HotKeys you MUST Know - MilkyTracker and Chiptune Tutorial #01

New MilkyTracker / Chiptune tutorial!

Questions and feedback are always welcome and appreciated. Need clarification?  Did I forget something?  How can I make these better?  Is there a topic you’d like to see covered?

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Hotkeys are really important when you’re tracking - It’s part of the tracking experience!

In this tutorial, I go through the ABSOLUTELY MUST KNOW RIGHT NOW hotkeys.  These are the ones you should start using right away as best as you can. All of the other hotkeys I’m going to spread out in the series.  Using hotkeys takes repetitive practice, just like learning a musical instrument, and I think it’s better to introduce them more gradually rather than all at the same time.

When in doubt, check the manual. I’m on OSX, so there might be some variation, depending on your operating system and your keyboard.  For example, my keyboard doesn’t have an ‘insert’ key, so there are a few hotkeys I don’t have access to.  

Using hotkeys is always a work in progress, so do your best to use the ones you have access to.  Every time you open MilkyTracker, try to use ONE more hotkey to make your workflow faster and easier. 

Moving Cursor:

• ARROW KEYS – Move cursor
• TAB – Jump to next right channel
• ALT+TAB – Jump to next left channel
• END – Jump to last row
• HOME – Jump to first row
• PAGE UP – Up 16 rows
• PAGE DOWN – Down 16 rows

Selection:

• SHIFT+KEYS - Extend block
• CMD+A – Select all
• CMD+C – Copy selection
• CMD+Z – Cut selection
• CMD+V – Copy paste
• DELETE – delete cursor selection

Input & Playback: 

• Note Input: (piano keyboard = computer keyboard, check out beginner tutorials)
• BACKSPACE – Delete previous row, move up
• F1-F7: changes note-input rage
• The key below ESC: Enter key-off - (“1” also works)
• ESC: Stop playback
• ENTER: Playback
• SPACE: Trigger record mode

MilkyTracker also supports MIDI keyboards, so if you have one, you might consider enabling that to input notes faster. That’s under the MilkyTracker program preferences

For a more detailed description of inputing notes using the computer keyboard, check out my beginner tutorial