How to input unpitched percussion so it plays back correctly?

  1. Please can you explain to me how to input a staff with a drum set on it, and to then add the gm 129 instruments so they correctly play back - e.g. so I can input and playback both the short and long guiro sounds.

  2. Please can you also explain how to just input a Guiro staff, and how to get the long and the short notes. I know they are midi 73 and 74 - but how do I input these so they play back?

I simply cannot understand any of the explanations on percussion maps, etc, that I have read to work out how to do this.

I setup my first drumset back in version 1.1 or 1.2? and that music still plays back correctly. In the Play window no individual percussion instruments are listed, just the one ‘Drumset’ row). But now, when I try to input a drumset, lots of rows for separate percussion instrument are automatically listed in the Play view, and I don’t know how to change any of them to a different sound from what is listed there - e.g. to playback other sounds such as the guiro. When inputing to Write directly from my midi keyboard I get the right sound, but what plays back is wrong - instead it plays back what is written as the original row instrument.

Also, when in setup I input a Guiro player on its own line, I don’t get any sound now at all, yet in a piece I did before, it did play back, although only as a short (73) note, not as a long (74) note.

So please can you tell me the steps to take to achieve both those things (1 and 2).

Thank-you!

I hope this explanation from a couple of weeks ago might help you.

For the guiro, try the attached project. What I did is go to the Play > Percussion Maps dialog and found the Long Guiro and Short Guiro notes in the Yamaha XG drum map (which is the one used by the default drum set in HALion Sonic SE 3, because it’s a Yamaha XG kit rather than a plain GM one). For ‘Short Guiro’ I changed the playing technique from ‘Natural’ to ‘Choke’, which seems as good a way as any to describe the desired short note.

Next, go to Setup mode, and expand the card belonging to the player holding the Guiro instrument, click on the little label belonging to the Guiro instrument, and choose Edit Percussion Playing Techniques from the menu that appears there. In the dialog that appears, in the ‘Playback of Articulations and Tremolos’ section, click the + button to add an entry to the list. Click the staccato articulation on the right-hand side. Under ‘Playback playing technique’ where it says ‘Natural’, click the … button to choose ‘Choke’, and make sure you click the ‘Replace’ button instead of ‘Add’.

Now you have your percussion instrument and the percussion map synced up. When you write a normal note on the guiro, it will use the ‘Natural’ playing technique and hence the ‘Long guiro’ sound; when you add a staccato articulation, it will use the ‘Choke’ playing technique and hence the ‘Short guiro’ sound.
guiro.dorico.zip (221 KB)

Thank-you Daniel, easy to follow and much appreciated. And now I have a long and short guiro - very happy!