File these designs under “do want.” Some of your favorite gear is rendered in miniature: Roland’s TR-808, E-MU’s SP-1200 sampler, Akai’s MPC 2000XL, and (coming soon) even the Yamaha NS-10 near-field monitors. It occurs to me that someday soon, such tiny things might even work in some form as functioning music equipment. For now, you’ll have to settle for tiny classic gear that contains an 8 GB flash drive – enough to carry especially-precious samples or demos or backups.

The drives are US$39.99, but contain extraordinary levels of detail and use Toshiba flash memory (not something overly generic). They work with USB 2.0, too.

The project is the work of Alkota, a musician who also offers a boutique of drum samples, including some more unique hip-hop drum sets and such. Shop:
http://hiphopdrumsamples.com/category/flash-drives

Gallery:

More on the artist:
www.alkotabeats.com
www.hiphopdrumsamples.com
www.twitter.com/alkota

It’s small, but I think it’ll be pretty huge. We’ve seen plenty of guitar audio interface adapters out there. Here’s the dirty little secret: they’re pretty awful. Because they connect to the audio jack of the iPhone or iPad, there are issues with impedance matching and noise / signal-to-noise. (Read: they don’t sound great. I’ve tried them, and since they all use the same in/out jack, they all sound more or less the same.)

The Mobile In from Line 6 has three things going for it. First, it works with Line 6′s POD effects and guitar amp modeling, which is already popular with guitarists. Second, the app that it works with the audio interface is free. No paid app, no add-on fee for presets – you buy the hardware and get all of the software for free.

Third, and most importantly, the Mobile In connects to the proprietary Apple 30-pin connector, so you get digital audio I/O rather than relying on the jack. That means the quality of the Mobile In is, well, the quality of the Mobile In. Without a test unit, it’s impossible to say for sure, but Line 6 at least claims a 110 dB dynamic range on the guitar input and a 98 dB range on the stereo line input. There’s up to 24-bit/48 kHz support, but I’m happy just to get a portable device with line and guitar ins. They’ve even tossed in a 6-foot guitar cable. Total price: US$79.

The Mobile POD app, while free, is no slouch, either: you get 10,000 presets, a built-in tuner, 64 amps and effects and more, even with a neat iTunes play-along mode. And it’s free for everyone, whether or not you have the hardware. And if you want to use a different mobile app, of course, you can do that, too, if you do use the hardware.

With specs like that, this looks like a must-have for the iPhone and iPad, even if you use them exclusively for practicing guitar. Now, I just wish the beautiful New Signal Process accessories, which turn iOS gadgets into stompboxes, had a MIDI-only version. Maybe there’s a MIDI-compatible controller that could eventually be compatible with these. (Line 6, you listening?)

There’s only one catch. Stereo line in. Guitar in. There’s something missing here – output. That means that the Camera Connection Kit with a USB audio interface could be a better option if you have an iPad. You’re still limited by the headphone output jack here – no other output is available. That makes this fine for practice, but people wanting more flexible ins and outs (well, outs period, beyond the headphone connection) will want to consider a USB audio interface. (Of course, the free app is still cool.)

My other wish? It’d be nice to see the Android platform compete with, well, any of this. Theoretically, there may be a way to do digital audio I/O on that platform, too; sounds like a research question. We’ll see if, Android or otherwise, another tablet/mobile platform starts to evolve these sort of features.

Any mobile guitarists who want to test this out for CDM, and share your music in the process? Let us know.

http://line6.com/mobilein/

For connecting music hardware from the 80s, 90s, 2000s, and today, you can’t beat MIDI and the standard MIDI connector (5-pin DIN). This week, both IK Multimedia and Line 6 announced adapters that support Core MIDI. Previously possible on iPad via the Camera Connection Kit, the new adapters support the 30-pin dock connector for the iPad (no additional adapter needed), iPhone, and iPod touch.

IK’s iRig MIDI has a number of features that set it apart from previously-available iOS adapters:

It’s got MIDI Thru. MIDI Thru means you can route MIDI into your iOS device, so an external keyboard can play an iPhone synth, for instance, and route that same signal “Thru” to another device – say, if you want to also record your playing, or layer another synth with the same notes an octave higher. (I can rant about the disappearance of Thru on other hardware some other time; it’s great to see it here.)

There’s a USB power port. This one’s huge, especially having tested Line6′s adapter. Normally, any hardware you plug into your iOS device takes over the jack you’d use for power – so you have to watch your battery life as you use it. By adding an additional USB jack for power, you can connect both MIDI and power – problem solved. That’s especially essential if you plan on using this a lot, or onstage.

A Gig of Sounds, to Go… IK Multimedia is also bundling a new SampleTank app for iOS so that anyone buying the adapter gets sounds straight out of the box. SampleTank has 1 GB of sounds (500 of them), 20 insert effects, and a master reverb-delay — yes, really on iOS, for free. (8 GB owners may not be thrilled about that, but those of you with more storage might.) You get acoustic, electric, and electronic instruments, and even orchestral and sampled Moog sounds.

Samples of those samples, via SoundCloud:
Two New Products Coming Soon by ikmultimedia

Other specs:
Detachable cables; “pocketable” (also true on the Line 6)

IK claims the hardware is “lightweight” so that you don’t hurt the fragile connector on the iOS gadgets

iRig Recorder for free MIDI recording and playback (there’s a similar feature on the Line 6 offering)

Pricing:
iRig MIDI, US$69.

