Feeling GarageBand's limitation - or am I just a novice?
Friday, July 20 2012 @ 06:07 PM CDT

I am trying to use GarageBand to merge MIDI file music with digital audio and I think I am beginning to run into some limitations of GarageBand. It's also possible that I am such a novice that I just don't know what I am doing. :-)

The first thing I noticed is how limited the available number of default instruments was. For example, there is no timpani. I thought it would come with an update that GarageBand/MacOS asked me to install but it didn't. Then I discovered SoundFonts and through some combination of luck and miracle I figured out how to install them. I found two defects. First, I cannot get any of the newly added SoundFont instruments to play previously imported MIDI data. I have to re-enter all the notes. Second, I cannot switch between multiple instruments in a single SoundFont file. If I could find a program that could separate each instrument in a SoundFont file into a separate file then I would be happy.

When I import a MIDI file I see that some of the notes don't get imported correctly. A drum roll of 1/32nd notes gets misread as a triplet. I guess that's fine but the total number of "strikes" in that roll don't add up to what is in the MIDI file. Has anyone experienced this?

I guess I can go on and on about the little quirks I am discovering but I've probably ranted enough already! :-)

What I am trying to do is learn to play music by loading MIDI files and then replacing the tracks one at a time with a digital recording of me playing the score. I keep the other MIDI tracks on to play along with. Eventually, as I work through each track, I will have a multitrack recording of me playing the MIDI file. I use the Finale SongWriter as my reference of what a MIDI file should look like (gotta pick something, I suppose).

Anyways, with all that said, can someone here offer me some pointers on how to get around these quirks in GarageBand? Is there a different (better?) software package I could be using?

Thanks!!

-=- Boris

Re:Feeling GarageBand's limitation - or am I just a novice?
Friday, July 20 2012 @ 07:02 PM CDT

Hi Boris, and welcome to Macjams!

You ask good questions, and the answer is probably (E) all of the above and then some :-)

First of all GarageBand is a sort-of general-purpose music renderer, but it doesn't do a great job of DISPLAYING the music if you want to see the score (like Finale does)...

Secondly, it does not come "out of the box" with all possible music samples (like orchestras, ethnic, choirs, etc.) you have to buy "sample packs" to extend it in the direction you want (not everyone wants timpani or a bouzouki!) Apple uses its own file format for these instruments, but there's also a so-so "back door" (via QuickTime) to add SoundFont libraries, but because of the limitations of how to pick instruments from inside the soundfonts, not all of the free ones you find on the internet will just drop in and play nicely. So yes, trying to use SoundFonts is a little clunky in GB. But there are tutorials on how to do it here (check out the Macjams ARTICLES section I think) and elsewhere on the net.

Third, MIDI is not the best way to capture music notation, so things get lost when you export to MIDI and then import to another program (like GB...) and have it interpret the note-on/note-off times and figure out what kind of note and rest it is. Triplets are especially tricky to detect.

However, it is all do-able, but each of the little hurdles you are running into is really there (and many are not just limitations of GarageBand, but any software), and as you find out tricks and ways around them, it all begins to make more sense (or else you decide to take up something easier, like astrophysics!) :-)

I do something very similar, where I write my music in notation software, export to MIDI, import to GarageBand, hook the instruments up to the "Symphony Jampack" samples (that I bought and added to GB many versions back, still works fine) and then tweak the heck out of the velocity curves etc to get the sounds I want.

I also mix MIDI with recorded AIFF audio, works great!

Ask more questions, we're ready!

ttfn,
Drakonis

Re:Feeling GarageBand's limitation - or am I just a novice?
Saturday, July 21 2012 @ 04:49 AM CDT

A good way of getting a lot more instruments, presets and loops is to buy Mainstage from the Apple Store.

http://www.apple.com/logicpro/mainstage/

I'm not sure how well it works in GB, if it does at all [I use Logic] but once you've installed it you get the option of downloading ALL the Apple Jampacks - 19gigs of content, which will work in GB. It's a hell of a bargain. 15,000 loops, 1700 sampler instruments and 4,500 presets, all for $30. It's quite a big download though! No good if you're on a slow connection.

Re:Feeling GarageBand's limitation - or am I just a novice?
Monday, July 30 2012 @ 11:32 PM CDT

Thanks for the replies! :-)

I understand that GarageBand is not an all-in-one solution for recording music. It does a lot of things a little bit and hopefully that is enough for the general population. Personally, I think it's actually pretty good for what it is. However, I still feel that the instrumentation is a bit lacking. How did Finale get all those cool synthesized instruments and GarageBand miss out?

I have never heard of MainStage before and I Google'd it just now. What is MainStage's relationship to GarageBand? Is it a supplement or a replacement? It looks like more than one person on Apple's Support Site is asking about sharing loops and instruments between GB and MS. People have seemingly done it.

Things to think about I guess!

-=- Boris

Re:Feeling GarageBand's limitation - or am I just a novice?
Tuesday, July 31 2012 @ 04:42 AM CDT

Quote by: poweredbypoptarts Thanks for the replies! :-) I have never heard of MainStage before and I Google'd it just now. What is MainStage's relationship to GarageBand? Is it a supplement or a replacement? It looks like more than one person on Apple's Support Site is asking about sharing loops and instruments between GB and MS. People have seemingly done it. Things to think about I guess!

-=- Boris
Hi Boris. MainStage isn't a replacement for GB. It was once part of the Logic Studio bundle aimed primarily at musicians who play live. Since Logic is now sold through the app stor (you have to download it) MainStage is sold separately and I think you can use it without having Logic installed, though as I don't play live, I'm not really sure about this! Since I upgraded to Logic 9, and bought it through the app store, I didn't bother getting MainStage. I never really used it in Logic 8, so you'd have to look into that one yourself. I don't know if the plugins will run without Logic, but I'm sure, with a bit of Googling, you could find out.

However, I do know that if you buy MainStage you are given the option of downloading ALL the Apple Jampacks which means 1000s of new instruments, presets and loops, all of which will work in GarageBand. 19Gigs in total! Which makes it a real bargain, however you look at it. I no longer use GarageBand, having moved over to Logic some years ago, so I'm a bit rusty with it. I would recommend Logic to anyone, it's so much better. But, if your finances are tight, then definitely check out MainStage for all those new sounds. Here's a link from Synthtopia that may help you some:
http://www.synthtopia.com/content/2011/12/09/is-apple-mainstage-at-30-the-biggest-bargain-in-music-software/