How A Real Musician Uses The Logic Pro Digital Audio Workstation

Introduction

The Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) has transformed the process by which musicians and producers create sound recordings. Since the first DAW was invented by Micro Technology Unlimited in 1979, the features available to the sound recordist have exploded over time. This has been fuelled by the growth in raw computer power available, along with an ever-increasing array of digital music- and sound-related hardware and software accessories, all with ever decreasing costs.

Systems like Ableton, Pro Tools, Cubase and Logic Pro offer a bewildering array of possibilities for making sound recordings. While all DAWs are based on the traditional analogue recording studio desk model of channels, sliders and plug-ins, they now offer a flexibility far beyond what was possible with a traditional analogue mixing desk.

Given the flexibility available now to musicians ranging from the home recording enthusiast to the serious professional, there are a great many tutorials on sites such as YouTube and LinkedIn Learning describing the mindboggling number of features that modern DAWs offer and how to use them. However, this raises the question:

• How do working professional musicians actually use these tools?

And also:

• How is the work of making a recording shaped by the tools used to make it?

This is a case study of how Jacob Collier, a relatively young but increasingly successful professional musician, uses the features of Logic Pro in the creation of his sound recordings.

The Artist: Jacob Collier

Jacob Collier is a 25-year-old musical creative genius based in London, who won two Grammy Awards in January 2020 for his arrangements of Moon River and All Night Long. An obscenely talented multi-instrumentalist known for his microtonal vocal harmonies, he uses digital recording technology from his home-based studio extensively in his work. He has also published several videos on his YouTube channel breaking down his use of Logic Pro in detail, which makes him an ideal candidate for this case study.

The Tool: Logic Pro

Logic Pro began life as a music sequencer named Creator from German company Emagic. In 1992 it evolved into Notator which ran on Atari, Macintosh and Windows computers. It was subsequently renamed Emagic Logic, acquired by Apple in 2002 and rebranded Logic Pro.

Apple dropped support for platforms other than macOS while continuing to develop Logic Pro. In October 2017, it was voted the second most popular DAW behind Ableton Live and ahead of Pro Tools and Cubase. The latest release, Logic Pro X version 10.5.1, is promoted online by Apple with the headline “Ridiculously powerful. Seriously creative.”

Jacob runs Logic Pro on a Mac computer with 128 Gb of RAM, a MIDI keyboard, condenser microphone and various electronic musical instruments connected via USB audio interface.

Moon River

Jacob’s Grammy Award-winning arrangement of Moon River by Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer is a great example of his non-linear creative approach facilitated by Logic Pro. He utilises the platform’s flexibility to develop creative ideas in a much more fluid manner than a traditional recording session, and collaborates online with large numbers of other musicians and creative artists.

Here is the Logic session breakdown:

This recording begins with a collage of famous musician friends such as Chris Martin, David Crosby, Kimbra, and even his mum, who he asked to video themselves on their smartphones singing the word “Moon” to any of the diatonic notes in the key of B♭ major. He used the external audio editor RX to remove background noise from the audio track within each video and imported the resulting 151 “Moons” into the Logic Pro session.

He created audio tracks arranged by frequency from low to high, grouped into folders for each of the diatonic notes in the key, and placed several audio samples onto each track using the Equalisation plugin to match the sounds of the various different sources. Audio samples were displaced along the timeline to create harmonies using different chords from B♭ major. To complete the ethereal sound collage, he applied reverb using the Altiverb reverb plugin set to Notre Dame in homage to the famous cathedral destroyed by fire on the day he collected the tracks.

The recording continues with his acapella arrangement of the song proper, constructed over a week from the music room in his house by rapidly recording hundreds of short improvised vocal clips in multiple takes. The tracks containing these clips are grouped into busses for common effect processing, including equalisation and octave-shifting for the bass tracks.

Jacob uses a MIDI keyboard triggering the Vintage Electric Piano software instrument to plan some of his harmonisations before singing them, while others are entirely improvised. Microtonal elements are introduced by adjusting the tuning of the instrument up 50 cents via its control panel to produce the key D-half-sharp, and then incorporated into the vocals. He sings with just intonation to avoid the dissonant compromises of equal temperament, aided by the Kontakt virtual instrument plugin’s Dynamic Pure Tuning option.

Many of the vocal parts are multi-tracked by recording the same vocal sound multiple times on different tracks to create “that family feeling of the hug you feel when many people are singing at once”. Notes are combined into chords by placing them vertically adjacent to each other in the Logic Pro main editor window. Each track is panned to position these notes to the left, centre or right in varying degrees, giving a feeling of being surrounded by and immersed in the soundscape. Rapid experimental recording, playback and re-recording is a fundamental part of Jacob’s creative process, facilitated by the ability to rapidly rewind, replay and record in the DAW.

