- How to Use Real Musical Instruments with GarageBand on Your iPad. Instrument such as a guitar or a keyboard directly to your iPad. The volume on your headphones and guitar. Open GarageBand.
- GarageBand for iOS has everything you need to play, record and share incredible music on your iPad or iPhone — now including Sound Library. IPad or iPod touch. Download GarageBand for iOS. Play Make music. With or without an. Plug in your guitar and choose from a van‑load of amps and stompbox effects that deliver the perfect feel.
So You Want To Record Authentic-Sounding Guitar In Your DAW
Part A: GarageBand As A Performance Tool 6 Why play virtual instruments? 6 Why play iPad instruments when you can play the real thing? 6 Drawbacks of using iPad instruments 6 Using GarageBand for performance 6 Multiple levels of difficulty 7 Some tips 7 Guitar Amp 7 Edit chords: Smart Instruments 7 Keyboards 8 Drums 8 Bass parts 8 Smart Strings 9.
In this article, I’ll show you exactly how to plug your guitar into GarageBand. The way that I find works best is the most convenient and sounds pretty good as well while minimizing latency and other problems.
How to Plug Your Guitar Into GarageBand
There are a few different ways of doing this, and some are significantly better than others. I’m just going to show you the way that I do it.
I have a couple of pieces of necessary gear:
- Obviously, your guitar.
- A Firewire to USB Cable
- an Audio Interface (I use the Focusrite Saffire 6USB. The Scarlett 2i2 is good too.)
- A USB-C to USB cable (The only reason this adapter is necessary is I’m using the latest edition of the MacBook Pro. The older generation MacBook Pro doesn’t need this adapter).
- Regular Guitar Cable.
If you’re new to music production, understand that a lot of this equipment will come in handy for years to come.
If you’re serious about recording and producing, much of this equipment and more are a necessity, so just grab some of it off Amazon and be done with it.
Without further ado,
The actual steps:
1) Connect your Firewire cable to your MacBook Pro. In most cases, this cable will come with your purchase of an audio interface, or a MIDI keyboard. However, if you don’t have one for whatever reason, I’m sure you can pick one up from Amazon for cheap.
2) Usually, the port for the firewire cable is on the back of the Audio Interface. Plug the other part of the firewire cable into the back of the Audio Interface.
In my case, the Firewire to USB has to go into the USB-C adapter that I mentioned earlier.
3) Now, assuming you have the Focusrite Saffire 6USB, it should be powered by your computer. You don’t have to plug it in or anything like that, so all of its lights will turn on which you can see on the front of the unit.
4) Open GarageBand.
5) Click “Open Project,” or one of your old existing files. It doesn’t matter.
6) Once it brings up the “Choose A Track Type Page,” Click on where it says: “Built-in Input.”
7) This should be all that’s needed for this part of the process. However, assuming this is the first time that you’ve ever done this, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to click on where it says, “Built-in Output.”
8) That should bring up your “Output” and “Input” Devices under the Audio-MIDI region preferences.
9) Make sure you’ve selected “Built-in Output,” if you’re using your computer as your speaker, or the speakers that are hooked up to your laptop.
10) Select your Audio Interface for the “Input Device.”
11) Now, once you’re back at the “Choose A Track Type Page,” then click on one of the two subheadings below, either the “Guitar option,” or the “Microphone option.” This should bring up your MIDI Region and all of your controls.
12) In the “Smart Controls Area,” make sure that you’ve selected your audio-interface where it says, “Input.”
13) Now, plug your guitar into the front of your Audio Interface.
14) Click on the “Monitoring Button,” which looks like an upside down Wi-Fi symbol. This part is important, otherwise, you won’t be able to hear what you’re even playing.
15) You can now select whatever kind of amp you want, whether it’s a “clean guitar,” “crunch guitar,” “acoustic guitar,” “distorted guitar,” “experimental guitar,” “clean bass,” “crunch bass,” and “experimental bass.”
16) You want to hit the “Monitoring” button beside your track-header as well. I’ve highlighted the upside down Wi-Fi-looking symbol with a black circle. It’ll turn orange once it’s been selected.
Under each heading, there are quite a few options that all sound pretty good, especially after you tweak them to your preferences.
