176 lines
6.9 KiB
Markdown
176 lines
6.9 KiB
Markdown
+++
|
|
title = "Recording MIDI"
|
|
description = "How to record MIDI with Ardour"
|
|
chapter = false
|
|
weight = 2
|
|
+++
|
|
|
|
There are several ways to get MIDI into a MIDI track in Ardour apart from
|
|
importing an existing MIDI file. Let's have a look at them one by one.
|
|
|
|
## Real-time recording
|
|
|
|
Perhaps the most obvious option to record MIDI into Ardour is connecting a
|
|
MIDI keyboard to your audio interface or your computer directly and recording
|
|
whatever you play. It's a pretty straightforward process:
|
|
|
|
1. Select an existing MIDI track to record to or create a new one
|
|
|
|
2. Arm that track for recording (click the button with a red circle in the track header or press **Shift+B**)
|
|
|
|
3. Toggle the global recording mode (click the button with a red circle in the track header or press **Shift+B**)
|
|
|
|
4. Roll the transport (**Space** bar) to begin recording.
|
|
|
|
{{< figure src="en/real-time-recording.png" alt="Recording to a MIDI region" >}}
|
|
|
|
5. Stop the transport (**Space** bar) when you are done.
|
|
|
|
Usually when you record a part from a MIDI keyboard, you should be able to
|
|
hear yourself playing. If you see that everything is connected correctly and
|
|
yet you still can't hear any sound, check what MIDI channel your MIDI keyboard
|
|
is sending note-on/note-off events to. It is entirely possible that it's a
|
|
channel other than 1, and your virtual instrument of choice got no patches
|
|
loaded for that channel.
|
|
|
|
<!-- ### Launching the recording from a MIDI keyboard
|
|
|
|
A lot of MIDI keyboards come with a set of transport buttons for rewinding,
|
|
fast-forwarding, playing, and recording. This is particularly convenient for
|
|
cases when you need to record multiple takes and you don't want to swithc
|
|
between computer keyboard and MIDI keyboard all the time.
|
|
|
|
Pushing a transport button sends a MIDI Control Change (CC) event, but a DAW
|
|
like Ardour needs to interpret that CC event. So Ardour comes with MIDI maps
|
|
where a CC event
|
|
|
|
By default Ardour is configured so that MIDI input will follow MIDI track selection. This means that when you have multiple MIDI tracks that all can produce sound when you press a key on your MIDI keyboard,
|
|
Setup MIDI devices in Preferences: set "follow track" globally and per-device. -->
|
|
|
|
## Step Entry
|
|
|
|
The _Step Entry_ recording mode is convenient when a part is too complex to
|
|
record in real time (think sweeping arpeggios of 1/128th notes at 140bpm).
|
|
Instead of trying to achieve that live when you are on the schedule, you can
|
|
use your keyboard to enter the notes one by one at your own pace. Ardour will
|
|
record a note you play, move the playhead to the end of that note, then sit
|
|
and wait for the next note you play.
|
|
|
|
{{< figure src="en/step-entry-duration-preview.png" alt="Note duration preview in Step Entry" >}}
|
|
|
|
To enable this mode, right-click on **Record** button of a MIDI track, choose
|
|
_Step Entry_ in the newly opened menu. The _Step Entry_ dialog opens.
|
|
|
|
{{< figure src="en/step-entry-dialog.svg" alt="The Step Entry dialog" >}}
|
|
|
|
Here are the options:
|
|
|
|
1. Chord entry mode — you can play multiple notes at once, they will be recorded like a chord and willl be above each other on the pianoroll.
|
|
|
|
2. Note length presets, from a whole note to 1/64th.
|
|
|
|
3. Dotted note presets
|
|
|
|
4. Rest presets
|
|
|
|
5. Velocity presets, from pianississimo to fortississimo
|
|
|
|
6. Numeric inputs for MIDI data: channel, length of a note, velocity, octave (for
|
|
entry from regular keyboard), MIDI bank and MIDI program (so that you could
|
|
use e.g. pizzicato sample in a sample library rather than arc).