SampleTank for iOS, price TBD.

iKlipMini is a little adapter for clipping an iPod touch or iPhone to a mic stand. US$39.

www.irigmidi.com
www.sampletank.com/ios
www.ikmultimedia.com/iklipmini

Digital notation took a big step forward last week with the release of Avid Scorch, the first take on mobile notation from developer Sibelius. (It’s the first mobile app, period, from industry titan Avid, so it’s interesting to watch them go first with notation – especially as even Apple skipped scores with their first release of GarageBand.)

Anything new is liable to generate a lot of questions. So we’ve taken those questions straight to the source, to the Sibelius team at Avid. One of the things I always enjoyed about the folks at Sibelius is that they’re an exceptionally bright, articulate, and musically-minded bunch of people, so I’ve found even if we don’t see eye to eye on an issue, I’ll get an intelligent answer. (The same is true, incidentally, of the people at their chief rival, Finale developer MakeMusic.)

Here’s what they had to say about page turns, annotation (hint: it’s missing for now), sharing and distribution, rendering and page format, and what this is all about.

Meanwhile, the most significant answer comes not from Sibelius and Avid but from vendors of Bluetooth foot pedals, the essential ingredient in making digital scores work. We talk to one of those vendors below, as well, about hardware relevant not only to Scorch and iPad, but other notation tools and devices, as well.

Q+A: Avid Scorch

Tom Clarke, Senior Product Manager for both Avid Scorch and Sibelius, answers a few of our questions. (Thanks to reader comments for suggesting many of these!)

CDM: How might a user turn pages with Scorch in a performance/rehearsal?

Tom: To turn pages in Scorch, you simply swipe – or, in Music Stand mode, tap on either side of the screen to go forwards and back. Scorch also works with any Bluetooth device that can send left- and right-arrow commands, including Bluetooth footswitches, to allow hands-free page turning. We’ve tested with a couple of devices in particular: PageFlip and AirTurn.

There’s not presently a way to annotate scores, I take it? With a paper score, of course, you can quickly make a note with a pencil, etc.

That’s correct – currently Scorch allows you to interact with and transform the music, but not to annotate it. We’ve already had a number of users request this, so it’s on the list of possible improvements to include in future updates. It’s actually quite a tricky problem to solve though, if the music underneath can be changed and reformatted: any annotations would have to be able to move around relative to the musical element(s) they’re describing, so it’s not a straightforward request.

Let’s say a composer wants to quickly push out a bunch of revised parts to an ensemble. How does one do this? And otherwise, you would distribute music for sale on the Scorch store as previously, correct?

Currently, the best way to distribute revised parts in Scorch would be to email the completed score (or extracted parts, if you prefer) to the musicians you want to share it with – or to use, say, a public Dropbox folder that everyone can access. Then each musician opens the score on their iPad and views their part independently, making any changes they want to their own copy of it.

As for self-publishing, using the SibeliusMusic.com site, composers and arrangers can sell their scores – or make them freely available – very easily. Sign up for an account, upload your music and set a price to sell it on SibeliusMusic.com (you get to keep half of the proceeds of any sale through the site); the Scorch Store, meanwhile, maps this price onto one of Apple’s in-app purchase price points and makes it available to buy on the iPad – if that price is higher you get to keep any extra margin.

How much of the Sibelius rendering engine is reproduced in Scorch? Is there anything you can see in a Sibelius score that won’t then appear for Scorch? Any special preparation?

The entire Sibelius rendering engine is reproduced in Scorch so that positioning, styles, formatting and everything else on the page should be no different to Sibelius on the desktop. There are some things that aren’t visible in Scorch, though, such as hidden objects, saved versions, ideas and layout marks. These items only really make sense in an editing environment like Sibelius. The iPad does have some limitations on things like the text fonts included in iOS, but we’ve included the same intelligent font substitution that Sibelius uses in order to try and render scores so that they resemble as closely as possible the original fonts used.

Normally, you format scores for different paper sizes (A4, Letter…) How would you format for tablets? Does the idea of a page size still remain? Would you make a score, say, 4:3 for iPad?

Currently Scorch respects the page settings and layout choices of the score’s author, so yes, page sizes still remain. We recommend using a Letter page size to make best use of the display in Music Stand mode. Look out for some House Style templates on the SibeliusBlog, which you can use to reformat your existing scores easily and make the best use of the iPad’s display and treat the device bevel as the margin.

How do you see the big picture for this offering?

We see Scorch as Avid’s first foray into the world of dedicated mobile apps: there’s a clear use for existing Sibelius customers, solving the obvious problems of portability – but without sacrificing musical intelligence, flexibility and the clarity afforded by the world’s most beautiful music notation. But there’s also an exciting opportunity here for people who wouldn’t normally be interested in notation, at least in the sense of creating it. For those people, Scorch is a great way to learn to play music and to expand their repertoire, tailoring the music that they enjoy to suit their instrument or voice. And because the world’s leading music publishers use Sibelius, we can take their extensive libraries of scores and make them truly interactive in a way that a piece of paper simply can’t match.

