We hear you: amidst the various music doodling tools calibrated for casual taps on a phone screen, you want something you can actually make your own with your own sounds. Here’s one example of that: triqtraq. It’s got the “tap it on the bus to improvise a pattern” feel of some of the apps we’ve seen lately, but without sacrificing the sort of control that might keep you coming back to it. And because it lets you include your own samples, there is some depth. (No Audio Copy/Paste, though, before some reader chimes in and points that out.)

Creators Sebastian Schatz, Olaf van Zon, and Joerg Peschel say that they wanted to scratch an itch similar to the one we’ve heard from readers. They write in the press release: “With this app, we (a bunch of friends that are crazy about electronic music) are trying to take music jamming on the iPhone to the next level. Instead of creating an app that simplifies the creation of music on an iPhone so much that you are bored with the possibilities within a week, triqtraq gives you a lot of flexibility.”

Features:

create musical patterns fast and intuitively, by programming live or by using the ‘step edit’-feature
automate parameters like pitch, filter, delay, decay and level in real-time
change samples or sample kits on-the-fly while jamming
edit multiple tracks simultaneously
store up to 16 patterns and 32 samples per session
specify the length of a sequence per track, or set the automation length for each parameter individually
switch seamlessly between patterns
use the loop range feature to create poly-rhythmic sequences
use sounds from the 350+ factory sample library
import your own sounds via iTunes file sharing

Find it in the CDM apps section:
http://apps.createdigitalmusic.com/apps/triqtraq-jam-sequencer

Among other information, the developers have loads of tutorials on their site:
http://www.triqtraq.com/index.php/tutorials

Speaking of the iPad and music making, Japan’s Human Boot Project draw a music video release for their latest track directly from screen as they play, working in the app Tabletop. I really love the personality of the resulting sounds. There’s a rawness to their music, the dense downtempo jazz-inspired electronics, which you can enjoy on their new EP “Picture Over Picture.” It’s a Beatport exclusive from Greece’s V.I.M. Records:

http://www.beatport.com/release/picture-over-picture-ep/887326

The artists say it’s “Downtempo beauty to Jazz Electronica futurism !!” (Exclamation points theirs, but … I agree.)

Human Boot Project are a Japanese underground music unit. This is a genre breaker fusing Jazz with Rock and Drum and Bass and one to get the synapses twinging.

http://www.humanboot.com
http://www.facebook.com/humanboot
http://soundcloud.com/hbp

Tabletop is on sale now for 99 cents currently free, though note that a lot of what you’re seeing here requires in-app purchases of add-ons:
http://apps.createdigitalmusic.com/apps/tabletop

Artist Paul Salva consulted on the app, and in a video with the LA Times walks through the features in detail, if you want a closer look at the app. (Interestingly, he notes many in the LA scene are going iPad live.)

Equipped with MIDI, a phone or tablet can communicate with a vast range of standalone hardware and computer software for music. So, what to do with that power? Two recent applications show just some of the breadth of possibility, one from Japan, one from Ukraine. One provides an array of powerful tools, combining into one application a lot of functions that have otherwise been available only in separate apps. One takes a more novel approach. Each demonstrates Apple’s increasingly-ubiquitous iPhone and iPad to be a surprisingly-indispensible musical tool.

Let’s look at the more whimsical of the two first.

From Japanese media artist and developer Masayuki Akamatsu (known as aka), MIDIWriter is a bit unlike MIDI tools you’ve likely seen before. It sends MIDI notes not from a piano keyboard or more familiar musical interface, but from the key entry you’d usually use to type in messages. That means the on-screen keyboard – even, as pictured, in another language – can become a musical instrument instead of input method for SMS and the like.

Where things get even more interesting is when you add a Bluetooth keyboard or keyboard dock, for iPad or iPhone. Then, those gadgets become physical input devices. (In the oddest example, a projected keyboard even works.)

http://akamatsu.org/aka/ios/apps/midiwriter/ [lots of great documentation, in both English and Japanese]
MIDIWriter @ apps.createdigitalmusic.com [View, install; US$0.99]

It’s all quite peculiar, but I can think of one particular advantage to doing something a bit unusual: sometimes, the best way to break out of tired musical habits is to face an unfamiliar musical interface.

In the more conventional and practical end of the pool, we have Wiksnet’s MIDI Studio. With rather lovely, refined-looking interface design, the Ukrainian app treads in the competitive waters of iOS MIDI controllers. What it does that those apps don’t necessarily do, though:
1. It adds velocity senstivity, via vibration, as seen in Apple’s own GarageBand but less-commonly in MIDI tools.
2. It combines layouts into convenient configurations, coupling, for instance, knobs with MIDI keys.

