In this article, I’ll show you exactly how to plug your guitar into GarageBand using a quick summary as well as a thorough step-by-step process. The way I do it not only sounds good but it’s also convenient, moreover, it minimizes latency and other problems too.

• Plug Electric Guitar Into Ipad Garageband
• How To Plug Your Electric Guitar Into Garageband
• How Do I Plug My Guitar Into Garageband
• How To Plug Electric Guitar Into Garageband

Product Description. JAM brings the legendary sound quality of Apogee to iPad®, iPhone® and Mac for just $99. Now guitarists can have a pocket-sized, plug in and play interface at an unprecedented price and experience ultimate tone with the guitar amps and effects in Apple’s GarageBand software or other compatible applications. Even with a preamp installed, recording an acoustic guitar, into GarageBand or any DAW, tends to lack a straightforward approach and best practice. The iRig Acoustic Stage makes it incredibly simple, and the results sound surprisingly good. In my opinion, this process made my Taylor sound better than it usually does on other tracks I've recorded. Aug 19, 2011 50+ videos Play all Mix - How to plug your guitar into iPad and GarageBand YouTube How to connect an electric guitar to an iPhone or iPad - Duration: 9:12. Pete Johns 82,276 views. GuitarJack Model 2 has been discontinued. Please see the newer models: GuitarJack Stage and StudioJack Mini.

To plug your guitar into Garageband, connect the computer to an audio interface like the Scarlett 2i2. In Garageband’s Preferences, set the Input to the Interface and the Output to “Built-in Output.” After plugging the guitar in and selecting the Audio track, click the monitoring button to hear it.

by the way, I have a list of all the best products for music production on my recommended products page, including the best deals, coupon codes, and bundles, that way you don’t miss out (you’d be surprised what kind of deals are always going on).

How to Plug Your Guitar Into GarageBand

There are a few different ways of doing this, and some are significantly better than others. I’m just going to show you the way that I do it with a short video below and then a full-on walkthrough.

I have a couple of pieces of necessary gear (the following 4 links take you to Amazon):

• Obviously, your guitar.
• A Firewire to USB Cable
• an Audio Interface (I use the Focusrite Saffire 6USB. The Scarlett 2i2 is good too.)
• A USB-C to USB cable (The only reason this adapter is necessary is I’m using the latest edition of the MacBook Pro. The older generation MacBook Pro doesn’t need this adapter).
• Regular Guitar Cable.

If you’re new to music production, understand that a lot of this equipment will come in handy for years to come.

If you’re serious about recording and producing, much of this equipment and more are a necessity, so just grab some of it off Amazon and be done with it, by the way, I couldn’t recommend JamPlay’s website enough if you are serious about learning how to play guitar in one of the most efficient ways imaginable (use the coupon code “1buck,” which makes the first month practically free).

Without further ado,

The actual steps:

1) Connect your Firewire cable to your MacBook Pro. In most cases, this cable will come with your purchase of an audio interface, or a MIDI keyboard. However, if you don’t have one for whatever reason, I’m sure you can pick one up from Amazon for cheap.

2) Usually, the port for the firewire cable is on the back of the Audio Interface. Plug the other part of the firewire cable into the back of the Audio Interface.

In my case, the Firewire to USB has to go into the USB-C adapter that I mentioned earlier.

3) Now, assuming you have the Focusrite Saffire 6USB, it should be powered by your computer. You don’t have to plug it in or anything like that, so all of its lights will turn on which you can see on the front of the unit.

4) Open GarageBand.

5) Click “Open Project,” or one of your old existing files. It doesn’t matter.

6) Once it brings up the “Choose A Track Type Page,” Click on where it says: “Built-in Input.”

7) This should be all that’s needed for this part of the process. However, assuming this is the first time that you’ve ever done this, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to click on where it says, “Built-in Output.”

8) That should bring up your “Output” and “Input” Devices under the Audio-MIDI region preferences.

9) Make sure you’ve selected “Built-in Output,” if you’re using your computer as your speaker, or the speakers that are hooked up to your laptop.

10) Select your Audio Interface for the “Input Device.”

11) Now, once you’re back at the “Choose A Track Type Page,” then click on one of the two subheadings below, either the “Guitar option,” or the “Microphone option.” This should bring up your MIDI Region and all of your controls.

12) In the “Smart Controls Area,” make sure that you’ve selected your audio-interface where it says, “Input.”

13) Now, plug your guitar into the front of your Audio Interface.

14) Click on the “Monitoring Button,” which looks like an upside down Wi-Fi symbol. This part is important, otherwise, you won’t be able to hear what you’re even playing.

15) You can now select whatever kind of amp you want, whether it’s a “clean guitar,” “crunch guitar,” “acoustic guitar,” “distorted guitar,” “experimental guitar,” “clean bass,” “crunch bass,” and “experimental bass.”

16) You want to hit the “Monitoring” button beside your track-header as well. I’ve highlighted the upside down Wi-Fi-looking symbol with a black circle. It’ll turn orange once it’s been selected.

Under each heading, there are quite a few options that all sound pretty good, especially after you tweak them to your preferences.

And it’s pretty much as simple as that.

There are some problems that you can run into when doing all of this for the very first time. For that reason, I’ll explain some of the problems that I’ve had when I first started out.

Common Problems and Annoyances As A Beginner

1) Make sure that the gain on your Audio-Interface isn’t turned up too much, otherwise, you’re going to be feeding GarageBand too hot of a signal, which will make it sound distorted and bad.

2) Make sure the “Pad,” and “Inst,” buttons are turned off on your audio interface, assuming you own a Focusrite Saffire 6USB. I imagine there are similar controls on other audio interface models.

