Quick & Dirty Cover Song Production Technique Using Guitar Pro

I’m going to let you in on a secret to producing cover songs more quickly than recording all the parts normally. The secrets requires the use of two softwares; Guitar Pro and Propellerhead Reason 5. In the following I am going to introduce you to these software and tell you exactly how you can produce a cover song quickly, typically within just a couple of hours.

Guitar Pro

Guitar Pro is tablature editing program that has many more features than just reading tablature and music. You can write your own music in Guitar Pro or you can also download songs from websites it has built in as well as other website you can find by typing the song name you are seeking along with the search term “guitar pro” (for example “comfortably numb guitar pro”). Guitar Pro allows you to export scores into MIDI files. These MIDI files are what you will import into the next software I will speak of, Propellerhead Reason 5

Propellorheads Reason

Propellerhead Reason 5 is a synth editing software that is widely used by music producers of all genres. It has an enormous range of synths, effects and mastering devices built in. You can create new sounds as well as purchase “refills” which are packages of synths configured typically for a specific genre or style of music. You can write things on the fly by using a USB controlled keyboard, by using your mouse and keyboard, or in this case by importing preconfigured MIDI files.

Now that you are familiar with the software, I will give you the basic steps for producing a cover song using both. These steps are presented at a high level and are designed for the user that is somewhat familiar with the applications. At a later date I will update this with a video stepping you through all of the following.

Quick & Dirty Method:

Launch both Propellerhead Reason 5 & Guitar Pro.
Find a cover song on the internet by searching for the song title along with the keywords “guitar pro” and you will typically find a site with your song if your song is popular enough.
Download the Guitar Pro file.
Open the file you just downloaded in Guitar Pro.
Go to the File menu > Export > and choose MIDI.
Switch to Propellerhead Reason 5
Go to the File men and choose Import.
Select the MIDI file you just exported.
Add your instruments to the MIDI tracks.

With this method you save time because you are importing the pre-composed MIDI tracks. If the Guitar Pro file is written accurately your only concern is creating the correct synths and instruments, reducing the time to produce since you don’t have to score out all of the tracks.

xoxo,

Christine Rage