Garage Band Tutorial

GarageBand BASICS What is GarageBand?

GarageBand is a software that allows you to make your own sound recordings. You can create songs,Recording Your Next Hit with GarageBand ringtones, vocals in GarageBand.

For today’s class we are going to create a vocal project by recording our voices in GarageBand with the microphone on the left-side of your apple laptop.

The speakers Recording Your Next Hit with GarageBand

Let’s begin by opening GarageBand. Click on the GarageBand icon.

CREATE A NEW PROJECT To start working in GarageBand, you create a new project. When you open the Project Chooser, the categories appear on the left. When you click a category, templates for that category appear on The next step is to save the project and decide on a few basic details: give a the right. name to your project (just use the song title if you've already thought of one), choose the location to save, and set the song tempo, signature, and key.

To create our project: 1. Open GarageBand, or choose File > New. 2. In the Project Chooser, select the microphone/ Voice picture 3. Click Choose.

4. When the Save As dialog appears, type a name for the project, and browse to the location where you want to save it. For this project save your files to the desktop (in a folder with your name on it.)

5. Click Create.

The next step is to save the project and decide on a few basic details: give a name to your project (just use the song title if you've already thought of one), choose the location to save, and set the song tempo, signature, and key.

Basically, the tempo tells how fast your song is, the signature decides the beat, and the key sets how high/low the song should be sung.

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Select the track you want to record. For the voice recording option you have two tracks to choose Click "OK" to move on to the next step. | 13 from: Male and Female. For this exercise you will only need to choose one track to record on. supersubconscious.com

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Let’s review the parts of the GarageBand screen.

At the bottom of the screen (in the right column) are the controls we will use for making our recording.

Here are the buttons/controls that we need to be familiar with for this lesson.

This button is to start or stop a recording.

This button will go to the beginning of the recording.

This button is to start or stop playing the recording.

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Let’s make our first practice recording.

1. Select the track you want to record on: Male or Female. The selected track will be highlighted in aqua blue.

2. Select the record button from your bottom control buttons.

3. Begin reading the text from the Justin Bieber song lyrics on your handout.

4. Select the record button again to stop the recording.

5. Select this button to go to the beginning of the recording.

6. Select the playback button to review your work.

7. Once you have a recording, it will display next to your track name as a purple color block.

8. You can select the purple block and delete it and record again.

It’s that simple. Now practice making recordings.

Adding Fade Ins and Fade Outs A very common mixing/transition technique is to add a fade in at the beginning of a project, and a fade out at the end of the project. Fade ins make the recording seem to “come out of nowhere,” and fade outs create the feeling that the project continues playing. You can easily add fade ins and fade outs to your projects.

To add a fade in: 1. Choose Track > Show Master Track.

The master track appears at the bottom of the timeline.

2. From the pop-up menu in the master track’s header, choose Master Volume. The master volume curve appears in the master track.

3. Click the master volume curve at the point you want the fade in to end.

4. Drag the control point at the beginning of the master track down to the volume level at which you want the fade in to start. To start with complete silence, drag it all the way down.

Now play the project from the beginning. You’ll hear all the tracks in the project fade in gradually to their final volume level.

To add a fade out: 1. C hoose Track > Show Master Track.

The master track appears at the bottom of the timeline.

2. F rom the pop-up menu in the master track’s header, choose Master Volume. The master volume curve appears in the master track.

3. C lick the master volume curve at the point you want the fade out to begin, then click at the point you want the fade out to end.

4. D rag the second control point down to the volume level at which you want the fade out to end.

To end with complete silence, drag it all the way down.

Now play the project from a point before the fade out begins. You’ll hear all the tracks in the project fade out gradually to their final volume level.