On the other hand, if you only play one note per measure, the 1/16 function wouldn’t be as useful. If you set the Quantizer function to 1/16 notes, that means it’s going to snap each note to the closest grid line exactly, which is much better if you have a ton of different notes in each bar. It pushes the notes back or forward until they snap exactly to the grid.Īs I’ve explained in my guide all about the piano roll, the intuitive part of it is the fact that the grid-lines are split up so it matches, mathematically, the traditional time measurements of standard notation.Įxplained in another way, if you look at how many grid-lines there are between the 1 and 2 in the Piano roll, you’ll notice there are 16 grid lines. When Quantizing Drum Tracks from really awesome drum programs like Steven Slate Drums 5 from Plugin Fox or even just Garageband’s drummer track, I pretty much always have it set to 1/16 notes, and then I slide the meter all the way to 100 to pull the notes exactly on the grid.Įssentially, that’s what the Quantizer does. While the options are based on traditional musical notation, for instance, 1/16th notes, 1/4 notes, and 1/8th notes, etc, you don’t have to have an understanding of music theory or standard notation to use the function. Once you’ve brought up the Quantizer, you can see the parameters, which there are two, the type of note and how strong you want the quantizer to function. You can also hit the ‘B’ part of your keyboard, or click on the dial in the top-left-hand corner of the DAW. If you want to bring up the Smart Controls, including the part where the Quantizer function is visible, you can just double-click on the MIDI/Audio region and it’ll bring up the Smart Controls in the bottom of the screen. Let’s say that you’ve created a track, whether it’s MIDI or a traditional recording. The Quantizer function is in the bottom of the Garageband interface within the section of the DAW that’s called the “Smart Controls.” It’s the section pointed out in the image shown below: Without further ado, let’s get right into it.
Another way to cut your learning curve with this stuff is to use PianoForAll (from their website), which is one of the best ways to learn the keyboard for music production purposes. When I first started using this software, I used to go through each MIDI note, select it, and manually push it on to the grid line, until I discovered that with a few clicks of the Trackpad, you can just do it automatically without wasting so much time. That, essentially, is what we’re doing when we quantize music. In the following image, we can see that the MIDI notes have been pulled exactly on to the grid. In the first one, we can see that the MIDI notes fall slightly off the grid, which means they’re a bit off-time.
The above summary is the nuts and bolts of how you quantize notes in Garageband, but to further illustrate what I’m talking about here, check out the two images that I’ve created below. In other words, it allows us to alter the notes after the fact, to make the music more “on-time.”Ģ) Hit ‘B’ on your keyboard to bring up the Smart Controlsģ) Choose the note value, ie, 1/16, on which you will base the time quantizerĤ) Drag the “Strength” bar toward 100 to increase quantization Punkademic’s Comprehensive Music Theory Courseĥ0% Off 1-Year Subscription On Their SiteĮxplained simply, Quantizing is the method by which the sound is processed so it falls more in-line with the beat and the overall rhythm of the track.
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In this tutorial today, I’m going to show you how to use the Quantizer function to its best capability, not only for MIDI music but also for actual real-time recordings.īy the way, I have a list of all the best products, coupon codes, and bundles for music production on my recommended products page. The quantizer function is an incredibly useful feature in Garageband, and I use it on pretty much every track.