The Must-Have Accessory for Digital Scores

Swiping a tablet while you’re trying to play has about as much appeal as … well, turning pages with paper. One clear advantage digital scores have over the printed variety is the promise of hands-free page turns. To do that, you need a Bluetooth pedal. Thanks to the standardization of Bluetooth, these should work not only with Apple’s iPad, but tablets from other makers, as well. (You wouldn’t want music notation to be a platform exclusive, after all.)

Expect to see various offerings out there, but Hugh Sung, co-founder of AirTurn, was first to pipe in when readers pondered how page turns would work with Scorch. Hugh sends over some extensive details on how their system works.

The BT-105 works as an external Bluetooth keyboard, but with some nifty extra features, like a built-in debounce filter to prevent multiple page turns per foot switch press, multiple keyboard profiles for different applications, and one really cool feature exclusive to the BT-105, the ability to toggle on the iPad’s virtual keyboard for text entry (all other external page turners/keyboards hide the iPad’s virtual keyboard by default).

The BT-105 features the latest 2.1 + EDR Bluetooth capabilities, which means that pairing is automatic – no need to enter any passkey codes. Also, the pairing automatically shows the BT-105′s unique serial number, making it easy for multiple users to quickly locate their respective AirTurn units.

The BT-105 comes with 2 ATFS-2 silent foot switches – as i mentioned in the comment, these are the quietest foot switches in the consumer market, thanks to some nifty proprietary technology that features no mechanical moving parts aside from the hinge. That means, no clicks, no squeaks when operating the foot switch. We’re using a nedymium magnet and a rhodium reed switch embedded in the high strength plastic body of the foot switch. As a professional classical pianist, making sure our AirTurn page turning device was perfectly silent was my top priority.

You can find some photos of the BT-105 and our new ATFS-2 silent foot switch in our press release here:

http://www.prweb.com/releases/2011/6/prweb8504375.htm

You can also get more information directly from our website at http://airturn.com.

There’s no reason this will be limited to iPad; Hugh tells us that we can expect an Android version of the Musicnotes.com music notation marketplace soon, projected by the end of summer. (That should time nicely with a whole crop of Honeycomb-powered tablets over the summer; I now have a Galaxy Tab 10.1 machine I’m carrying for development and everyday use, and it compares nicely to my iPad that’s CDM’s testbed for music apps.)

There’s also no reason the use has to be limited to page turns. Foot switches could be boons in applications like punch in / punch out recording, too; developers just need to add support – and it’s simple to implement.

We’ll keep an eye out for other pedals. And if you’re considering using digital notation when gigging, we’d love to hear from you – and maybe talk about doing a proper review.

What if a gaping product hole for musicians were filled by a game company instead of a musical instruments company? There’s no need to imagine: pick up the new Rock Band 3 keyboard, and you’ll see what I mean.

Consider: most sub-$100 and compact keyboards have dumped 5-PIN MIDI DIN ports in favor of USB only – little comfort if you want to plug a keyboard into that DIY sound module or eBay treasure. (Alesis’ QS25 is one exception, but even a $150 M-Audio Oxygen is USB-only.)

And keytars? Fuggedaboutit. Strap-on keyboards or keytars are a great way to play keyboard lines, but they’ve tended to be freakin’ huge. They really do feel like strapping a full-sized keyboard on your shoulder, which can kill the joy of playing them. And the current “entry-level” model, Roland’s Lucina AX-09, has a street of US$600 or more. eBay bidders have made used items similarly pricey.

So, forget for a second that a game is involved. What if I told you you could get a cute, light little keyboard with MIDI DIN, intelligent MIDI mappings, and two great-feeling synth action octaves, all in a strap-on form factor with battery power, for $80?

Yeah. That’s what I thought. So whether you’re a hardened gamer or just looking for a nice, mobile keyboard controller, here’s an in-depth look at how MIDI works on the new Rock Band 3 Wireless Keyboard Controller – forever to be known to everyone outside Harmonix and Mad Catz as “the Rock Band keytar.”

The Hardware, Impressions

Hardware specs:

• 25 velocity-sensitive keys. (Velocity already gives a leg up over some stuff you can get on eBay. No aftertouch, though.)
• TRS port for stomp or expression pedals. (Right now, that means the bass drum pedal, until we figure out a DIY solution. It uses a little 3.5mm jack; working on finding out voltage specs.)
• 1-axis touch strip which maps to modulation and pitch.
• 5-pin MIDI DIN port.
• Xbox 360 (or PS3) game pad, wireless Xbox operation. (For wireless MIDI, you’re on your own.)
• Three AA batteries. (No external power.)
• Optional stand accessory. (This looks cute; I didn’t pick it up yesterday but may yet.)
• 4.6 lbs.

US$80 street, and also available bundled with the Rock Band 3 game.

I’ve handled a lot of “shoulder-mount keyboards,” and the simple reality is, a lot of them have pretty awful ergonomics. The Rock Band keyboard is about the best I’ve handled. It’s light enough that you can hold it in one hand, and compact enough that it’s about the width of a typical adult waist. That means it actually feels like a keytar sized to be played as a keytar.

The keyboard action is just a basic, unweighted synth action, but feels solid enough, and velocity response is consistent. I have to admit: I was very surprised by the quality of the keyboard. You could easily put this alongside so-called “pro” unweighted keyboards in the sub-$200 range and, blindfolded, no one would ever guess this was a game keyboard. I have no idea who built the action (it’s labeled “made in China”), but there would be no shame whatsoever in using it.

