Unlock Unconventional Methods to Build Something with Probability in the Grid

Bitwig Tutorial | Dec 05, 2022

This video discusses building a poly grid with unusual methods. It starts with dialing in a tempo and using a pitches module with a probabilities module to create a melody. It then goes on to explain how to use a sample and hold module and a clock quantizer to create a rhythm. After that, it explains how to use a sine oscillator, a mod delay, and a chorus to create an FX section. Finally, it explains how to use a volume slider and an octaver to create a bass.

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Transcription #

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[00:00.000] Hey folks, welcome back to another video.
[00:03.560] Today I want to build something in the grid with some unusual methods.
[00:08.080] So something I don't do all the time.
[00:11.600] So here we have the Poly-Grid.
[00:14.520] I dialed in 85 BPM.
[00:16.440] And I also have here the loop enabled.
[00:20.160] And important to know, the Poly-Grid here itself is in mono mode.
[00:25.640] So I don't use multiple voices, I use mono mode.
[00:28.440] So it's a self playing patch, or it's possible to have a safe self running patch in the grid.
[00:36.000] So inside the grid here, it's completely empty.
[00:39.520] And we want to start with the node generation.
[00:42.200] And for that, I want to take an probability approach with the pitches module here.
[00:49.160] And here I dial in not a melody, I dial in a scale.
[00:53.240] So I dial in here D sharp minor.
[00:55.920] So we have D sharp, then we have F, F sharp, G sharp, A sharp.
[01:02.600] We have a B and a C sharp, and again a D sharp.
[01:07.520] And now for this to work, I also take here a probabilities module.
[01:16.280] And we scale this up to the size of the pitches module.
[01:22.080] And now we want to dial in basically here a probabilities for each note.
[01:26.480] So we want to have a melody with a lot of the root note in it.
[01:30.880] And also the root note here, an octave higher.
[01:33.360] We also want to have a lot of the dominant, the fifth in there, right?
[01:38.040] So this one, and all the other notes maybe not that much.
[01:43.600] Maybe also this not too much, maybe just a bit more.
[01:47.640] But something like this, right?
[01:49.560] And every time we basically step through the sequence,
[01:54.160] the probability should decide if to take this note or not based on the probability.
[02:00.200] So we just use a sample and hold here, take the note input,
[02:05.560] and every time we have a probability yes,
[02:08.360] then we hold the current note because we're on the same step.
[02:12.160] And of course this needs to happen a lot of times.
[02:17.800] So we use the clock input here, disable the pre-chords.
[02:25.360] And then up here the clock speed to 32 hertz.
[02:30.360] And every time basically we have a yes,
[02:33.200] we take the note from the same step and hold it here.
[02:36.760] Then we go here into another sample and hold.
[02:42.400] Take here the input from this sample and hold.
[02:45.040] And here we sample only when we have a rhythm signal.
[02:50.280] So we take your clock quantizer and trigger, of course.
[03:01.600] And we want to synchronize everything to a 16-bit grid.
[03:05.160] We also change this here to triggers.
[03:09.080] And we maybe dial in here 3.
[03:14.000] So 3 beats within a 16-bit note grid.
[03:17.760] So some of these beats are or some of these triggers are offset.
[03:22.320] So we get some kind of a nice rhythm, an uneven rhythm.
[03:27.480] And with this we use this output in the sample and hold, of course.
[03:32.000] And this is also what we use for the rhythm later on.
[03:35.320] So then we go into a quantizer.
[03:37.880] But not to quantize something, it's more like a visual component.
[03:41.640] We can see what kind of note we are playing currently.
[03:45.080] You can see its highlighters, right?
[03:46.920] So you see we play a lot of the root note.
[03:50.000] We play a lot of the dominant, the fifth here,
[03:53.280] and some notes in between.
[03:55.480] But most of the times you land on the root.
[03:57.440] So it's exactly what we want for a melody.
[04:00.480] And then we go into a sine oscillator, finally.
[04:07.680] And change the pitch of this.
[04:09.560] And also an AD.
[04:12.520] And we trigger the AD here with the same trigger output.
[04:17.200] So every time we hold the note, we also
[04:19.160] output here the sound of the sine oscillator.
[04:25.320] What else?
[04:26.520] So yeah, then we go into out.
[04:28.520] But before we go into the output, we go into a mixer.
