I’m pleased to announce the first-ever CDM Giveaway. We’ve got over US$4,000 of hardware and software tools for music creation, and we’d like to give you the chance to win them. To do that, we’re holding a good, old-fashioned prize drawing — I’ve been warming up my true random number generator — so that all you have to do is enter for a chance to win. To better your odds, each prize will get a different winner.

CDM Giveaway Info Page; official rules (no purchase necessary).

Here’s what we’ve got:

Akai MPC500 mobile music workstation
Ableton Live 6 music production software
Alesis ControlPad drum pad controller
Glyph GT 050Q 250GB eSATA/USB/FW400/FW800 hard drive
Moog Music Moogerfooger FreqBox VCO effects box
Native Instruments Absynth 4 soft synth
Native Instruments Elektrik Piano soft synth
Numark Total Control DJ control surface
PreSonus FaderPort

…plus boxes of Ableton beanies and AudioMIDI.com Synth Legends DVDs. You can check everything out on the giveaway page.

And get some link love, too: Eligible residents of the United States can enter to win any one of these prizes. Unfortunately, for legal reasons we can’t extend the whole sweepstakes to international readers. To make up for it, we’ll be watching international entries for the best blogs, project pages, and music websites to feature on CDM, and we’ll send out Ableton beanies and/or DVDs to our favorite entries. (American readers, we’ll be watching your pages, too, so be sure to include your URLs when you enter.)

We’ve been putting this together for a while now and it’s been a lot of work, so I’m excited to be able to roll it out. We’ve hand-picked some of our favorite gear and software makers to partner with, or we wouldn’t be doing this.

Full details on the giveaway page. Enter now, because at the stroke of midnight following Monday, June 11, the contest is over. And I really want to get these boxes of gear and swag shipped. It’ll be a lot more fun out of the brown cardboard boxes, I’m sure.

Update: If you’re not from the US – please do fill out the form, if you include nothing other than your URL (so we can check out your site) and your country. (Nothing else is required.)

We’re really sorry we weren’t able to go global on this one for legal reasons (I try to explain why in comments). But that’s all the more reason to find out where you’re from. Server stats provide a very incomplete picture of what country people are from, and we would like to know. And if you include contact info, I might at least be able to get some of you some swag.

Real sequencers and drum machines force you to approach groovemaking with a different technique than software. I discovered this completely by accident when I invested a few hundred bucks in a tiny Alesis MMT-8 scratchpad sequencer. The Alesis and I got along famously, to the point that it became my songwriting tool of choice. It was only when I needed more than 8 tracks or fancy editing that I powered up a computer.

Few manufacturers are willing to invest in the development of a new hardware sequencer these days. That’s what makes Akai’s MPC500 special — it’s the latest (and smallest) incarnation of Akai’s renowned rhythm sequencer family.

Novation is hoping you’ll bring their new Xiosynth mini-synth keyboard home, and to help give you an additional push, they’ve got a new online sampler keyboard plus lessons for learning synthesis techniques.

Have a listen to the patches on the Xiosynth with the Flash player below; try the z, x, and c keys on your QWERTY keyboard:

The Xiosynth mini-site has a series of synthesis “tutorial” podcasts that purport to teach you synthesis. Novation PR (who sent links along with banner ads that it apparently hopes us blogs will run in stories — fat chance) hopefully describe these thusly: “The renowned technicians from the longstanding Museum of Techno have taken up the challenge of producing a series of comprehensive tutorials on synthesis. Included in this thorough analysis is a comparison with other cutting edge products on the market, such as the RS2000, and consultation from highly acclaimed industry professionals.”

I’m hoping they’re being ironic. Let me translate: a couple of tripped-out blokes get drunk on sherry and fiddle around with a homebrew synth before calling up an international DJ/producer who tells them to just use cheezy presets instead. (What, you expected something else from a techno DJ?) Watch the amusing, if less than instructive, videos for yourself.

There’s only one problem. This video makes me far less interested in the Xiosynth as that ridiculous home-built box. I want the “most analog synth since World War I” with “one oscillator made out of fish.” It does make me wonder what sort of instructive synthesis how-tos I would make drunk.

