Índex per March 2022 a Computer Music

What is it about Berlin? Not only do a large proportion of the software companies we deal with here at Computer Music hail from the city but so do an almost endless list of the artists we interview. And while Sissi Rada was born in Greece, with a passion for both contemporary harp playing and electronic music production, it was only a matter of time before she succumbed to the creative pull of Germany’s finest city. Here she plays harp for Teodor Currentzis’ musicaAeterna orchestra and also collaborates with the Berlin Philharmonic. But as impressive as those two orchestral manoeuvres are, we’re more intrigued about how she managed to rope both Brian Eno and Mouse On Mars’ Andi Toma in for her recent album, Nanodiamond… 1 Tell us how you…

“Arpeggiators provide an easy way to add harmonies, even with limited keyboard skills” In our bass and leads sections, we’ve essentially focused on sounds and techniques that apply to single-note parts. As we’ve seen, these parts may well be generated by synths, and using said synths in monophonic mode often achieves the best outcome. In this section we’re going to focus on production elements that can (though may not always) provide harmonic or chordal content. These parts are often provided by instruments that can play multiple notes together, such as any polyphonic keyboard (piano, organ, polyphonic synth and so on), or some other polyphonic instrument — a guitar for example. That said, it’s important to be clear that this isn’t always the case — bassists sometimes play chords for example.…

Hip-hop has evolved massively over the decades, but much has stayed the same in terms of how a sound engineer approaches the mix. The vocals are so important in this genre because they are carrying the song: a story is being told over a beat. Electronic production tools have been good for the genre, which is now mainstream in many guises. Vocals, along with tracks themselves, are more experimental and genre-bending than at any time in its rich history. But one thing hasn’t changed: the vocals always need to shine because they are so close to the spoken word. Just like any vocal mix, the voice is treated as an instrument — refined and polished by an engineer to make sure that the frequency sweet spots are hit, that the…

Have you ever played that game where you build a shopping list of vintage synth classics? Scour the auction sites for the machines you couldn’t afford when you were a teenager, and you’ll likely find that it’s an even worse financial prospect now! All is not lost though, as we dive headlong into the realm of nostalgia, thanks to IK Multimedia. Vintage-tonic! Syntronik 2 is a welcome update, building upon the reliable Mk 1 offering from IK. We’re reviewing the full suite, which is described as Syntronik 2 MAX. This offers a full-sized compendium of 33 software instruments, placed at the top of the package tree. If that feels a little overblown for your requirements, the regular-sized version offers 22 synth instruments for €299, while the entry level SE version…

One of the unique facets of Omnisphere is its multi-use potential; it’s superb in the studio, where up to eight patches can be loaded into a single instance of the plugin, helping with CPU loading, although we did find the EXtensions to be quite CPU hungry. It’s also a great package to use in a live setting. The quality of the on-board and more mainstream sounds is right at the top of the quality tree. Another Spectrasonics package, Keyscape, provides some of the finest piano, electric piano and other associated keyboard sounds currently available, making it a perfect fit for any live keyboardist. The same could be said of the Sonic EXtensions packs, but within their respected sound portals. They all sound immense and offer great control and playability. Linking…

Founded half a century ago as an offshoot of Sound Exchange studios in New York, Eventide are probably best known for their long-running Harmonizer product line. Although still in the business of hardware, the company has kept up with modern, in-the-box trends too, with a range of plugins featuring recreations of classic Eventide hardware, alongside entirely new creations such as Physion. This was the first airing of the company’s Structural Effects technology, in which transient and tonal components of a signal are separated and processed independently. This same tech is at the heart of Eventide’s latest plugin release, the potent and fascinating SplitEQ. Split personality On the surface, SplitEQ is a fairly straightforward equaliser, with six multi-mode EQ bands bracketed by high-pass and low-pass filter bands. The regular bands offer…

