Making music for the non-musically inclined

While Apple holds only 3-5% of the market share for personal computers, there is one industry in which Macs remain ubiquitous: professional digital audio recording. Other platforms have made strides in the past decade, but Macs still hold the fort. It was with great interest then that followers of the industry watched as Apple snatched up Emagic ? makers of the Logic Audio line of professional audio production software ? in July of 2002. The typical reactions emerged: Emagic's PC users were angry at their forced migration to a different platform while the Mac faithful speculated wildly (as they are wont to do) at what the future held.

Manufacturer: Apple Computer
Price: US$49 as part of the iLife '04 suite (includes iPhoto 4, iDVD 4, iMovie 4, and iTunes 4.2 as well)
System requirements: Mac OS X 10.2.6 or later, 600 MHz G3 CPU (G4 or faster required for software instruments), 256MB RAM, QuickTime 6.4 or later, 1024 x 768 resolution display (minimum), DVD drive required for installation

The first offspring of the union was seen in Logic Audio's excellent integration with Mac OS X. Apple has always gotten high marks for their OS and hardware integration ? one of the benefits of having both components under the same roof. Bringing Emagic in-house assured the same for Logic Audio on OS X. It was exciting as Core Audio and Core MIDI (Mac OS X's audio and MIDI frameworks) held the promise of fantastic hardware integration and super-low latency. Logic Audio was the first to market with an OS X port of their flagship audio production beating most competitors by over a year.

Then came Soundtrack, Apple's entry into the audio-for-video field. Soundtrack definitely contained some of Logic Audio's genes, but was aimed more at video editors and website designers needing to create aural backdrops for their visual media. More importantly, it was the first application to support the Apple Loops audio format. Like the ACID and REX loop formats before it, the Apple Loops format defines a new standard of open architecture and usability. Look for its integration into professional audio applications in the near future, starting with the next major release of Logic.

The latest addition to the family is Logic and Soundtrack's baby brother: GarageBand. The third child is usually a bit of a black sheep: they are photographed less often and always wear hand-me-downs. They are cute but people do not take them seriously. GarageBand is kind of like that.

In January 2004, Steve Jobs introduced GarageBand to much fanfare at the San Francisco Macworld Expo. Jobs spent an entire 25 minutes introducing and demonstrating GarageBand. 25 minutes! All for an app that's 1/5^th of a US$49 "digital hub" suite, iLife '04. He had his "good friend" John Mayer record some guitar and keyboard licks into the program, and said such things as, "we love music" and "we're very excited." (For reference, Jobs spent only 6 minutes discussing the iPod mini.) Jobs must really love GarageBand.

I guess I cannot blame him as GarageBand has many endearing qualities. It is the only audio production app widely available that is specifically marketed towards, and accessible by, individuals who have absolutely no musical training. GarageBand carries forth the Apple ease-of-use tradition with startling precision ? perhaps even to a fault. Here the world of audio production (with its myriad of outboard devices, MIDI configurations, and software peculiarities) has been condensed into an environment so easy to use you barely need to crack the help file.

According to Apple, GarageBand "turns your Mac into an anytime, anywhere recording studio packed with hundreds of instruments and a recording engineer or two for good measure, all assuming you don't have an iBook which doesn't have an audio input." Ok ? the last bit is an editorial comment. It is an application that lets you record and edit audio, arrange loops, and sequence MIDI sounds. You can apply professional processing effects to any of these elements, mix them together, and export the resulting "song" into iTunes for use as a soundtrack with other members of iLife '04. Want a groove with that special something to go along with your iPhoto vacation slideshow, or a sweet string arrangement that softly lingers in your daughter's graduation video? GarageBand is your app. It also makes a fantastic practice tool. Plug in a USB MIDI keyboard controller, turn on the metronome, and work your way through Bach's Well Tempered Clavier. Or plug in your electric guitar and don some headphones for some virtual amplification and distortion that won't send your cat into a tizzy.

What GarageBand is not is a professional recording application. It is no substitute for packages on par with big brothers Logic Express and Logic Pro. It is also no Pro Tools killer. There are far too many designed limitations, and a few that probably slipped through the cracks.

Getting started

As many have already demonstrated, absolutely no musical skill is required to get GarageBand up and running. When launched for the first time, the user is asked for the song name, tempo, and time and key signatures, with defaults set at the over-used 120bpm (beats per minute), 4/4 time signature, and key of C major. A welcome touch here would have been a feature that randomly chose different time and key signatures for new projects; so far every GarageBand song I have heard on the web has been in 4/4, and right around 120bpm.