One of his favourite techniques is what Jacob calls “Pyramiding”, which is essentially arpeggiating the introduction of each note in a chord by staggering the recording of each vocal sample contributing to it. These are used for decoration throughout the piece, often multi-tracked. Subtle breathing noises were added to fill every gap in the sound. Background motifs from other songs on the same album and other “Easter eggs” are also incorporated.

He recorded the song without a click track or metronome, to make the work flow freely, and used the repeat function to copy and expand individual notes when he wanted to add extra time to them. In the final chorus, Jacob introduces a microtonal direct key change into the key of B-half-flat to give the finale of the song a lift.

Increasing numbers of tracks were added as the song progresses towards its climax. The final arrangement involved over 600 tracks, for which he was grateful to Apple who only recently increased the limit from 255 to 1000. Mixing involved extensive use of automation to adjust the volume of each track dynamically in the final mix.

All Night Long

Jacob’s arrangement of Lionel Richie’s All Night Long also won a Grammy Award, and was “Arranged, orchestrated, recorded, mixed, produced by Jacob in Logic Pro X.” As with Moon River, the creative workflow was highly non-linear, taking full advantage of the flexibility offered by the platform.

Here is the Logic session breakdown:

He developed the orchestral arrangement in 6 hours by playing software instruments on his MIDI keyboard. The resulting score was then exported from Logic Pro, imported into Finale music notation software, played by the live orchestra, recorded as audio files and used to replace the software instruments. He applied no processing to the orchestral recording other than mixing levels, to maintain as faithful a sound as possible.

The vocal parts were notated in Sibelius music notation software and sent to the members of the featured artist, acapella group Take 6. They recorded their parts and sent the audio files back to Jacob, who combined them in the Logic Pro session.

Brazilian samba rhythms inspired the percussion in the introduction, which was recorded in a separate Logic Pro session with Jacob sequentially playing various instruments in his music room. The percussion session had 293 tracks which were bounced down to four audio tracks for inclusion in the main Logic Pro session.

The first sound in the song is a chord consisting of 19 separate samples grouped together in a track folder and pitch-shifted down 1½ semitones with the Pitch Shifter plugin. He then bounced this down into a single sample, reversed it and shifted it back up 4½ semitones for use elsewhere in the piece.

Jacob used the Keyscape keyboard sample library, consisting of samples of a vast array of popular keyboards, to include the mechanical sounds of the Rhodes LA Custom organ. He also included electric guitar and bass parts played by himself on real instruments connected directly to his USB audio interface.

Ben Bloomberg engineered the orchestral recordings and helped Jacob mix the orchestral tracks. Room microphones captured the whole room, while each instrument also had its own microphone. This allowed muting and tuning adjustments for individual instruments on the rare occasion that they were out of tune.

Other inclusions to the soundscape include an “Oh!” exclamation by Herbie Hancock recorded during a session 3 years prior, the sound of light rain to make the song breathe during the lyrics “feel it in your soul”, a Theremin, cathedral organ, choir sounds, vocal utterances, scatting, party sounds, and the motif common to all songs on the album. Each of these was captured with a microphone and included on the audio tracks in Logic Pro.

At a previous gig, Jacob had asked the audience to perform and make recordings on their phones of a “stomp clap” and submit them to him via social media. He took the samples and used a separate Logic Pro session to create a “JC stomp clap” battery for the Battery drum sampling plugin, triggered via keys on the MIDI keyboard.

As with Moon River, each track uses extensive volume automation set during mixing. Mastering is performed using the Ozone mastering plugin on the Stereo Out channel and automating the compression parameter to dynamically adjust the dynamic range of each part of the song.

Sleeping On My Dreams

This song was recorded at 108bpm and then sped up to 111bpm to give it more energy. They even shot the music video at the slower speed and sped it up. Here it is:

Here is the Logic session breakdown:

Jacob describes his creative philosophy as: Don’t think about it; just do it and see if it works. If it doesn’t, change it.

He listens to pop music that he likes and tries to imitate it. There is no rule book.

He believes in himself.

He played his Grammy in the track.

Plugins:

• The King’s Microphones Plugin
• Little AlterBoy Plugin
• PanMan

All I Need

Here’s the song:

Here is the Logic session breakdown:

Time Alone With You

Here’s the song:

Here is the Logic session breakdown:

With The Love In My Heart

Here’s the song:

Here is the Logic session breakdown:

Foster le Concrète

Inspired by Jacob’s epic breakdown videos, I decided to do one of my own.

Here’s my song Foster le Concrète:

And here’s a breakdown of how I made it in Ableton:

Conclusion

Jacob Collier is an example of a working musician who uses many features of Logic Pro extensively in his creative workflow. His non-linear use of the platform, huge numbers of tracks, simultaneous application of a diverse set of plugins with a wide variety of settings, and extensive use of multi-tracking and automation allow the creation of recordings that would otherwise be impractical, or even impossible, without the aid of a digital audio workstation.