CUCAT Wiki | Reapermidi / RecordingAndEditingMIDI

There are several ways you can record with MIDI. We'll explore a few of these options and why you may want to use them.

Count in and preroll:

There are a couple of ways to start recording in reaper: Count in and preroll. Count in means the metronome starts a set number of measures before reaper or a sequencer in general accepts input from a device, so if we set that to two measures, nothing will be recorded during those measures, You'll only hear the metronome sound; the actual recording will start at the next measure. Preroll means you can set a number of measures of the prerecorded material that you want to hear. If you're at the beginning of a project, preroll acts like a count in. To set these two options go into the metronome settings by pressing Alt+Shift+M or go to the options menu. You'll see a dialogue with check boxes to enable count in or preroll metronome during recording and edit boxes to set the x amount of measures you want. You can choose different samples for your metronome or adjust the beep frequency; in reaper 5 there is also the possibility to change the pattern the metronome is following.

Setting the grid:

If you want to quantize your recording you have to set the grid value at which you want your quantization to be, like 4th, 8th, 16th, 32nd notes, or their triplets. Note about the grids: Reaper has two different grids we have to consider when we want to work with midi: The first one works in the track view, while the second one, in the midi editor. Here's how to set them: We have two ways to set the one related to the track view. The first one is pressing alt+l which makes a dialogue appear. You'll find a list box with all the grid values, choose one and hit escape. The second way is the quickest one because we can use hotkeys to set the grid. All of the hotkeys use the control+shift combination plus the numbers on the number row. 1 sets it to a whole; 2 sets it to half notes; 4 sets it to quarter notes; 8 sets it to 8th notes; 6 sets to 16th notes; 3 sets it to 32nd notes; 5, 9 and 7 set it to quarter, 8th, and 16th triplets.

Quantizing

From the track view, after you set the grid to your liking, select the item you want to quantize, then hit Ctrl+Shift+q which is an sws action that will quantize the notes position to grid.