An update to Moog’s massively-popular Animoog synth now gives you Audiobus compatibility, if you purchase the Audiobus app. That means easier recording and processing, in combination with other compatible apps. Photo courtesy Audiobus.

iPad and iPhone owners got a nice gift recently. Over the Christmas holiday week, a whole slew of new iOS updates rolled in, perhaps caught in the holiday rush. Many of the improvements centered on Audiobus, a proprietary technology that, via a host app, allows iOS users to connect different apps for input, recording, and processing. And with those updates, the picture on Audiobus has become significantly clearer.

Magellan, Magellan, Jr. Since Moog and Korg get plenty of attention, let’s start with the dramatic improvements to Magellan. Earlier this month, Magellan’s industrial-strength iPad app got a hand-sized companion in the form of Magellan, Jr. If the idea of using an iPhone to play a synth doesn’t appeal, presets are compatible between the two versions, so you could create some sound designs on the go, then play with them on the iPad later. See Synthtopia’s write-up from mid-December.

In Version 2.0 of iPad app itself, Audiobus support joins numerous improvements, particularly around touch control (for built-in controls) and MIDI (for external playability). Watch:

Version 2.0 has arrived! Just when you thought we couldn’t add any more awesome features to Magellan… BAM! Our demo here shows off new 2.0 features including Audiobus, enhanced touch pad features (adjustable glide, note-snapping, new voice-control destinations), touch-sensitive velocity, expanded recording features (record a set number of measures for easy looping), new MIDI features (over 350 learnable MIDI CC destinations, UI animation), and more!

Check out our website for more info: http://www.yonac.com
Magellan on iTunes: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/magellan/id544119998?mt=8

Animoog 2.0: Animoog adds Audiobus support, too, along with control and recording enhancements – whether or not you have Audiobus, this is a major update. And yes, it seems the developers at Moog heard user feedback.

• 3D tilt/accelerometer control for modulation.
• Note hold and scale lock.
• Load and save MIDI control maps.
• Audiocopy/Audiopaste integration (and yes, for some users, this will suit workflows just as well as Audiobus.
• “Holiday gift” 4-track Recorder with internal recording, iTunes Library import, split, loopy, copy, paste, and sharing of songs and clips, with SoundCloud integration.

Hurry: the 4 Track Recorder is free now through New Years’ Eve, but becomes a US$4.99 in-app purchase after that.

The price of the app if you don’t have it yet is now US$14.99 for iPad and US$4.99 for iPhone. Filtatron is also US$4.99.

KORG: The entire suite of popular apps from Korg has added support for Audiobus. (See this forum post if you have trouble seeing those apps.)

KORG has also brought other modern iOS music-making features to many of their apps:

• Virtual MIDI (iPolysix, iElectribe, iMS-20)
• Retina Display support (iMS-20, iElectribe)
• iKaossilator iPhone 5 display dimension support (to use the full size of its screen)
• iElectribe “Beat Flutter”
• iPolysix song sharing

And yes, their apps are on sale, too. See Sonicstate’s recent write-up.

Audiobus integrated all my iOS apps and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.

And more important Audiobus updates: Compatibility with apps out of the gate was the biggest complaint from readers. Audiobus is only useful if your app adds explicit support – and, since many of you are loyal to certain apps, taht left some of you disappointed.

That said, a steady stream of new apps should start to remedy the situation. In addition to these, some of my favorite recent releases with Audiobus additions:

• PPG WaveGenerator
• AudioShare – significant as it’s a file manager, something sorely needed for music making and field recording and absent in iOS’ dumbed down sharing options (grumble, grumble)
• Grain Science (Well, because it’s cool)
• KAOSS-style effects, seen in a teaser on Synthtopia, should also be a big deal when that app arrives. The app was just submitted to Apple, so keep your eyes peeled.

If app compatibility still is lacking, though, here are two vital resources:

When will [insert favourite app name here] be getting Audiobus support? on the Audiobus forum answers your question.

And if you’re still not satisfied, here’s a hack/workaround for using non-compatible apps with Audiobus. Spoiler alert: it involves two devices and a recording cable, so, uh, you could also just record – interestingly, already the workflow for a lot of iOS users:

That said, looking at Audiobus, virtual and hard-line MIDI, and other enhancements, it’s terrific to see these apps mature. New and shiny is nice, but these are the sorts of updates that make tools more usable in actual production work.

