In a previous video I triggered two drums voices on my Tama TAM500 analogue drum module from a Behringer RD-6. Today I am using a Raspberry Pi Pico to trigger all five voices via MIDI, four of which respond to velocity data.

Currently the MIDI notes for each drum are simply hard coded. When a MIDI note is received its velocity gets translated to a voltage between 0 and around 160mV by a dedicated MCP4725 DAC, which seemed to give the best velocity response. Anything above that triggers the drum channel at full intensity.

I am using my Roland JP-8000's arpeggiator (connected to the Pico via DIN MIDI) to trigger the 5 drum sounds on the Tama drum module.

To visualise what's going on I set up the TM1638 LED&KEY module to light up 0-8 LEDs depending on the current note's velocity, and to display "BD", "SN", "HH", "HI" and "LO" in the 7-segment section, depending on the drum currently playing.

The main audio out (mono) of the Tama goes into the NTS-1 for a tiny bit of distortion to fatten up the sound and a smidgen of reverb for stereo-ness.

In addition, the bass drum's direct out goes into my "100 Kinds Effects DSP Digital Reverb Module DC 5V Karaoke Reverberation Mixer Effect Board" I got from AliExpress for a short stereo delay (this is 100% wet).

The snare's direct out goes into my PT2399-based delay unit for some subtle fast delay.

For more details on the hardware setup check out my series on MIDI to CV here: https://axwax.eu/electronics/raspberry-pi-pico-as-midi-to-cv-converter/ and my post about the TM1638 LED&KEY here: https://axwax.eu/electronics/tm1638-ledkey-based-midi-visualiser-on-the-raspberry-pi-pico/

I'll try to post the code eventually, once it is a little bit tidied up.