Hi guys!
I’ve got an expression pedal here, and I thought I’d hook it up to use it as a controller for the hihat. Now, I know this is not a recommended setup, but I wonder if I could get more out of it with some adjustments.
My main problem is that while the closed → open hit works like a charm,
Blah
(with the pedal fully closed, I hit the hat once and immediately release the pedal; a swell is produced)
I can’t close an open hihat the same way. When the pedal is fully open and I hit the hat once and immediately step on the pedal, there’s no effect. I have to hit the hat again in the fully closed position for the open hihat sound to fade into the new hit. This doesn’t sound good at all, because it sounds as if the cymbals never lost their energy by closing completely.
I don’t remember if it always worked like that. Back in the day I was using a Roland FD-8 for this job, and since it had a switch at the bottom, it always sent a pedal event when closed.
Blah
(That also sounded like crap because it was just a switch. It always sent the pedal note at a fixed velocity. But at least it would close the hihat completely.)
Now, I want to avoid using the Auto Pedal Event for a similar reason, mainly that the Pedal causes even closed hihat articulations to go unnaturally dry. It’s one thing to step on the pedal from a fully open position and close it, and it’s a different thing to apply a bit of pressure with our toes to the pedal from an almost-closed, to a fully-closed position. But it looks like I will have to use it, because its open/close sound is better.
Is there anything I could do? Anything I’m missing? Could I tweak those mysterious fade numbers in the prefs and get a better result with Auto Pedal enabled? Or will I make matters worse?
Edit: Ok, I now see in the manual that the closed shank sound is an exception and will not choke the hat. I need to play with all those fade times in the prefs and see if I can make it work better.