One oddity: F3, C4, and F4 each have raised ridges on the left-hand side of the keys, in order to delineate the keyboard’s five zones for gameplay. With proper keyboard technique, though, you won’t even feel them, since the pads of your fingers will hit the middle of the keys. (That is, unless you have larger fingers.)

You also get a standard set of game controllers, and everything either sends a MIDI message or is used to toggle features on the keyboard. Not a button goes to waste.

The touchpad on the neck is probably the weak spot of the design. It’s usable, and conveniently located, but its response is pretty hard to control exactly. It’s also hard to hold down the overdrive button while using it, which is the only way to get to pitch. Then again, your left hand is likely busy holding the keyboard, anyway, just as on all keytars, so a pedal seems the better solution for anything really expressive. I’ll see how I adjust to it over time, though.

MIDI Mapping

As with the guitar, operation is simple: plug in a MIDI cable.

Yeah, okay. There is something to be said for old-fashioned MIDI, huh?

Once you’ve plugged in, you get some surprisingly robust MIDI implementation:

Keyboard: 25 keys transmit normally, with velocity. (No aftertouch. I’m glad we get velocity.)

In drum mode, the keyboard transmits General MIDI drum parts, which is, of course, handy for playing drum patches. (It’s also handy for confusing the hell out of you if you didn’t know that’s what it did.)

Touch controller: 1-axis modulation. Hold down the “Overdrive” button, and while that button is held, it sends pitch bend – which makes pitch bend nearly unusable. (Too bad they didn’t just make the Overdrive button a straight toggle.) Works well enough for Modulation, though.

Octave: Octave up and down shift uses the X and B keys (on Xbox, or the left and right action keys), just as on the guitar – and just as on the guitar, you get four up, four down. Octave feedback is available on the LEDs.

Program change: Top and bottom action keys increment or decrement, respectively, program change. (Y and A on Xbox.)

D-pad buttons: As on the guitar, these toggle functions, though for the keyboard all four are mapped instead of three. Up turns on and off drum mapping, right changes the pedal to foot controller, down changes pedal to channel volume, and left changes the pedal to expression.

Transport controls: The Back, Guide, and Start buttons on the Xbox gamepad correspond to Stop, Continue, and Start MIDI messages, respectively – so if you’re tracking your next Rock Band Network song in Reaper, you can control your takes right from the keyboard.

Pedals: There’s one pedal port on the side. More on how to use this soon; I haven’t yet tried it. It’s a 3.5mm jack, but I have to find out the voltage. Stomp should work fine with a standard Rock Band drum pedal, and in the default mode, you can use that for a damper pedal. For expression, you need something that sends analog voltage.

Panic: Press the Back, Guide, and Start buttons simultaneously to switch all notes off. (Curiously, this appears not to be the same as on the guitar, but I can only test the keyboard to know for sure.)

MIDI channel: 1. Always. It’s always MIDI channel 1.

Note that there is no accelerometer output from the keyboard. Too bad; that would have been fun (and likely more useful than the two-fingered salute you have to do to get pitch bend from the touch strip). In fact, this sounds like a ripe opportunity for a little hack – maybe a strap-on board that transmits accelerometer and MIDI via Bluetooth.

Applications

Bottom line is, this thing is a joy for controlling computer synths or hardware, and may have just become my portable keyboard of choice, just because it’s fun to strap on. Of course, if you don’t care about the “keytar” form factor, any number of inexpensive keyboards will give you real pitch and mod wheels and some knobs. But if you want to play a keytar, this game controller has become, bizarrely, a must-buy.

As we find out more about the pedals, I’ll share that. In the meantime, enjoy.

Mobile devices are here, they’re powerful — get used to them. Now, could they just connect to the rest of your noisemakers and studio rigs? That’s the potential of new iOS SDKs for MIDI I/O and keyboard docking. But aside from some restrictions imposed by hardware support on iOS, what many developers are publicly wondering is whether a different path entirely will be most productive.

Hot on the heels of Line 6′s SDK for their MIDI Mobilizer, a MIDI input and output connector for iOS devices, Akai is courting developers for its own music accessory. The SynthStation 25 is a standard 25-key music keyboard with a dock for an iPhone or iPod touch inside.

The proposition for developers: now your sequencer or controller can connect to MIDI gear (with MIDI Mobilizer), or your synth can actually be inside something that looks like a synth, with a real keyboard.

Changes to Apple’s developer agreement have facilitated just this change. But while this is a step forward for developer flexibility, there are still some limitations on what developers can do, and what they can talk about, imposed by the makers of the accessories. Those restrictions won’t discourage all developers, but they’re worth noting, especially as mobile music gear is in early days.

There’s another discussion brewing among developers, too, which is whether the kinds of hardware assumptions upon which these two products are built even belong in the mobile age.

Here’s a look at where we are and how we got there, whether you’re an intrigued developer or just wish to consider how this fits into a larger picture of music gear in 2010.

Why Third-Party Apps for Third-Party Hardware is Now Available on iOS

In April, I wrote an editorial on the direction of hardware support on iOS, which has been a remnant of Apple’s tightly-controlled iPod accessory program, long before their mobile gadgets became real pocket computers. Line 6′s MIDI Mobilizer was the catalyst for the piece:
Of MIDI, iPhones and iPads, and a Restrictive Future for Hardware?

