Virtual Drummer was built from the ground up to be easy to use, so you should have no problems getting it up and running.
Adding Drums to your Song
When you open a Virtual Drummer document, no drums are in your drum set. To add them, you drag them from the drum palette to the left part of the Virtual Drummer window. Add as many drums as you wish to the set, but you cannot add more than one of the same type of drum.
Removing Drums from your Song
To remove a drum from your song, hold down the option key while clicking on the drum.
Adding a Measure
To add a measure to the song, select Add Measure from the Song menu. Alternately, you can click on the add measure button, which is right-most button at the top-left of the document window.
Adding Beats
If you've adding drums and measures, you'll notice a grid within the document. This is where you place your drum beats. Click on the box where you wish to add the beat, and a black box will appear.
To see a more detailed view of your song, use the zoom buttons at the button of the document window. There, you can zoom in, zoom out, or choose the zoom level. This allows you to add more notes in a given time frame.
Playing a song
To play a song, select Play Song from the Song menu or click on the Play button in the main document window.
Selecting Measures
To select a measure or group of measures, click on the ruler area above the sequencing grid. If a measure is already selected, and you want to select the measure instead of dragging it, hold down the shift key while clicking. Selections must be contiguous. You can move measures by dragging selected measures. To copy a measures, drag it while holding the option key down, and drag it to a new location.
Playing Selected Measures Only
You may want to play just a portion of your song. To do so, select those measures, click on the button with the right-pointing arrow on it to toggle it down, and play the song.
Looping your Song
To play the song continuously, click on the loop button in the document window, then play the song.
Drumlets
Drumlets are measures or groups of measures that are available to use in your song. To open a drumlets palette, select "New Drumlet Palette" from the "Drumlets" sub-menu under the file menu.
To add a drumlet, select the measures you wish to add. Then, click and drag them onto the drumlet palette. You'll be asked to name the drumlet.
To add a drumlet from the drumlet palette to your song, click and drag the name of the drumlet onto your document window. If you don't have the proper drums in your set, Virtual Drummer will automatically add them.
All other functions in Virtual Drummer are just as you'd expect from any Macintosh application. If you have a suggestion, please forward it to me at my address in the read me file.