Symphonic Destruction’s third designer is the whallop-packing Braam Designer, intended to provide those huge subby tones and impacts that are now quintessential in modern cinema. The sub, mid and tail of your Braam can be switched between 36 sounds per layer, and overlaid to various positions on your MIDI keyboard for performative control. Each of these can be panned, tuned or sequenced. Even playing with a handful of these combinations yields a timbre of room-shaking size. If you’re someone who earns a crust as a regular fisher for trailer commissions, then this is perhaps the most effective tool in Symphonic Destruction’s arsenal. And it’s particularly so if you also invest in Heavyocity’s percussive legend, Damage 2, with which this software partners with exquisitely.…

While a background in music theory can be a mighty useful foundation for sonic creativity, more often than not we as songwriters and track-builders let our ears – and our feelings – make the all-important chordal and melodic choices. Some of the greatest musicians of all time lacked a theoretical education, including The Beatles, Prince and Elton John. That said, unpicking what you’ve created after-the-fact, and noting the keys, chords, melodies and riffs can be time-consuming. So too can finding those corresponding samples, or instructing other musicians to write around your tracks when you’re trying to get something finished within a pressurised time-frame. Mixed in Key have form in this domain. Originating as DJ-oriented key-detection software back in 2006, the company’s flagship software has been entrusted to detect the key…

Cyclick Analogue and Digital Oscillations We’ve gone for a waveform theme for our new sample packs this issue (and with twice the usual amount!), so both of our sampling experts have created their own analogue and digital waveforms. You can either use these as source waveforms in your own synths and samplers or use their treated creations just as great sampled sounds! Here’s Robbie from Cyclick to explain the process… “This sample collection is based on two folders of source oscillations, one analogue and one digital. These have been created as an alternative to the normal waveforms that power our synths, be they analogue (real or modelled), DCO, wavetable or PCM sample. These root loops have then been used to create a set of instruments to provide looped lines, one-shot…

cm/experts Our resident music production gurus walk you through their specialist fields every month VOCAL PRODUCTION HIP-HOP VOCAL MIXING SYNTH MASTERCLASS HOLLOW BASS IN ZEBRA CM HOW TO DO EVERYTHING! A massive 18 videos to download, covering the six main production processes listed above. Each video demonstrates a composition or mix technique that you can try out right now with a free plugin from the mighty Computer Music Plugin Suite! (Download the collection from filesilo.co.uk.)…

HALion owners rejoice, because among the slew of free releases at the end of last year, Steinberg’s Lo-fi piano for HALion stands out as one of the best. Firstly, Steinberg don’t do rubbish freebies and secondly, we liked the lo-fi picture that comes with it (although the GUI on the instrument itself is rather less grand — “functional”, shall we say). You’ll need a copy of HALion to run it, which means either the excellent £300 HALion 6, or the free HALion Sonic SE. LoFi Piano also adds to a number of other freebies for the platform, and you can get it by registering through the Steinberg website here… steinberg.net…

Programming beats is a fundamental aspect of most modern music production and for those at the top of the game it’s a specific job. This is why we regularly dedicate big tutorials to beat production, looking at the specifics of different genres, and the various ways we can nail what defines their sound. Nevertheless, whatever your specific musical tastes, all beat production starts with some pretty basic building blocks and ultimately how you combine those aspects defines the grooves you create. Here we’re going back to basics taking a very general approach. The walkthroughs provide three different entry points, and each uses a specific instrument. None of the instruments is particularly complex, but each has its strengths and we’ll use those to our advantage. If you’re new to beatmaking and…

In these pages we’ve grouped together a couple of key aspects of music production — leads and special effects. Both require bespoke sounds and both tend to play quite a prominent role when they happen. Lead parts in a music track can be vocal or instrumental. Producing vocals from scratch is a big topic that goes beyond this tutorial. It starts with melody/lyric writing, involves recording and editing and will at some point make use of the EQ, dynamics, reverb and effects sections we explain elsewhere. Hopefully we’ve contributed some relevant advice, showing you how to make use of the Plugin Suite for some parts of your vocal production process. In contrast, creating instrumental lead and melody lines is a more immediate and tangible process that the Suite is better…

