Where to start to get a basic understanding of Midi and Programming in Reason?!

[Eddie T. Ellis]

Hey everyone,

So far my whole experience with recording has been with tracking live instruments to a click and I've now come to the point where this needs to change. My style has changed as an artist and I need a medium to turn to to build my tracks to send off to my producer/to be fully developed and Id rather be ahead of the game building scratch guides or even just starts to my songs.

Im an Electro/Pop/Rock Singer/Songwriter/Lead Guitarist and I just got Reason 4.0 and i have no Idea where to start. I've never programmed drums, never used Midi, never sampled, never used Soft Synths, etc. Basically I just need to know where to start to get a basic understanding of this stuff and build from that. I will defiantly be using Reason Integrated with Pro Tools so I can track Live guitars, vocals, etc but I still need to figure this part out.

Any help you guys can be is extremely appreciated and would mean a lot.

Best,
Eddie

[Jovas]

Operation Manual

[Yoozer]

Originally Posted by Eddie T. Ellis

I've never programmed drums

If you can drum or at least drum with your fingers, go try an Akai MPD or any of those pad-based controllers. Load drums up in Reason's sampler, and you're done.

ReDrum is one of the simplest drum machines ever. Pick the sound you want to use, punch in the 16th notes where you want to hear something. That means the kick at 1, 5, 9, 13 and the snare at 5 and 13.

never used Midi

Neither does Reason; at least, it only uses MIDI in the sense that you can play a controller and it listens to what notes you play.

The most important rule to remember - write it on your wrist with a sharpie if you have to:

MIDI IS NOT AUDIO

MIDI is to audio as sheet music is to a CD player. MIDI tells you what to play, not how it sounds; audio tells you what it sounds like, not what to play. Everything else logically follows from that.

never sampled

Nonsense. Of course you have. Every time you digitally record something, you sample.

The difference is that in a sampler, you put it in there and do more with it than cut bits out - you play it back faster or slower, or you play back something different depending on how hard the keys are hit (velocity).

Anyway, Reason doesn't sample either; you record your material with a wave editor, cut it to the right size, save it and open it up in Reason. The only reason older hardware samplers have a method to record and options to edit samples is simply because transfer via a computer was a ridiculous hassle back then (or not even envisioned).

never used Soft Synths

There's nothing special about them; it's just that you can allow automation to move far more parameters at the same time than the poor MIDI protocol could handle with most hardware machines.

Basically I just need to know where to start to get a basic understanding of this stuff and build from that.

Wauter's Reason tutorial

Work through that; yes, 4 has more options, but they are mostly user interface related, nothing game-changing.

[Stevil]

Tweak's Guide to the Home and Project Studio

[Llitsor]

Originally Posted by Jovas

Operation Manual

Agreed. And as luck would have it, the manuals for Reason are very good. Beginner or not thumbsup

[Eddie T. Ellis]

Wow,

Yoozer that means a lot that you just did that thought out answer. Most people would never take the time to do that and as a 17 year old who is still learning quite a bit, it really meant a lot to me.

Another question: For what Im doing Electro/Pop/Rock. What is a better route to tracking live guitars, vocals, etc while building the track digitally. Reason w/Pro Tools? Logic? Ableton?

Eddie

[Eddie T. Ellis]

BUMP.

[onion]

Originally Posted by Eddie T. Ellis

For what Im doing Electro/Pop/Rock. What is a better route to tracking live guitars, vocals, etc while building the track digitally. Reason w/Pro Tools? Logic? Ableton?

eddie, i wouldn't want to have the final word on your decision, but i'll tell you my opinion. i don't think that the genre you work in has much to do with which daw you pick; any of the titles you mentioned (as well as sonar, dp, cubase, etc.) would give you the power and the tools to make compelling music, provided the talent and skill are there.

since it seems you're new to some of the concepts involved (such as midi, soft synths, sampling), and i gather you may already be familiar with pro tools, that might be the one for you. pro tools is very simply and elegantly laid out, editing is a breeze, and midi handling has improved markedly over the last couple updates. i think pro tools is a great beginner daw, and it's obviously capable of satisfying professional engineers the world over.

i humbly submit that, while many excellent musicians/producers use it as their platform of choice, logic is unnecessarily complicated and unintuitive. logic seems to favor power and flexibility (namely, object-based editing rather than tracks and the totally customizable environment over a standard digital mixer) at the expense of simplicity.

my personal preference is ableton live. it is practically built from the ground up for "building the track digitally," as you say. the session view is one of many innovative features designed to maintain the creative flow as you work. so i recommend that, if you'd like to try something other than pro tools, you give live a whirl.

best of luck to you.

[Eddie T. Ellis]

Onion,

Thank you. I will take all of this into consideration on my final decision. Im going to ask around a bit more before I commit but I feel the Pro Tools/Reason Route is probably best.

Eddie