Get your ideas down quickly by recording to a simple beat.
If you have an idea for a rap or a rhyme and you want to record it quickly, laying it over a simple beat is an effective way of doing so. Recording a rap with no rhythmical backing can be challenging, because there is no beat to guide you. Many artists have an archive of beats already recorded for this purpose so that they can go straight to the recording process when they come up with a rhyme that they like.
Instructions
1. Connect a microphone to the audio interface. Plug the male end of an XLR cable into the female XLR socket on the bottom of your microphone. Plug the other end of the cable into the XLR input socket on the audio interface.
2. Connect the audio interface to the computer. Use either a USB cable or a Firewire cable, depending on the make and model of your computer. Typically newer systems have Firewire connectivity. The socket for both Firewire and USB cables is normally located on the side of a laptop and on the rear or front panel of a desktop computer tower.
3. Set up a channel for the voice. Double click "File" in the top left corner of your music production program interface. Select "New" and, when prompted, select "Audio Track." If you wish to set up more than one channel, delete the "1" from the dialog box and enter the amount of tracks you want. You can always add extra tracks as you go if you don't know how many tracks you need.
4. Audition the voice level. Sing into the microphone at the level you intend to record at. If the gain meter on the audio interface is hitting the red section, reduce the gain.
5. Connect a pair of headphones to the headphone output on your audio interface. Listen to the beat through headphones. Otherwise, the beat playback will spill into the microphone when you record. Typically, the headphone out socket has a small headphone icon above it. On some interfaces, you can assign any socket as the headphone out. Do so by selecting "Preferences," then click "Outputs." Select the output channel you wish to assign to headphones and then select "audio out." Alternatively, unplug the speaker cables from the audio interface and insert the headphone cable into on of the vacant sockets.
6. Cue up the beat. Slide the navigator button to the extreme left of the screen or double-tap "Return" to set the track to the start.
7. Turn the master volume down. Put on the headphones and hit "Play." Gradually increase the volume of the beat and begin to sing. Find a mix that lets you hear the beat as well as your voice.
8. Hit "Record." Click on the record icon in the navigator section or use your pre-determined command shortcut. For example, "Ctrl+R" for PC or "R" for Mac. Typically, the music production software will give you a two-bar count in before the beat starts.
Tags: audio interface, cable into, into microphone, music production, simple beat