Exercise 1: Learn Your First Beat

In this exercise, you’ll learn to recreate a beatbox pattern in Strudel by first capturing the rhythm, then matching the sounds.

Prerequisites

This tutorial assumes you have read the following Strudel workshop pages:

• First Sounds ↗ - Basic Strudel syntax and sound playback
• First Notes ↗ - Understanding patterns, cycles, and tempo

Beatbox Sounds Used in This Exercise

This exercise uses these beatbox sounds. If you haven’t seen them yet, check the landing page sounds section to hear each sound:

• B (bass/kick) → bd - Deep foundation beat
• T (hi-hat) → hh - Sharp, crisp percussion
• K (outward snare) → sd - Classic snare sound

If you’re interested in producing these sounds with your mouth, check out TylaDubya’s beatbox tutorial.

Step 1: Listen & Analyze

Watch the beatbox clip below. Listen carefully for:

• How many beats are in the repeating pattern?
• What different sounds do you hear? (low booms, high clicks, etc.)
• Which beats have sounds and which are silent?

Video Credit: Clip from TylaDubya’s beatbox tutorial.

Step 2: Get the Rhythm First

Start by recreating the timing using just one sound. Don’t worry about the different tones yet.

Strudel basics:

• setcpm() sets the cycles per minute - how many times your pattern repeats per minute
• One cycle = all the sounds in your s("...") (unless using angle brackets s("<...>"))
• Sounds in quotes s("...") are evenly distributed within one cycle
• s("bd bd bd bd") plays 4 evenly-spaced bass drums in the time you set for one cycle
• s("bd ~ bd ~") uses ~ for silent beats
• You can write setcpm(80/2) and Strudel calculates 80÷2=40 cycles per minute

Step 3: Add the Real Sounds

Now that you have the rhythm, replace the bd sounds with the actual beatbox sounds. The pattern is: B T K T B T K T at 80 BPM.

Try different combinations and listen to how close it sounds to the original beatbox!

What We Learned

• Start with rhythm, then add sounds
• Use the target audio to guide your ear training
• Beatbox notation maps to Strudel samples:
  • B (kick/beat) → bd
  • T (closed hi-hat) → hh
  • K (outward snare) → sd
• CPM (Cycles Per Minute): Controls how fast your pattern repeats
  • One cycle = all sounds in s("...") (unless using angle brackets <>)
  • For 80 BPM with 8 beats: setcpm(80/8) = 10 cycles per minute
• Math in Strudel: Write 80/8 and Strudel calculates it automatically
• Patterns repeat in cycles - this one has 8 beats