Let us know which apps you’re using – and this should give you something to do on a New Years’ holiday. Skip the party, stay in and make music?

A bare-bones UI belies a powerful engine – and a tool that could finally jump-start sound designers embracing an open format. Proprietary lock-in, no more.

“Free As In Free Me From Proprietary Formats.” If you’re ready to explore sounds – as a novice sampler user or as an advanced sound developer – SFZ brings tidings of great joy.

When they move from defining mere sounds or samples to describing whole instruments, sound designers need file formats. The problem has been that those formats tend to be particular to one sampler or another – just Kontakt, or just Logic’s EXS24, or just Gigastudio. Yes, there are converters, but because these samplers have different capabilities, converters cause problems. Being able to create instruments for these samplers is all fine and well, but sound designers badly needed a lingua franca.

Well, they’ve got it, in the form of a beautiful format called SFZ. Never heard of it? You should. And now, there’s a free (as-in-beer) player for Mac and Windows, plus some free samples to get you going. (Linux users will want to check out SFZ support in LinuxSampler, which is true free software.) This player is a great, ready-to-use option you can play with right now – and could likewise push the format for all compatible samplers. (See, for instance, Cakewalk and rgc:audio.)

The player, called sforzando, was released this week by master plug-in developer David Viens of Montreal:

• Bare-bones, SFZ 2.0-compatible sample player
• “Advanced sample hobbyists now have a powerful tool to experiment and share instruments without relying on proprietary formats.” (I’ve never heard anyone described as an “advanced sample hobbyist” – sounds like a good hobby to start!)
• One instrument slot – everything at the SFZ file level. (Hackers!)
• Engine shared with Garritan, Plogue Chipsounds
• RTAS, VST, AU, standalone
• Mac, Windows, 32-bit, 64-bit
• Drag-and-drop conversion to SFZ 2.0 from other file formats (SF2, DLS and acidized WAV files)

This all calls for some sounds, no? You’re in luck. This week, in addition to sforzando, various contributors released some 171 MB of great sounds for the engine – ready to load in sforzando.

• 11 Instruments from Garritan
• 14 Instruments from Digital Sound Factory
• CR-909 Electronic Drum Machine, thanks to Analog Industries
• Various Instruments from Patch Arena, Plogue and More!

Free Sounds for ARIA Engine [ariaengine.com]

Of course, the real hope is that this kick-starts sound designers using the SFZ format. We’d love to see that happen here at CDM Tower, too, so do let us know if you go after the format.

To get you started, you can drop SF2, DLS and acidized WAV files on the UI to get automatic conversion to SFZ 2.0. Drop, tweak, and publish.

A peek inside the file format reveals a very clean, easy-to-read, logical text description of the instruments. No need to fear. Images courtesy Plogue.

David shares his introduction with CDM, which makes nice reading on what this is all about even if you don’t plan to use the sforzando player specifically:

Back in 2005 when Gary Garritan gave me the task to design a complex sample playback engine, I obviously started with some homework. First question was obviously: “Is there already an instrument format that is open, powerful, flexible enough, and future proof”? YES! And its called SFZ!. Not only that, but I also found out it was invented by someone I both admired and respected, my old #musicdsp IRC buddy René Ceballos. The more I looked into it the more it was also obvious that René did his homework as well, since he made sure his SFZ 1.0 specification pretty much covered everything from SF2/DLS/GIG and other formats of the day.

His first implementation of the format was in the famous sfz.dll plugin, originally given for free on rgcaudio.com. After being acquired by Cakewalk – and for a good while later-, René pursued the development of his specification, this time with some help from Chad Beckwith, culminating with the SFZ 2.0 format as implemented in Cakewalk Dimension™ in 2005 and in Drop Zone™ a few years later.

Meanwhile at Plogue, we were just getting ready to ship the first product based on our new ARIA Engine: the Garritan Authorized Steinway Model D. Entirely SFZ based, this multi gigabyte sampled piano already utilized a few new SFZ opcodes that were submitted to René for review. Some of these were officially added to the specification, while others were still pending at the time René and Chad left Cakewalk. Simon Cann’s Cakewalk Synthesizers: from Presets to Power User 2nd Edition lists some of these new opcodes.

