Playing with midi using keyboard's own sounds
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Dewald van Deventer
2:07 AM (17 hours ago) 2:07 AM
to LOGIC-ACC...@googlegroups.com
Hi folks. Dewald here again.
I've been talking to a person who owns a music school but who also does
recordings, etc.
I told him how I sometimes record a song over and over and over before
I'm happy.
He said that I could record with midi.
I've obviously done this before, experimenting with different sounds in
Logic and Reaper.
But then he told me something interesting.
He said that I could use my Yamaha P220 own sounds to record midi. He
explained to me the basics. I tried to Google instructions on how to do
this.
It seams like you just need to set your midi outto your instrument.
But in Logic, I think you would need to add an external instrument for
this.
So, I tried it out, and it worked.
I had to do this in the inspector, under the midi group, and set the
destination to my Yamaha keyboard.
So I recorded, and everything went well.
But, then I wanted to mix the keyboards's sound and the imported guitar
track togeter.
But, somehow I wasn't able to get the keyboard sound to come through my
mixer.
Even when I tried to bounce the midi track to audio, and export it as an
audio file, it said something about that it was exporting it in real time.
Could any of you enlighten me on how exactly I could record with midi,
but capturing my Yamaha's sounds?
And how to mix it afterward?
My Yamaha P220 is connected to my Mac via USB, and my mixer too. I also
have a normal audio quarter inch to quarter inch connecting my keyboard
to my mixer.
So by the way, I checked out the Z key and Shift+Z, and I'm not
completely sure how it works, but it doesn't want to work on the midi
track.
Another note:
I had flex time turned on and turned on addapt mode for the tempo before
importing my guitar track. Maybe it could mess up my recording. I also
tried to quantize the piano track after recording, but it messed things
up a bit. It sounded a bit better when I changed it to 32=note.
The whole reason for me wanting to record through midi, is that I
sometimes make a mistake, press the wrong key, or slip up a little bit
here or there, and could easily fix it afterward, than to discard the
whole audio recording and start over again. Sometimes it's only one note
I want to change!
Your help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
Dewald
I've been talking to a person who owns a music school but who also does
recordings, etc.
I told him how I sometimes record a song over and over and over before
I'm happy.
He said that I could record with midi.
I've obviously done this before, experimenting with different sounds in
Logic and Reaper.
But then he told me something interesting.
He said that I could use my Yamaha P220 own sounds to record midi. He
explained to me the basics. I tried to Google instructions on how to do
this.
It seams like you just need to set your midi outto your instrument.
But in Logic, I think you would need to add an external instrument for
this.
So, I tried it out, and it worked.
I had to do this in the inspector, under the midi group, and set the
destination to my Yamaha keyboard.
So I recorded, and everything went well.
But, then I wanted to mix the keyboards's sound and the imported guitar
track togeter.
But, somehow I wasn't able to get the keyboard sound to come through my
mixer.
Even when I tried to bounce the midi track to audio, and export it as an
audio file, it said something about that it was exporting it in real time.
Could any of you enlighten me on how exactly I could record with midi,
but capturing my Yamaha's sounds?
And how to mix it afterward?
My Yamaha P220 is connected to my Mac via USB, and my mixer too. I also
have a normal audio quarter inch to quarter inch connecting my keyboard
to my mixer.
So by the way, I checked out the Z key and Shift+Z, and I'm not
completely sure how it works, but it doesn't want to work on the midi
track.
Another note:
I had flex time turned on and turned on addapt mode for the tempo before
importing my guitar track. Maybe it could mess up my recording. I also
tried to quantize the piano track after recording, but it messed things
up a bit. It sounded a bit better when I changed it to 32=note.
The whole reason for me wanting to record through midi, is that I
sometimes make a mistake, press the wrong key, or slip up a little bit
here or there, and could easily fix it afterward, than to discard the
whole audio recording and start over again. Sometimes it's only one note
I want to change!
Your help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
Dewald
TheOreoMonster
12:19 PM (7 hours ago) 12:19 PM
to logic-acc...@googlegroups.com
I really wouldn’t recommend doing this unless there is just some sound on the Yamaha keyboard thats just so unique you couldn’t live without it. ITs a lot more hassle than its generally worth with the wealth of virtual instrument sounds available to us these days.
That being said, if you want to do it, there is a few things to under stand first.
MIDI Has NO Sound! MIDI is purely DATA. Nothing but DATA. MIDI records what key or note was pressed, how long the key or note was held, how hard the key or note was pressed and where in the timeline said key or note was press. If using a drum Pad style MIDI controller replace key or note with drum pad here.