What hasn’t changed since then: Apple’s Dock Connector is not only a non-standard, proprietary adapter specific to their phones, but one for which you must ask permission if you wish to make your own hardware accessories.

What has changed: because of an adjustment to Apple’s legal writing, you can now let developers write apps for your hardware accessories.

Line 6 and Akai, as Apple developers, are not allowed to comment on Apple’s user agreement. (Insert Fight Club reference here.) But the changes to Apple’s Program Agreement are available publicly.

The old agreement

3.3.24 Your Application may interface, communicate, or otherwise interoperate with or control an iPhone Accessory (as defined above) through Bluetooth or Apple’s 30-pin dock connector only if You have obtained a license for such iPhone Accessory under Apple’s MFi Program.

The new agreement

3.3.25 Your Application may interface, communicate, or otherwise interoperate with or control an iPhone Accessory (as defined above) through Bluetooth or Apple’s 30-pin dock connector only if (i) such iPhone Accessory is licensed under Apple’s MFi Program at the time that You initially submit Your Application, (ii) the MFi Licensee has added Your Application to a list of those approved for interoperability with their iPhone Accessory, and (iii) the MFi Licensee has received approval from the Apple MFi Program for such addition.

Source: Twitter user beweeet

Spot the difference?

Apple is now allowing third-party apps to support those hardware accessories – provided Apple approves both the accessory itself, and via the accessory’s maker, the app.

Requirements for Developing for Akai, Line 6 iOS Hardware

Akai and Line 6 deserve some kudos for mediating between Apple and the third-party developer. Again, these developers are not able to talk about their agreement with Apple. But they were extremely cooperative in sharing their policy for working with developers. (In fact, basically, to get started all any interested developer has to do is email them.)

Line 6

A copy of the developer agreement obtained by CDM reveals what’s necessary to become a MIDI Mobilizer developer. At its most fundamental level, that means proposing an application plan to be approved by Line 6 as compatible (as per Apple’s own requirements), and agreeing to non-disclosure regarding any confidential information with which you’re providing (including documentation).

Marcus Ryle at Line 6 confirms with CDM that an additional requirement is sales reporting, though it appears this shouldn’t be a deal-breaker:

We do request reporting on the unit sales of the applications that use the MIDI Mobilizer. This information is kept confidential, and the purpose is so that we can have visibility into which apps are being most widely used by the MIDI Mobilizer. If we were to make any new versions of hardware in the future, we want to be sure that we can continue to meet the needs of our users by understanding what is important to them, and this requires us to know what is being used. We also understand that for some developers this is information that they do not want to share, and we are happy to discuss this directly with them to come to an amicable resolution.

With the SDK itself under non-disclosure, I asked Marcus what this might mean for someone developing an open source app (several of which have already appeared on the App Store):

We do have some limitations with regard to open source usage in our agreement. Specifically, we do not allow the use of open source if our SDK is used in a way that would cause our code to become part of the open source license obligations (unless we have provided written consent), since this typically results in the requirement that our source code would have to be released publicly. If the open source code can be used in a way that does not cause our code to be connected to the open source licensing, then this would be ok.

Akai

Glen Darcey, product manager at Akai, confirmed to me that the SynthStation SDK has some similar requirements in order to maintain their proprietary SDK. But unlike Line 6, Akai is not requesting any sales reporting.

Darcey also downplays the requirements. “Your product is your product,” he says. “Our code is our code. It cannot be redistributed. It can be in your app… Anyone who wants to add support for our hardware can but they have to go through our developers SDK process which is minimal.”

“There are requirements for adding our logos that say the app is compatible with our hardware,” he adds; that appears to me to come from Apple’s program.

As for the NDA, in this case, says Darcey, it’s nothing out of the ordinary: “The NDA is a standard NDA. It basically states that anything we say will be confident as will anything you say to us.”

Will this discourage developers?

Short answer: no – that is, if the developer has the desire to develop for this SDK in the first place.

Developers I’ve spoken to had some concerns about these requirements, but they also didn’t appear to change anyone’s mind one way or the other. That is, those wanting to develop for these accessories found the requirements workable. Those who don’t care … well, don’t care.

I think these restrictions are a deal-breaker for truly open source development on mobile, but for those projects, support for proprietary hardware accessories is generally less appealing anyway.

(If you disagree, of course, you can make yourself heard in comments.)

More than the issues of restrictions on the platform, though, the conversation I’m hearing is one that’s more fundamental.

Time to Move Beyond MIDI (or Wires)?

Line 6 and Akai each promise some exciting applications. But as comments recently demonstrated, many users and developers alike are treating the announcement with skepticism.

First off, even if the requirements for the proprietary SDK are modest, the issue is their competition. A $200 netbook (or a $400 used Mac laptop, if you like) can plug into a $30 MIDI interface without drivers. A variety of free development tools on any platform can then talk to that interface, or you could write your own – we’re talking serial communication, which is hardly brain surgery. And the reality is, a lot of people who use MIDI gear also own these other devices.

Once you add MIDI gear to an iPhone or iPad, you limit some of the device’s elegance and portability. You can also connect only one device at a time, meaning adding a MIDI Mobilizer gives you MIDI but no external audio – and since there are now things sticking out of your iPad, your laptop is suddenly just about as mobile as it is.

