Hello!

[bopeuph]

I posted a few days ago, but I'm going to now start with my intro as I begin to ask many questions to get my computer going.

I'm Nick, I'm a freelance musician in the Orlando area. I work regularly all over Florida on trombone, euphonium, tuba, electric bass, and double bass. I'm classically trained, but usually gig in jazz or more popular genres.

I've been having a hankering to get into recording for years. I've been wanting to be able to record myself or just some quick demos of groups I play in with a bit better quality than my minidisc recorder.

On top of gigging, I do a lot of work as a music copyist and arranger. I've never been too crazy about the audio side, but if I'm optimizing my computer for sound, I might as well have better sounding MIDI setups too, right?

I have just enough computer knowledge to get by with my computers safely, and probably just enough to not know when I'm actually being dangerous to my computer. So some of my questions might sound a bit nutty.

Well, there you have it. Thanks for this great asset.

[JayGee]

Nick,

Welcome to the forum.

[Emma]

Hi there and Welcome!
That's quite a range of instruments you play! You've come to the right place for learning audio stuff - ask heaps of questions. There is so much stuff to learn, it can seem overwhelming at times. Don't forget to check out the Killer home Recording free Setting Up stuff as it's got some great start-up hints that can save you a bunch of trouble.

[brandondrury]

I might as well have better sounding MIDI setups too, right?

MIDI tools are too damn good now to ignore them. For example, take a listen to what Stormdrum 2 Virtual Instrument can do. If a musician can't figure out how to get in trouble with that, they don't have a pulse. It's easy to go off the deep end with this stuff, but what I hate most about being totally overloaded is I don't have time to make my noises like I used to. I used to love taking 30 minutes a day and throwing together a quick 45 second thingy for future use (or not).

Brandon

[bopeuph]

Thanks, Emma!

MIDI tools are too damn good now to ignore them. For example, take a listen to what Stormdrum 2 Virtual Instrument can do. If a musician can't figure out how to get in trouble with that, they don't have a pulse. It's easy to go off the deep end with this stuff, but what I hate most about being totally overloaded is I don't have time to make my noises like I used to. I used to love taking 30 minutes a day and throwing together a quick 45 second thingy for future use (or not).

Holy jeez. That really does sound incredible. I think I might actually disappear if I had those libraries. I don't even consider myself a creative musician, but there's so much fun to be had with those! The thing is--they're so freaking expensive. You could blow thousands of dollars just buying this kind of stuff.

These sounds create the need for a third hard drive, right? If I were to go this route, I would have one disk for programs, one for audio, and one for MIDI. Right?