Introduction - Lesson 1 - Lesson 2 - Lesson 3 - Lesson 4 - Lesson 5 - Credits
sYnCHAoZ' Skale Tracker Drumming Tutorial
Lesson 4 - Semi-advanced drumtracking

By now you should have a small simplistic drumtrack. Perhaps a bit too simplistic. But as with all things in life, you must first learn to walk before you can, eh, run.

What we're going to do now is give our drumtrack some basic variation. As previously, follow the steps closely.
1. First of all we will just do a routine test and do a basic module loading procedure. If you still have Skale Tracker running, shut it down by pressing the "Quit Program" button in the General Options. You can also simply press the "ESC" button on your keyboard. A small window will pop up saying something like "Gotta go??" with a YES/NO button. Press YES and Skale Tracker will shut down.
HINT: If you do not see the General Options becuase you have some other section activated, look for any kind of Exit, Close or Quit button. Pressing this will exit the current section and return you to the General Options.
2. Now that Skale Tracker is shut down, start it again by clicking the "Sk@le076w.exe".
3. Once Skale Tracker is back, click "Disk Options", highlight the "Module" in the "Items to load" (although this should already be activated by default after af program restart).
4. Browse to your \Songs\ folder and open your newly created Tutorial Drum 1.skm file. The song will load in a instant, and you are back once more.

Now comes some vital features that are crucial to understand when tracking, so stay sharp.
First thing we will do is spice our drumtrack up a bit. We will make some simple variations in the kickdrum track and add a few more cymbals and such. Follow the steps closely.
1. Select your kickdrum in bank 01 and go to line 00 in track 0.
2. Activate Record Mode (SPACE), scroll down to line 14 and add a kickdrum hit by pressing Q.
3. Now scroll down to line 26, press Q, and in line 27 press "M".
This requires an explanation. The reason why we press "M" instead of Q in line 27, is because we will simulate a dual-bassdrum-kick, as if the drummer hits the kickdrum very quickly in succession. By tracking this in two slightly different tones "Q" and "M", it sounds slightly more realistic than if we were to simply program the kickdrum in the exact same tone and pitch. It is not necesary to do so, but it is one of my small 'tricks' that I often use when creating dual-bassdrum blastbeats, and it works quite well.
4. Scroll down to line 42 and create a kickdrum with "Q", do the same in lines 54 and 62.
5. Now select your Snaredrum in bank 02 and jump to track 1.
6. Scroll your way to line 50 and add a Snaredrum with "Q", do the same in line 58.
7. Select the Crash Cymbal L in bank 03, jump to track 2 and give it a "Q" in line 32.
8. Now select Crash Cymbal R in bank 05 and add it to line 28 in track 4 with the Q key as usual.
9. Finally you must jump back to track 3, scroll to line 28 and delete the Hihat entry on that line by pressing the "DELETE" key on your keyboard. This will clear the entry on that line. Do the same on line 32 just below.
WARNING: Do NOT use the BACKSPACE key to delete an entry in a channel. Pressing BACKSPACE instead of DELETE will delete the current entry, but it will also 'drag' all of the other notes in that track one setp upwards, possibly causing serious mayhem in your track, setting the instrument notations slightly out of 'sync' with the others. Only use BACKSPACE if you know what you're doing!
10. Play the song and check out the new changes. As you can hear, the drumtrack has become more 'alive' and dynamic, simply by adding a few extra beats and strokes on the crash cymbals. Now is the time to expand our drumtrack, and add even more notes.

