The way music is composed has come a long way from the days of Mozart and Beethoven. The days are long gone where you had to record music on a 4 track tape recorder and write down each and every single note. Nowadays almost all professional music production is done through digital hardware and software. The textbook talks about software such as Apple's Final Cut Pro which is used for making and editing movies but similar software such as this is used for professional and amateur music production as well.
Two of the most popular softwares currently used by music professionals all over the world are Apple's Logic Pro 9 and Ableton Suite 8. Most audio professionals prefer to work on Apple's Macs due to their efficiency and reliability in handling such hardware and resource extensive programs while minimizing unnecessary clutter. Therefore this is why you will see numerous producers work on Logic Pro 9 (the mac only software) as opposed to Ableton 8 (although Ableton can be used on macs as well it is mostly used on windows systems).
The traditional definition for Logic Pro 9 is that it is a digital audio work station and MIDI sequencer. (1) MIDI stands for Musial Instrument Digital Interface - it is an industry standard protocol that enables electronic musical instruments, computers, and other electronic equipment, to communicate and synchronize with each other. Unlike analog devices, MIDI does not transmit an audio signal: it sends event messages about musical notation, pitch and intensity, control signals for parameters such as volume, vibrato and panning, cues, and clock signals to set the tempo. (2) In other words, Logic is pretty much equivalent to a VCR in terms of it being a MIDI and digital audio recorder. For example, you can have a MIDI keyboard such as one by M-Audio; plug it in to your computer with the Logic Pro software, hit record in Logic, and it will record whatever you play on your MIDI keyboard into Logic. Once you hit play, you will be able to hear what you have just recorded. The amount of sounds and instruments that can be recorded through one MIDI keyboard is unimaginable. Simply put Logic gives you the ability to record audio, edit what you have recorded with extreme precision, record MIDI, edit that recorded MIDI, print out professional notation with the MIDI you have recorded, software instruments built in to Logic, audio track mixing, along with a wonderful graphical user interface called an Arrage Window that allows you to view and manage all your multimedia files. You can record MIDI through a MIDI keyboard and have it be played back as any number instruments ranging from guitars, to pianos, to drum kits, to trumpets. It is truly an amazing way to create music. Not only can you plug in MIDI keyboards, you actually have the ability to plug in actual instruments such as drum kits or electric guitars if you wish. Whatever you play on these instruments automatically gets transcribed on to logic in a easy to see and edit visual interface.
I myself use Logic Pro 9 to produce music in my free time and personally know some very prominent and award winning song writers and producers that work with artists such as Lil Wayne, Jay Sean, David Guetta, Beyonce, and Britney Spears that use this very software to create hits upon hits for these artists. To sum it all up Digital Audio Sequencers and workstations such as Logic Pro 9 are the future of music production. These powerful software give you the ability to create great music, as long as you can figure out how to use the complicated software (takes years and years of practice to perfect your technique) and you have musical talent. Simply put, Logic gives you the ability to write music with the perfect creation and writing tools, record music, edit and polish performances, and mix a number of tracks with hundreds of input channels.(4)
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logic_Pro
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIDI
3. http://www.musicradar.com/tuition/tech/10-killer-new-features-in-logic-pro-9-217023/4
4. http://www.apple.com/logicstudio/what-is/
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