Recording my keyboard with Audacity

[rodneylush]

I would like to record my daughter playing her keyboard with Audacity. I have an older keyboard with midi input and output. I have ordered a midi to usb cable. It it as easy as that or will I have to do something else?
Thanks,

[kozikowski]

Keyboards have two different connections. MIDI is the obvious one. That's a control signal where the computer tells the keyboard which key to press. It has nothing to do with music.

The keyboard also has an audio output -- on my Yamaha, it's the Headphone Out. You can adapt that to the Stereo Line-In of your computer. Usually, a stereo 1/4" plug to an 1/8" plug on your computer. That's how I made this sound clip.

http://www.kozco.com/tech/organfinale.mp3

That's the good news. The bad news is it rarely works on a Windows Laptop. It works on a large Windows Deskside with a full, large sound card or a Mac which comes with Stereo Line-In.

Windows Laptops tend to have Mono Mic-In which will not cross to your keyboard.

Some Windows laptops have many connections or have one connection that will switch between Mic-In and Stereo Line-In, but that's not normal.

You can buy a simple USB adapter to provide Stereo Line-In to any computer.

http://www.behringer.com/EN/Products/UCA202.aspx

Koz

[rodneylush]

I have connected my keyboard to my pc through the headphone jack to the stereo inline jack on my pc. The sound is good but there is a little delay from when I press the key to when I hear the music. Is there a way to fix this?

[steve]

Switch off "software playthrough" (bottom of the Transport menu)
If you can no longer hear the keyboard you will need to configure your sound card to play sounds from the line input. How to do this varies depending on your Windows version, but you will probably find the option in the Windows Control Panel.

If it is not possible to configure the sound card to enable playing sounds from the line input you will need to use a splitter cable so that you can simultaneously connect the headphone out to the computer and to your headphones/speakers.