We will now create a new pattern. Patterns are the buildingblocks of a tracked song that make for variation and advancement in a song. Make sure that the General Options section is currently active. Look in the top left corner of the interface. You will see our pattern-modifier, which shows and controls the current number of patterns in our song.
Currently there is only 1 pattern, designated "00 00". This is the default pattern that Skale Tracker always creates when it is started.
The left value (marked in red) is the global pattern-counter. It shows the current number of the actual pattern of the total number of patterns in the song. If there are 5 patterns in a song, the pattern-counter will look like this:
00
01
02
03
04
And so forth. This number, the pattern-counter, will always increase by 1 each time a new pattern is added, and likewise decrease each time a pattern is removed. It cannot be manually modified.
The pattern-number however (marked in blue, see above picture) are the actual individual patterns themselves, they are the patterns that hold all of our notes and instrument placements. The number of this pattern can be modified by the user as he sees fit. To do so, use the arrow keys in the pattern-modifier section
Try clicking the "up" arrow. You will notice that the pattern-number changes its number to 01, however the patter-counter remains at 00. Also you will surely have noticed that your drumnotes has disapeared from the tracks below. This is becuase we have altered our current pattern to a new number, thus changed into a new fresh pattern. Click the "down" arrow and you will change the pattern back to 00 again where our drumnotes are safely stored. You can likewise add and remove new patterns with the "Insert Pattern" and "Remove Pattern" buttons.
WARNING:When editing a pattern, the changes will be global. This means that if you alter something in pattern 00, those changed will affact ALL current patterns with the number 00 in the entire song. If you wish to alter something in a pattern, but do not wish the changes to apply to all other patterns of the same number in the rest of the song, you must create a new fresh pattern and make the changes therein.
This might be a bit confusing at first, but fear not, we will start working with the patterns immediately, and you will soon get the hang of it. We're going to create some new patterns now, do some copying and pasting, and tracking some more drums. As usual; follow the steps closely and stay sharp:
Just in case something goes wrong now, you should save your song once more with the current changes. Save the song as "Tutorial Drum 2" in SKM format (see Lesson 3 if you don't remember how saving works).
1. Click the "Insert Pattern" in the pattern-modifier window (see above images). You'll now see an extra pattern being inserted as "01 00".
2. Play the song and notice how once the first pattern is done playing, it will move on to the next pattern, which is exactly the same as the first pattern we made since they are both pattern 00. Stop playback.
3. Make sure that you are in pattern 00 on position 01 (01 00). You can navigate up and down between the two patterns with the scroll arrows to the right of the patterns.
4. Change the pattern-number to 01 by clicking the "up arrow".
You'll now notice that the drumnotes in the track have all disapeared. As explained earlier this is because we have now created a new and fresh pattern that has not yet been used for anything.
We now need to track our drums in this new pattern (01) again, however instead of typing each drumnote all over again, we will simply copy the entire contents of pattern 00 and paste it into our new pattern 01.
5. Using the pattern scroll, scroll up to pattern 00 and then hold down the CTRL key and press the F4 key on your keyboard. This will copy the entire current active pattern (00) to system memory.
WARNING:When copying a pattern the information in that current pattern will be temporarily stored in the system memory untill the memory is dumped or overwritten by new data. This means that you can only copy one pattern at any given time. Once that pattern has been copied, and resides in the system memory, copying a new pattern will replace the current pattern in the memory, so make sure that you paste the first pattern before copying a new one - otherwise you will have to do it over again, nothing serious, but it can be annoying.
WARNING:You cannot undo a paste. Once you have pasted something it will completely overwrite the existing content of the pattern, and it can no longer be undone in case it was wrongfully pasted. So be careful!
6. Scroll back down to pattern 01 and press the CTRL and F5 keys on your keyboard simultaneously. This will paste the current copied information from pattern 00 into pattern 01.
We now have 2 identical patterns but with each their own number, thus modifying one of them will not affect the other.
We will now modify our drumtrack in the new pattern 01 to create some more over-all dynamic drumming.
7. Select the "Tut Ride Cymbal" in instrument bank 06. Make sure you are still in pattern 01.
8. Jump to track 3 where the Open Hihat is currently tracked. Now activate recording mode and insert the Ride Cymbal in the same locations as the Open Hihat currently resides (line 04, 08, 12, 16, 20 and so forth, simply replacing the Open Hihat entries in that track).
NOTE: You do not have to delete a note in a track if you wish to replace it with another note - when entering a new note onto another the previous one will be automatically overwritten with the new one.
9. Now select your kickdrum and go to track 0, enter a note on line 02 with "Q" and another note on line 03 with "M". Then add a note in line 06 with "Q", delete the note on line 08 and add one on line 10, delete the two notes on line 26 and 27 and add one on line 30, delete the note on line 40 and add one on line 46, delete the note on line 56 and add one on line 58.
10. Now select the snaredrum and jump to track 1. Add a note with "Q" on line 18 and line 26, delete the note on line 58 and add new ones on lines 56 and 57.
11. Select the "Tut Crash Cymbal R" in bank 05 and then go to track 4 and delete the note on line 00 and add a new one on line 04 with "Q".
12. Now jump back to track 3 and delete the note on line 04 and line 60.
13. Lastly jump to track 2 and add a Crash Cymbal L in bank 03 on line 58.
14. Now select pattern 01 in the pattern-modifier window and add a new pattern with the "Insert Pattern" button.
Note how the new pattern has the same number as the current pattern that you have highlighted when you added it. Skale Tracker always 'copies' the current highlighted pattern-number when inserting a new pattern.
15. Change the new pattern-number to 02 (by using the pattern arrow keys).
16. With your new pattern 02 selected, select the kickdrum in bank 01 and add notes with "Q" in track 0 on lines 00, 10, 16, 26, 30, 32, 42, 50, 52 and 58.
17. Select the snaredrum, go to track 1 and add "Q" notes on lines 12, 24, 44, 46, 48, 49, 54, 56 and 60.
18. Now select the crash cymbal L, go to track 2 and add a "Q" note on line 00, 32 and 52.
19. Select the crash cymbal R, go to track 4 and add "Q" notes on line 00, 30, 44 and 60.
20. Now select the "Tut Hihat Closed" in bank 08, go to track 3 and add notes with "Q" on lines 04, 08, 12, 16, 20, 24, 28, 36, 40, 48 and 56.
21. Save your song again as "Tutorial Drum 3" in SKM format.
Now play the song and check out the changes and additions! Note how it playes the three patterns over and over. Try experimenting by inserting more patterns and changing them around between 00, 01 and 02 combining the 3 different patterns in various ways.

Onwards to Lesson 5
Introduction - Lesson 1 - Lesson 2 - Lesson 3 - Lesson 4 - Lesson 5 - Credits