|
|
|
|
Now you have three options:
|
|
|
|
1. Click piano keys with a mouse
|
|
2. Press keys on your regular keyboard
|
|
3. Use a MIDI keyboard connected to track's input
|
|
|
|
For option 2, the middle row of letter keys is used for white keys, and the upper letter row is for black keys:
|
|
|
|
{{< figure src="en/keyboard-map-to-piano-keys.svg" alt="Keyboard map to piano keys" >}}
|
|
|
|
All the settings you see in the _Step Entry_ dialog apply to the options 1 and
|
|
2. For each note you input next, you can set:
|
|
|
|
- Length, from a whole note to 1/64 (or any length when using the 1/Note spinbox), with optional chord input
|
|
- Channel
|
|
- Velocity (z through < on English (US) keyboard can be used as keyboard shortcuts)
|
|
- Octave (keys 1 through 9 can be used as shortcuts)
|
|
|
|
You can also insert rests which basically means that Ardour shifts the editing
|
|
cursor to the right by the currently selected note length.
|
|
|
|
When you use a MIDI keyboard for step entry, only a subset of settings in the
|
|
dialog apply. Ardour will use the defined note length, but it won't bother
|
|
with either velocity, channel, or octave settings and will use whatever you
|
|
send from the keyboard.
|
|
|
|
Let's try to use it and create a simple bass line that we can later use in the
|
|
project.
|
|
|
|
1. Create a new track, select Surge XT as a virtual instrument.
|
|
|
|
2. Open the _Factory Patches_ navigator and select _Bass 2_ in _Basses_.
|
|
|
|
{{< figure src="en/surge-xt-bass-patch.png" alt="Selecting a bass patch in Surge XT" >}}
|
|
|
|
3. Make sure the playhead is at the beginning of the session so that it
|
|
matches the beginning of the first bar of all percussion tracks in the current
|
|
project.
|
|
|
|
4. Open the _Step Entry_ dialog
|
|
|
|
5. Select 1/8 note length and octave 3
|
|
|
|
6. On your regular keyboard press D,G,H,G,D,G,U,J,H,4,A,S,A,3,H,4,A,E,D.
|
|
|
|
Now you have a basic bass line you can repeat.
|
|
|
|
{{< figure src="en/bassline.png" alt="Initial bass line" >}}
|
|
|
|
## Drawing notes on the piano roll
|
|
|
|
Perhaps the easiest way to add notes to a MIDI track is to draw them on the
|
|
canvas.
|
|
|
|
1. Create a MIDI track.
|
|
|
|
2. Switch to the _Draw_ mode by pressing **D** or clicking the respective button
|
|
in the toolbar.
|
|
|
|
3. Click and drag on the canvas to create a MIDI region.
|
|
|
|
{{< figure src="en/draw-new-midi-region.gif" alt="Draw a new MIDI region" >}}
|
|
|
|
4. Point the mouse to where a note should begin, press and hold left/primary
|
|
mouse button and drag to the right as far as the note should go. Release the
|
|
mouse button.
|
|
|
|
{{< figure src="en/draw-new-midi-notes.gif" alt="Draw new MIDI notes" >}}
|
|
|
|
5. The top toolbar has some default settings for new notes: duration,
|
|
velocity, channel. You can change these settings before adding new notes: by
|
|
either choosing a preset in a drop-down list of by scrolling the mousewheel
|
|
over any of the three drop-down lists.
|
|
|
|
{{< figure src="en/midi-draw-toobar.png" alt="MIDI drawing toolbar" >}}
|
|
|
|
6. Repeat until you wrote down the melody.
|
|
|
|
If you are not accustomed to this type of entering notes and mentally rotating
|
|
the keyboard by 90° clock wise seems difficult for you, try clicking on the
|
|
vertical piano keyboard widget to listen to notes until it grows on you.
|
|
|
|
While in the _Draw_ mode, you also can do some leight editing: select and
|
|
resize individual notes, drag them around, adjust velocity, use the
|
|
right-click menu to perform various transformations.
|
|
|
|
Continuing
|
|
----------
|
|
|
|
In the next chapter, we'll talk about helping yourself to perform in sync with
|
|
the rest of the session material, whether you are using a MIDI keyboard to
|
|
record a lead synth part or a bass guitar.
|
|
|
|
Next: [PERFORMING ON TIME](../performing-on-time)
|