Getting going in GarageBand requires the exertion of .15 calories. Will someone please spend the extra .05 calorie to change the key and tempo?

Once these few settings are specified, the project window opens, with a software Grand Piano already loaded. The interface, with its faux wood side panels and LED-like time display, is undoubtedly intended to look like some sort of forgotten piece of recording studio hardware. At first I was a little put off, especially by the wood ? it is a real departure from the rest of iLife, and doesn't serve any functional purpose. It doesn't make me forget that I'm working with cold, harsh bits of audio. Plug in a MIDI controller keyboard and you're ready to go. When adding a track, users choose to create either a "Real Instrument" or a "Software Instrument" (GarageBand's terms for "audio" and "MIDI"). The differences between audio and MIDI are barely understood by most musicians, let alone the target GarageBand user. Fortunately Apple has made working with these two technologies all but foolproof.

GarageBand's main window: not very iApp-ish

Audio

GarageBand allows users to record actual audio and place Apple Loops into Real Instrument tracks. Any Core Audio-compatible hardware can be used for input, including your Mac's built-in audio input jack. (Again: sorry, iBook owners. You will need a third-party USB or Firewire audio interface.) Luckily I was able to use my Digidesign DIGI001, which has far better preamps and converters than my Dual 1.25GHz G4's on-board audio input. Recording is deceptively simple: create a Real Instrument track, select the track, and hit the record button. Once your performance is "on tape" it can be edited in the Editor, the lower section of GarageBand's main window. The Editor provides the most basic of sound editing tools: cut, paste, copy, and move. In addition, audio regions that originated as Apple Loops can be transposed up to an octave up or down. Select an Apple Loop from the Loop Browser and drag it onto any Real Instrument track to add a conga groove or string pad, or any of the over 1,000 included loops. Apple's Jam Pack add-on provides 2,000 more, plus additional effects and software instruments.

The Editor allows for bare-bones waveform editing

Audio recording is restricted to one stereo or mono track at a time. This limitation alone will keep GarageBand out of the realm of professional audio production tools. You cannot multi-track a live garage band with GarageBand. In most cases anyone wanting drums will be stuck using included loops, which I found to be useful, but ultimately generic sounding. In some cases, odd production decisions limit the functionality of the loops. For instance, Modern Rock Drums 01 and Modern Rock Drums 02 were obviously meant to compliment each other, but have different EQ and pan settings.

A nice surprise was the ability to drag any WAV or AIFF file from the Finder into a project, essentially importing it for use like any other audio file.

MIDI and effects

The MIDI standard was officially adopted in 1982, but early versions had been around since the seventies. Originally developed as a way for analog synthesizers to communicate and synchronize with one another, MIDI is now built into every keyboard and audio recording device made, including GarageBand. In GarageBand, the MIDI realm is presented in the form of Software Instruments. Software Instruments are collections of audio samples or synth parameters that, when triggered via MIDI, emulate the real thing. For instance, the Grand Piano in GarageBand is a bank of individual WAV files that describe how the instrument sounds at different volume levels throughout the range of its pitches. (To hear the audio files that make up the Grand Piano, take a listen to the contents of /Library/Application Support/GarageBand/Instrument Library/Sample/Sample Files/Grand Piano.) When I record myself playing a Software Instrument, no audio is recorded. Rather, my performance is described in MIDI messages, like NOTE ON, NOTE OFF. When I play back my performance, GarageBand repeats the process of sending that MIDI data to the Software Instrument. Sounds complicated; works well. Say I do not like the Grand Piano, but love my inspired performance. Simply open the Track Info window and switch to a different Software Instrument. One feature I really liked was the ability to use MIDI-based Apple Loops in Real Instrument tracks ? drag a Software Instrument Apple Loop onto a Real Instrument track, and the MIDI is rendered as an audio file.

The MIDI data can be tweaked, too. When a Software Instrument region is displayed in the Editor, users are given the options to fix the timing, or "quantize" (which snaps all the data to the nearest unit of time like 8^th note or 16^th note), transpose (this time up to 3 octaves each way), and change the velocity, or volume. Think of velocity as the force with which you played a note. Users can also edit individual notes of a MIDI performance. One major annoyance with MIDI regions in the Editor had to do with Apple Loops. If your song is in the key of C, and you add an Apple Loop that was originally in the key of A, GarageBand will play the notes in your project's key, but display them in their original key. This caused problems when I decided I wanted to edit the notes of an Apple Loop that had been transposed into my project. I had to edit the loop in A major while hearing it in C major. Weird. This is probably a bug or oversight and should be fixed in future versions.

