Logic: Why My First Note Never Records (or Plays?). Pre-Roll It!

So you do the count-off and start to record on the Measure 1 on your timeline. You realize that the very first note you hit never plays back (though it's recorded on the Piano Roll) on your Logic MIDI or Software Instrument recording.

There is nothing wrong with your technique or timing. You are not trigger happy nor your timing is completely off. Nobody in the right fame of mind can play exactly at the 1.0.0.0  Just about anyone will get into this issue.

Almost all of us hit a note slightly earlier from time to time. We tend to swing a beat a bit early to a bit late and that makes the music sound more naturally played. In syncopated Jazz tunes that's almost required!

The Best Solution:

Let the Logic roll one measure and then start recording your piece. That's called a pre-roll and there is nothing wrong approaching your recording that way. In most professional recordings, you do need to include a pre-roll so get in the habit of including one.

Excess pre-roll can be dealt with during bounce by you specifying the in and out points (start and end points) in the bounce dialog box. Also a bit of a pre-roll space gives listener a bit of breathing room in albums. You should give a bit of gap between tunes. If you do not give this space, and if you cut your album that way, every song starts abruptly as soon as the last song ends.

Having a pre-roll also is a good idea if you have many other stuff in your recording chain. It will help "boot up" from your FireWire sound source to external synths when the Start signal is sent.

If You Absolutely Have To Start the Note at the Very First Tick in a Measure...

Just go to your Piano Roll and look for the very first note. Mark that note then just select the Quantize and it will line up with the very initial point of a grid, or manually drag in the first note. You will find the first note sticking a bit left of the grid.