I am fully blind and a voiceOver user. I play guitar, and would be interested in recording some of the songs I write.
I’m looking for a few things. First, and the reason I chose this forum, what’s the best app to use to do this?
Second, I need a good recommendation for a microphone that won’t break the bank.
Finally, I’m looking for a good splitter to plug both my guitar and a microphone into. I would like them to be on separate channels if possible so that I can edit volume on each track, etc.
Again, this doesn’t have to be top of the line equipment. I’m just looking for a better option than recording into my iPhone. Thank you in advance for the help.
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Bit more clarification
When you say “won’t break the bank,” what’s your hard limit? That’ll help narrow things down right away.
For microphones, if you’re mainly recording guitar and vocals, I’d look at the Shure SM57 . It’s durable, directional, and works well for both. If you want something a bit more sensitive for vocals, you could go condenser later, but the SM57 will do the job just fine to start with.
Now, what you actually need isn’t a splitter, it’s an audio interface — something that lets you plug in both a mic (XLR) and your guitar (instrument jack) on separate channels. The Focusrite Scarlett Solo , M-Audio M-Track Solo , or M-Track Duo are solid options.
If you want a recorder that can also act as an interface and is accessible , avoid the older Zoom “Pro” models — they’re not voice-guided. Instead, look at the Zoom H4 Essential or Zoom H6 Essential . These have built-in accessibility features (spoken menus), multiple inputs, and can record directly or connect to your computer as an interface.
For interfaces or recorders, one thing to keep in mind: if the interface or recorder have volume knobs, make sure the knobs have some kind of tactile indicator — a small notch, point, or bump that tells you where they’re set. If they don’t, an easy trick is to turn the knob all the way up and place a raised sticker or bump dot at the top (12 o’clock). Then you’ll know your orientation — 6, 9, 12, or 3 o’clock positions give you a mental map of your gain or volume level. You may need a sighted person to help label them once, but after that, you’ll know by touch. The reason why I say if they have knobs is because as an example, the Zoom recorders in the essential line don’t have knobs.
As for software, if you mainly want to record and edit audio tracks (not heavy on virtual instruments), Reaper is one of the best choices. It’s extremely accessible with VoiceOver and has an active blind-user community. Given you’re on macOS and want more built-in instruments or loops, GarageBand or Logic Pro also work, but they’re more complex to navigate, in my opinion. Reaper stays cleaner and more focused if you just want to track, mix, and master record and edit, and at least compared to logic pro is cheaper. Reaper is $60, logic last I checked is $200, garage-band is free, comes as part of the apple apps, imovie, pages, numbers, etc.
Anyway, hope this helps, if you have any more questions, let me know, and I’ll do my best to help. My experience with recording and sound design is slightly different, as I am more oriented towards field recording, and not so much music recording, but I do have a bit of experience in this as well.
Audio interface.
The Audient Evo interfaces are also accessible and have auto-gain. This means you start auto-gain and play and sing as loud as you will in the song, and it sets the microphone levels automatically. The Evo 4 is between $100-200, probably about the same price as the interfaces already recommended. The only issue is that the gain is a little low for dynamic microphones like the SM57. Behringer makes some decent condenser microphones that are pretty cheap, I don't have prices handy, or models. But again, at worst about as expensive as an SM57.
For software, you can start with Garage Band, it's free. There's also Reaper, which costs to register but it's pretty cheap. But really, if you're just recording guitar and vocals, you probably don't need that much software. If you do, you can look into your options later, you've got a few, Logic Pro and Reaper and Ableton Live and Protools, if you want to go really crazy. Garage Band will probably do everything you need though.
If you don't want to be able to mix, i.e. control the volume of each track to balance levels and such, you could get a USB microphone and just use that to record. Essentially this would be like recording with your phone or an old-style cassette recorder, you'll be recording guitar and singing at the same time with one microphone, and you won't be able to separate the guitar and vocals. This assumes you're recording an acoustic instrument or using an amp with an electric guitar.
With an audio interface, if you've got an electric guitar, or an electro-acoustic, you can plug the guitar into the interface and record it directly, and use the microphone to record vocals. Ideally this is what you want to do, putting each on a separate track.
Why? Suppose you want to put a different effect on the guitar, say a chorus, (think of the sound of a twelve-string), than the vocals, let's say you want to put reverb on those. The only way to do that is to have them as separate tracks. Otherwise, any effects you add will apply to both. Also, if you want to go as cheap as possible, you could use a USB microphone and record each track separately, first the guitar, then your vocals. But you would always have to record only one at a time that way.
Good luck, and feel free to ask more questions.