FL Studio 20 Getting Started Manual

THE PIANO ROLL – NOTES, CHORDS & MELODIES

So you have probably already realized that there are some things that the Step Sequencer doesn't

do. You can’t use it to make melodies or to play chords. The Piano roll solves all of these problems!

Open the Piano Roll. Load up NewStuff.flp and select a pattern that shows some green bars as

shown below. Notice that the Channel Rack view is very different. These Channels contain Piano

Roll data instead of normal steps. You can open the Piano Roll for any, Channel either by right-

clicking the Channel name or by left-clicking the Mini Piano Roll.

1. What You're Looking At (next page). See the Play Indicator Bar, the Edit Mode Buttons,

and the Edit Menu Button? These are important tools. Each horizontal green line shows

where a note starts and ends. The Piano Keyboard on the left shows the pitch of each note

(you can click that too). Remember we looked at ENVELOPES earlier? These are also

important as they interact with note ON (where an envelope starts) and OFF (where the note

release section starts). If you don’t have any envelopes set then the sound will probably start

but not stop when the note stops. Also keep in mind, synthesizers and other instruments will

have envelope sections of their own, and the Channel Settings envelopes won’t have any effect

for these.

or Left Click Here (Mini Piano Roll)

Right Click here

Then click

Watch where you click! The mini view Piano roll in the

Channel window has a cool feature, that for long Piano roll

scores it will open the Piano roll at the location where you

clicked. Super-duper!