EQ, or equalisation, to give it its full name, is the tool we use most in music production. It’s a frequency modifying processor that changes the tone of whatever you’re processing, and if you’ve ever used bass and treble controls before, these are a simple form of EQ. The other similar and related concept you’ll encounter is a filter, and this also influences the frequencies you hear. For convenience, we generally say that an EQ can both cut and boost the selected frequencies, whereas a filter only removes selected frequencies. That said, you will encounter some EQs that only cut or boost, and you will also find that resonance within filter designs actually results in frequency boosts, so things aren’t quite that simple. “You can change the tone of your…

In the first three parts of this series we have looked at virtual guitar instruments, creating the right tone, and virtual amps and effects. Now, for the final part of this huge series, it’s time to mix everything up! The traditional setup of guitar, bass and drums was a reliable bedrock of the rock world for years, and though there are bands out there who still adhere to this basic template, for many, the convenience of having a stock setup ready to go has been supplanted by the limitless levels of musical texture that you can now add to your mix within a DAW, coupled with the enormous potential of sample libraries. The guitar therefore might need to be considered not a central focal point of the mix, but as…

When it comes to packages which offer a calling toward the vintage classics, they tend to fall into one of two camps; sampled or modelled. The process of sampling has largely come of age, as represented by the colossal sampling suites that will allow you to recreate an entire symphony orchestra. By and large, sampled synths don’t require anything like as much sampling capacity, when compared to their acoustic counterparts, unless you want to create literal synth patches, generated by the original machines themselves. The modelled alternatives tend to do the math(s) in the computer, calculating the sound in real-time. Some might argue that this can offer a more realistic experience, but the reality is that it’s down to a sum of parts. In the case of Syntronik 2, IK…

How does an electronic musician attempt to create an electronic sound with acoustic ideals using software-based sound generation? Expressive E might just have an answer for you, being, as they are, an organisation that likes to push boundaries in terms of both sound creation and performance. No Air-fixes Their latest offering is produced in collaboration with Applied Acoustic Systems and is called Imagine. Despite a relatively nebulous product name, which doesn’t give much away, Imagine is a pretty hefty, creative powerhouse, in the form of a modelling synth. The construct, on the face of it, will be relatively familiar to most; two instrumental layers provide the tonal colour within a given patch, but the difference lies in the initial tonal palette itself, which ranges from simplistic to beautifully complex. Back…

Most musical sounds consist of a transient element – that is, the initial onset and attack of a note played on an instrument – and a tonal element that follows the transient. It has long been known that the majority of the individual character of an instrument – the complex, changing waveform that makes a piano sound like a piano, or a guitar sound like a guitar – is contained in the transient. The tonal, sustained, element is usually much less complex, typically consisting of a regular, repeating waveform. This difference between transient and tonal is ably demonstrated by Roland’s Linear Arithmetic synthesis system, first seen on the legendary D-50. LA was astonishing at the time it was released, creating fairly convincing instrument emulations by combining very short samples of…

The removal of mix-ruining resonance in music production has long been a careful balancing act, best left to those (often expensive) ears who can discern which elements of your track are negatively impacting each other. Developing the right kind of mixing finesse — or entrusting the job to an expert — is, thankfully, no longer necessary for these kinds of jobs. As we sit here, smug in space year 2022, we can rely on the super-fast resonance detection of algorithms, such as the one in Mastering the Mix’s latest plugin, Reso. While previous plugins from MTM have included the likes of the frequency-tweak-suggesting Mixroom and track-comparison suite Reference, both serving as superb time-accelerators in the mastering stage, Reso is handy from the get-go, particularly as mixes start to build out…

Presonus Revelator io24 £172 Web presonus.com Gear USB audio interface with DSP processing It’s fair to say that the small audio interface market is a pretty crowded one, full to the brim with units from SSL, M-Audio, Native Instruments, UA, Focusrite (we looked at their latest Clarett+ 2Pre a couple of issues back) and more. While most are ideal for small setups and singer/songwriters, and are usually very mobile and USB-powered, they all also need to have a USP to stand out from the (massive) crowd. And Presonus’ latest is no exception… We looked at the company’s Revelator microphone last year and this interface takes some of the same tech and gives you a different slant on it. The Revelator mic features DSP processing to shape your voice in…