Fours years have passed, but of course we didn’t stop there! We kept designing new opcodes (the so called ‘ARIA-extensions’), to keep the specification up to date with what other – newer – contemporary sample formats offered. Each time we did this, we asked ourselves: “What would René do?” How would HE transform a specific feature request into one or a series of opcodes in such a way that would both make sense, and wouldn’t break existing compatibility? This is not a trivial task for a single implementer to achieve. So we did our best not to ‘pollute’ the spec too much and we hope as time goes by to disclose as much info as possible on our extensions with the new forum and wiki on ariaengine.com.

Today we present you Plogue sforzando, the new free, minimalistic SFZ 2.x player! It only has ONE instrument slot, no effects or mixers. Just the ability to load SFZ files and to play sounds from current ARIA-based products.

Of course we understand that editing text files to create sounds is not for everyone, but we’ve had too many requests for a product such as this not to pursue René’s tradition of giving away a simple player.

There’s also a tutorial video on the sforzando site. David cautions that he hopes to do a better video, but… since you’re likely to find it at the site, and since it’s public on YouTube, here it is. (When that better video gets done, we’ll publish it, too, David!)

And a quick video intro:

http://www.plogue.com/products/sforzando/

In-app editing, at last. Without switching to your Mac or PC, you can now edit or create layouts right on Lemur. Images courtesy Liine.

Once the layout is done, using an iPad as an interactive, do-anything-you-want, Star Trek-style music and visual controller is a unique pleasure. But as your fingers surf through virtual knobs and faders, the idea has surely occurred to you: why can’t I actually do my editing and layout on the iPad?

Lemur is perhaps the most powerful controller app anywhere, a terrific demonstration of why a tablet controller can be useful. And its editor – directly descended from the editor that went with the original, pre-iPad Lemur hardware – is powerful, unquestionably. But switching between an editor on the desktop and the layout on the tablet definitely feels less intuitive.

A Lemur update at last brings what users have wanted: now you can directly edit those layouts on the iPad (and iPhone/iPod touch), ideal for “improvising” layouts and adjusting to what feels best on the controller. See the video for a first look. (One bonus, very interesting to a few of us: this also means, since you’re no longer tethered to the editor, you can more easily use Lemur as a controller with your Linux rig, whether that’s a laptop or a Raspberry Pi.)

It should be available on iTunes now. (Some country stores don’t get all updates immediately, so keep an eye out.)

That’s not all Lemur developers Liine are announcing today. Lemur also adds three new “skins” for a bit more control over how your layouts look. And coming early next year, there will also be a free layout for Ableton Live from one of the best creators of this stuff, ST8. (I would expect this is tailored a bit to some of the subtle but significant controller changes in Live 9.)

The new Lemur – in-app editing, new skins, and still the mobile controller app to beat.

Entirely tailored to iOS interface paradigms, in-app editing does everything you need to customize control layouts, says Liine. Here’s how they describe the use cases for the functionality:

So what does editing templates directly In-App mean?
For novice users, this means a much smaller learning curve and an immediate initial experience. Any basic configuration, such as a typical bank of faders, can now be created with a few familiar taps and gestures. And any factory template can be adjusted quickly to suit your particular needs.
 
For advanced users, the In-App Editor provides the possibility to quickly edit templates without breaking the musical flow. Whether you’re playing with live musicians or engineering a track in the studio, designing and using the Lemur controller becomes improvisatory. Need to add an extra fader for the reverb effect? Two seconds and you’ve got it.

We don’t know a whole lot about LiveControl 2.0, but knowing how powerful some of this stuff has been in the past – and knowing ST8 was involved – I expect hard-core Live users who love touch will be intrigued. (It’ll be interesting to stack this up against Ableton’s own Push, which should become available in roughly the same timeframe – how you might choose one over another, or even use the two together.) What we have from Liine on what’s coming:

Experience the ultimate Ableton Live controller, designed in partnership with master designer ST8. Improvise a riff on the Play page, then switch to the Sequencer page to edit the pattern. Choose a key and scale to guide your melodies and use Quick Chord to instantly create harmonies. Use the Modulate page to flawlessly map any parameter from any plugin to the MultiBall object and take advantage of Physics, LFOs and gesture recording. The Launch page gives you everything you would expect from a clip launcher, and more. We even integrated snapshots and morphing. LiveControl 2 will be a free download available in early 2013.

Let’s have a look at the new releases in images:

The New Lemur

Some people may still prefer doing initial editing on the desktop app, but it’s hard to imagine anyone will complain about at last being able to make adjustments on mobile. And if you do want to start from scratch, you can do that, too. The new Lemur app, editing away.

