| We all know that Reason Refills are a great way to | | | | would with a sequence that you'd recorded into |
| expand the already bulging factory soundset included | | | | Reason yourself from a MIDI keyboard. |
| with Reason, but how do you import other sounds into | | | | Now we'll take a quick look at using WAV format |
| this versatile piece of music production software? We'll | | | | samples in Reason. Depending on the type of sample |
| start off by looking at MIDI files, these allow you to | | | | your working with there are several ways to use |
| easily reconstruct a single riff or entire piece of music | | | | WAV. |
| and add your own unique sounds using any of | | | | For single hit drum sounds the most convenient is |
| Reason's instruments. | | | | Redrum. This handy drum machine can import up to 10 |
| First off let's import a MIDI file into Reason's sequencer. | | | | separate drum hits which can be triggered from your |
| Make sure that you've got a song open with at least | | | | midi keyboard or built up into a pattern using Redrum's |
| one instrument in your rack and a sequencer track | | | | internal sequencer. |
| added. Then from the file menu choose "import MIDI | | | | For melodic sounds, like synth samples that you'd like |
| file". This will open a file browser window. Navigate to | | | | to play from your MIDI controller keyboard, by far the |
| the location where your MIDI files are stored, select a | | | | best choice is the NN-XT Advanced Sampler. To |
| file and click open. | | | | import a sound into the NN-XT click the arrow to open |
| The MIDI file will then be imported onto empty | | | | the 'Remote Editor', this will open the sampler's |
| sequencer tracks. You can see from our example | | | | keymapping and other parameters page. |
| below that this MIDI file contains Lead and Bass | | | | To import a single sound click the load sample button |
| channels. | | | | and navigate to the sample of your choice. Click open |
| If you press play on the sequencer you won't hear | | | | and the sample will be mapped to a key zone in the |
| any sound, that's because we first need to assign a | | | | NN-XT. |
| sound to the imported MIDI sequences. You can do | | | | From here we can the sample, add ADSR envelope |
| this by clicking the small black triangle in the 'out' | | | | and filter setting and a whole lot more. The "Spread" |
| column. This will bring up a drop down menu of | | | | knob that you'll find in the Amp section is particularly |
| available devices, choose your favoured device, make | | | | useful for spicing up mono samples. |
| sure there's a preset loaded into it and hit play. Now | | | | The NN-XT also imports Sound Fonts (SF2) so |
| you'll hear the some sound, in our case a trance riff. | | | | importing multi samples needn't be a laborious chore. |
| Repeat the process for any other channels in the MIDI | | | | You can also use Chicken Systems Translator Free to |
| file to hear them with any instrument or sound you like! | | | | convert pretty much any other sample or sampler |
| Using the pencil tool from the Sequencer's menu we | | | | format to NN-XT (.sxt) format. |
| can turn our MIDI information into something useful in | | | | So there you go - quick and easy ways to use MIDI |
| terms of using it in a Reason song. Click with the pencil | | | | and sounds like those you can get here on DMS or |
| tool on each MIDI channel to create a box around the | | | | from elsewhere on the net in Reason! While the |
| data, then click the black square at the end of each to | | | | specifics of operation of each of the Reason devices |
| expand it to the entire sequence. | | | | we've used today is beyond the scope of this guide |
| Double click each box to see the note data in each | | | | you'll find plenty of tutorials on Reason related sites |
| MIDI sequence. You can now edit this data as you | | | | and some great videos on YouTube. |