As Computer Music readers, you really know your synths. So, when we gave away the all-new Zebra CM synth – one especially created for us by plugin masters u-he – four months ago, we thought you might like it. But we didn’t expect the response we got and it is now the most downloaded plugin from the mighty Plugin Suite ever! And where Zebra CM can now easily be regarded as the best free synth out there (well, ‘free’ in the sense that it comes free with this magazine!), this latest Bazille CM update can be seen as the most powerful. Between the two, you now have all of your synth needs sorted! Bazille CM is based on the full Bazille, widely regarded as one of the best modular synths…

… for whatever music you make There’s a sea of freeware out there and rather than just list the best, we’re going to save you some time and suggest just a few prime apps to download depending on the genre and type of music you make. All free. All next month! PLUS! Delays for free A fantastic new, free delay plugin from WA Production! Reviews On test! Moog Animoog Z synth, PSP Saturator and many more! More How-Tos The last two parts of How To Do Everything!…

Right about now we’d usually just be returning from our annual NAMM pilgrimage where we all claim to have been in LA for a week finding out about all the latest music tech releases. The reality is this massive music gear show is in the rather less majestic Anaheim and, secondly, it’s been postponed until May because of, well, you know what. But that’s not stopped some companies releasing some great products so here are three of the best, including a sad goodbye to an iconic orchestral series… First up, news of a new G-Force plugin. The Gear of 2021 winners (for OB-E) don’t usually release many plugins so are really spoiling us with two in two years. The M-Tron MkII is, as G-Force say, “a celebration of an instrument…

cm How did you get into music software? CS “I have been studying, performing and composing music in various forms since I was ten. Much later I moved to London where I studied Music Information Technology at City University, London, under the inspirational Jim Grant. I got all the tools I needed to understand the principles of sound and the ability to produce working prototypes of signal processing ideas, but was not very familiar with core C++ programming. When I moved back to Greece I got introduced to Akis Golfidis and his team (a very famous and well respected audio engineer of over four decades) as well as Theofilos Christodoulou who later became the main software engineer at MIA. Working together as a team, we started MIA Laboratories.” cm How…

Bass plays both a rhythmic and melodic role in music and can sometimes be very prominent in a track, while at other times almost invisible, providing a supportive role holding down the low frequencies. In our three bass walkthroughs we’re going to provide three different jump-in points using three different synths. Our synths have plenty of presets to page through and that’s ideal for finding sounds. Even so, bass synth sounds are pretty straightforward to create from scratch and provide a good way to acquaint yourself with a synth’s capabilities. So in our first walkthrough we’ll look at creating a couple of slightly different synth bass sounds from scratch. These are by design meant to be functional, solid patches and are ideal for the supportive role mentioned above. The first…

“The key concepts translate to other dynamics processors” Dynamics processors are used to modify sounds based on their signal level. There are a number of different types of processors including compressors, limiters, gate/ expanders, frequency dependent compressors and transient processors. Some of these processors were originally designed to do very functional jobs. Limiters, for example, were used to prevent nasty signal level overloads, and gates were used to curtail signal and tape noise. However, over time it became clear that these tools had plenty of additional sonic benefits and could also be used in many creative ways. Here we’re looking at two key dynamics processes — compression and gating. Our first compression walkthrough is a familiarisation tutorial that shows you what the controls do and how they affect your sound.…

There was a stir of excitement back in the 90s, as a style of garage emerged from the underground, forever associated with legendary producers such as Todd Edwards. While much of this format made exceptional use of sample chopping, in a technique which became known as micro-sampling, the ever-present bass sound has inspired a whole raft of other genres, from hip-hop to pop. Understanding the emergence of this sound has plenty to do with the machines that created it, and for that we look east to the shining inspiration of Roland. Two machines have become inextricably linked with this bass, namely the Roland Juno (predominantly the 106) and the SH-101. The bass sound was sonically informed by the use of the sub oscillator, which was present on both machines. Adopting…