You have complete access to widgets and parameters. And, as you can see, by using iOS-native UI components, Lemur makes sure those editing tasks are fat-finger-friendly.

LiveControl 2.0

A new Ableton Live controller template will be available as a free download early in 2013, says Liine.

Info on the updates:
http://liine.net/en/products/Lemur

http://liine.net

I’ll take one DAW, to go?

Cubasis isn’t the first traditional-style DAW to appear on the iPad. But it could be the most complete offering yet. I’ll be testing it later this month, but I’m already impressed that the software appears to strike some balance between the traditional working methods of a DAW and the need for streamlined, fat-fingered control on an iPad. Most significantly, it also offers connectivity with other iOS apps and hardware, meaning it could be an ideal mobile sequencer for other apps and gear, and, allows you to integrate with desktop software and Steinberg’s own Cubase. Since many of us want to hang onto big screens and big collections of plug-ins and the like when we actually finish a track, that’s a big deal. I wanted to learn more about the workflow here, so check out some Q&A with a specialist from Steinberg below.

You’ll need an iPad 2 / iPad mini or better, but once you do, you can get a surprisingly capable DAW that’s more mobile than your laptop. The basic feature set, according to Steinberg:

Unlimited audio and MIDI tracks (depending on the device used)
Over 70 virtual instrument sounds based on HALion Sonic
Mixer with over 10 effect processors (insert and send effects)
Over 300 MIDI and audio loops
Virtual keyboard and virtual drum pads
Sample Editor and Key Editor
Export to Cubase, Dropbox, SoundCloud, AudioCopy & email
Core Audio and Core MIDI compatible hardware supported
Sequence other Core MIDI apps (MIDI recording only) and run Cubasis simultaneously via background audio
Import audio from your iTunes music library or using iTunes filesharing, use AudioPaste or set up a Wi-Fi server in Cubasis

The price is higher than most iOS tools, at US$49.99. (44,99 € including German VAT.) Then again, we’ve already seen one serious tool that can make a higher price point pay off, in the form of Lemur. And sometimes it’s better to spend more on one truly useful app than buy a bunch of apps that do half of what you need. Stay tuned for our review for a real judgment on that.

Workflow and integration with a studio setup seem to be the reason you would shell out for more. Steinberg talks to CDM about how those features work.

PK: What’s the workflow like when going from Cubasis to Cubase? How does the import work, via iTunes? What do you actually see when you open a file?

Steinberg: You can use the iTunes file sharing system or the Cubasis Wi-Fi Server to transfer the files to your Computer. Then you install the Cubasis project importer extension for Cubase (steinberg.net/cubasisimporter) and then you import the project file in Cubase.

What’s the relationship of Cubasis to Cubase under the hood? The sounds come from HALion Sonic; were there other Cubase technologies that made it into the iPad version?

Cubasis was done from scratch to be able to give users a fully multitouch DAW experience.

Is Audiobus something you’ve evaluated?

Audiobus is one of our top 5 feature requests, so we plan to support it as we support other standards such as AudioCopy/AudioPaste.

“Sequence other Core MIDI apps (MIDI recording only) ” — sorry, I’m not sure I understand the parenthetical note there. This means you can only record MIDI from those apps?

It means that you can play the virtual keyboard in Cubasis or play back a midi track and trigger the sounds of your other apps.

You can use MIDI sequencing with external hardware, too, no?

Yes, that’s possible too.

http://www.steinberg.net/en/products/ios_apps/cubasis.html

Stay tuned for our hands-on review.

And here’s the promo video – yes, with a somewhat funny awkward moment as this woman hands the narrator an iPad.

Amusingly, this to me is closer to Cubase for iPad than GarageBand is Logic for iPad. I like GarageBand on the iPad a lot, but Cubasis appears to come closer to what I’d want and actually use. Did Emagic’s old Hamburg neighbor one-up the folks who actually work at Apple? We’ll have to test and see. Pass me a Fritz-Kola and some edamame.

Gallery: (and is it just me, or does this look better visually than Cubase on desktop?)

Any instrument from software maestro Urs Heckmann seems worth a mention. This one, doubly so: it’s free.

Podolski isn’t new; it has made appearances through the years in the excellent German-language magazine KEYBOARDS (no relation to the US Keyboard). But now, it’s available for everyone, with some nice updates and modernization and versions for just about any Mac or Windows host (or Linux, via WINE).