Therefore when you record a MIDI track, the only thing thats actually being captured is that data. Thats the very DATA you can edit in the piano roll or event list. What generates the sound is the Software instrument on the MIDI track. That Software Instrument is interpreting that MIDI data in real time and generating the sound on the fly. This is why you can change the Software Instrument to change the sound.
Now to discuss using an external MIDI instrument. If you want to record MIDI but get the sound of an external MIDI device like your Yamaha keyboard, then instead of using a software instrument like Studio Piano, replace the Software Instrument on the MIDI track with Logic’s external instrument plug in. Now you can tell it to Use the Yamaha keyboard as a MIDI out device and which input on your audio interface the keyboard is plugged into so it can grab the audio that the MIDI data is generating on your keyboard.
Now you can record and edit your MIDI and whenever you play keys on your keyboard or hit the spacebar to play the MIDI you recorded, you will hear the sound of your Yamaha keyboard.
When you are done, you will need to bounce in place and this will bounce in real time as it needs to run all the MIDI out to your keyboard and record the audio of your keyboard back into Logic.
The whole time you are recording with the external instrument loaded on to the MIDI track you are only recording the MIDI data but monitoring what the MIDI data generates sound wise through your Yamaha keyboard, its not actually recording the Yamaha keyboard. The sound of the Yamaha keyboard won’t be recorded till you bounce that MIDI track in place.
This is probably the most straight forward way to do this and it’s still. A bit of a hassle, especially bouncing in real time. One could make an argument for doing this if you had an analog synth whose sounds you wanted to capture in the DAW., however, The Yamaha pr line if memory serves correct is a digital keyboard, and you would only be forgoing using a digital software instrument in Logic to pass MIDI out to another digital device to then capture that digital device back into the DAW through it’s analog output. So yeah unless there is just a really cool sound you can’t find elsewhere, probably not worth the hassle.,
One could also argue if the sound is so unique you want to keep using it, use Auto Sampler to turn that sound into a Logic Sampler instrument and then you can use it as easily as any other software instrument going forward.
-T.O.M
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That being said, if you want to do it, there is a few things to under stand first.
MIDI Has NO Sound! MIDI is purely DATA. Nothing but DATA. MIDI records what key or note was pressed, how long the key or note was held, how hard the key or note was pressed and where in the timeline said key or note was press. If using a drum Pad style MIDI controller replace key or note with drum pad here.
Therefore when you record a MIDI track, the only thing thats actually being captured is that data. Thats the very DATA you can edit in the piano roll or event list. What generates the sound is the Software instrument on the MIDI track. That Software Instrument is interpreting that MIDI data in real time and generating the sound on the fly. This is why you can change the Software Instrument to change the sound.
Now to discuss using an external MIDI instrument. If you want to record MIDI but get the sound of an external MIDI device like your Yamaha keyboard, then instead of using a software instrument like Studio Piano, replace the Software Instrument on the MIDI track with Logic’s external instrument plug in. Now you can tell it to Use the Yamaha keyboard as a MIDI out device and which input on your audio interface the keyboard is plugged into so it can grab the audio that the MIDI data is generating on your keyboard.
Now you can record and edit your MIDI and whenever you play keys on your keyboard or hit the spacebar to play the MIDI you recorded, you will hear the sound of your Yamaha keyboard.
When you are done, you will need to bounce in place and this will bounce in real time as it needs to run all the MIDI out to your keyboard and record the audio of your keyboard back into Logic.
The whole time you are recording with the external instrument loaded on to the MIDI track you are only recording the MIDI data but monitoring what the MIDI data generates sound wise through your Yamaha keyboard, its not actually recording the Yamaha keyboard. The sound of the Yamaha keyboard won’t be recorded till you bounce that MIDI track in place.
This is probably the most straight forward way to do this and it’s still. A bit of a hassle, especially bouncing in real time. One could make an argument for doing this if you had an analog synth whose sounds you wanted to capture in the DAW., however, The Yamaha pr line if memory serves correct is a digital keyboard, and you would only be forgoing using a digital software instrument in Logic to pass MIDI out to another digital device to then capture that digital device back into the DAW through it’s analog output. So yeah unless there is just a really cool sound you can’t find elsewhere, probably not worth the hassle.,
One could also argue if the sound is so unique you want to keep using it, use Auto Sampler to turn that sound into a Logic Sampler instrument and then you can use it as easily as any other software instrument going forward.
