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SoulViaSound has released iMounds, a free library for iMaschine users. iMounds contain 4 drum kits made with sounds selected from SoulViaSound’s Anamorphic, Pathfinder and Azalrea libraries. This [Read More]
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SoulViaSound releases iMounds – free library for iMaschine users
Sunday, January 15th, 2012
Diaspora: On a Fledgling, Open Social Network, Users Gather to Make Noise
Tuesday, November 29th, 2011
Diaspora is an attempt to build a social network that contrasts with the locked-garden vision of Facebook, one built on open source software, open exchange of information, and distributed – rather than centralized – communication. I already let slip that we’ll be rebooting our own social endeavor, Create Digital Noise, in the new year. But it’s also telling to see the first noises emerge on Diaspora.
If you wrote off this service when it was in early testing, perhaps overwhelmed by its ambition and crowd-sourced nature, you may be pleasantly surprised. As users gain invites, the service is surprisingly stable and usable – at times, indeed, more so than the offerings of giants Google and Facebook. Most notably, features like tagging make it possible to actually focus on a task. (Compare what would happen on the rivals: even Google’s Circles can be more a chore than a useful feature, and Facebook still tends to dump everything in giant, overcrowded buckets of chatter.)
I’m game for any excuse to get together and make music with people, whether at a website, a studio, or in someone’s kitchen. So, here’s this experiment – Jóhannes Gunnar Þorsteinsson kicked off the first Diaspora sound project:
Here is the initial foundation track for the #diasporanoise2011 open collaboration project. Initially the rules are the following, Once you comment in this thread and ask to join you will be assigned into a queue according to the number of your comment. Apart from that, the rules are completely freeform. You can add a layer of sound to the original recording, or you can completely remix it, cut it up or even destroy it. When you are done you upload the bounced track to your upload service of choice with the same naming scheme as the link below. (yournumber_yourname_diasporanoise2011.wav), if you decide to upload more than one tracks for some reason, zip them together but use the same naming scheme.
There is no actual time limit, (at least not for now) but try to stick to max 1-3 days per person. Recordings and work at this nature is usually done improvised (and that’s usually where the magic happens) so more time shouldn’t be needed. Of course if more time is needed for some reasons then just let us know and I am sure we’ll understand.
I refer affectionately to many kinds of music as “noise,” but this certainly fits the bill – some experimental soundscapes going on, like this one (I enjoy it!):
Diaspora users can find the whole thread – and lots of tracks to hear – at:
https://joindiaspora.com/tags/diasporanoise2011
If you’re really, really desperate for an invite, explain why in comments and perhaps one of us can hook you up.
You’ll find in this thread that what happens for many musicians is various places to host sound, from Dropbox to self-hosted files to the increasingly-ubiquitous SoundCloud. Diaspora itself lacks audio upload features, but on the other hand, there are some limitations to what even a sound-focused service like SoundCloud offers in collaboration features. (For instance, I recently ran up against the inability to run private groups or easily download bunches of stems on SoundCloud, which makes even a simple remix collaborative easier on other services. More on that soon.)
The developer-friendly crowd also talk about how to roll your own player, taking on the primary advantage of services like SoundCloud. For instance, one contributor hosts their own files and uses a JavaScript-based solution (with HTML5 and Flash) on which some projects on other services are themselves based.
http://www.schillmania.com/projects/soundmanager2/
I’ll be continuing this conversation with readers over coming weeks and in more formal ways, but why not kick it off now: what would you want in a social website, or in collaboration? Leaving out fancy real-time collaborative environments, how would you most want to come together with fellow music lovers and geeks and make some stuff? Having used online communities since the days of BBSes, CompuService, and GEnie, I find often it’s basic, elemental communication that makes things work, so if you had only a select feature or two, what would they be?
(thanks, jure, for the tip!)
Two Notes Audio Engineering releases Torpedo Capture v1.4 for Torpedo VB-101, Torpedo VM-202 and Torpedo PI-101 users
Thursday, May 19th, 2011Two Notes Audio Engineering has released a new updated version of Torpedo Capture for Torpedo VB-101, Torpedo VM-202 and Torpedo PI-101 users. Torpedo Capture is software that allows you to “capture”… [Read More]
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AudioCopy + ReBirth: For iOS Users, Music Making Goes from App to App
Friday, May 6th, 2011
Mobile-based music can mean a chance to do more with less, but that hasn’t stopped lovers of production on the iPhone and iPad from wanting to move ideas between apps. So, you’ve got a great bassline … if you could just combine it with that vocal sample, and then finish a track…
That presumably explains why we hear so many readers clamoring for AudioCopy. It’s a proprietary audio API developed by Sonoma WireWorks with an available SDK, and it’s gained some real traction among iOS music apps. Latest to the fold is ReBirth, the iPhone and iPad all-in-one music studio. (A corresponding price cut makes the iPad version US$ 9.99 and iPhone edition $ 4.99, though if you have a choice, I’d avoid the iPhone version and stick with the iPad.) I know this was an oft-requested feature.