And it’s pretty much as simple as that.
There are some problems that you can run into when doing all of this for the very first time. For that reason, I’ll explain some of the problems that I’ve had when I first started out.
Common Problems and Annoyances As A Beginner
1) Make sure that the gain on your Audio-Interface isn’t turned up too much, otherwise, you’re going to be feeding GarageBand too hot of a signal, which will make it sound distorted and bad.
2) Make sure the “Pad,” and “Inst,” buttons are turned off on your audio interface, assuming you own a Focusrite Saffire 6USB. I imagine there are similar controls on other audio interface models.
I find that these buttons make the signal too powerful as well, and thus, create distortion.
3) Latency. I’ve never actually had latency problems when using an Audio Interface, but some people do have this problem. I have an entire article on Latency which you can read more about here.
Essentially, if you’re having latency issues, there could be a number of different causes, however, most of them will be a result of your set-up and incorrect settings for your gear.
For instance, you want to make sure that – if you’re running more than one track – you have the monitoring button turned on for only one of them, rather than every single track.
Other Ways Of Recording Your Guitar In GarageBand
1) You can also use your MacBook’s microphone. This is for very rough demos, obviously, because this way of doing it is going to make a very low-quality recording. However, if you’re desperate, and want to record something, this method will work.
- To do this, you just open a new “Audio” track in your workspace.
- And then click on the “Record” button.
- Start playing the guitar with your amplifier close to it, and that should be enough for a very rough demo.
2) You can also purchase a Guitar to USB cable and hook your guitar directly up to GarageBand. This is an inferior way of recording guitar tracks as well, but it works if you’re running on a string budget.
(This is what a guitar-jack to USB looks like. I don’t own one so I couldn’t take a picture. I had to piece these two images together, but this is what it looks like).
GarageBand will immediately recognize this as an input, so you don’t have to worry about there being compatibility issues.
However, like the method above, you’ll likely run into latency.
3) Use a small portable audio interface if you plan on only running one instrument through your DAW. This is pretty much the same as the main method which I described in detail above.
The only difference is that you’ll be using a much smaller, and likely, limited audio interface. The good thing about this is that it’s relatively inexpensive. Small interfaces are becoming exceedingly popular, like the iRig for example.
I haven’t picked one of these up yet, but once I start traveling around Europe, I imagine I’ll eventually purchase one. I’ll make sure to write a review on it once I do.
Update: You have to use the iRig HD if you want it to work with a PC computer or Mac. The iRig 2 is only good for mobile.
4) Another popular way would be to mic your guitar amplifier up to your audio interface and then through GarageBand.
This is a decent option, but I prefer just to run my guitar directly through GarageBand, rather than doing this. Amplifiers are too big and cumbersome, and I would much rather limit the amount of gear I own.
Before playing your guitar in GarageBand, know that there’s an actually fairly useful tuning mechanism set up in the DAW. It’s not as good as a good old fashioned Korg tuner, but it still works pretty well. I usually use it if I’m too lazy to go over and grab my tuner.
How To Tune Your Guitar Using GarageBand
1) Your guitar is plugged into your audio interface in the computer, so it’s as simple as clicking on the tuning fork beside the center of the DAW where it shows the time signature, tempo, and key signature.
2) When you click on the tuning fork icon, it’ll bring up the meter where you can tune your guitar.
Other Features
One of the great things about using a DAW for your guitar is all of the great VST plug-ins that you can use for your guitar.
For example, you can download amplifier simulators and cabs for your set up, and while it may not sound good as the original which the plug-ins are modeled after, they still sound good enough to use, and they’re good enough for the vast majority of people who aren’t tone-purists.
I’ll show you how to download plug-ins into your DAW in a later article.
That’s all for now. If this helped you out, do me a favor and share it on social media.
YouTube Video Tutorial
More then ever, it has become easier to lay down your song ideas while on the move. With GarageBand for iPad, we are also closer then ever to having a full professional recording studio in a very thin package. And at a price of $4.99, who can complain? For those who are just starting out, here's a first tutorial on recording guitar to get you and your iPad rocking.