Now, even if we’re talking only free plug-ins, there are a lot of virtual analog synths out there. But this one is special: it’s got the great sound of FilterscapeVA, and waveform morphing and short “Click” filter attacks.

Specs/highlights:

• One oscillator, one filter, one envelope, two LFOs (though sometimes just those kinds of restrictions – rare in software – can be nice)
• Arpeggiator/sequencer, as seen in Zebra
• Chorus effect
• Delay effect
• Click parameter for short filter attacks
• Three waveform morphing with WaveWarp
• New presets by Howard Scarr
• New skins (brown and blue)
• New English-language manual
• Mac: VST2, VST3 or AU, 32- and 64-bit
• Windows: VST2 or VST3, 32- and 64-bit
• Automatic installer for Mac and Windows

http://www.u-he.com/cms/podolski

Thanks to Jan OS on the Facebook Synth Experts Group for the tip!

Here’s a look at that arp and some of the other features packed into this gem:

Artist Decktonic, aka Christian Montoya, hovers over his sound machines, as neon-fantastic as his music sounds. Photo courtesy the artist; (CC-BY-NC) Ben Mason.

A generation of gaming has done something to our ears. It has primed listeners to appreciate the sound of digital instruments in raw form: dry and immediate, crisply-synchronized machine dance music. So, while I wouldn’t call the music of Decktonic “chip music” or “game music,” somehow it’s a modern take on each. It’s retro-futuristic, electro-techno unadorned with effects. And, hell, while Korg’s DS-10 running on Nintendo DS is far from a high-fidelity sound experience, there’s something irresistibly funky about its sound. Listening to the DS-10 dry in the hands of a creative musician can be a cure for the ear fatigue you suffer from the endless sameness of a lot of releases.

“Forgotten Machines” is a free download (available lossless), Creative Commons-licensed if you want to do your own remix.

And it comes with an aptly-geometric abstract video for the title track, too.

Artist Christian Montoya explains:

I’m writing today to share my newest album, Forgotten Machines, which I released this morning on 56kbps Records. It was made entirely with the KORG DS10+ software and it has a classic electro meets future techno style. You can think of it as a love letter to early synthesizers.

The description:

FORGOTTEN MACHINES is all about rediscovering old tools and using them to make new art. The story of FORGOTTEN MACHINES is told through the magic of ~dance music~ and was written with the intention of marrying early synth-pop with a future techno aesthetic. This marriage eventually produced a baby, thereafter called FORGOTTEN MACHINES and he is a love letter to classic synthesizers and ~dance music~ enthusiasts everywhere.

It really does sound like DS-10 to me – in fact, with an amount of character even the iOS apps, while great, lack.

I say, blip, blip – dirty nerdy.

http://thisisdecktonic.com/

Decktonic DJing Lomography Gallery Store, New York, speaking of things that are made of plastic and addictively fun. Courtesy the artist.

It’s a bit ironic, don’t you think? Part of the original appeal of the iPad was focusing on running one app at a time. But it has become clear that in some instances, you want the focus of one app, but with tools combined in a meaningful way. (Linux users will sigh and note that they had argued for something similar for years – but the usability experience I would say has progressed radically on iPad beyond what developers were doing with Linux.)

In a new video, you can at last see this in action, with three applications mixed together at the same time, live – thanks to our friends at iOS Musician for producing this terrific vid.

(Rather than “ménage a trois,” mélanger de trois?)

The magic is all possible with Audiobus, the app we’ve been covering in recent weeks that allows you to pipe audio between iOS apps in real time. The results are an excellent argument for splurging for the iPad 4 (or at least the iPad “3″ from earlier this year); added horsepower makes this possible.

Some readers have expressed frustration with Audiobus, once they have found it doesn’t work with the apps they want to use. It’s absolutely crucial to understand that each app you want to use must separately provide support for the technology. But this video is a good illustration of where things are going once that support becomes available, which I expect will accelerate early next year. There’s a lot coming once the floodgates open. In this video:

BeatMaker 2 (beat machine) [beta - an example of an app that's coming]
Sunrizer synth
Funkbox

For months, you’ve heard about Audiobus, an app that allows iOS apps to work together rather than being isolated tools. Now you can try it – and see if connecting apps on iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad can make you more musically productive. The video above puts it more nicely than a written explanation could, summing up what it means to be able to easily combine apps. It’s nothing new: software for computers and patch cables for hardware have done this before. But that’s the point: connecting musical tools can make them more powerful, and the ease with which they connect makes a huge difference.

