Hi guys, I play Edrums triggering drum VST’s on my desktop PC. I want to be able to switch between 2 or 3 different drum vst’s while playing live. What program will allow me to do this and how would this be done ?
Thanks !
Hi Rick
you can use Cantabile to do this. You’ll need to learn about Cantabile basics, shared racks, song states, bindings and routes in @brad’s excellent videos. After that, you’ll understand what I’m writing below 
You set up your songs to use the different drum vsts in their respective racks, and activate/ deactivate the routes from your eDrum MIDI input to the racks depending on song states. Use bindings to switch song states with MIDI triggers (e.g. use small drum trigger pads to switch between states).
What you’ll need to consider with drum VSTs is loading times: Better to have the same drum instrument loaded twice with different sample set (if you can deal with the RAM footprint) and simply change the routing in the song than having to wait for the loading time when changing sample sets within the same plugin.
Cantabile does have a bit of a learning curve - but not more than a DAW or any other sophisticated piece of software; you’ll get the hang of it. Start simple (just one drum vst plugin), then move step by step through states, racks, bindings and setlists.
We’re always here to help when you get stuck!
Cheers,
Torsten
1 Like
Hi Rick,
I’ve spent quite a bit of time with Cantabile and Superior Drummer. I also have a bunch of IK drum kits that I’m going to get around to testing one of these days.
Am I correct to assume you would change kits between songs?
There are a lot of variables regarding edrums and switching kits. If the kits are small (under 1GB) and you have an SSD or even better, NVMe PCI express storage, you can simply load the kits as Cantabile plugin snapshots in a few seconds. This can be done even with the free Cantabile Lite version.
Another approach is to load the VST multiple times with different kits. This approach requires tons of RAM, 16GB would be enough for maybe 3 kit. If you happened to have 64GB RAM you could load a bunch more. A drawback of this approach is it takes a long time for the song with all those kits to load so if something goes wrong during a gig you might have to load a single instance song and forego the multiple kits.
I use Cantabile Performer and use states and racks. In Superior Drummer if you stay in the same SDX you can quickly switch between kits in it using states.
1 Like