Tag: farrago

METT Podcast #16 – Master Your Virtual Teaching Tech, with David MacDonald

Thanks to my sponsor this month, MusicFirst

David MacDonald returns to the show to talk about the hardware and software in our virtual teaching setups. Then we speculate about touchscreen Macs and consider how Apple’s recent App Store policies might impact the future of creative professional software on iOS.

Topics include:

  • New Zoom features for musicians and teachers
  • David and Philip Rothman‘s new podcast, Scoring Notes
  • Using Open Broadcaster Software to level up your virtual teaching
  • Routing audio from your apps into Zoom and Google Meet calls
  • Teaching with Auralia
  • LMS integration with third-party music education apps
  • Using MainStage and Logic for performing instruments into virtual classrooms
  • Touchscreen Macs
  • Apple’s App Store Policy

Show Notes:

Where to Find Us:
Robby – Twitter | Blog | Book
David MacDonald – Twitter | Website | Blog

Please don’t forget to rate the show and share it with others!

Subscribe to Music Ed Tech Talk:

Subscribe to the Blog

Subscribe to the Podcast in…
Apple Podcasts | Overcast | Castro | Spotify | RSS

Today’s episode is sponsored by MusicFirst:

MusicFirst offers music educators and their students easy-to-use, affordable, cloud-based software that enables music learning, creation, assessment, sharing, and exploration on any device, anywhere, at any time.

MusicFirst Classroom is the only learning management system designed specifically for K-12 music education. It combines the flexibility of an LMS with engaging content and powerful software integrations to help manage your students’ progress, make lesson plans, and create assignments.

And for younger students, MusicFirst Junior is the perfect online system for teaching elementary general music. It includes a comprehensive K-5 curriculum, hundreds of lessons & songs, and kid-friendly graphics to making learning and creating music fun!

Whether you’re teaching remotely, in-person, or in a blended learning environment, MusicFirst will work with you to find a solution that fits your program’s unique needs. Try it free for 30 days at musicfirst.com. 

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        <div class="image-caption"><p class="">David’s teaching setup.</p></div>
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        <div class="image-caption"><p class="">My teaching setup.</p></div>
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        <div class="image-caption"><p class="">…From far away. </p></div>
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Routing Audio from Your Apps Directly Into Your Zoom Call (Or Other Voice Chat App) with Loopback

UPDATE: Learn more about Loopback from my interview with CEO Paul Kafasis on my podcast. Listen and subscribe below…

Listen on Apple PodcastsListen on SpotifyRSS Feed

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            <img src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5595df9ce4b0ce9ff9ecd1a8/1595452750007-D26OAX2RKZQIH3PLZ874/loopback%402x.png" alt="Loopback is an app that creates custom audio ins and outs for the Mac using the audio of other apps." width="512" height="512" style="display:block;object-fit: cover;width: 100%;height: 100%;object-position: 50% 50%" loading="lazy">

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      <figcaption class="image-caption-wrapper">
        <div class="image-caption"><p class="">Loopback is an app that creates custom audio ins and outs for the Mac using the audio of other apps.</p></div>
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Have you been teaching a class in Google Meet or Zoom and wanted to play a song from iTunes for your digital classroom? Or perhaps a YouTube video or any other application with audio?

Sure, you can play it right on your computer and let the audio from your speakers go straight back into the microphone input of your computer. This works ok in my opinion. But it isn’t going to produce a pure representation of the audio I am trying to send. And in some cases, it creates issues with echo, delay, or a nasty feedback loop.

So what do you do? Rogue Amoeba makes excellent Mac apps that, for lack of better explanation, hack into the audio system of your Mac. I have written about Audio Hijack here before, their app that allows you to record audio from other applications (and that’s just the start of all the powerful things it can do). Rogue Amoeba also makes an excellent utility called Loopback.

What does Loopback do? Think about your computer’s audio settings. You have an Input and an Output. The Input is, by default, your computer microphone, and the Output is the speakers. If you connect an audio interface that has higher quality microphone and speakers plugged in, you would need to set the Input and Output to that interface to get the input and out put the be the microphone and speakers, respectively.

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            <img src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5595df9ce4b0ce9ff9ecd1a8/1595453574122-OW83Y83K7XW3RVX5EOY1/CleanShot+2020-07-22+at+17.31.48%402x.png" alt="Usually my computer microphone is a Device that can be set to the computer’s Input. In the scenario above, Loopback has allowed me to combine the audio from my microphone and the Music app into a new audio Device called “Music+Mic” that can be selec…" width="2224" height="1224" style="display:block;object-fit: cover;width: 100%;height: 100%;object-position: 50% 50%" loading="lazy">

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        <div class="image-caption"><p class="">Usually my computer microphone is a Device that can be set to the computer’s Input. In the scenario above, Loopback has allowed me to combine the audio from my microphone and the Music app into a new audio Device called “Music+Mic” that can be selected as the input of my Mac or any individual app.</p></div>
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Your Inputs and Outputs can be controlled from the Sound settings of your computer. Some audio apps also let you control how, specifically, they behave. For example, I have manually set up GarageBand and Skype to use my audio interface as the Device I use for input so that whether I am recording for my podcast, or simply catching up with a relative, they hear me through the microphone, no matter what Device my Mac’s audio Output is set to in the System Preferences.

Loopback allows you to create Inputs and Outputs that are accessible to your Mac’s Sound settings as well as your apps. In the example above, I have created an Input that combines my Mac’s microphone (the usual Input) with the output of the Apple Music app, something I might want to use to play a recording example for my students in a Google Meet.

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        <div class="image-caption"><p class="">Selecting my new audio Device from the System Preferences.</p></div>
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Look now as I go to my computer’s Sound settings, and I can select this new custom Input to be used across the entire operating system! This way, when I am in a Google Meet, students are hearing both me speaking through the mic and all of the output of the Music app.

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            <img src="https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5595df9ce4b0ce9ff9ecd1a8/1595452726313-QK1V1G3GMW9N3C0GMI23/CleanShot+2020-07-22+at+17.06.14%402x.png" alt="Now I can route my band warm up tracks, reference recordings, or any other audio I desire, into my Google Meet classrooms." width="2500" height="1563" style="display:block;object-fit: cover;width: 100%;height: 100%;object-position: 50% 50%" loading="lazy">

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        <div class="image-caption"><p class="">Now I can route my band warm up tracks, reference recordings, or any other audio I desire, into my Google Meet classrooms.</p></div>
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