Second Lecture
Adding tracks and learning to record audio and MIDI
What is a track?
A track is a strip in your DAW that will be used to record audio or midi on. You can create multiple tracks in your DAW thus being able to record multiple instruments, voices, load multiple Vsti( virtual instruments) and plugins.
In traditional recording softwares there are different kinds of tracks, for example:
-Audio track ( to record audio )
-Instrument track ( To insert Virtual instruments and record MIDI )
-Aux track
In Reaper the same track can have multiple functions.
To insert a track we must click on the Track button in the top menu then click on Insert new track.
If we wish to make it an audio track we must select its audio input (source of the audio signal).
On the left of our screen in our track we will see a box where it is written “Left” by default. We must click this box and select from the drop down menu the input we want to use. It is preferable that the input would be in Mono.
We must arm the track to prepare it for recording. We do so by clicking the red arm/disarm button on the left of the track.
TIP ( the arm/disarm button looks just like the record button but smaller and it is located on the left of the track strip )
Finally to start recording we must click the red record button located in the middle of the screen next to the stop, play and pause buttons.
To stop recording simply press the space bar.
To insert a virtual instrument on a track we must click the Fx button located on the left of of the track strip. This will open a pop up menu where we can select our virtual instrument (VSTi).
Note: select “All plugins” on the left of the pop menu and then search for your instrument in the filter tab located in the bottom of the menu by typing its name. After selecting you VSTi click ok.
TIP ( the Fx button will turn green whenever there is a VSTi loaded on the track )
To record MIDI, we must arm the track to prepare it for recording .Then we must choose the input, we do so by clicking the tab where it is marked “Input1” and selecting “Input:MIDI” then selecting the name of our MIDI controller while putting it on “All channels”. and finally to start recording we click the red record button. NOTE (To hear our virtual instrument while playing it we must click the record monitoring button on the track strip shaped like a loudspeaker)