Introduction au sampling

Introduction to Samplers

Before we take a look at sampling in Logic, let's talk a little bit about what samplers are and where they came from.

The Birth of Samplers

• When samplers first emerged in the mid-1980s, they revolutionized the way music was made.
• They pushed the boundaries of what could be done and gave birth to new genres and waves of music.

What is a Sampler?

• A sampler is essentially a piece of hardware that you could use with:
  • No built-in sounds
  • No way to generate them

You would be responsible for sourcing your own sounds and loading them in or programming them.

Sources for Sounds

Of course, you could get your sounds from a range of places, such as:

• Existing records
• Sounds that you had created or recorded yourself
• Film soundtracks

The list goes on. Samplers were a very personal piece of equipment because you were essentially loading all of your own sounds into them.

Limitations of Early Samplers

When samplers first came around, they were limited by the amount of memory they had. This often meant:

• You could only hold single drum hits or small bits of music
• Typically, one or two bars maximum

Impact on Music Genres

This limitation kind of gave birth to genres like:

• Hip Hop: Where people sampled breaks and just repeated those.
• Jungle and Drum and Bass: Using sped-up versions of a drum break as the backbone of the genre.

Evolution of Sampling Techniques

The sampler wasn't just for sampling drum breaks. As time went on, many interesting ways of using samples emerged, including:

• Vocal samples: Chopped up and retriggered
• Melodies from other instruments

Sampling began to grow and expand beyond simplistic loops.

Notable Samplers

The sampler has gone through many different iterations. For instance, consider the Akai MPC series of drum machines:

• Largely used to chop and retrigger drums or other loops
• Highly influential in the development of hip hop music

Advancements in Sampling

As technology improved, sampling moved into the digital realm and gained further abilities, such as:

• Creating multi-sample instruments
• Accurately creating playable representations of instruments like pianos, bass guitars, and even hardware synthesizers.

Samplers in Logic

In Logic, we have our very own Sampler and Quick Sampler.

Benefits

This makes samplers:

• Really accessible to us
• Super affordable
• Almost limitless in capability

Sampling is super cool because it allows people who haven't had any formal training in an instrument to:

• Cut and paste
• Rearrange sounds from various sources
• Create their very own music

Often, this leads to the creation of a distinct sound.

Copyright Considerations

However, this notion of getting music from wherever you like has thrown up a whole heap of copyright law issues, which we'll discuss shortly.

Conclusion

For now, your sampler is a blank canvas, and it awaits your creativity.