From the course: Remixing Techniques: Arranging and Song Form

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Adding drum fills

Adding drum fills

From the course: Remixing Techniques: Arranging and Song Form

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Adding drum fills

Drum fills are a fantastic transitional tool. A 1-bar drum fill before the chorus, or going into the bridge section, can often add the flavor that causes the listener's ears to perk up. It also shows that you, the arranger, took the time to add those last bits and pieces, which, for me, make an arrangement fill finished. I've added two Kong Drum Designers, which will be the centerpiece of our fills, and I will program these using MIDI. The first area that I'd like to focus on is right before the first chorus. So I will set my left and right locator points to that section of the arrangement, and I'll bring the playhead to the left start point. (music playing) So we have a bass glissando, that bass sound that glides down, and there is a drum fill. We can listen to it very quickly. (music playing) There's a slight snare fill, but I'd like to go a little bit further with that, and our program some additional drum parts on top so that that 1 bar before the chorus is really highlighted…

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