Before recording audio

You can record your voice, an acoustic instrument, or any other sound using your computer’s built-in microphone or a microphone connected to your computer. You record sound from a microphone to an audio track.

Before you start recording audio, do the following:

  • Check hardware connections and settings, making sure that any sound source you plan to use in your session—microphone or mixer, for example—is connected to the audio inputs of your system and is working. You should also check hardware settings such as the system memory requirement and disk space.

  • Add an audio track, which is used to record a voice, an acoustic instrument, or any other sound from a microphone.

  • Choose the recording file type—AIFF, WAV, or CAF—for audio data before recording.

  • Set the audio recording path, which is only necessary if you want to save recorded audio outside of the project.

  • Set the project sample rate, which is the number of times per second the audio signal is sampled. Recording at a sample rate of 44.1 kHz is recommended for most situations.

  • Set the project bit depth, which is the number of digital bits each sample contains. Recording at a bit depth of 24 bits is recommended for most situations and is the default setting.

  • Set up the metronome, which plays a steady beat so you can play and record in time, or as a count-in before recording starts.

  • Enable software monitoring, which allows you to monitor incoming audio through any effects that are inserted into an armed audio track.

  • Check the monitoring level, which controls the playback (or monitoring) level, not the recording level.

  • Tune any instruments that are connected to your system, to ensure that your external instrument recordings are in tune with any software instruments, samples, or existing recordings in your project. You can access the Tuner using the Tuner button in the control bar. For details about the Tuner plug-in, see the Logic Pro Effects manual.