Setup and Equipment needed
First off before even starting the application, you should get the hardware you need to enable you to record your guitar to your iPad. There are two basic input types you need to consider:
- Guitar Input for Electric Guitar and Bass (IK Multimedia iRig, Apogee Jam, AmpKit Link)
- Mic Input for acoustic guitar (IK Multimedia iRig Mic, Blue Yeti Pro -- requires Apple's Camera Connection Kit)
L to R: IK Multimedia's iRig, Blue Yeti Mic, Apple's Camera Connection Kit
Guitar Amp
Launch GarageBand for iPad and plug your guitar into the iRig. On the left of the screen is a ' 1/4' jack' button which lets you add a noise gate. Handy for those distorted tones. Next to it is the guitarist's best friend: the Tuner... no excuses for a flat g-string!
In the middle, you can select from different amp combinations and even save settings of your own. You can also swipe the amps to keep the same preset settings and try these settings on different amps.
On the far right is the 'pedals' section. Here you can add up to 4 pedals, change their effects level and remove pedals. To get back to the amp section, tap the 'Amp' icon on the right of the screen. One nice thing about GB for iPad is that you can change the amps settings after you've recorded your part and even create your own presets for future recordings.
Audio Recorder
If you want to record acoustic guitar, you can use the iPad's built in microphone but I would recommend looking at Blue Microphone's 'Yeti Pro' or Apogee's upcoming 'Mic' to add a professional sheen to your recordings. When you first open Audio Recorder it gives you a VU meter to check your audio input levels. A noise gate is also available by tapping on the '1/4' plug' icon.
Garageband For Ipad Tutorial Guitar Beginners
Once you record a take, you can then add processing to the sound from a preset selection that include effects and voice transformers. The effects also give you sliders for compression, reverb, chorus, etc. depending on the effect you choose.
Recording Tips!
First and foremost... PRACTICE! GB on the iPad does not allow editing like GB on a Mac and you don't get features like Flex Time, multiple takes, pitch correction, etc. Also, you will have to play the parts at the tempo of the song unlike those who slow a song down, record their part, and speed it up after. While some would look at this as a detriment, I look at it as positive growth for musical skills and it ultimately gives you a better understanding of your song. After all, becoming a better musician is a life long process and not a means to an end.
After recording an electric guitar you have plenty of options to affect the tone as the amps have EQ and FX pedals to compress, etc. If you want to record feedback on the electric guitar, you will need to connect the output to your speakers and boost the main volume. But... be careful as each amp/guitar has it's own characteristics for feedback and some are just plain uncontrollable ear-piercing squeals. Layering guitars also has the usual big sound but also eats up tracks so planning is crucial.
Also, when planning your song parts, take into account that GB for iPad does things in 'sections' and only up to 10 sections. While this may not seem like a big deal, you will want to figure out the parts/sections of your song beforehand. For example, song intro, verse 1, pre-chorus, verse 2 with added guitar, pre-chorus with organ, Chorus, verse 3 with less instruments, bridge, intro, Chorus, Chorus 2, End, etc. You can put the 'Sections' into 'Automatic' mode which gives you whatever amount of bars you want i.e. Record intro and verse 1 together.
When recording an acoustic guitar or instrument, be sure to try different takes with your USB microphone or iPad mic on different spots and distances from the guitar. Mic placement is very critical to get a decent sound. For example, placing a mic close to the sound hole of the guitar can add unwanted bass frequencies. Although with the iPad mic I found this to be the best spot.
Also, there are No EQ Frequency bands to allow you to fix things after recording. For a brighter tone, consider newer strings or a harder pick. If using the iPad's mic, make sure your room is as quiet as possible, because it'll pick up every little sound as the signal to noise ratio is not great. Another trick is to use the Guitar Amp settings for EQ control. I found the most natural to be the Clean Combo setting with the gain off. As you increase the gain, it adds some crunch to the tone. This way you can EQ somewhat and even add some nice compression and chorus. Even playing with the Noise Gate setting gave some interesting results. Metal Acoustic! Experimentation is key.
Learn Guitar On Garageband Ipad
Stay tuned for more GarageBand for iPad tips and tutorials on recording synths, pianos, etc. and vocals!