Learing to use Reaper,

DeadMoney

Hi, I have downloaded reaper and bought a new audio interface and I am looking to start messing around recording some loops using a microkorg and guiatars. Not looking to make any full tracks as of yet but just want to use it to aid with writing some stuff. I have no idea where to start though with reaper as I have never used any production software before. Anyway am hoping to educate myself over the next few months so can anybody recommend where I should start. I was looking for some tutorials on youtube but they seem a bit advanced. Oh and also, if I connect a synthesizer through the interface and on to Reaper, can I use the sounds off the synth along with reaper's built in sounds or will the synth just act as a keyboard controller?
Thanks

Quiggers

I've never used reaper but the synth question i can help with,
if you connect the midi leads then the micro korg will be able to play soft synths,
and reaper will be able to play the microkorg, you may have to go into the keyboard settings and turn local off, this way when you press a note, the midi message goes straight to reaper, you should have a midi channel created, with the input from the microkorg and the output as the microkorg, the message will travel through reaper and back into the microkorgs sound engine where it will cause a sound to play, to hear this sound you will have to connect the microkorgs stereo out to the audio interfaces input and monitor it through reaper. this is done to avoid a midi loop which can cause notes to repeat or hang. so you'll need 2 midi leads and a stereo lead. dont forget to turn local back on if you want to just jam with the microkorg without booting up your pc.

Executive Steve

Reaper is wicked! Reallly helpful forum community, loads of wicked tutorial stuff around too, can't recommend it highly enough. Haven't used any external devices with it myself yet, only starting to learn the ins and outs of it myself.

old gregg

+1 on Reaper
I started using it a few months ago to mix an album that had been initially recorded in Ableton. Great software and I'm thrilled with how it's all working out.

Can't say I spent much time looking for video resources (yet) cos mixing is very straight forward in Reaper but I have grabbed the free user guide and will probably invest in a book or two when I start the next project and bypass Ableton completely.

DeadMoney

old gregg wrote: »

+1 on Reaper
I started using it a few months ago to mix an album that had been initially recorded in Ableton. Great software and I'm thrilled with how it's all working out.

Can't say I spent much time looking for video resources (yet) cos mixing is very straight forward in Reaper but I have grabbed the free user guide and will probably invest in a book or two when I start the next project and bypass Ableton completely.

Cool, thanks for the link. I am a bit intimidated by Reaper to be honest coz I am not even sure of what it does so hopefully I will be able to figure it out. Basically what I am looking to do is put guitars through it and record some riffs and loop synth and drums, effects etc over it. Basically just to put some songs together but not to make any high quality recordings. So you think Reaper will be good for this?

old gregg

for sure Reaper will take care of that task.

as a complete beginner with Reaper I tried to get it to record some guitar and didge via mics plugged into my M-Audio Fasttrack Pro interface, it took me a bit to get them talking but once I'd figured how/where to set the record source for the track I was arming then it was easy.

I suppose there are easier ways of just recording simple guitar parts, even Audacity would do that, but the advantage of getting the hang of a prog like Reaper is that it prepares you for the day you want to do something more adventourous.

best of luck with it!!!