This is the first in a series of nine tutorials about how to record a song in GarageBand. I’m going to be using GarageBand ‘08, which is the second most recent edition. GarageBand ‘09 looks only slightly different (the project window has slightly different colours) and has a few extra bits and pieces of tutorials included. But for the purposes of these tutorials, in which we’re going to look at song recording, the two versions are pretty much the same.
GarageBand - the Project Window
Lots of people who own a copy of GarageBand for their Mac (it comes as part of the iLife suite of software) have lots of fun playing around with the samples and loops included in the application. However, you can do a lot more than just create funky-sounding grooves in GarageBand. Underneath the user-friendly interface there’s a surprisingly powerful digital audio workstation (DAW) that you can use to create very professional-sounding songs, and even whole albums.
If you have a Mac, and you were thinking of buying a more expensive DAW like Cubase or Logic, try GarageBand first. If you’re working on relatively straightforward material (singer-songwriter type stuff, for example) you’ll find it can do around 85% of everything the pricier apps can. Even if you ultimately end up upgrading to a professional-level DAW, GarageBand is a great tool for learning some of the home recording basics that will ensure a quick learning experience on more complex pieces of software.
So what we’re going to do is start with the basics - including what external gear you might need - and work up to producing a short song that includes software instruments (piano and bass), ‘real’ instruments (voice, in this case) and one of Garageband’s built-in loops (drums). The idea is that you’ll be able to see how the whole process works, from scratch, in a plain and simple way - rather than having to scratch round Google and YouTube trying to piece together individual bits and pieces.
Your home recording setup
You can use GarageBand quite effectively without having any external gear at all. The application contains a virtual piano keyboard and hundreds of drum loops, synths and software instruments to choose from - along with a usable MIDI editor to chop the sounds around. If you fire up GarageBand with no external audio interface and/or MIDI instruments plugged in, the virtual keyboard pops up by default.
But without some sort of external rig, it’s hard to generate your own complex parts (unless you’re willing to spend a lot of time entering notes with your mouse on the virtual keyboard, then editing them together - something that would require musical ability and patience in equal measure).
At the heart of any home studio rig is going to be your audio interface - effectively, an external sound card for your computer. You might just plug a single mic into that interface, or you might also use it to help MIDI instruments communicate with GarageBand (or whatever DAW you happen to be using).
If you’re short on external kit, check our post on buying a mic and digital audio interface. If you’re looking for a MIDI/keyboard digital piano, read about the M-Audio Sono 61, which has a USB-compatible audio interface with mic capabilities built in.
For an overview of the external home recording kit I’m using, check out this post, which includes a short video of my rig. None of this gear was especially expensive, with the exception of my digital piano - and you don’t need to spend a fortune on one of those, either.
So the setup basically goes microphone and/or MIDI instruments –> audio interface –> your Mac, via a USB cable. My setup is a little unusual in that my digital piano has an independent interface and lines right into my Mac, but for most people a standalone interface will be at the centre of everything.
In the next GarageBand tutorial we’re going to fire up the application and make sure our mic and MIDI instruments are getting through to it, using Mac OS X’s Audio MIDI tool.
{ 2 trackbacks }
{ 0 comments… add one now }