I think some of the skepticism here is undue; I still like the idea of a portable, pocketable recorder for MIDI sketching or library backup. But developers like Christopher Penrose, creator of Cosmovox, aren’t necessarily criticizing the availability of these SDKs. They’re saying that energy could be directed somewhere else. From comments, Christopher writes:

It is important to consider the benefits of Open Sound Control and other alternative communication protocols. I don’t believe the future of music entirely belongs to people who have an interest in protecting and extending their hardware investment. But I will say I would consider supporting the MIDImobilizer in some/all of our iOS products if the demand was significant, the API is well designed enough, and the licensing terms are acceptable. But I think developers should be putting their limited energies into viable communication protocols that extend and enrich the music we can make, rather than being bogged down by outdated, replacement-ripe legacy standards…

For independent developers, it may very well be an either/or situation. Time is finite. I have Open Sound Control support well under way and it works without an additional hardware investment.

The other advantage of wireless communication is that it keeps mobile devices mobile. And incidentally, there’s no reason you can’t use a protocol like Bluetooth to do MIDI, as well as implemented OSC wirelessly over a network. It is possible to achieve accurate timing and low latency wirelessly, too, though that’s a discussion I hope we have in greater detail on CDM, so I won’t do it an injustice by faking it now.

I actually had a dream last night in which I was using Bluetooth to do MIDI, so I’m obviously supposed to be getting on this instead of writing lengthy investigations of Apple developer agreements. And I’ll leave it at that.

In the end, I don’t doubt that we’ll see a handful of interesting apps for the Akai and Line 6 gear. And MIDI hardware is something with which we’ll want to interoperate for a long time to come. The question now is, what’s the best path for the future?

Ah, amplifiers and stompboxes. We hardly knew ye. Once exclusively the stuff of tubes, wires, cabinets, aluminum, and electronics, guitar amps and pedals have for years been available in growingly-sophisticated software models. Once the electronics of sound become software, there’s nothing stopping them from running on any computer – which now includes computers disguised as mobile phones, like the iPhone. (In fact, I expect that trend will accelerate; mobile processors are providing expanded access to native DSP functions.)

Before anyone gets to ask whether a phone is the ideal device for such a task, in the spirit of technological advancement, you’ll see simulated guitar processing from various parties.

In the past 24 hours, not one but two developers made official announcements. Agile Partners, makers of iOS’ Star6 music making software, TabToolkit tab notation tool (also on iPad), and GuitarToolkit tuner + metronome + chords and scales, partners with Peavey. IK Multimedia, makers of the industry-standby AmpliTube guitar emulation software, offer their own iPhone-specific release of AmpliTube.

AmpKit LiNK hardware [Peavey, with pre-order info]

http://ampkitapp.com [Official site]

AmpliTube iRig [IK Multimedia]

Dueling Banjos: Two Upcoming Simulations, Close Feature Sets

Here’s a quick comparison of IK’s AmpliTube and Agile/Peavey’s AmpKIT.

Hardware: Onboard audio hardware clearly won’t cut it, so both AmpliTube and AmpKIT offer specialized hardware connections. AmpKit LiNK promises to “raise the audio fidelity bar” and includes built-in cross-talk elimination for reducing feedback. iRig has its own electrical impedance adaption for line- and guitar-level input. Both cost $39.99, both have audio inputs and outputs, and most importantly, since they appear simply as audio devices, both work with any iPhone audio app. So, if IK’s software turns out to be better and Peavey’s hardware, or visa versa, you’ll be able to mix and match. Only Peavey has a skinny dude with no shirt on.

The models: AmpliTube includes 3 stompboxes, 1 amp+cabinet, 2 mics in a free app, two addition stompboxes in the US$2.99 LE, or a full 11 stompboxes, 5 amps + cabinets, and 2 mics for US$19.99. There are also a la carte models for $2.99-$4.99 each.

What’s included? IK says it will offer, in the full version: “5 amp models (clean, crunch, lead, metal, bass) with full tone and drive controls, 11 stompbox effects (delay, flanger, phaser, overdrive, distortion, filter, wah, fuzz, octaver, chorus, noise filter), 5 speaker cabinets (1×12”, 2×12”, 4×12” A & B”, 1×15) and 2 microphones (dynamic and condenser).”

AmpKit has 10 amps, 12 cabinets, 12 pedals, and 6 mics, and will also offer add-ons. Software pricing and details are currently unavailable; I’ve requested more details and will update the story when I get them.

So, both are pretty cheap; it’ll just be a matter of which software works better, and which models sound better.

Extras: AmpliTube also includes importable song playback for backing tracks (complete with real-time effects), 36 presets, and an onboard tuner and metronome, apparently in all editions – even the free one.

AmpKit also has backing tracks, custom setups with up to 12 pedals each, unlimited presets (instead of just 36), a tuner, and metronome.

Compatibility: Both work on the iPhone, iPod, and iPad.

Bottom line: These are nearly-identical products with nearly-identical feature sets. So, may the best one win.

Will people actually want it? To me, the key feature here is as a practice tool. With the iPod touch well under $200 (especially with refurbs), and no contract, guitarists get an interface that’s cheap, portable, and allows them to practice and jam anywhere. As a replacement for full-blown amp rigs, it’s probably still too limited, but that isn’t the point. If you’re recording a track or playing a live gig, it’s likely worth the extra effort to use a computer. The competition for these devices isn’t that, or even real amps; it’s the little handheld devices we’ve seen in the past for practicing, and this shouldn’t have a hard time blowing those things out of the water on price, performance, and ease of use.

