indie Disco, Indie Rock, Garage Rock, Modern 80s, and then Synth Pop.

Songwriter – Funky Songwriter, Pop Songwriter, Experimental Songwriter, Roots Songwriter, 60s Songwriter, Roots Brush, and then Pop Brush.

Rhythm and Blues – Modern R & B, Neo Soul, and Modern Motown

Electronic – Big Room EDM, Tech House, Dubsteb, Electro Trap, Modern House.

Hip-Hop – Trap, Modern Hip-Hop, Boom Bap

Percussion – Latin Percussion, Songwriter Percussion, Pop Percussion.

If you float your cursor above the drummer, the cursor will give you a quick description of each drummer, the type of person they are, and the style of music they play.

For the sake of this tutorial, we’ll choose Ian, who plays Britpop, and then we’ll use the stock drum-kit that comes with him, the Manchester.

Sub-Settings Of The Drummer Track

From here, you’ll notice that each drummer actually comes with a series of patterns to work with.

Garageband calls them “Beat Pre-Sets.”

Once you’ve selected the genre, the individual drummer/style, and then the beat preset, you can move on to adjusting more sophisticated and specific parameters.

In the image below, you can see what Garageband calls the X/Y Pad. It’s the trackpad that we can adjust by four parameters, Simple, Complex, Loud, and Soft.

Obviously, what you intend on using depends entirely on the style of music, but in my case, I usually air for Complex and then Soft, which means I’ll move the ball to the bottom-right-hand side of the X/Y Pad.

On the right side, there is the Swing and Fill option.

The Fill option just means the parts of the drumming that aren’t a main portion of the pre-set. They’re the little stylish patterns that you use to transition to other parts of the music.

If you split the drummer track using the (Command + T) function, you can add whatever fills you want to the last bar of the measure without changing the sound of the rest of the track.

If a noticeable rhythm section is integral to your style of music, then you’ll probably want to turn the “Fill” knob up. Turning it up to “Complex” on the X/Y Pad is a good move for this as well.

The “Swing” adjusts the amount of syncopation, which in other words, means the degree at which notes are played between the beat.

If you’ve created something that you like but want to switch drummers or drumming styles, make sure you’ve hit the Lock button beside where it says Fill and Swing. This will save your settings.

Also, make sure to adjust the drummer track region so it corresponds with the time signature of your music.

For instance, if your melodies are 4 measures, make your drummer track 4 measures, 8 measures, 16 measures, or another divisible of 4.

One of the great things about these drummer tracks is the fact they’re not static like loops. They’re essentially like artificial intelligence. They adjust themselves according to the music well.

Some people also like using the “Show Arrangement” option within the Track setting in the toolbar.

Additionally, you can actually use the Drummer Track to follow certain instruments over others.

In the Smart Controls of the Drummer Track, you can see the check-box which says, “Follow,” above the Kick and Snare parameter.

Click on the box, and it’ll ask you what instrument you want to follow. I actually don’t use this function ever, but I can definitely see how it’d be useful for others.

In case you don’t know, the drums typically work with the Bass, rather than the melodies, so keep that in mind.

Whether you choose to follow pre-determined standards is really up to you, though. Someone has to break the mold.

Considering all of its parameters, it’s really not hard to understand some of the ways that the Drummer Track comes in handy.

For instance, you can create separate Drummer Tracks for each part of the song, adjusted by complexity, the genre, the actual drum kit, as well as what instrument the Drummer Track follows.

The X/Y Pad is very sensitive as well. A simple move of the knob by a small measure

Add Drum Kits To Garageband