Tutorial No 13. Entering drum and percussion patterns onto the staff screen
The MIDI system, under the General MIDI standard, uses channel 10 for percussion instruments. Since these "instruments" have no pitch, MIDI uses the pitches of the notes as a code for the percussion instruments. Some kind of percussion instrument is assigned to every pitch between D#1 (3 octaves below the D# above middle C) and E6 (2 octaves above the E above middle C).
However, there are really only about 9 or 10 MIDI percussion sounds in common use, and these are all in octaves 2 and 3, which are presented on the bass clef in staff notation. The following table lists these percussion "instruments", with their corresponding pitches.
Pitch | Percussion Instrument | Comments | MIDI note number |
F#2 | Closed hi-hat | Soft, muted cymbal. Used on 1st and 3rd beat in jazz swing and easy listening ballad styles. | 42 |
C#2 | Side stick | Emphatic sharp drum. Used on the off-beats, i.e. the 2nd and 4th beats in jazz swing and easy-listening ballad styles. | 37 |
Bb2 | Open hi-hat | Added for occasional variety, at 3/4 of 3rd beat perhaps. | 46 |
Eb3 | Ride cymbal | ![]() |
51 |
D2 | Acoustic snare drum | Used for contrast in bridge passages. | 38 |
C#3 | Crash cymbal | Loud cymbal, used in bridge passages, or at the end. | 49 |
C3 | Hi tom | The 3 toms are often used as triplet rhythms, in bridge passages, alternating between hi, mid and lo for contrast | 48 |
F2 | Lo tom | 41 | |
A2 | Mid tom | 45 |