Of course, the one thing you don’t get is an actual speaker. And neither of these tools has a solution for actually controlling the stomp boxes – since those would defeat the portability factor. As long as humans have ears, amps and portable amps will remain a big hit. But as practice tools, they’re likely to be big hits.

Guitar tab on iPad

Pocketable practice amps are fun, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t point to TabToolkit. It’s the only music software to be awarded an Apple Design Award this year at the World Wide Developer Conference. The feature set is pretty extraordinary, especially on the iPad: it’s the first really usable-looking, full-featured notation software on iOS. US$9.99 buys you the ability to import notation from a variety of formats — Guitar Pro, Power Tab, PDF and text tab. With the amount of text tab online, that’s a pretty big deal. It then provides tablature and standard notation views. Sure, you could just, you know, print this stuff out, and for that reason, it’s probably not going to be enough on its own to justify an iPad purchase. Likewise, you lose something in the translation from paper: it’s not quite as easy to just pick up a pencil and make a quick fingering note while you’re learning a score. But it’s nonetheless a pretty impressive way to manage access to a variety of scores, a sort of virtual fakebook of sorts, it assists people learning to play guitar with interactive fret display, and it looks like a powerful tool for play and practice.

Also, good choice of song:

Virtual backlash?

It was interesting as always to read comments last week as I reflected that phones aren’t everything in music and subsequently composed a set of haikus to try to restore perspective.

Here’s my short prediction: iPhones, iPods, and iPads are tools, and they do demonstrate how powerful mobile processors can be. At the same time, just as with computer software, musicians may find that they get a certain amount of virtual fatigue, and long for actual hardware. I think part of what will keep all of this in balance is that, for every polished and controlled device like the iPhone, there will be greater interest in DIY and music-dedicated software and devices, for everything shiny, consumer gadget with virtual software, a renewed interest in raunchy, physical hardware. And that’s a good thing.

Understood this way, a practice tool you can put in your pocket is pretty amazing. It’s not a replacement for a trusted, beloved amp. In fact, it might make you see the latter in new ways.

Analysis elsewhere:
iPhone amp modelling arms race escalates! [MusicRadar]

That seems going a bit far. I’d say this is more like when those two asteroid movies came out at the exact same time.

I find it quite surprising then, that relatively few of the artists I know use any kind of hearing protection. Stereocilia damage in mammals is permanent, and tinnitus is no fun. Most people know that cheap foam earplugs can help prevent damage, but few seem aware that a slightly larger investment can make gigs considerably more enjoyable.

Etymotic ER-20 are affordable (around US$12), semi-professional, one-size-fits-most earplugs. Their biggest advantage over disposable, foam plugs is their reasonably flat attenuation. Foam and other disposable plugs tend to cut out more high frequencies, causing everything to sound muffled.

When I was learning to VJ, playing 6-hour sets alongside whichever DJs or live acts were in town on the weekend, I always kept a box of foam earplugs in my box-of-adapters-and-miscellaneous-cables. They stopped the tinnitus after a night of throwing photons around the place, but I was loath to use them at bands I’d paid to see. If I was exchanging money for music, I wanted to hear every nuance, even if it made my ears considerably less nuanced the following day.

Fortunately, I was introduced to nice earplugs by a mild-mannered musician who happens to make bionic ears when he’s not hanging upside down playing guitar. The ER-20 plugs aren’t quite as easy on the ear canal as the soft foam-rubber disposable ones, but the slight physical discomfort is definitely worth the increased listening comfort. Not only do they protect your hearing, but for particularly loud PA systems, I find that they allow me to hear the band much more clearly.

The first show I used them at was Mogwai, one of my favorite groups, who I hadn’t been able to see in 7 years. In the middle of the set I tried a couple of songs without the plugs, but found that replacing them allowed me to discern more detail in the wall of sound.

One caveat: I’d be careful using them in a boisterous crowd.  The plastic stems extend a bit beyond the outer ear, and I can imagine a physical blow to the side of the head could lodge them somewhere near your brain stem. To protect yourself from that fate, 20x the investment will give you some custom molded earplugs, and the molding can be used for in the future for an excitingly expensive in-ear monitor system.

For now, I’m happy with the ER-20.

(Available from Amazon.com: US$10)

Synthtopia goes out on a limb and says iPhone 3.0 kicks ass for music.

Well … sort of. The thing that makes the iPhone special for music is that it has Core Audio and can run C/C++ code. Google’s Android, by comparison, currently has a limited set of APIs and, as near as I can tell, no easy way to get a real synthesis or effects library going. That’s allowed the likes of Pure Data and ChucK to run serious real-time synthesis and audio processing, in the guise of consumer-friendly apps. Think this doesn’t matter to non-CDM readers? Tell that to the zillions of people who bought Ocarina for the iPhone as a toy. This is, mark my words, a very big deal. It just isn’t any more of a big deal in iPhone 3.0.

The other improvements still have the caveats that the iPhone has always had. The iPhone still has a closed ecosystem that’s dependent on iTunes, plus restrictions on hardware and software that keep it from being, well, as open as your Mac or Windows computer is, or even many mobile devices. Now, what you do with those limitations is up to you. I believe in dissent and disagreement on the Web, and I think the iPhone has no shortage of cheerleaders. I’m not a fan of Apple’s model. That’s my bias, and I’m upfront about it, I think.

