Apple's GarageBand 3 (included in the iLife '06 suite) lets a musical wannabe make music with a MacBook Pro — complete with a driving bass line, funky horns, and a set of perfect drums that never miss a beat. In fact, the thousands of prerecorded loops on tap in GarageBand even allow you to design your music to match that melody running through your head, from techno to jazz to alternative rock.
GarageBand 3 also produces podcasts. You can record your voice and easily create your own show, and then share it with others from your iWeb site — even add photos if you like.
As shown in Figure 1, the GarageBand window isn't complex, and that's good design. The important controls are described in the following list:
Figure 1: The GarageBand window — edged in wood grain, no less.
Track list: In GarageBand, a track is a discrete instrument that you set up to play one part of your song. For example, a track in a classical piece for a string quartet would have four tracks — one each for violin, viola, cello, and bass. This list contains all the tracks in your song arranged so that you can easily see and modify them, like the rows in a spreadsheet.
If you're creating a podcast, a Podcast artwork track like the one you see at the very top of the list in Figure 1 can also appear.
Timeline: This scrolling area holds the loops (see the following bullet) that you add or record, allowing you to move and edit them easily. As a song plays, the timeline scrolls to give you a visual look at your music.
Loop: This is a prerecorded clip of an instrument being played in a specific style and tempo. Loops are the building blocks of your song. You can drag loops from the loop browser to a track and literally build a bass line or a guitar solo. (It's a little like adding video clips to the timeline in iMovie HD to build a film.)
Playhead: This vertical line is a moving indicator that shows you the current position in your song as it scrolls by in the timeline. You can drag the playhead to a new location at any time. The playhead also acts like the insertion cursor in a word processing application.
Create a New Track button: Click this button to add a new track to your song.
Track Info button: If you need to display the instrument used in a track, click the track to select it and then click this button. You can also control settings such as Echo and Reverb from the dialog box that's displayed.
View/Hide Loop Browser button: Click the button with the striking eye icon to display the Loop Browser at the bottom of the window; click it again to close it. You can see more tracks at a time without scrolling by closing the Loop Browser.
View/Hide Media Browser button: Click this button (which bears icons of a filmstrip, slide, and musical note) to display the media browser at the right side of the window; click it again to close it. By closing the media browser, you'll see more of your tracks. If you're already familiar with iDVD or iMovie HD, you recognize this pane in the GarageBand window — it allows you to add media (in this case, still images or video clips) to your GarageBand project for use in a podcast.
Return to Beginning button: Clicking this button immediately moves the playhead back to the beginning of the timeline.
Play button: Hey, old friend! At last, a control that you've probably used countless times before — and it works just like the same control on your audio CD player. Click Play, and GarageBand begins playing your entire song. Notice that the Play button turns blue. To stop the music, click Play again; the button loses that sexy blue sheen, and the playhead stops immediately. (If playback is paused, it begins again at the playhead position when you click Play.)
Time/Tempo display: This cool-looking display shows you the current playhead position in seconds. You can also click the time/tempo indicator (the blue LED numerical display at the bottom of the window) to change the tempo (or speed) of your song.
Volume slider: Here's another familiar face. Just drag the slider to raise or lower the volume.
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