And it looks nice. A future version promises editable templates, but for many, having some nice stuff up and running without any additional effort could be a draw. From the developers, a feature list:

• Essential MIDI compatibility (Core MIDI, over WiFi and USB)
• Drum pads with modulation across X/Y axes, velocity
• Two keyboards, each with a different key size, and customizable key/tuning mappings
• Built-in arpeggiator
• Easy mapping of ADSR, etc. to knobs on the keyboard layout

http://www.wiksnet.com/
MIDI Studio @ apps.createdigitalmusic.com [View, install; US$10.99]

There’s no official view, but here’s one fan-made entry:

The Ukrainian developer has done other commercial work, they say, but this is their first unique iOS music app. The next release will have, alongside editable templates, velocity sensitivity, and will fill other user requests.

In the case of MIDIWriter, there’s not a lot of comparison to be made – desktop software has often mapped standard input and keyboards to music, but not necessarily iOS apps. With MIDI Studio, of course, we’re overdue for an overview of MIDI apps.

Let us know how you use these – or other tools, including things that don’t begin with a lowercase “i” – to produce MIDI events in your workflow.

Delicate and dense, melodies and sounds from church contexts, found sounds of bells and voices, are set against crisp, sharply-solid, forward-driving electronic beats. And then, there are the visuals: an archaic architecture of mystical symbols and three-dimensional, evolving forms interpret the music in visual form.

Swedish-born artist and technologist Eric Wahlforss, in other words, has been busy. As the artist Forss, his album is an app, appropriately for someone who is the co-founder and CTO of SoundCloud. Eric showed me an early build over cheeseburgers. It’s reactive, perhaps, more than interactive, but there’s still a chance to use your hands to rotate both visuals and music, a bit like picking up a sculpture and viewing it from different angles – though with the added element of sound. What you get is a sense of an interwoven visual and musical world, and an aesthetic vision that Wahlforss has pulled together.

From the man who built the world’s largest online recording business, it’s little surprise that recording features prominently, in two threads:

Recordings of strings, choirs, organs and ambient noise from church concerts which have been cut up into fragments and rearranged into a new mosaic of music, and recordings of wooden, stone and metal objects which make up the beats and percussion. These are the plosive, rhythmical noises that provide the link between the traditional to modern electronica.

That musical combination sounds to me familiar, though also clearly comfortable to Mr. Wahlforss. The collaboration is especially intriguing, though, as a Viennese graphic designer (Leonard Lass) and German computer graphics artist (Marcel Schobel, Untouch) collaborate to produce an audiovisual experience. Berghain, that cavernous church of techno (and occasionally more experimental sounds), seems an appropriate setting in the city that also played home to SoundCloud’s founding. (The fact that the former power station has the acoustics of a church doesn’t hurt, either – even if it’s ill-suited to denser music for the same reason.) Ecclesia will get its launch across media: live show in Berlin, app on iPad, album. For now, you can hear the tracks streamed via – of course – SoundCloud, even shared directly from Ableton Live.

The live show premieres May 2 in Berlin at Berghain/Panorama Bar, with the app out the same day. The album itself releases on June 12.

http://forssmusic.com/

Visuals come from Untouch (Marcel Schobel):
http://www.untouch.fm/
…and Leonard Lass:
http://depart.at

“Timelapse” usually refers to the process of sampling small bits of video or film and piecing them together to form a sped-up version of reality. (Actually, that’s not entirely accurate. Any recording involves sampling small bits of time. Timelapse simply plays back those samples at a rate faster than reality, so that instead of playing back film frames recorded at 30 frames per second at a playback speed of 30 frames per second, you play back film recorded at one frame every ten minutes at 30 frames per second, for example.)

What if you made a timelapse of sound, and not simply image? Reader Andrew Spitz did that, building a sound-sampling app in visual development tool Max/MSP. He’s made the resulting tool available to anyone using Mac or Windows, for free, so you can try it yourself. In the demo video, what you get is a stuttering, rhythmic montage of found sound. But change the material or setting, and perhaps you can get very different results.

I love the word he’s using here: “phonography.”

phonoLapse is a free desktop app for Mac and Windows that lets you create audio time-lapses. For the 2010 Enterferenze New Art Festival I put together a little Time Lapse Phonography piece that followed me over the course of 24 hours (check the video below). I have been receiving emails from people wanting to create their own, and decided to work on a standalone version so you too can create some time-lapse phonography .