Here’s the bit you’ve been waiting for: Audiobus on the iTunes App Store:
Audiobus, A Tasty Pixel

In addition to the “here’s what this thing does in a minute” pitch above, we’re also seeing the first of what I expect will be many hands-on impressions.

I received an early copy of Audiobus yesterday to try it out while playing live MIDI through it. I was pleasantly surprised that it barely adds any latency and reacts really well. The shortcut bar is extremely useful and app-specific icons makes it very easy to interact with backgrounded applications while having another app in the foreground.

In this short demo I’m using my Eigenharp Alpha with a pre-release of PPG WaveGenerator. It’s fed into JamUp for additional effects and amp simulation. Loopy HD sits at the output side to build up the loops. I’m also using FunkBox, MIDI-synced to Loopy, for the drums.

The Eigenharp is connected with iConnectMIDI through a USB hub, into the camera connection kit to send the MIDI with virtually no latency and at a very high bandwidth. I use a Matrix USB/SPDIF interface that’s also plugged into the USB hub and recorded the iPad audio digitally without any post-processing.

This is all extremely promising imho!

Our friend and CDM reader Geert Bevin shared with us over the weekend his own experience using Audiobus so far, complete with video, via our Facebook page.

Also worth checking out as you investigate iOS creation workflows is this creation on virtual MIDI. It’s not Audiobus – this handles the MIDI portion – but combine this with Audiobus, and things get interesting:

Tutorial: Setup to Song in Genome [Discchord]

If you need a DAW to combine your Audiobus glue, Synthtopia notes over the weekend that Multitrack DAW has just added support:
MultiTrack DAW for iOS Updated With Audiobus

The developers also post a nice set of reflections on the development process:
Thirteen Months of Audiobus

For nearly all users – and even for many developers – today is really the beginning of this set of tools on iOS. Some readers were disappointed that there weren’t more apps available, but we know that a) the SDK is extremely easy to work with and support, b) a vast number of developers are signed up for it and have promised compatibility, and c) Audiobus’ creators are rolling out that SDK to developers gradually rather than all at once. So I expect the scene could be radically different by spring.

The place to watch that will be the official site:
http://audiob.us

And, of course, here. But I do hope the impact of Audiobus is beyond only iOS: it seems like there are some user interface ideas and usability notions that could be just as valid for creating new interfaces to tools like JACK.

Looking the opposite direction, all of this has gotten attention beyond just our little music tech-y circles. (I mean, yes, sure, we’re the sexiest and most intelligent boys and girls around, us music technology nerdsters, but it is nice to see the “normals” take note, too.)

Mobile music-making just got a lot more interesting: Meet Audiobus [The Next Web]

More interesting, indeed. Let us know how it works for you in The Real World, folks.

Chroma and Gris-Gris are a beautiful pairing, a performance-savvy sequencer and a “monster” monosynth. If the release of the OSC implementation we dreamed of in Reaktor wasn’t enough to make you dust off NI’s modular flagship, this will surely do the trick. It’s the work of Montreal-based Reaktor guru Peter Dines, veteran CDM contributor and one of our favorite patchers anywhere, on any platform, for his eminently-practical, sonically-lovely creations.

And just as the Chrome sequencer goes nicely with the Gris-Gris synth, the whole thing comes alive with Reaktor’s new OSC implementation, letting you perform sequences – alone or in public – with a variety of inputs. So, in addition to mouse (which works quite well, in case you’ve only got your laptop handy) and MIDI, you can fire up OSC. That means Konkreet Performer, TouchOSC, and Lemur on the iPad/iPhone/etc. all make gliding through sequences from your fingertips a joy.

In fact, Peter says Konkreet Performer is his favorite. I think if KP hasn’t won over everyone’s heart, it’s probably because you need the right patch to match its alien, futuristic abstract interface – and this could be that, as seen as Peter uses the two in the video here.

For its part, Gris-Gris has legato and glide features that combine with Chroma, plus great-sounding virtual analog mono sounds with “flux controls” for adding a bit of chaos and morphing. There’s a dedicated filter LFO, too – listen via SoundCloud below.

The whole package is tuned for plug-in operation as well as standalone says Peter. (Good call.)

Check out the sounds and Konkreet Performer – performing.

US$24.99; requires a full copy of Reaktor. Full details and interface guide:

Chroma and Gris-Gris: Sequenced Monster Monosynth

(We dreamt about proper OSC happening, and it happened. Maybe now we can dream about Reaktor Player support for the amazing Reaktor community, somehow? Well, we can dream, anyway.)

