Logic Pro X - Multi-Layered Instruments with MIDI FX Plug-ins and Summing Stacks Video Lecture | Logic Pro X: A Practical Hands-on Course - Music

hey everyone this is music tech help guy
and today I want to show you a cool
trick that I use sometimes to layer up
multiple software instrument tracks
together with a track stack specifically
I'll be using a summing stack we'll come
back to that in just a moment as well as
using multiple different MIDI effects
plugins to layer up different effects
like the chord trigger here or the
arpeggiator but before we get into this
video I want to let you know about my
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the course I start with just the basics
of MIDI MIDI signal flow events and
messages MIDI recording and editing
techniques quantization and some
advanced features as well so if you're
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check it out at Mac Pro video comm ok
back to the tutorial so I'm hesitant to
call this like a multi instrument or a
multi tamriel instrument because
technically that terminology means
something else in logic I just consider
this creating a multi-layered
multifaceted instrument and the cool
thing about this is that when it's all
said and done I'll be able to basically
just play one note at a time on my MIDI
controller and trigger bass trigger
chords and arpeggiator and also some
ambient sound design as well so really
this is more of like a sound design
trick that I use again when this is all
done I'll be playing one note at a time
so one thing I want to pull up first is
under window show keyboard and I'm just
pulling this up because I want you to
see the actual notes that I'm playing
the key range I'm going to use is
between C 2 and C 3 and the idea I'm
going to be building is in the key of C
minor so I'll just be using the C minor
scale between these two notes but within
this one octave here so the first
instrument I have here is just a
Steinway grant and just to sort of
expedite things so don't end up with a
40 minute long video I've sort of
pre-loaded some presets so on this
channel I have just the Steinway grand
pulled up
I've also pulled up space designer has
an effect let me just find sort of like
a large hall preset so go to halls let's
use the reflective Hall let's see what
that sounds like cool I definitely want
this to be ambient so I'm going to go
with that and then I have two effects
MIDI effects plugins on my Steinway
grand track I have the velocity
processor as well as the cord trigger so
let me turn off the cord trigger for now
and the only thing I'm really doing with
the velocity processor is I'm setting a
threshold of around high 70s to more or
less limit or really compress my
velocities I don't want my velocities
than the piano to come really come
through is really loud so I'm hitting
the keys hard as I can if I pull this up
to 127
[Music]
so you can see it compresses the
velocity so I'll end up with softer
velocities even though I'm playing the
key at the level you know the loudest
velocity I can hit it at which is 127 so
that's all that's doing and after that I
have this chord trigger
now the chord trigger you can see has a
range of c2 to c3 and I have all these
different chords stored in here
wait just bypass space designer for a
second there so I've saved this as a
preset up here called C minor big chords
so the way you can create your own set
of chords is recall the default setting
go to multi mode and then turn on learn
mode then what you can do is click on a
key and then assign a chord to that key
and then turn off learn mode so not
every single time I press c2 on the
keyboard I get that cord now what I've
done is I've gone through the entire C
minor scale from c2 to c3 and assigned a
cord to each one and I've just saved
that as a preset up here and there we go
okay so now I've got my piano done
and again this is allowing me to play
just one note at a time and trigger an
entire chord okay so the next one down
is an electric piano it's pretty simple
what I'm using is the MIDI effects
plug-in called Transposer and I'm going
to transpose this up an octave or twelve
semitones so when I play c2 on the
keyboard I'm actually hearing c3 when I
play C 3 I'm actually hearing C 4 now
that paired with the electric piano
probably doesn't sound that great
but I'm gonna add some really really
heavy reverb to this now this is a
third-party plug-in it's only fifty
dollars it's called shimmer from
Valhalla and it's a really really cool
plugin for creating ambience here's what
this sounds like with the mix all the
way down so essentially a dry if I pull
the mix up
so essentially shimmer is doing more of
the sound design than the actual
software instrument is so together with
these two together
just creating this really cool ambient
high-frequency sort of afterthought
along with the piano okay next up is the
base for this I've just got a retro
synth setting pulled up it sounds like
this nothing fancy
and then what I'm using is one of the
step effects presets called crowded
chamber because I want to use step
effects to create some motion and I'm
also gonna use the tremolo plugin and
what I'm doing with the tremolo plug-in
is I'm not using one of these other
settings where it pans left and right
I'm using this setting called mono
tremolo synching it to an eighth note
and then pulling up the depth of bit
just so it doesn't completely get ducked
out and then pulling the symmetry back a
bit and this is just gonna create sort
of this moving bass line for me and then
I've added just a channel EQ here just
to scoop out a lot of the high end it'll
get rid of and soften a lot of those
popping sounds now I could try adding
the Transposer to this and transposing
down an octave I really want some really
low heavy bass but it's all gonna depend
on what key you're in I think it's okay
where I'm at right now okay so that's
the bass so let's listen to all three of
these together pretty cool so let's go
down to the last one here since says
mini sync this is an es - setting and it
just sounds like this
I've actually in reality I've got the
cutoff pulled down a bit more
and I've got the channel EQ on it just
to scoop out some of the low and high
end and then I've got the stereo delay
on it just to give it a repeating effect
it's a bit of delay on there so this
track is actually going to be in our
Peggy ater so what I'm doing is I'm
actually layering both a chord trigger
along with an arpeggiator so if I don't
have the chord trigger on it's just
gonna sound like this with one note it's
just jumping up and down in octaves and
again the goal here is to be able to
play one note and trigger all four of
these instruments so if I wanted to have
actual like you know try at our Peggy is
that actually actually to play a triad
so what I'm gonna do is pull up a preset
that I made called C minor triads and
what this does is on each note of the C
minor scale I've created a different
triad but still within that same octave
range of c2 to c3 so now when I play
those notes I actually trigger arpeggios
and then that along with the stereo
delay gives it some nice motion so now
all four of these together sound like
this
[Music]
so the way that we're going to get all
four of these to be triggered by one
MIDI region because right now we'd have
to record the same MIDI region on all of
these or record on one of them and copy
and paste it down I want to treat all
four of these like one instrument so I'm
going to select all four them go up the
track go to create track stack and
create a summing stack and then I have
one summing stack that I can arm and
play all four at the same time so let me
just record in something here
[Music]
so let me open this up here and what
I'll do is I'll set all the velocities
to the same value but just by holding
option and I'll also quantize all of
these it looks like the fastest rhythm I
have is a quarter note so there we go
and then just to make sure that there's
no gaps between notes I'll go over to
edit trim and I'll use this note to
remove overlap so that's one thing I do
is get rid of overlaps and then second
go down to force legato here and what
that does is it gets her the first one
gets rid of any overlaps the second one
gets rid of any gaps so now we have
something that's perfectly quantized to
the grid and we're only playing one note
at a time and we're getting all of those
sounds together so let's hear what the
sounds like with a bit of a drum loop
behind it
[Music]
[Music]
and there you go so that's a cool trick
I like to use to layer together multiple
instruments with a summing stack and
also take advantage of logics MIDI
effects plugins to create chords and
arpeggios and to make sound design easy
and trigger all sorts of cool sounds
with just one key press at a time I hope
you guys enjoyed this video and thanks
for watching