Grab it yourself:
phonoLapse {+ software} [sound+design]

By the way, Andrew is responsible for one of my other favorite recent projects:
Voice Messages Become 3D Paper Waveform Sculptures: Paper Note

Figure, the iOS app that’s powered by Reason instruments and effects, is now available on the App Store for US$.99 cents. The sound is Reason on your phone – literally, with the Thor polysynth and Kong drum machine, plus the Master Bus Compressor and side-chaining from Reason in effects. But the user experience is quite different. Introduced as something you’d use on the bus, this is really more about playing drums and making melodic gestures with your fingers, then tweaking those sounds and musical elements via X/Y touchpads. It’s a little bit like Korg’s Kaossilator and Reason had a love child.

For beginning users, this could mean a friendly environment to play with your fingers. But for more advanced users, there’s still enough open-ended room to work so that actual music talent might yield a very different result.

A number of our readers pointed to other apps like Intua’s Beatmaker, one of the first iOS production tools on the iPhone, as more fully-featured micro workstations. (Going back to the days of the Palm handheld, you might see something similar.) But there are already good options for those; Figure appears to be something different.

Features:

• Drums, bass, lead synth
• X/Y pad controls melodic figures, constrained by key
• Adjustable controls for key, rhythm, tempo
• Tweak as the songs play

What’s remarkable about Figure is as much what it doesn’t do as what it does. There’s no MIDI control. No AudioCopy/Paste. No SoundCloud export. No … export. Actually, absolutely no saving. All of this is in itself rather interesting, if only for the reason that it swims upstream, and if you make something you like, you have to sample it with another piece of gear. (Cue various people upset about this, others who defend its purity. Go.) Me? I’m not, uh, super thrilled not to be able to save, but I’m going to run with it in my test – plug it into my KAOSS Pad, record without a click, $*&# with the result… okay, yes, in a weird way, it could wind up being more fun without it.

More information: propellerheads.se/figure

iPhone-optimized user manual (readable from your computer, too, though, if you’re curious)

And you can find Figure in our Apps section, then grab it from the iTunes App Store (or add your own review):
http://apps.createdigitalmusic.com/apps/figure

(We’re working on expanding functionality in that store with our partners; expect a full look at what we’re doing for this multi-platform collection of apps this month.)

Looking a bit like the love child of a Nintendo DS and a microKORG, the Miselu neiro is a different animal in mobile music. The upcoming device is powered by Android and has a touchscreen – a bit like a tablet – but it’s hardware dedicated to music-making, complete with a compact, piano-layout keyboard. The gamble is that people wanting to make mobile music will choose this dedicated device instead of a general-purpose gadget like an iPad.

Whether they can pull it off or not is a big question, but in the meantime, the specs are intriguing. And it’s worth mentioning now, because if you’re reading this from Austin, Texas, there’s still time to check out the Miselu in person at SoundCloud’s open house. (I’m in Berlin, so I just have to pour myself a beer, stare at the gallery, and munch on some barbeque and pretend.)

Here’s what we know:

• Connected: The creators call it a “network-enabled mobile companion,” so online connections and “social” interaction are part of the plan. That includes, out of the gate, SoundCloud.
• Internal DSP: The neiro will include the Yamaha AudioEngine Series Sound Chip NSX-1, a dedicated DSP for synthesis and signal processing. (Now, the creators say that “almost matches the sound of real musical instruments,” but while DSP chips add predictable horsepower, native processing remains competitive.)
• I/O: Product mock-ups show USB (2x), HDMI, audio in and out (stereo minijacks), and, in a nod to the Atari ST, dedicated MIDI DIN jacks. There’s also an SD card slot.
• Custom software: Retronyms, makers of the popular iOS modular app Tabletop, have already revealed that they’ll be doing a custom app for this platform; see their blog post on the announcement and image below. (Thanks to Freesoulvw for the tip!)
• Platform: The hardware is an “open platform environment” that will run custom apps and “solutions,” say the creators. Exactly what that means, we’ll have to see, but of course Android does offer application deployment possibilities (even outside of Google’s Android Market, now called Google Play).

http://www.miselu.com/products/

Before the Android aspect of this invites skepiticsm, the big challenge with Android has been unpredictability with OEM-delivered hardware. While the audio API doesn’t work in the way many of us would like, if you do have dedicated hardware with predictable performance, you can side-step many of those problems, so the possibility of music-focused gear has always been interesting.

I think the real challenge is whether this keyboard can stand up to an iPad in a custom keyboard housing. Akai recently demonstrated the clever solution of adding a 4×4 set of MPC-style drum pads just by designing them into an iPad case. In order to compete, Miselu will have to do something unique both with the hardware and software add-ons; they have to actually be better at what the iPad does, not just “as good.”

On the other hand, just looking at the ports they’ve got on the prototype could easily make you drool. If they nail the hardware and get this out the door, there could be some real possibilities with this.