Apple tends to avoid commenting outside its famously-watertight public relations apparatus, but executives sometimes get personal. That appears to be the case for Xander Soren, Director of Product Marketing (and a key player in their pro audio apps). Xander has been in my experience an outspoken and articulate individual. Here, he dispels notions that Apple is backing off of Logic development:

Nicholas, thanks for your email. As the lead for our music creation apps, I always want to hear what our users are thinking. I want to assure you the team is still in place and hard at work on the next version of Logic Pro.

-xander

Apple ‘Hard at Work’ on Next Version of Logic Pro [MacRumors]

Yes, leave it to the site with “rumors” in its title to go with evidence, while other major tech outlets go crazy over the rumor. Synthtopia did an excellent – and amusing – round-up of those reports, as well as a well-thought-out argument against the rumors:
Did The Mayans Really Predict The Demise Of Apple’s Logic Pro?

Jim Dalrymple also discounted the rumor on The Loop.

Ironically, you could find some truth to this rumor if you want to get pedantic about the English language.

“Decimated” comes from a Latin origin meaning removal of a “tenth,” referring to not the complete destruction of your personnel, but some portion of, presumably, dead weight. (See any dictionary, or this Wikipedia entry.) I have also heard reports of some personnel changes related to Apple audio, though nothing suggesting any fundamental changes. That may mean that, yes, Apple reorganized and people over-interpreted the results. If they took one person off a ten-person team, they might have even “decimated” someone.

I’m also, frankly, sick of the Final Cut Pro comparisons. Final Cut Pro in its previous version relied on deprecated QuickTime frameworks, lacked a modern code base, lacked 64-bit support – the list goes on. So, Apple never “dropped” features from Final Cut Pro X, as Ars Technica writes, reporting on the Logic rumors. Apple decided to do a ground-up rewrite of their flagship video editor. They’ve gradually re-implemented lost features, and in at least some cases created better, more usable, faster-performing functionality. You may still not like the result, but that’s your prerogative – it’s a new app. It’s just unreasonable to suggest Apple was somehow trying to spite the people who buy the tool.

Logic, by contrast, is already modernized and ready for the OS. Apple has lagged between releases, no question. But let’s judge the results whenever a new release arrives. And, for now, you should make your choice of DAW based on what’s available today. If Logic is the most productive tool, then by all means, carry on. “What’s available today” is a whole heck of a lot of choices, from Reaper to Ableton Live to Cubase. If Logic isn’t competing, then move on.

Speaking of companies that began in Germany founded by guys named Gerhard who make major music production tools that had been in a lag in their product release cadence since around 2009 (phew), Ableton (Gerhard Behles) answered users with Ableton Live 9 this fall. So, now we wait for Apple’s pro audio team (Dr. Gerhard Lengeling) to let us know what they’ve been doing. And users I think deserve to be skeptical about that until they see something. It just means you should also be skeptical about these sorts of rumors unless you have some solid evidence.

Moving on… for now…

Audiobus is all about connecting apps, which requires apps with built-in support. So, one surprising and encouraging feature – Audiobus will make it easy to discover which apps are compatible. (See also: notifications, below.)

Use a great effect app to process another app. Record your favorite app in another tool. Make apps work together, and maximize the potential of your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. At last, Audiobus promises the ability to take the constellation of apps appearing on Apple mobiles and use them together, easily. We’ve known why this was cool, and we knew it was coming – see our in-depth preview and explanation of workflow..

Now, we know when, and to which apps. Audiobus’ developers have revealed next Monday December 10 as the official launch date. Also, we’re seeing some new screens – prepared for CDM – that show that it’ll be really easy to discover which apps work, or even to sign up for notifications on when apps are available.

All you need to run Audiobus:

• The US$9.99 Audiobus app. (Given the massive development effort behind this thing, that seems a good way to support the creators – and the app itself is rather beautiful.)
• An iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch running iOS 5.0 or later. (The new iPod touch, for instance, looks like a great handheld music machine for those who don’t want a phone contract.)
• Compatible apps (a lot of your favorite apps will just add support in updates).

The heart of Audiobus: routing different apps allows you to combine sources, effects, and recording/hosts. All images courtesy Audiobus.

