Songwriting often benefits from a fast workflow—and starting the songwriting process with MIDI, rather than recording audio, can speed up the process....Read More
Most people of think of arpeggiation solely in melodic terms, but arpeggiation has additional uses—especially for triggering useful percussion patterns....Read More
Instead of quantizing to a rigid grid, you can load a specific, humanized groove—for example, a hand-percussion part—and quantize to that instead....Read More
Some synthesizers let you program their faders, switches, and buttons so you can mix with them in conjunction with a recording program’s virtual mixer....Read More
Mod wheels are often used to introduce LFO-controlled vibrato, but they have many other potential applications—all you need to do is add some imagination. ...Read More
Although originally intended as a way to help learn how to play guitar, the Jamstik+ from Zivix can also serve as a useful, basic MIDI guitar controller....Read More
When playing a chord progression, it’s easy to have chord notes hit at the same time—but “strumming” the chord can add a more guitar-like quali...Read More
Keyboard shortcuts save much time, but macros—which string together multiple shortcuts—can save you even more time by automating repetitive operations. ...Read More
Yamaha’s Disklavier Education Network website has thousands of public domain classical music files in the Standard MIDI File format, available for free. ...Read More
Obtaining a more consistent touch from an instrument has to happen at the source, when the instrument play, rather than after-the-fact audio compression....Read More