Logic Pro 7 & earlier Logic 7 - please help!

hello everyone

I am new to Logic and have always used Steinberg so please bare with me and try to refrain from using too many technical terms at this early stage with me. i would appreciate that.

Basically I can see that a few people in the past have had the same issue. i have tried to read their comments and responses of help by other forum users but i cannot make anything of it. What is happening is that I can hear the metronome, I am able to record audio and play audio back but when I want to record MIDI and playback my MIDI recording, i can't hear a thing and it's driving me insane. The manual doesn't make any sense to me and it just doesn't seem too clear cut

I hope some of you can help me.

Rachel x
 
Also I forgot to add that the manual has been written like people should already know what they are doing which is not very helpful to people who are not used complicated programmes like this
 
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Welcome to the forum!

Some of the discussions get very technical. And sometimes it takes the forum members a while to understand the background level of the person asking a question, so do not be surprised if someone asks you for more explanation.

It is definitely true that the manual assumes the reader understands what the question should be, and also true that the program presumes you know what you want to accomplish.

It is good you are successful with recording and playing back audio, that means your hardware is connected.

MIDI can be confusing, and you really have not provided enough information. Do you want to record your MIDI from a MIDI keyboard, and have the MIDI recording play back the sounds in the MIDI keyboard? Or are you entering the MIDI notes into the piano roll or score editor, and want them to play back on one of Logic's built-in instruments?
 
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Hello Juan,

Many thanks for your kind response. I am using my Dave Smith Mopho synth as a MIDI keyboard to record MIDI using the Logic Plug-ins but just cannot hear anything and I really do not understand what I am doing wrong. As I said, I can record audio from my synths and I can hear the metronome but cannot hear the MIDI plug-ins either monitoring or playback. I can see that logic is responding to the MIDI information as I play the notes on my synth.

Yeah my hardware is set up correctly it would seem.
 
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There are forum members who have published books on Logic, and others who have written their own software, so I am sure you will find answers.

I skipped from Logic 5.51 up to Logic 8 and 9, but did go to a demo for Logic 7 and noticed the interface looked similar to 5.51. Some things were renamed in the recent release, and many features were added that made things easier.

When I bought Logic 8, I also bought a Logic 7 book by David Dvorin and was able to reconcile the differences.

Sooner or later, either you or the forum members are going to upload a screen shot to illustrate what is at issue. Do you know how to use the "Grab" utility that is part of OSX so that you can upload screen shots?

Also, for simplicity's sake, I suggest you load an existing MIDI file and try to get it to play back the included virtual instruments. Once you have that mastered, you can record new MIDI files.

How is your keyboard connected to Logic, with a USB cable or with a combination of MIDI and audio cables?
 
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It is worth learning to use the grab utility. It is under the finder pulldown, under Utilities. Start it and play around with it, ask questions if you get stuck.

For Logic, create a new empty file. Create a new track. In the current version of Logic, and from the arrange window, there is a tab for "track" as part of the arrange window, and you can select things like audio, MIDI, software instrument (maybe audio instrument), etc. Logic now creates aux tracks when you use a send, and I am pretty sure it also automatically creates things like master faders and click tracks in the background.

With the current version, you should create a "software instrument" track. These used to be called "audio instrument" tracks. Let me know your choice.

You will need to load a virtual instrument into this track. It should default to your main output strip. Beginning in Logic 8, much of this was visible in the arrange window. But in Logic 7, you may have to switch to the "Mixer" window so you can check out where the audio out is routed.

If you have questions, no problem.

Highlight your new track (to select it) and hit the [ESC] key. That should pop up a mini window that gives you little icons that will morph what happens when you click with your mouse. Drag down to the "Pencil" tool. Click in the new track and pull to the right, this will create an empty MIDI region. Hit [ESC] again to re-select the standard "pointer" tool (an arrow), it should be at the top of the list.

From the main pull-down, select "Window" and open either the "Matrix" or "Score" editor. While inside of one of those, use the [ESC] key to pop-up the mini-tool menu, and choose the "pencil" tool again. Draw in a few notes into the empty region. Don't try to get anything musically perfect at this point.

If none of the above makes sense, I will have to upload a few screen shots. But, the idea will be to see if your virtual instruments are outputing audio.
 
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Hello there,

Many thanks again for your kind response and help. If you could add screen shots for me that would be great. It might help me that little bit more to understand what I have to do.

I cannot thank you enough for your help
 
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I attached a "zip" of a Logic 5.51 MIDI session. It should open in your version of Logic. I am pretty sure it will "unzip" -- I downloaded it into my Logic 9 computer to see if there were any issues.

Most likely you will get some error messages because you are using a different interface (this was saved on a PC, which used an ASIO interface). Try it and see. When I opened it in Logic 9, I got a message asking if I wanted to convert it to audio units. I did not have to change the interface, etc.

The session uses two of Logic's free virtual instruments. You can switch "screen-sets" by using the 1 - 9 number keys (above the letter keys, not the numeric keypad). Just tap the different numbers while the file plays.

The main audio should be "pulled down" to minus 3 dB to avoid clipping. The synths have a hot output, turn your speakers down before playing it!
 

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This demo was saved in Logic 8, and was previously uploaded to test if Logic 8 could open Logic 5.51 files. If you cannot open it because you are using Logic 7, I will have to upload a different version.

The demo is a disco, seventyish piece, but has some interesting environment artifacts as well as a nice demo of nine screensets. There is a wave file for it that I did not include.

As I did not include the "wave" audio file, if you want to audition the piece, you must add the ES2 hybrid synth to each of the indicated tracks.

When the file loads, it will tell you the audio file is missing. Click "Skip." Load the Logic instrument ES2 on tracks 1 to 14. Track 15 is an audio track if you want to do a bounce. Track 16 has some meta data: if you want to let Logic flash explanations about the ES2, as the demo plays, unmute track 16. Open the mixer and pull down any tracks that are higher than 0dB. Pull the Outputs 1-2 track down to -6dB to eliminate any clipping.
 

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😡 I am still struggling to get to grips with this problem. I can't get my head around it :brkwl:

I'm sure you've explained everything to the best of your ability and I really appreciate it. I am sorry if this seems rather frustrating for you.

Rachel
 
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