Sebastopol, CA--GarageBand may not begin with the letter i, but it's a glittering addition to Apple's iLife creative suite. It's a song-making toolkit and software recording studio that can produce professional-sounding, polished musical tracks. The program comes with 1,100 prerecorded loops, tracks for live recordings, and effects like reverb and panning. But it doesn't come with a single page of printed instructions.
GarageBand: The Missing Manual (O'Reilly, US $19.95) is the book that should have been in the box--and the manual that author David Pogue, a composer and former Broadway conductor, was born to write.
GarageBand makes possible "a world where Joe Nobody, a guy with a great voice but no money, can produce a studio-caliber demo CD in his living room," promises David Pogue. And it's for musicians and non-musicians. "GarageBand lets you create authentic-sounding, studio-quality music even if you can't carry a tune, let alone a tuba," assures Pogue. "If you have some semblance of musical chops, though, GarageBand can quickly take you to the next level of creativity."
In GarageBand: The Missing Manual, Pogue explains the two ways GarageBand can create music--digital recordings (sound recordings that Apple calls "Real Instruments") and MIDI recordings (built-in synthesizer sounds that Apple refers to as "Software Instruments")--and advises readers when and why to use each. He explores every GarageBand feature in depth and offers shortcuts, workarounds, hacks, tricks, and troubleshooting advice. He also includes advanced GarageBand techniques for power users.
Covering GarageBand 1.1, GarageBand: The Missing Manual includes:
With GarageBand: The Missing Manual, readers can marry the stunning quality of digital sound with the power of their imaginations and create musical magic with their Macs.
Additional Resources:
- More information about the book, including table of contents, index, author bio, and samples
- More about the Missing Manual series
- A cover graphic in JPEG format
GarageBand: The Missing Manual
David Pogue
ISBN: 0-596-00695-0, 304 pages, $19.95 US, $28.95 CA
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