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GarageBand Roundup
Wired covers the GarageBand revolution. Matt Van Horm writes "MacBand.com is an online directory of songs and loops created by users of Apple's GarageBand software who submit their work. Songs are organized by category and loops are organized by genre, instrument and mood, and are rated with a system similar to the one in iTunes." franklinrh writes in about the free loops available from Access, and others note free loops from Bitshift Audio and Drums on Demand. And if you want to import MIDI files into GarageBand, check out Dent du MIDI. What other software -- and equipment -- are you using with GarageBand? I've got my setup pumping out tunes.
download a program called midikeys
Midikeys
all you are, is all you are, i'm so sorry for you.
No, no...
Good MIDI keyboards gets far more then just pressed keys.
Acceleration & 'deepness', for example.
AFAIK.
MOTU, Yamaha and M-Audio all have MIDI-USB intefaces. The question is how cheap is cheap?
I found the cheapest online was the M-Audio Midisport Uno, at $40. I was impatient, however, so I went to my local music shop where they had a Yahama UX96. More expensive, but more features (though I may never use them). Worked fine.
Also try ebay, of course. There were plenty available.
HTH
Slashdot looked deep within my soul and assigned
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$100 is too much? That's what the keyboard sold at the Apple Store costs...
Lalala
Have you tried the Sagemore store in Marleton, NJ? I think I saw it there last time I went. Not only do they have a good selection of stuff, but you pass a Hooters on your way there from Philly. It makes a good day for shopping at Apple. I found the Sagemore store to have a LOT of stuff and the staff seemed even more helpful than most stores.
"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts...for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang
It does make sense to use what you've got, up to a point. But there are advantages to getting a dedicated midi/USB controller. I use a Midiman Oxygen 8, which is pretty cheap. You wouldn't expect a trained pianist to be happy with it, but it works for me. The real advantage over the 'classic' midi keyboard is that it offers a heap of definable knobs (well, 8, as the name implies) that you can map to filter cutoff, reverb send, delay feedback, etc. etc. I haven't used it much with Garageband, but it's invaluable with programs like Reason, Reaktor and Live - much nicer to be able to tweak parameters that way, and to be able to tweak more than one at a time and hop between them intuitively. Mouse XY controllers help in this regard, but I much prefer the Oxygen 8's hardware control method...
Most places big enough to have an Apple Store also have a Guitar Center or a Sam Ash -- one of the HUGE music superstores that has about one of everything, and a selection of staff that can't even be bothered to learn about a single item in the store.
Check them out...probably cheaper than Apple too...
... here:
...)
http://virus.info/
(That's Virus as in the hot synthesizer not the Microsoft kind
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Don't need any third-party tool. Just drag your MIDI files into the iTunes Library (literally), then select the newly added song and convert to AIFF. Finally drag this new version of the song as a new track to GarageBand. Mind you, all the MIDI information is lost in the process, so make sure you're satisfied with it.
j1
Hi, I've been downloading loops from these guys for years. I've been bugging them to port Acid to the Mac since, oh, 1999? Recently, Mike told me they weren't gonna port it -- because their lead programmer moved over to Apple to write SoundTrack and GarageBand.
They put out an 8pack of loops every two weeks usually. I've got like 1000 loops now, and I've been thinking of writing a Konfabulator widget to automate the downloading, organizing, etc. of my loops.
www.acidplanet.com/loops/8packs/
I'm not normally an irrational zealous dickhead, but I figure "When in Rome..."
I was Toys'R'Us checking out the keyboards. FOr about 150$ a yamaha keyboard, touch sensative keys (58 keys I think) and midi out. I think any of these inexpensive keyboards would be a good-alternative as they also work as stand alone players as well.
Yamaha makes one for about $30-$40 or so.
I can vouch for that M-Audio USB Uno; it works great and could not be simpler to set up. Just make sure to download the newest OS X drivers as in the box it may come with a bunch of OS 9 stuff that won't mean anything to GarageBand.
After installing the drivers, though, it's completely plug and play, the best MIDI experience I've ever had.