[04:32.160] And the mixer goes into a blend.
[04:36.360] Because we want to create some kind of FX section here.
[04:40.560] We use a mod delay.
[04:42.360] We go also with the dry signal into the mod delay
[04:44.680] and then into the blend.
[04:45.640] So we can mix the dry signal and the wet signal here together.
[04:52.040] Also in our path, so the diffuse bit here, the signal,
[04:55.960] before we go into the delay.
[05:00.040] So it's more like a reverb maybe.
[05:03.280] And also let's take chorus here before we
[05:07.720] go into the out pass to diffuse even more.
[05:12.560] So use the 8V, 8 voices option, and a bit of modulation depth.
[05:20.920] So we have a bit of pitch modulation in there.
[05:24.280] Then we go into this.
[05:26.280] Then we go into the second one and then the mod delay.
[05:28.760] OK, maybe increase here the feedback a bit.
[05:32.760] And this is our FX section.
[05:35.160] Then we go into the output finally.
[05:39.080] But before we go into the output, we probably also
[05:41.840] use here a volume slider.
[05:44.080] So we have already here a melody running.
[06:09.880] Yeah, high pass could be nice here at the end for the reverb
[06:15.360] and a high cut.
[06:25.760] That's already a nice reverb.
[06:29.360] Yeah, that's OK.
[06:32.480] OK, so this is the rhythm generation here.
[06:39.760] OK, so we probably want to have multiple of these here.
[06:48.120] Of course, we want to play multiple melody rhythms.
[06:52.840] Maybe take two, track this down.
[06:56.360] OK, and here we play, or maybe we
[07:06.760] slow this even down at this top one.
[07:10.800] Maybe I use face input.
[07:14.960] So instead of using the face input from the DAW,
[07:19.640] we take this module here and feed it in there
[07:22.880] so we can disable this.
[07:25.080] So here.
[07:27.120] And then we take a scalar and scale this down.
[07:34.520] Maybe something like this.
[07:39.680] And every time we hit play, we want to reset here
[07:42.360] the face of the scalar.
[07:43.920] And we use this here maybe for the bass.
[07:55.160] So we take an octaver and pull this down.
[08:01.800] So now we have the bass and the melody on top.
[08:32.800] OK, so this is nice, nice, soft bass.
[08:41.400] You can also try to speed this up here a bit.
[08:46.560] So maybe dial in a 7 or 6.
[08:51.120] And then also use an octaver, and pitch this up by one.
[09:05.880] OK, so we have a nice Poly rhythm for the bass and the mid.
[09:18.120] So we have a nice Poly rhythm for the bass and the mid melody
[09:21.800] and the top melody.
[09:23.080] Plays a different melody.
[09:30.960] And it's all sine partial, so we have no overtones
[09:33.920] that can interfere.
[09:53.360] OK.
[10:23.360] I put this over here.
[10:44.360] So it's a bit like playing Tetris.
[10:48.160] Maybe give this here a green color.
[10:55.360] So effects, then we have here our melody section.
[10:58.000] This is a melody bass.
[11:28.000] OK, so we give this here also this kind of color.
[11:47.000] Nice.
[11:48.000] So now we need to create some kind of rhythm.
[11:53.000] And for the rhythm, I also want to take some kind of unusual approach.
[11:56.640] It's not super unusual, but I don't use it all the time.
[12:02.000] So we use a saw tool for the rhythm.
[12:04.840] As you can see, it has this nice little ramp thing here going on.
[12:10.520] Maybe take an oscilloscope here.
[12:13.640] See, it looks exactly like this, right?
[12:17.680] And it's played at a high frequency.
[12:20.080] So we want to change this at the place at a high frequency.
[12:23.240] I want to play it at a low frequency.
[12:27.040] So let's take it out.
[12:32.040] Take a volume slider here.
[12:36.240] And then we take a phase input, right?
[12:44.040] And we use this phase input to drive the saw tooth here completely with 800%.
[12:50.520] Disable the pre-code for the pitch and also direct here the first number down to zero.
[12:57.560] So now the saw tooth oscillator is completely driven by the phase input and the phase input
[13:01.800] decides when you play which point in the cycle here of the oscillator.
[13:09.960] So it's the same output, the same saw output, but it's much, much slower.