-T.O.M
Grab your free “Getting Started With Logic Course at https://www.theblindlogic.pro/subscribe/
Join The Band! Membership perks include in-Depth Tutorials,live Q&A & more https://www.theblindlogic.pro/members
Interested in One On One Training? Visit
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Dave Leo Baker
12:31 PM (7 hours ago) 12:31 PM
to logic-acc...@googlegroups.com
The only thing I’d add as some keyboard guy who struggled to connect with the idea of soft synths at first: Yamaha and Roland both have VSTs of heir own hardware including the quirks of the boards like the D50, etc. Yamaha also has a good track record of accessibility, something we didn’t know about back in the 80s.
The reason you have to bounce real time if you’re using your gear as an external instrument is it needs to record the instrument playing the part. I would look at Yamaha and VSTs before looking at sampling because the VST is going to let you do the deep synthesis you’re used to as a keyboardist, including how your CCs like Mod wheel or breath behave. And TBH I haven’t tested a Yamaha or Roland VST so I don’t know which is more accessible at this point.
I’d say about 7 years ago I felt that the only way to capture a Jupiter8 / Juno106 / Prophet V etc was the hardware, but I keep being surprised. Even by the very inaccessible Omnisphere which I do use professionally at this point, even if I can’t do any deep synthesis with it as I do Alchemy, Sampler, surge XT etc. All the presets, all the different synths now, it’s a lot compared to what we used to have.
If you’re willing to deal with the realtime bounce and you need that sound which you can’t find elsewhere, the external instrument route is your only route.
dave
> To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/logic-accessibility/2EA92462-A6A4-4369-9728-B7CE7F67B6F7%40logic.band.
The reason you have to bounce real time if you’re using your gear as an external instrument is it needs to record the instrument playing the part. I would look at Yamaha and VSTs before looking at sampling because the VST is going to let you do the deep synthesis you’re used to as a keyboardist, including how your CCs like Mod wheel or breath behave. And TBH I haven’t tested a Yamaha or Roland VST so I don’t know which is more accessible at this point.
I’d say about 7 years ago I felt that the only way to capture a Jupiter8 / Juno106 / Prophet V etc was the hardware, but I keep being surprised. Even by the very inaccessible Omnisphere which I do use professionally at this point, even if I can’t do any deep synthesis with it as I do Alchemy, Sampler, surge XT etc. All the presets, all the different synths now, it’s a lot compared to what we used to have.
If you’re willing to deal with the realtime bounce and you need that sound which you can’t find elsewhere, the external instrument route is your only route.
dave
Kevin Gibbs
1:09 PM (6 hours ago) 1:09 PM
to logic-acc...@googlegroups.com
Tell me more about how Auto Sampler works.
Sent from my iPhone
> On Mar 26, 2026, at 11:19 AM, TheOreoMonster <theoreo...@logic.band> wrote:
>
> I really wouldn’t recommend doing this unless there is just some sound on the Yamaha keyboard thats just so unique you couldn’t live without it. ITs a lot more hassle than its generally worth with the wealth of virtual instrument sounds available to us these days.
> To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/logic-accessibility/2EA92462-A6A4-4369-9728-B7CE7F67B6F7%40logic.band.
Sent from my iPhone
> On Mar 26, 2026, at 11:19 AM, TheOreoMonster <theoreo...@logic.band> wrote:
>
> I really wouldn’t recommend doing this unless there is just some sound on the Yamaha keyboard thats just so unique you couldn’t live without it. ITs a lot more hassle than its generally worth with the wealth of virtual instrument sounds available to us these days.
TheOreoMonster
1:54 PM (6 hours ago) 1:54 PM
to logic-acc...@googlegroups.com
Yeah they have VST’s or Software instrument versions of their classic analog hardware. And yes those software instruments will give you all the features of the instrument unlike a sample library version of the instrument can. But while I am not familiar with the exact model, if memory serves correct the Yamaha pr line was usually the lesser expensive all in one digital keyboards.
> To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/logic-accessibility/AFEBD313-B9C3-493C-8F51-DAA27C8866F8%40gmail.com.
-T.O.M
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TheOreoMonster
1:58 PM (6 hours ago) 1:58 PM
to logic-acc...@googlegroups.com
It’s similar to the external instrument except it’s loaded as an audio plug in and not a MIDI instrument. It sends MIDI data to the external device and records the audio that the MIDI device generates into the appropriate audio files that it can then use to build a sample library from in the format compatible with Logic’s Sampler. You can then load that instrument as a preset in the Logic sampler and play the captured sound whenever you’d like.
I am pretty sure Andre did tutorials on this when the feature was first introduced years ago, thats probably the best option to see it in action from an accessibility stand point.
> To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/logic-accessibility/5EB51AA9-0ED0-4CEB-898F-E610DBEBE419%40gmail.com.
I am pretty sure Andre did tutorials on this when the feature was first introduced years ago, thats probably the best option to see it in action from an accessibility stand point.
-T.O.M
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