I find that these buttons make the signal too powerful as well, and thus, create distortion. For example, you can use “INST” setting (which stands for instrument), on the Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 instead of keeping it turned off. Use the “AIR” feature to give it a bit more juice if you want.

3) Latency. I’ve never actually had latency problems when using an Audio Interface, but some people do have this problem, and the solution – as I’ve explained in my article dedicated to the subject – is usually fairly straightforward.

Essentially, if you’re having latency issues, there could be a number of different causes, however, most of them will be a result of your set-up and incorrect settings for your gear.

For instance, you want to make sure that – if you’re running more than one track – you have the monitoring button turned on for only one of them, rather than every single track.

Other Ways Of Recording Your Guitar In GarageBand

1) You can also use your MacBook’s microphone. This is for very rough demos, obviously, because this way of doing it is going to make a very low-quality recording. However, if you’re desperate, and want to record something, this method will work.

• To do this, you just open a new “Audio” track in your workspace.
• And then click on the “Record” button.
• Start playing the guitar with your amplifier close to it, and that should be enough for a very rough demo.

2) You can also purchase a Guitar to USB cable and hook your guitar directly up to GarageBand. This is an inferior way of recording guitar tracks as well, but it works if you’re running on a string budget.

(This is what a guitar-jack to USB looks like. I don’t own one so I couldn’t take a picture. I had to piece these two images together, but this is what it looks like).

GarageBand will immediately recognize this as an input, so you don’t have to worry about there being compatibility issues.

However, like the method above, you’ll likely run into latency.

3) Use a small portable audio interface like the iRig HD 2 (my dedicated review) if you plan on only running one instrument through your DAW. This is pretty much the same as the main method which I described in detail above.

The only difference is that you’ll be using a much smaller, and likely, limited audio interface. The good thing about this is that it’s relatively inexpensive. Small interfaces are becoming exceedingly popular, like the iRig for example.

I haven’t picked one of these up yet, but once I start traveling around Europe, I imagine I’ll eventually purchase one. I’ll make sure to write a review on it once I do.

Update: You have to use the iRig HD 2 if you want it to work with a PC computer or Mac. The iRig 2 is only good for mobile.

4) Another popular way would be to mic your guitar amplifier up to your audio interface and then through GarageBand.

This is a decent option, but I prefer just to run my guitar directly through GarageBand, rather than doing this. Amplifiers are too big and cumbersome, and I would much rather limit the amount of gear I own to just a guitar like my PRS SE Custom 24 from ZZounds and BlueCat’s Axe Pack from Plugin Boutique.

Before playing your guitar in GarageBand, know that there’s a default tuner right in the DAW, although, Blue Cat Audio’s Hot Tuna (also on Plugin Boutique) is much better. There was a time when I would use the default tuner on occasion, but these days, I use the Hot Tuna instead because it’s way better.

How To Tune Your Guitar Using GarageBand

1) Your guitar is plugged into your audio interface in the computer, so it’s as simple as clicking on the tuning fork beside the center of the DAW where it shows the time signature, tempo, and key signature.

2) When you click on the tuning fork icon, it’ll bring up the meter where you can tune your guitar.

Other Features

One of the great things about using a DAW for your guitar is all of the great VST plug-ins that you can use for your guitar.

For example, you can download amplifier simulators and cabs for your set up using my tutorial here, and while it may not sound good as the original which the plug-ins are modeled after, they still sound good enough to use, and they’re good enough for the vast majority of people.

That’s all for now. If this helped you out, do me a favor and share it on social media.

YouTube Video Tutorial

Conclusion

I hope this was helpful to you. Share it on social media, it would be greatly appreciated.

Can I record my guitar on GarageBand?

You can connect an electric guitar or another electric instrument to your computer to play and record in an audio track, and use the included amps and pedals to shape your guitar sound.

Can I plug my guitar directly into my computer?

The most popular way to connect an electric guitar to a computer is by using an audio interface. An audio interface is a simple box that allows you to plug your guitar or other inputs into it, and it converts the signal into a digital signal to send via USB to your computer.

How do I plug my guitar into my laptop?

Place your standard guitar cable into your guitar. Plug the opposite end of the guitar cable into the pre-amp’s input port. Insert a USB, Firewire, or Optical cable into your pre-amp’s USB or Firewire out port. Plug the other end of this cable into your laptop’s USB or Firewire in port.

What do I need to plug my guitar into my computer?

Here’s what you should have:

1. Your electric guitar.
2. Your guitar cable that you would normally plug into the amp.
3. A laptop, PC, or Mac with an open USB port.
4. An audio interface.
5. A USB cable to connect the audio interface to the computer.
6. DAW software on the computer.

Plug Electric Guitar Into Ipad Garageband

Can I plug my guitar into my iPhone?

You can’t just run a cable from the guitar to the iPhone’s headphone socket. Instead, you need to buy an interface. … Step two is to plug everything in. The guitar gets plugged into the big hole, your external speaker or headphones get plugged into the little hole, and the Lightning cable runs to your iPhone or iPad.6 мая 2017 г.

Can you record MIDI in GarageBand?

How To Plug Your Electric Guitar Into Garageband

Record a software instrument

in the control bar (or press R) to start recording. Use your MIDI keyboard, Musical Typing window, or onscreen keyboard to play some notes. The recording appears as a new MIDI region on the track as you record.

How Do I Plug My Guitar Into Garageband

Do I need a DI box for electric guitar?

How To Plug Electric Guitar Into Garageband

It’s a good idea for gigging or recording guitarists. Even better for bassists and acoustic players. If you gig a lot or do a lot of studio recording, you should have a good DI box. … That’s because guitars and basses (passive models, which is most of them) produce very fragile signals with very little real power output.