
Next, open the Piano Roll for the third channel and choose File | Open score in the Piano Roll Options. In the Step Sequencer you will now see something like this: To illustrate this further, close the Piano Roll Arpeggiator by clicking Accept. I believe it is clear how the arpeggiator pattern translates into the arpeggiated chord. Instead of explaining this in words, have another look at the illustration above. The pitch is determined by the pitch of the source notes and the relative pitch of the arpeggiator note, starting from C5. The arpeggiator pattern controls the way the chords are chopped up – in terms of the bounderies and lengths of the individual note events.

Hmm…but how exactly does it work? To clarify things a bit, have a look at the illustration below: For the sake of this tutorial I suggest you select the Default pattern under Pattern – simply click the folder icon and load the Default.fsc file. You may see another pattern though, dependent on what arpeggiator pattern has been selected. Your chord progression has been instantly arpeggiated based on some default settings. See below:īeware, this will have an immediate effect on your chord progression. What you do now is open the Piano Roll for the second channel with the chord progression and select Tools | Arpeggiate from the Piano Roll options. You should now hear the chord progression of the second channel only (reFX Nexus #2 in my example). First you want to make sure to mute the first channel with the chord progression (I want to see the greyed out notes, but not hear them). Let’s first have a look at the arpeggiator tool. I will use this third channel to make my own arpeggiator pattern. To make things even more confusing, let’s add another channel. Ok, back to our two channels with the chord progressions. This is what you see in the first screenshot of this tutorial – which I will repeat here to make my point. If you do this you will see the note patterns of other channels greyed out when working in the piano roll of some channel (only applies to patterns that are in the same pattern track in the Playlist). Next, make sure you switch on Ghost channels in the Piano Roll options.
FL STUDIO SCORE FILE CHORDS HOW TO
If you want to know more about how to make chord progressions, I suggest you read: Making a chord progression and lead synthįirst I place the chord progression in two channels. Deciding on the scale(s) and the chord progression(s) is an excellent foundation on which you can build your composition and add the various layers - in our case an arpeggiated melody.įor this tutorial I use a chord progression – based on a D minor scale - which I also used in another tutorial (see also screenshot above). One thing that I usually (not always) start with when composing a song is a chord progression. While you can always create an arpeggio manually – by simply placing, copying and pasting all necessary note events, FL Studio also offers a neat little tool – the arpeggiator - that you can use to create great arpeggio’s. Here you can see the original chord progression (greyed out note events) and the arpeggiated version (green note events).


It gives me so much control and flexibility. While the standard generators as well as many VST plugins have real time arpeggio features, I always like to play around with FL Studio’s arpeggiator. Knowing how to create a great arp (short for arpeggio) will allow you to add wonderful layers to your compositions. It is quite a common technique in the electronic (trance) music world. FL Studio tutorial explaining the arpeggiator tool.Īn arpeggio is a type of broken chord where notes are played in a sequence rather than simultaneously – with notes going up or down along the notes of the chord.
