Product Description

Sonar 8 Power! is the most recent edition of the best-selling Sonar Power book series providing detailed training for Cakewalk's Sonar 8 music recording software. Written for both new users and veteran upgraders alike, Sonar 8 Power! walks you through all of the features of the software with step-by-step instructions and exercises. New users will start at the beginning and learn everything they need to know to use Sonar 8 for recording, editing, producing, mixing, and bringing their music to the masses. Upgraders will learn about all the new features in Sonar 8 as well as enhancements to existing features that may affect their current production workflow. PLEASE NOTE: Pages are NOT missing from this book. Instead, there are a number of bonus chapters available for download. Please see the bottom of page 565 at the end of the book for more information.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #73472 in Books
• Published on: 2008-12-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 565 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9781598638219
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

About the Author
Scott R. Garrigus (www.garrigus.com) has been involved with music and computers since he was 12 years old. After graduating from high school, he went on to earn a B.A. in music performance with an emphasis in sound recording technology at UMass, Lowell. In 1993, he released his first instrumental album on cassette, entitled "Pieces Of Imagination." In 1995, he began his professional writing career when his first article appeared in Electronic Musician magazine. In 2000, he authored his first book, Cakewalk Power! This was the first book to deal exclusively with the Cakewalk Pro Audio, Guitar Studio, and Home Studio software applications. Since then he has authored a number of other titles including Sound Forge Power!, SONAR Power!, SONAR 2 Power!, Sound Forge 6 Power!, SONAR 3 Power!, SONAR 4 Power!, SONAR 5 Power!, Sound Forge 8 Power!: The Official Guide, and SONAR 6 Power! Today, Garrigus continues to contribute articles to a number of print and online publications. He also publishes his own music technology e-zine, called DigiFreq (www.digifreq.com), which provides free news, reviews, tips, and techniques for music technology and home recording users.

Customer Reviews

Hopefully a genuine appraisal...
This is the first time I've submitted a review to Amazon, and I guess like most reviewers they are only motived to review it because they either like or hate the item :) Me, i love it.

Anyway, I'm a new Sonar user, starting at Sonar 8 and i was completely overwhelmed by the interface and array of possibilities, settings, customisations - completely LOST.
As most people, I'm so used to intuitive immediate music apps that I tried just fiddling and making a tune myself, but Sonar is so powerful and complex i was getting nowhere, so I needed help.
RFTM!??
Well... no, it's really just a fancy feature list.
The help file was indeed helpful, but cumbersome to manipulate and work alongside Sonar. so in the end I found this book.
At present i'm up to Chapter 5 only, but here's my take so far.

It's kind of Sonar for Dummies. Pitched just at my experience level and it takes you through every step slowly, clearly and methodically.
It's a huge book, but not scary, purely because Scott takes his time to explain things clearly, and in layman's terms.
Honestly, I think this is the best technical-manual-type-book I've seen - I'm impressed and actually looking forward to reading the rest, it's given me hope I can understand and work Sonar correctly (rather than just the 10% of the features I would've worked out for myself), and given me confidence that I can find my own efficient workflow, ....the final point being to make tunes quickly, and not lose inspiration whilst fiddling with myriad buttons and menus.
I can't recommend it enough.

A Must Have!
Hello Everyone,
I must say that Sonar 8 Power has saved me so much time and is written in a way which mades the program easy and fun to understand. What's cool too is that it shows you quickly how to customize your preferences in all areas of the program like Track View preferences, Piano roll view etc. I come from analog and have been a musician all of my life and had quite a bit of success along the way. I wish I had gotten these books when I had Sonar 5, which is where I came in at. Could've saved a lot of time and frustration. 6 Stars!
Tony
[...].

A book that covers the minute details about Sonar 8
Disclaimer: I'm an audio amateur and not a detail person.

Scott will grind and grind and grind through the minute details of Sonar to the point it becomes annoying. But than, just when you thought it pointless, Scott covers an area you knew nothing about in great detail. It is then you realize why the painstaking detail of this book: the author has covered the things many readers know nothing about. So, for that "utility", I give this book 5 stars and highly recommend it if you are a Sonar user.

However, if you are an considering "Ableton Live" and Sonar, I recommend you go with Ableton and buy a book on Ableton instead. After becoming very familiar with Sonar I think Ableton is more polished and helpful for amateurs. I think Sonar is more helpful for pros. Both apps have free demo downloads on the web site so you can try them out and make decisions based on your actual preferences. Also, both apps do an outstanding job at their task.