This Apple Loop played in the key of C, but showed up in the Editor in the key of A

Effects

GarageBand includes a handful of audio plug-ins designed to mimic the processes of compressors, equalizers, reverbs, and other filters. Again we see the influence of Emagic technology, whose own Matrix Reverb in included. GarageBand can make use of any plug-in in the Audio Unit format, so users who have third-party effects will be able to use them in GarageBand. Adding an effect to any track is as easy as opening the Track Info window and selecting a plug-in. Compressor, Equalizer, Echo, and Reverb are default on every track, and users can pick up to 2 additional effects per track. A tricky peculiarity here: the echo and reverb effects must be activated on the master track in order for them to be available for any instrument track. Most of the effects parameters are customizable, and configurations can be saved as presets for use on other tracks, or even in other projects. Again Apple has kept the design simple at the expense of functionality; the effects parameters cannot be automated.

Adding effects is one way to distinguish your tracks. Use EQ to carve out muddy frequencies

Much has been said of GarageBand's included guitar amp simulation effects. The effects themselves are handy, but I found the default presets over-the-top and clich?. No worries ? a little tweaking and I had some fairly convincing guitar sounds.

Putting it all together

Having explored the ins and outs of GarageBand a little, I set out to create a project that would put it through its paces. What would it take to bring GarageBand to its knees? I wanted to create a project that used every available feature of GarageBand, and see what the result was. I began by creating a new project and changing the tempo to 90bpm. First, I used the Loop Browser to find some basic material to work with. The Loop Browser previews loops at the tempo of your project, so you can hear how they'd fit with the tracks you already have. This is very handy. I settled on Nordic Keyed Fiddle 02 as my main melodic element. Hmmm . . . something about it sounds so . . . Braveheart. It makes me feel like I am standing amidst fog-covered downs. Is there a wind sound in here? Selecting "FX" and "Dark" in the Loop Browser shows me a list of Sci Fi Textures. Sci Fi Texture 04 sounds like wind. Great! Into the project it goes. I had a problem with Sci Fi Texture 04 ? it was too short. Using the Editor, I cropped the waveform, copied and pasted a section, and dragged out the end (the normal keyboard shortcuts work here, like option-click and drag to make a copy). This made the impression that the sound effect itself lasted longer. Another problem: digital clicks in between each waveform edit (a common problem in digital audio production) ? easily fixed by the Join Selected feature in the Edit menu. Join Selected creates new audio files with cross fades at the old region boundaries. I would have liked to customize my cross fade lengths and curves, as the resulting sound was not just right. Again I was forced to trade in flexibility for simplicity.

OK. The Nordic Fiddle player is receding into the fog with the wind (accomplished by automating the fiddle's volume), now I need a new element in there. Let's see what the keyboard loops are like. Moody Electric Piano 01 is cool, but it needs a bit more edge, so I add a little overdrive to the track using the Track Info window. I kept going, adding more tracks, recording live guitar, MIDI performances for the electric piano and bass sounds, and drum and percussion loops. I added EQs and reverbs, edited MIDI data and waveforms, and deconstructed Apple Loops to create custom drum fills. I even imported a WAV or two. For closure, I brought the fiddle player back at the end. Every song needs a good name (not "My Song"). Thurdansk is a made-up word that came from "Thor" (a Nordic deity) and "dance."

A full project with plenty of volume automation, edits, and effects

GarageBand is definitely a CPU hog, gobbling up around 30% of my dual 1.25GHz G4's processors while idling. Some users have reported improved performance after repairing their disk permissions. As always, your mileage will vary depending on the number of tracks you use, and how much effects processing you incorporate.

The only option for mix down is exporting an uncompressed 16-bit AIFF which is automatically put into an iTunes playlist (pro apps are all in the 24-bit realm these days). I thought my track sounded slightly more compressed after mixdown than I had intended. Have a listen (2.12MB mp3 file). Also, for anyone interested, here is the whole project (6.53MB Zip file). I'd love to hear your remix!

Excursus: other audio apps

Individuals looking to take their audio production beyond GarageBand have a plethora of options. For loop-based music look to Apple's Soundtrack or Ableton's Live. Reason by Propellerhead Software provides an extremely-flexible environment for software instruments, audio samples, and loops (in a virtual rack interface done right, by the way). For audio recording there is the venerable Pro Tools, Digital Performer, and of course Logic Audio.