Drum fills really help to take a drum track and song to the next level. They add variety, spice, they help move a track along. They keep the beat interesting. They communicate a change, and emphasize a point.
Or simply, Drum fills are awesome.
Programming them in a DAW can be a bit challenging.
Here's a simple drum fill you can copy into your DAW.
The Drum Fill
Here's the drum fill in MIDI format and let's take a listen to how it sounds.
So a pretty straightforward fill but it sounds good and will help make your beats sound a bit better.
Let's break it down
The Breakdown
The Hi Hat
Just one hi hat in here to keep it simple. It's on the grid and shows up halfway through:
The Snares
This is where the magic happens. We have two different snares.
The main snare we see three in a row, in a nice snare roll. This is followed up by a second snare. A brief pause and then we get the first snare again.
Percussion
The snares are the meat and potatoes of this drum fill but we need some percussion to really nail it and take it home.
Here's a tom drum and the tambourine added in to really round out the drum fill.
The Full Picture
Here's all the drums with the velocity called out. It's key to get the velocity right so it's nice and balanced and sounds right.
More MIDI Drum Fills
If you're looking for more MIDI drum fills, make sure to check out the MIDI drum fills. MIDI files with 70 unique Fill Patterns to drag and drop into your DAW.
More MIDI
Of course if you're looking for more MIDI drums we have all sorts of genres for MIDI Drums. Check out all the MIDI Drum packs.