ReBirthrebi
You can keep track of which apps work with AudioCopy (and AudioPaste) at Sonoma’s site:
Compatible Apps
A few apps stand out. Sonoma’s own FourTrack and StudioTrack allow you to multitrack arrangements from materials you’ve built in other apps, as well as add audio tracks recorded from another source. Other highlights:
- Jasuto is a full-fledged modular environment.
- Monle is a simple but elegant multitrack editor, ideal for laying out audio sampled from other tools
- VoiceJam from TC-Helicon is a vocal sampler and looper.
…and, of course, there are countless synths and other interesting sound generators, including Korg’s offerings and various tools we’ve covered on CDM. But it’s nice to see these tools in the mix, too, in terms of workflow.
I’m still partial to the far more open and capable conventional computer as a way of working, but what’s interesting to me is that part of what many want on mobile is the same sort of studio-in-a-box flexibility. And there’s no question that with these tools, you can get music made. There are efforts to route signal between apps, too, but what’s nice here is that you still focus on one app at a time – avoiding performance bottlenecks in either their device or your attention span.
If you do use iOS, let us know which apps you use with AudioCopy.
Studio One Users Add Direct-to-Fan Marketing and Sales with Nimbit
Friday, January 14th, 201113th January 2011: PreSonus has partnered with Nimbit to make a powerful, integrated, direct-to-fan marketing, sales, and distribution platform available to all registered Studio One users. Through Nimbit, Studio One us…
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Wild, Colorful Controllers for Guitarists and Ableton Live Users, from Starr Labs
Thursday, January 13th, 2011
Kids today. They just love their Ableton Live and their Rock Band and their alternative tunings and their Live triggers and touch controllers stuck to their far-out new boutique controllers and high-end MIDI guitars.
Starr Labs has a line of MIDI controllers for Rock Band gamers and musicians on a budget, real guitarists (that’ll be the pro MIDI guitarists, not the gaming ones), and a novel new controller designed especially for Ableton Live. We saw their wireless line earlier today, which interoperates with these; here’s them exploring control.
Gaming and serious musicianship have some surprising overlaps here. Look at the new Ztar, the ZS-XPApros, which is a MIDI guitar – complete with advanced features for hammer-ons, sensitivity, and programmable zones – that also can manipulate Ableton Live right out of the box. Triggers are pre-mapped to Live control layouts. Like the game Rock Band, there’s cheery color coding to match what’s on the screen to what’s on the instrument. Unlike the game Rock Band, you’re playing an actual guitar and controlling advanced music software at the same time. (Show that to the next Xbox gamer who thinks they know it all.)
If you don’t play the guitar, there’s also the airPad, a wireless controller for Ableton with pots, X/Y pad, nav control, and 4×4 light-up pads.
Ztar
The Ztar Z6S-XPA and Z7S-XPA are advanced MIDI guitar controllers with “the industry’s only zero-latency, 6-string x 24-fret touch-sensitive keyed-fingerboard.” (I actually think that’s not hyperbolic; this is the only one I know of.)
Each string trigger has its own tuning, so you get what amounts to a combination between a sophisticated MIDI guitar and an alternative key layout. It’s a controller singularity, as if an alternate-tuning keyboard and a MIDI guitar had a love child.
Specs:
6 Velocity sensitive, Zero latency String Triggers
4-Way programmable Joystick and programmable Mod Wheel
24 fret touch sensitive Ableton Live color-coded fingerboard
Ableton Live control layouts and set-up templates
Ribbon Controller with 2 touch pads (Z7S) / six touch pads (Z6S)
Unlimited String and Fingerboard Tunings
32 Mappable Zones
Programmable Chording System
Arpeggiator & Sequencer
Volume Pedal Port & Sustain Pedal Port
MIDI and USB i/o
The Z6S-XPApro adds six pots.
Scott Caligure has more on the updates to the Ztar.
“The Z6S-XPApro and Z7S-XPApro are newer/updated versions, with improved sensing, latest drivers, multiple sysex ‘layouts’ for various software not only Ableton Live, color coded fingerboard soon to be led-illuminated. We are currently working on the instrument to be a class-compliant device.”
I would call this more like an keyboardaraaytrixocontrollatar. I’m not sure the music this instrument plays has been invented yet. (Microtonal breakcore psychedelia?)
Ztar Rock Controller
The “Rock Controller” is marketed partly for use with the Rock Band 3 Pro Mode, but it looks to me to be just as practical as a MIDI instrument – maybe even a little more so for some users, as it’s a bit simplified in contrast to the Ztar. With USB and MIDI connections, it’s just as happy to be plugged into your computer as an Xbox or PS3, and Starr are quick to say it’s not a toy. With zero-latency string triggers, a four-way joystick, five-way knife switch, muting, and two pedal ports, it’s still out there controller-wise.