Back to the … ahem … synthesizer, there’s now a fair range of “starter” synths at around US$600 or less. For beginners, these could make a great first syntheszier. For the rest of us, they could be a fun addition to the studio, especially if you’re like me and have neglected the hardware side of things while focusing on software. (Yes, I still prefer the flexibility of software, but having a tweakable instrument around that doesn’t require booting the computer has a certain amount of appeal, especially if it’s portable.) Your options are:

Alesis has its eyes on the drum market with two new products:

The Trigger iO is a trigger-to-MIDI percussion interface for drum triggers. It will go head to head with Roland’s TMC-6. There’s no predicting how good this will be until we see it, but from a marketing standpoint, it looks like a smart direction: whereas Roland modestly markets its MIDI trigger interface as a way of expanding a set of Roland V-Drum electronic drums, Alesis looks like it’s going after everyone. The package even includes the “lite” edition of the excellent BFD drum set from fxpansion. There’s an optional drum stand mount and lots of customization for presets, trigger settings and assignments, and so on. If the quality is there, the feature set looks great for performing digital drummers.

In the category of “things you hit,” Alesis has the ControlPad, a compact MIDI percussion pad. Note that you can really hit these with sticks, as opposed to the finger-trigger pads like M-Audio’s Trigger Finger. Again, Alesis’ strategy seems to be to remake Roland products so they’re less ugly, as Roland has an entire line of similar products. (Sorry, Roland, but you do have to admit, they are kind of ugly.) Other than offering a different color, though, I’ll be curious to see if Alesis can really diferentiate themselves here.

Updated from comments: these pieces have “was that a misprint?” low prices. US$199 for ControlPad and US$149 for Trigger iO (though you’ll of course need triggers to go with the latter). The low prices could definitely make these devices a player.

Alesis has always managed to make good hardware synths at low prices, and the quality of their analog-modeling synths (see our review of the Micron) has been stunning. The Fusion is a particularly impressive deal, with multiple synthesis engines (sampled, physical modeling, virtual analog, and FM) and even a genuine-article Alesis HD 8-track hard disk recorder, all starting at under a grand.

No, not that kind of playmate. (Sorry.) The killer feature of Alesis’ new PlayMate Guitarist is (really!) a CD player: pop in a CD of music and you can change the tempo without affecting pitch. Throw in 80 guitar effects and a helping of I/O, and this definitely makes a cool gadget bag addition for practicing guitarists. If you can find an excuse for the US$299 list price by coming up with something to do with the FX, even non-guitarists may want one for transcribing solos. (via Harmony Central)

Vocalists, there’s a vocal version, too — because you can never really practice successfully without reverb.

What does a hardware synth have to do to compete with
software these days? How about offer the same fantastic virtual analog
sound for about the same price, for starters?

The Alesis Micron is the kid brother to the Alesis Ion
synth, with the exact same 8-voice, 4-part multitimbral VA engine. Each
voice has 3 oscillators, 2 multimode filters, 3 envelopes, 3 LFOs,
sample and hold, and a tracking generator.

There are filters galore on offer here, 20 different types in all, many
are nearly exact replicas of filters from Moog, ARP, Oberheim, and
Roland. Alesis has even modeled in the drift associated with analog
oscillators. Rudimentary FM capabilities allow you to create fairly
realistic pianos, organs, and bell tones, a real plus in a synth this
inexpensive.  One thing unique to the Ion/Micron is being able to
access all of these different sounding filters in a single synth.
Flexible envelopes provide control over your sound sculpting. A mod
matrix delivers much of the power of the semi-modular synths of old.
The synth can also be used to process external signals. (read more)

Keyboards are getting to be a lot of fun, on the cheap.
The latest mini-keyboards from Alesis feature X-Y joysticks, audio I/O,
and the psuedo-photo-theremin Axys dome (wave your hands in the air
above the dome!). That I knew — but I hadn't checked prices to realize
how cheap these things are. Alesis appears to have the best 25-key
deals.

• Alesis Photon 25 is a USB/MIDI controller with joystick and 12 knobs; street $130
• Alesis Photon X25
  has the theremin-style controller dome, 12 360-degree knobs, 10
  buttons, full-size pitch and mod wheels (nice ones like the Ion's!),
  24-bit balanced stereo audio I/O; street $200
• Both have 20 template presets for software and an LED display

360-degree knobs are perfect for working with software, and the 3D
domes are fun. (Note I say theremin-style as the Alesis domes are
IR-based; they're not
as sensitive as a true theremin but they're rugged and reliable.) Even
as an additional toy for your occasional mono synth lead, this is a
deal. The X25 in particular looks like a great upgrade from M-Audio's
Oxygen8 / Ozone.

Want a synth, too? Alesis' Micron is a mini 49-key version of Alesis' Ion analog synth, and it's just $400. (No 3D dome, though.)