Audiomodern Opacity II £85 Exquisitely performed and curated by Justin Hodges of Terre Grande, Opacity II is a godsend if you want creative guitar textures in your mixes and can’t craft them physically. Highly modifiable, expressive atmospheric licks and sequences. audiomodern.com Zero G Impromptu Electric Guitars £32 Impromptu Electric Guitar features 21 patches and 8GB of samples, though its true potential lies in how you can weave them together to fashion organic soundscapes. All the samples were processed via a range of real-world pedals, while its ‘Impromptu Engine’ allows for random sound generation. zero-g.co.uk Heavyocity Scoring Guitars 2 £70 A combination of pads, beds, drones, melodic pulses and performance palettes, Scoring Guitars 2 is superb for developing warm and emotive guitar-based soundtracks and soundscapes. The interface provides…

Amid much secrecy, Spectrasonics released a teaser video as a warm-up ahead of their latest release. “It’s not going to be what you think,” they said, and it isn’t! It’s probably fair to say that many were hoping for something along the lines of a much-awaited update to Stylus RMX, which might also explain why initial reactions in industry circles seemed somewhat muted. But dig a little deeper and there are some very happy surprises, so let’s get curious! EXtending Omnisphere Sonic EXtensions are a series of expansion packs for Omnisphere 2.8. There are four in this initial release, with each adopting a stylistic persona, presumably with more to follow. There is a caveat: you must have Omnisphere to use these EXtensions, as they load and run within that package.…

Expressive E are an incredibly interesting company, creating a number of inspiring products in both software and hardware form. Their first commercial release was the Touché, which to the uninitiated appears to sound a little like a sustain pedal. Nothing could be further from its actual calling, as it is better described as a uniquely different performance device for controlling parameters, either on computer or other hardware. This beautifully designed piece of kit allows any performer to control information such as MIDI CCs within a DAW, or CV signals, should you want to connect to a Eurorack system or CV equipped synth. Expression, swells or even beats are all possible, through its tactile interface. While the Touché ships with its own Lié software, it’s the perfect counterpart for any modelling-based…

Fiery, powerful, destructive, aggressive – all overly-used synonyms for the kind of sound mangling for which Heavyocity is renowned. Ever since 2012’s game changing Damage blew the lid off home cinematic percussion, the company has been central to discussions around the best methods of constructing epic soundtracks and organic-sounding textures. While Damage and its recently released sequel emphasised dramatic percussion, the team have now applied a similar approach to the entire orchestra. Symphonic Destruction’s central concept is explained pretty succinctly by its title – this isn’t a typical string sample library, more of a meticulously crafted chaos machine. Symphonic Destruction is a rich resource of over 11,800 samples, in a download that clocks in at a surprisingly slight 17.4GB and leans on Kontakt 6 (or the free Kontakt player) to…

If you were to ask a roomful of producers what their favourite modulation effect is, it’s unlikely any would shout ‘tremolo’. Originating as a guitar effect back in the mists of time, today, tremolo’s simple LFO volume fluctuations don’t quite entice in the same way as say creative delay processing, high-pass filtering or blazing distortion. That said, with increasingly off-the-wall production techniques more commonplace in modern pop (we’re looking at you Finneas), there’s been something of a resurgence of interest in how tremolo can be creatively applied in a fresh context. That’s precisely what French company BLEASS have set out to achieve with Dragonfly. Established as recently as 2018, the company has already received praise for a growing storehouse of meaty-sounding effects plugins. This ear-pleasing arsenal is also fully usable…

UNDRGRND Sounds DiscoMadness £34.95 An absolute loony bin of bonkers beats and pieces to rifle through, here. A quick dive in and you’ll be pulling out in-the-pocket drums, sly slapping bass riffs, classy synths, hits, horns, and music lines so groovy they’d send Bootsy round the bend. The seasoned team of musicians drafted in to provide the sounds on this project deliver a certifiable set of super credible, super dancefloor, and super usable loops. Everything bumps, shimmies, and shakes, and almost feels ripped right from an authentic vintage Philly recording studio session. Basically, if you can’t find a loop in this little lot for your next soulful 70s session, then you might want your head looking at, mate. undrgrndsounds.com n9/100 Zenhiser Revolve – Drum & Bass £34 Warped and…