~jeff
The built-in keyboard isn't probably meant to play any real music on, so I have used the editor tool. I'm however considering to buy M-Audio Keystation 49e USB Midi Keyboard which Apple is recommending. It is for $99 (or 99 EUR), which I don't think is "significant cash" (you wouldn't even get a half of the cheapest iPod mini for that price.) Does anyone have any experiences? I'm not a musician and don't need the best keyboard available.
I demand the Cone of Silence!
I use iTunes BPM to do that from iTunes.
I tried to buy one last week at the Tyson's Corner VA Apple Store, but they said that they were all out of them.
I called back a day later to check on availability and the guy there said that they didn't have the $99 Keystation 49e, but that they did have a shipment of the M-Audio Radium49 in. I put a hold on one and picked it up the next day.
It costs more - $150. It has 49 keys and 16 MIDI presets that you can program. So it's a step up from the $99 version. And they had them in stock.
It's fun to pipe Garageband's output into other more robust sequencers and apps - check out Jack for OS X: http://www.jackosx.com
Yes, Hooters on Rt 38 in Maple Shade =) I used to live a block away from it. I'm there every other Thursday or so!
I did call the Sagemore store this morning. They had the more expensive M-Audio one in ($149). They put me on the call list for the 49E though, and I think I'll wait for that one.
You're complaining about slowness during installing? That's not interesting. What you are experiencing is the "optimizing" process, in which the OS updates itself so apps can launch a lot more quickly. It happens only during install, and yes it takes longer to install than on other systems, but it is for larger performance gains after the one-time install.
Complaining about this is boring, and no, the same operation on Windows would not take 2 minutes, because Windows doesn't have this optimization feature. Google for "prebinding" to learn more.
Right now it is just a PB 12" 867. You can check out 3 songs I made here (my blog). I have a Roland USB MIDI keyboard, but it is at home, and I am also going to get my electric guitar from home to make more tracks.
GB is pretty cool, but just like iMovie, I am finding the limitations really fast.
Non-apple loops can't be effectively transposed...
All the loops included don't show up if you start a song in either not-4/4, or not-C.
None of the included loops are transitions, they are all groves or effects.
On my computer the recording is too laggy... If I just want to bump all the notes to the nearest quarter note it is all-good, but it doesn't put them close enough to bump them to smaller notes.
Like anyone can even know that
The link in the blurb is to the second part of the article. Here is the actual link.
Ok this might help. Record an instrument using the mouse keyboard. Record anything cause it doesn't matter. Then when you are finished you can edit the instruments notes (which you may already know). Here you can delete and move notes and add new notes by holding the command key and clicking where you want the note to go. this is not as good as an acutal keyboard but it gives you the ability to do things like chords.
I tested it with 10.3.2 and it worked just fine. I also just tested it on my Linux box (my PowerBook is at home) and it appears to work, granted I didn't play the files, but they are there.
Did you get an error?
Here is what I got:
I've just been to a great demo of GarageBand by the producer Steve Levine (Beach Boys, Culture Club, lots of others - http://www.stevelevine.co.uk/ - which has various free stuff to download) at the VideoForum/SoundsExpo exhibition in London.
He thinks its a serious recording tool, good enough to produce records on. The pieces he'd recorded (in just a few hours) were complex, multi-layered, and did show how much it could do, and that it didn't need to sound like just another GarageBand composition.
He built up massive rythm sections (using multiple tracks), often taking just a snare or high-hat from a loop (open it and delete the other parts of the drum kit you don't like). He also made great use of the different effects to make them sound very unlike a straight-forward loop.
The audio tracks are similarly easy to cut bits out of and use to set up your own riffs.
He also showed off The Hit Kit (published by Dorling Kindersley [Mac and Windoze], which includes a cut-down version of Logic, a microphone, a CD of samples). It provides a very cheap (UKP25 - about $40) next step for GarageBand users - most of the power of Logic (including synching to video), less of the complexity. As he said, it is easy to move tracks from one app to the other.
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