And like the others, it has actual strings (to make absolutely certain this isn’t just a toy). But it might be a more down-to-earth alternative if the Ztar is a little too alien or pricey for you. It’s also a huge leap up in quality and versatility from the (also useful) MIDI guitar controllers designed for the game.
airPad for Ableton Live
It might seem a bit out of place here, but the airPad is a more traditional Ableton Live controller. It does boast a novel control layout, and it’s wireless, working in the 2.4G ISM band.
It’s well worth a visit to the Starr Labs site; they make an array of controllers and guitar electronics, including some fascinating alternate keyboard arrays. Makers like this make me wish I’d cashed in on some Web startup boom with an inexplicably-successful idea so I could squander part of my fortune collecting these designs. And for someone, I’m sure, they’ll find a real musical place in performance.
Studio Devil Virtual Bass Amp updated to v1.2
Thursday, February 25th, 201025th February 2010: Gallo Engineering has updated Studio Devil Virtual Bass Amp (VBA) to v1.2. Changes: Addresses some stability issues on the Windows ProTools RTAS version. Other users of Mac, Audio Units, or VST ve…
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Studio Devil Virtual Bass Amp updated to v1.2
Novation Releases All MIDI Details for Launchpad
Monday, November 2nd, 2009
Novation’s Launchpad, its affordable (<$200) "grid" controller, may have a big Ableton logo on it. But underneath, it's just a MIDI controller. Bi-colored LEDs, containing a red and green element for red, green, and amber output (amber = red+green), can be triggered using simple MIDI note and control messages. That means, whether you're looking forward to Max for Live or you're sequencing in a tracker or writing Processing sketches, you can use the Launchpad just like any other MIDI controller.
One of the things I thought was a major demerit for Akai was the fact that they failed to ship a MIDI implementation for the Akai APC40. MIDI implementations are the charts of MIDI messages we’ve had since the very first MIDI devices came out in the 80s. They’re usually printed in the back pages of the manual, and even the cheapest gear has often had one.
Score: Novation 1, Akai 0. Novation has done the MIDI documentation, and then some. Its MIDI “Programmers Reference” is out even before the official Launchpad ship date. And rather than just doing a MIDI chart and assuming people know how to read it, they’ve taken the care to fully explain the way MIDI messages work, how to calculate the right messages, and how to really use this. Experts will have all the information they need, but newcomers will also find they can spend a little time and learn how to do what they want.
Launchpad Support with Downloads (see Programmer’s Reference at the bottom)
Via: Novation released Launchpad Programming Guide, and Protocol [Nezoomie's Zen Wave Blog - great read]
It’s listed as “for Max/MSP programmers,” but anyone using MIDI will want to have a look; that’s obviously relevant to far more than just Max. (In fact, there’s not a single mention of anything specific to Max in the document.)
What might people do with stuff like this? Well, as of just four hours ago, Matt DiFonzo lets us know he’s written a simple monome emulator. It’s even got a clever name:
nonome – monome emulator for Novation Launchpad
There’s some bad news mixed with the good. Even with something as simple as a grid of buttons, MIDI isn’t as friendly as it could be. I still would like to have a MIDI editor for the Launchpad so you can reassign buttons if you like — that’s a feature, incidentally, available on rival Ohm and Block hardware from Livid Instruments. Also, the documentation reveals that Launchpad uses “a low-speed version of USB,” which runs at a maximum of 400 messages per second, thus taking 200 milliseconds to update a Launchpad. (There are some workarounds, but they’re … more work.)
Also, here’s a hint to Novation: use a Creative Commons license for that document. That way, your users will be free to document even more ingenious solutions and friendly guides. You win, and your users win. For instance, I have the illustration here, which I should be able to do for purposes of reporting on this story. But can I write my own how-to guide using your guide? Why not make it explicit to encourage me to do so? (They list the PDF as “proprietary,” though there’s no explicit license, and I think they just mean “proprietary” as in “what we’ve done on our hardware.”)
That’s a difference between open hardware and closed hardware, but I don’t even want to belabor the point — CC licenses are something a commercial company like Novation could easily use. In fact, if anyone at Novation or Ableton would like to talk to me about why I think it’s a good idea, I’d like to extend an open invitation. I’m no legal expert, but I can explain what it means to me as a user and developer, and connect you with some of the right people at Creative Commons and the CC-using community.
But those gripes aside, kudos to Novation for getting this documentation out here. I think it’s really good news for people experimenting with grid controllers. And we’ll be looking at how all of these tools, hardware and software, fit together, and how open source development can make them more powerful.
Patchers and coders and hackers: if you’re interested in working on interoperability between all this stuff, let us know.
Originally posted here:
Novation Releases All MIDI Details for Launchpad