- make snares sound bigger I'm not sure I 100% agree with this. I think I get what you are saying by reading it in context of the other items on the list, but rolling off the highs of the snare could run the risk of shrinking the sound instead of making it bigger.

What I mean is this. After the initial transient, the snare drum sound has two main components: the resonance of the drum and the sizzle of the snares. In larger drums, the resonance-to-snare ratio favors the resonance part. Bigger boom, less sizzle. Generally, the smaller the drum the more the wires contribute to the overall sound. Also, the smaller the snare the higher the frequencies of the snare rattle, since the snares themselves make no sound, they only excite the drum. If your snare sounds too small, like an orchestral snare when you're after something heavier, roll off some high frequencies above ~10KHz. It will make the snare sound more weighty. That's all I meant.

BTW, when I do this I also set a bandpass filter to boost just below the natural resonant frequency of the drum, and another to cut just above the resonant frequency. This also makes the snare sound bigger by pitching it down. Great for 80's hair band stuff.

bitflipper

Talk to me about the sidechaining for kick and snare. How does that work?

You'd use a low pass filter if you need to filter out snare and hihat bleed when using the bass drum as a trigger.

Heh, and I thought he meant how does one use side-chaining in general ;)