Recording audio is theoretically a very simple process. You have to make essentially 2 decisions: what are you going to record, and how many channels will you be recording, then press a couple of buttons and you're recording. Unfortunately, most recording also requires monitoring—providing some way to hear what you are recording as you record it, possibly with existing recorded material as well. Monitoring in Ardour is very flexible, but with flexibility comes complexity. If you want to try to skip ahead and record without reading about monitoring, you are welcome to do so. Ardour attempts to use reasonable defaults for monitoring, but the variety of hardware setups make it impossible to pick one default that will work for everyone. For this reason, you are strongly recommended to spend a few minutes understanding , because otherwise you're going to get very confused and possibly irritated.

These steps can all be taken directly within the Editor window, although most of them can also be done via Mixer window if you prefer.

Choose Session Add Track/Bus . This will popup a dialog allowing you to choose how many tracks to add, and what basic I/O configuration the track will have (mono, stereo, etc.). You can change I/O configurations for tracks at any time. Make the editor's dedicated mixer strip visible by clicking on the Editor Mixer button located at the left end of the transport bar. In Ardour2, there is no Editor Mixer button, but you can make the mixer strip visible by selecting View Show Editor Mixer , or by pressing ShiftE on the keyboard.

Check the input configuration for the new track. Click on its control area. A mixer strip appears in the editor for this track. Click on the Input button near the top of the strip, and select Edit from the menu. The standard I/O dialog pops up to let you connect the track to whichever JACK port you want to record from. Rename the track. This is an important step in helping you make sense of your session, because track names are used when naming newly created regions. Click on the track's record-enable button to record enable the track. You can use the r button in the track control area or the record button of the mixer strip. The button will turn pink. Adjust the output level of the sound source to the a level where the loudest input drives the meter in the mixer strip close to, but not over, 0dB. The mixer strip will show the incoming signal level, along with peak indicators If you are using software monitoring, adjust the output volume and possibly panning if desired. These settings do not affect the recorded material. Check the output configuration for the new track. Click on the Output button near the bottom of the strip, and select Edit from the menu. Make sure the track's output is connected as you intend. by default (and when not using a session template that works otherwise) mono tracks have mono outputs, meaning that you cannot pan them.

If necessary, setup the session's default meter and tempo by on the initial meter and tempo markers. If desired, enable the click track in the transport bar. Click on the Record button of the transport window, which will start to flash. When you are ready to record, click the Play button in the transport window. When you have finished recording, click the Stop button in the transport window. If desired, click the track's record-enable button to disengage record-enable for this track. The audio you recorded will be written to a new audio file stored on one of your disks. In the editor, a new region will appear in the track display area and also in the region list display.

Press the Home key (or CtrlA) to return the playhead to the start of the track In the transport bar click on the Play button, or press the spacebar. Adjust the track's volume as necessary, using either the mixer strip in the editor, or the corresponding strip in the mixer window.

Multiple tracks can easily be recorded simultaneously by record-enabling each track you would like to record.

There is a p button in the track controls. If you press it and select new playlist, the contents will be cleared, allowing you to construct a new arrangement of recordings. You can recall your playlist later by using the same button and selecting select.... This will open a window displaying all the playlists you have recorded on that track. Select the one you want and proceed. Playlists from other tracks can also be selected.. in fact you can have the same playlist on two different tracks if you feel it necessary.

You can automate the portion of a track to be recorded using the punch functions. This is most often implemented when a portion of a particular take is problematic but an adjacent portion is good. In order to punch record, the punch range must be set.