But my opinions aside, let’s talk specifics.

The good

• Peer-to-peer connectivity for multiplayer music + visuals: iPhone and iPod touch can now connect to each other wirelessly over Wi-Fi, as well as auto-discover each other via Bluetooth. Think sync, data exchange, and multiplayer music and visual apps — something, incidentally, promised in early prototypes of Tenori-On and then dropped.
• iPod Library Access: Long overdue, you can now finally get at music files on your device, as the Android could at launch.
• Hardware control, audio recording: The iPhone can now access hardware connected to its dock. That was possible before, but with weird workarounds and non-documented APIs. Now it’s official, which should open the floodgates for accessories like iPod-connected audio recorders. Very good news.

The coolest things I imagine will come out of this, and unmistakably good news a result — I think you’ll get more-powerful, more-connected music apps (controller apps like Mrmr and brilliant musical toys like those from Smule). And I think your iPod is more likely to be useful as a recorder.

For a definite example of the bright side of all of this, Smule, with Dr. Ge Wang (CCRMA) showing off how geeky music tech can have mainstream appeal:
Smule at iPhone Software 3.0 Announcement

Tech always involves tradeoffs, though, so let’s be frank about some of the caveats.

The mixed and the not-news

• Sync is still iTunes-only: Access to your library of your own music is a good start. But it’s only available to apps. What still isn’t available: any kind of sync API for getting your own files to and from the device. That’s a huge deal-killer for music apps, which have had to invent their own hacked solutions, and it means that Apple’s iTunes monopoly is so important, Apple is willing to keep their 2009 device from having mid-90s PDA features – seriously?
• Peripherals suffer from reinventhewheelitis: Here’s another question, not only for Apple but the entire mobile industry: what happened to standards for connecting hardware? On a computer, the ability to connect hardware and communicate to it is not news. On mobile devices, you’d think someone had invented some new technology – because they probably have, because hardware connections get reinvented each time there’s a new device. Apple has a fantastic record of championing standards like DVI, USB, FireWire, SCSI, and many others. It’s too bad mobile devices don’t have standards. And on that note …
• Hardware is still stuck with “Made for iPod”: Dreaming of a MIDI connector for your iPhone/iPod? My guess is, dream on. Apple requires proprietary licensing just to have the privilege of making hardware for the thing. Weirdly, that means you can’t even use the headphones you want with the new iPod shuffle. Now, I’m aware more people want to buy dockable speakers than MIDI connectors – I get it, seriously. But what this means is, practically, people doing oddball things will continue to jailbreak their device, and jailbroken iPods will be cooler than factory models. On Hack a Day, someone in comments points to Arduino running with iPhones. Nice.
• Apple can still block your app. And sometimes they do it for no apparent reason, not only as with a powerful, free multitouch tool the reviews folks didn’t understand, but also with Cycorder, a wonderful video recording app whose crime seems to be being better than Apple’s. (Oops.)

Now, don’t get me wrong: I think the iPhone and iPod touch have wonderful potential. The problem is, there are some disclaimers attached. And they’re not there to protect you from driver instability or damage to your mobile carrier — they’re there because they can be there, for control. These devices are a leap backward from ordinary computers so that they protect us from things from which we previously didn’t know we needed protection. Things like, you know, unauthorized headphones (the horror!) or transferring our own files to our own device (no, stop!) or installing an application (hey, there are children listening!).

And, practically speaking, the upshot of all of this is that some things — like unusual hardware accessories — may turn out to be mere pipe dreams. And because progress isn’t progress, I do feel obligated to point these things out, and wonder if there isn’t another way.

I hope that Google’s Android goes a different path; some things about that device are very promising, though generally, I think it’s too soon to tell — not only for Android or iPhone, but smart mobile devices in general.

That said, know what a jailbroken Mac is called? Your Mac.

Just sayin’.

Speaking of Rain Recording, Rain is about the only vendor I’ve found that offers a 2-port FireWire ExpressCard known to work well with audio interfaces. Now, your mileage may vary depending on the chipset in your laptop, but based on what I’ve been hearing, this looks like a good option. I’ve also seen a cheap (US$30) card floating around some random Internet vendors; it’s so cheap, I’m probably going to buy one just to see if it works. I’ll report back.

2 Port FireWire Express Card (formerly ADS Tech PYRO1394a) [Rain Recording]

I get nothing out of this, for the record; Rain actually hopes you’ll get this card with one of their laptops, but I’m just as curious to hear how it works on other machines. Of course, this would be a nice add-on not only for PCs, but also potentially for MacBook Pro users wanting dedicated FW400 ports and the TI controller – theoretically, at least. Let us know what happens if you take the plunge.

If you’ve had experience with different chipsets and ExpressCard slots on Mac or PC, we’d love to hear it. And I hope to offer my own tests soon.

Updated: The StarTech EC13942 also shares the TI chipset and is available from a number of vendors if that’s a vendor you prefer. It’s the only one endorsed by PreSonus aside from this former ADS Tech card that Rain sells — and may give you better results with other, non-PreSonus hardware, based on reports I’ve read. See PreSonus’ official word on the matter:

Presonus Hardware Compatibility: Approved Chipsets [PDF]