Audiobus has also revealed launch apps:

Funkbox (input slot)
JamUp (effects slot)
JamUp Pro (effects slot)
Loopy (input and output slot)
Loopy HD (input and output slot)
MultiTrack DAW (output slot)
NLog MIDI Synth (input, effects and output slot)
NLog Synth PRO(input, effects and output slot)
Rebirth for iPad (input slot)
SoundPrism Pro (input slot)
Sunrizer Synth for iPad (input slot)

Thumbjam and Drumjam are awaiting Apple App Review; Moog Animoog and Wavemachine Labs Auria support is coming, awaiting completed implementation.

Support is ramping up gradually. 700 people entered to become developers, but only 25 will get the SDK in the next round. (CDM will be looking at the SDK to give users and developers alike a preview.)

One reason: Audiobus’ creators want to make sure that these apps get feedback and that developers are approved by App Review. They say things will go public in the coming months.

More videos and details are coming from Audiobus – and hopefully from us here, too. In the meantime, here’s a look at the Audiobus app. See you next Monday.

Audiobus Launch on December 10th [Audiobus Tumblr]

Developers can notify you when apps become compatible – crucial given that Apple has to approve new apps, which Audiobus’ creators say is typically the longest delay, not development.

Got a copy of Reaktor 5, perhaps via Komplete, or an instrument or effect based on Reaktor (running in Reaktor Player)?

Got an iPad, and want to start touching sounds with OSC?

Great! We’ve got some powerful tools and references that will make it easy to get going – and, for those who want to peek under the hood, can yield some nice tools for your own creations.

Actually, maybe “un-exclusive” is the best way to describe this. In addition to official references from Native Instruments on how to use the tools, developer Clément Destephen has built templates that make connecting Reaktor patches to popular iOS touch apps easier and deeper. Clément’s day job is at Native Instruments here in Berlin, but working with Clément, we’re glad to say that he has made the templates available under a GPLv3 license. That means you’re free to use them, learn from them, modify them, and share your modifications. (Patchers, you can even “fork” the project on GitHub if you have ideas for what to do with them.)

The templates are richly powerful for working with TouchOSC and Lemur, two of the most popular control apps. But before we get there, let’s start with NI’s official guide to using OSC in Reaktor.

Setup Guides

Your first reference should be the general MIDI and OSC mapping guide – and, in fact, MIDI mapping has improved greatly in this release, too:
How to map MIDI and OSC controllers in REAKTOR 5.8

There are specific guides for two apps, though, in TouchOSC and Lemur.

How to set up TouchOSC with REAKTOR 5.8 (Mac)

How to set up TouchOSC with REAKTOR 5.8 (Windows)

How to set up Lemur with REAKTOR 5.8 (Mac)

How to set up Lemur with REAKTOR 5.8 (Windows)

While specific to those tools, these instructions are reasonable guidelines for other software, too.

Check the developer sites for those two apps, as well:
Hexler’s TouchOSC

Liine’s Lemur

Go Deeper with the Templates

If you do have TouchOSC or Lemur, Clément’s templates serve a number of purposes. Used as-is, you get templates that take common layouts of controls and make them easy to map to parameters. Using embedded panel object sends and receives, you can route controls to wherever you like.

Secondly, you get a set of nice objects that allow you to adjust interpolation curves.

Go a little deeper in Reaktor, and it keeps getting cooler. Those interpolations are each saved in snapshots. That means you can create a set of performance snapshots that each let you dial in control of certain parameters – a particular part of a filter, for instance, for one section, then a larger filter area with a different grain size with another.

When you’re ready to build your own performance layouts, all of these features are built into well-organized, easy-to-use macros you can drop into your own Reaktor patches. Even if you’re a relative novice working with Reaktor, they’re logical enough that basic copy-and-paste patching skills will be enough for you to get use out of them.

Using internal MIDI, you can easily combine this with drumpads and keyboards, too.

Out of the box, there are ensembles set up for the StudioCombo – using instruments Junatik and SpaceDrone (with Lemur) and Beatmachine with the MemoryDrum2 drum machine (with TouchOSC).

Download

If you’re comfortable using GitHub, head to:
https://github.com/clement-destephen/Reaktor-OSC-Templates/

If you just want the download, grab it here as a cross-platform zip with all the files you’ll need:
Reaktor OSC Templates

This seems just the start. Clearly, a lot of the Reaktor developer community is going to be all over this, having already worked hard to hack OSC control support in the previous Reaktor versions.

Let us know what you think, do share what you create, and have fun out there.