[13:15.800] It's exactly at the pace of the BPM.
[13:19.440] So basically this one cycle of the saw tooth wave, it's exactly now one bar long or one
[13:27.320] fourth of a bar, I'm not sure.
[13:32.640] So we get this click.
[13:38.840] But this click happens every time you switch here basically from one to zero.
[13:46.200] So it's a bit late, or it's actually not late, it's just delayed by one, by one fourth then.
[13:55.400] And we can reverse this, right?
[14:00.920] So we have exactly the opposite waveform.
[14:04.840] Now we have this, nice.
[14:16.000] And you can already guess what happens next.
[14:19.000] We use an filter, let's use an MG, pull this down, also disable the pre-code for the pitch
[14:28.200] input.
[14:30.000] And now we can take the same signal here because it's not at audio rate for the frequency
[14:36.760] modulation here, or we can take an SVF here with the band S, you reverse this here, it's
[15:01.960] almost like bubbles.
[15:12.120] So you can also do this, of course.
[15:15.440] So if you have a nice click, I try to create some kind of bass line here, or kick drum.
[15:25.320] What you also can do is we can try and shape the signal here, maybe use a band.
[15:36.520] And now it looks like this here, you can see down below we have a nice little curve in
[15:47.600] there, and we use this basically for the pitch modulation here, or for the frequency modulation.
[15:57.920] Maybe use a curve, and pretty, makes super short.
[16:21.120] Way to click it still, something like this.
[16:46.680] Maybe use a wave folder here at the end, and a high pass, just to get some rumble stuff
[17:04.040] out there.
[17:08.040] Okay, cool.
[17:12.040] So we can replace this here.
[17:16.600] So we have to click from the wave, from the sawtooth here, and the curve basically decides
[17:21.320] how we shape the sawtooth for the pitch modulation.
[17:28.280] So now that we have this, we want to use a scalar for this here, so we can decide how
[17:41.240] fast, right, with the kind of ratio here, something like this, and then we use a gate
[17:58.600] module here, and this one behaves still like before, there's still the pre-chord from the
[18:07.680] sequencer coming in, so there's no alteration here, and every time you can see it's playing
[18:13.600] a perfectly nicer bar, every time at the beginning here we have a trigger, and with this trigger
[18:20.400] we reset here the scalar, just to make sure we are in time on the beat grid, and we also
[18:41.400] want to use multiple of these, so use a mixer, and then I'll probably use all of that in
[18:53.080] a second input here, something like this.
[19:07.400] So we can create some kind of Poly rhythms also with this, we can change here the modulation.
[19:33.400] Something like this, and maybe another one, and another one.
[19:59.400] Yeah, something like this.
[20:25.400] Could be something.
[20:51.400] Maybe we have to reset here also the base of this.
[21:11.400] You can experiment here of course with all the settings to get the right sound, the right
[21:23.720] rhythm.
[21:32.400] Okay, kind of like it, so this is the beat station here, it would be probably nice to
[21:58.120] create your more effects for the drums, also delay, and get red.
[22:11.080] Let's try and create a more delay, blend, we have a phasal here, yeah.
[22:38.080] Okay, so this is the end of the video, I hope you enjoyed it, I'll see you in the next
[23:04.080] video.
[23:09.080] Okay, so this is the beat station, what you also can do is, inside of Xbox here we can
[23:24.600] use the supermassive, the new modes here from the update, but we have all the clicks in
[23:40.520] here from the beat station, right?
[23:43.600] So we can take here the transient split and only put the reverb on the tonal parts, all
[24:03.600] the clicks here, or not in the reverb, which is nice to have.
[24:22.280] We could also use here for instead of a sign, we could use here a saw, maybe the tuned saw
[24:38.040] wave, and then with the filter on it, but maybe triangle, triangle sounds like it's
[24:53.760] a saw with the filter on it, so we just save, we save a low pass.
[25:12.440] So the melody plays a bit too much in one octave here, so this would be nice to have
[25:36.760] here some kind of modulation for this melody line, we take the dies, take here this output
[25:48.720] to the dies, then we modulate this, and then we modulate this, and then we modulate this,
[26:18.560] I think it's a nice rhythm and melody combo.
[26:37.240] Maybe another one.
[26:54.920] Okay, that's it for today's video, I hope you enjoyed it, I'll see you in the next one.