Of course, there’s far more we don’t know than do know about this, but that just means it’ll be interesting to watch. See some pictures, teaser video, and check out the site.

I missed the chance to write about it, but I’d be curious to know if anyone is picking up a KDJ-ONE, a Linux-powered dedicated music-maker that seemed a bit like the love child of an oversized classic Game Boy and a tracker, as seen last year on Synthtopia. (They exhibited again this year at NAMM, as Chris Randall reminds me in comments.)

Apple yesterday described their iPad as “this magical pane of glass that can become anything you want it to be.” So – how about making mobile devices into what you want it to be?

With the help of author Peter Brinkmann and publisher O’Reilly, we’d like to give you a taste of Peter’s new book, Making Musical Apps: Real-time audio synthesis on Android and iOS. Imagining that a lot of you are especially curious about iOS, we’ll include the chapter on how to get started with development. It really gives you a sense of how easy this can be; the challenge is, as it should be, coming up with musical ideas. And Apple did say that they thought that technology was at its best when it was “invisible,” not when it was “inaudible.” So let’s make it make some noise.

(Android developers, libpd actually got its start on Android and runs quite well even on very primitive Android handsets, so consider this a sample; the full book – and the libpd site – include loads of examples on the Android side, too. In fact, because libpd works basically identically on the two platforms, it’s a great choice for making cross-platform development easier.)

In this excerpt, Peter covers:

• How to set up your development environment
• Starting a project with Xcode, and including Pd
• How to make a Pd patch run in your app
• Making the Pd patch and your UI connect with each other (here, from the app’s UI to Pd; the book covers both directions)

In fact, in just a few pages, you’ll have a working guitar tuner for iOS. Have a look:

Read it on CDM’s Scribd page:

Making Musical Apps (Excerpt: How to Build a Music App for iOS)

Direct PDF download link, hosted by CDM (please don’t link to this file directly):
Making Musical Apps (Excerpt) [PDF]

I’ve read an advance copy of the whole book, and my review is simple: if you’re curious about this stuff, get this book. Peter’s style is friendly and precise; no technical detail is left out, and yet those details aren’t overwhelming. The book can be accessible to those new to development, which is essential for a title that’s likely to be read by people who are used to Pd, but dipping their toes into Java and Objective-C for the first time in order to get their patches running on a device.

Ready for the full book?

Get a printed copy on Amazon:

Or read the Kindle edition:

For multi-platform epub, mobi, and PDF formats, head straight to the O’Reilly page:
Making Musical Apps [shop.oreilly.com]

http://libpd.cc/read-the-book/

The iPad as a controller is at its best when it plays to its strengths, letting you use that continuous finger control do something useful. So that makes MidiPads worth a look. It’s a strikingly-versatile drum pad controller with all of the kinds of features you might want, and with a major version 1.5 release this week, looks even more useful as a control addition to your studio.

First off, it’s got all of the I/O you could want:

• USB MIDI (so, use the Camera Connection Kit and a class-compliant interface, or dedicated interfaces like iRig MIDI and MIDI Mobilizer II)
• Wireless MIDI over a WiFi connection
• Virtual MIDI, for connecting to other apps (we need to do a round-up of these soon, so give a shout if you have a moment, devs)

Once connected, MidiPads sets itself apart with flexible control on each of those pads. Just tapping rectangles isn’t much fun on the iPad, of course – you lack tactile feedback and pressure sensitivity found on a physical pad. So, instead, MidiPads provides other modulation to exploit the touchable surface for continuous control. In fact, thinking of it as a “drum pad” is almost a bit unfair. New in this release:

• Presets, which you can share with other users – which could in turn make a nice little community of users here
• “Bouncing mode” for touch pads and sliders
• Send multiple messages with each axis and knob
• Individual up/down messages for each touch pad and slider, if you so wish
• Enhanced views, settings reset, and MIDI connection settings
• Resize pads and pad area (essential for either fat fingers or getting more controls!)

What I like best of all is the integration of X/Y controllers on pads, so you can send continuous messages as you trigger a pad. In the video at top, you can see that in action with Traktor Pro. (Yep: you can use this for DJing, not just drum sounds.)

To solve the lack of velocity response, you can choose from a few options, including tapping with two fingers or setting velocity from the vertical position of your tap on the pad. Those ranges are scalable, and you can even set some randomization.

You get 64 resizable pads, and everything can be customized, both in terms of the MIDI message and appearance. You can also send MIDI to those pads for bi-directional feedback. With that, I’m just waiting for someone to come up with some awesome preset for Renoise or a drum synth or Ableton or what have you. Let us know.

Other features:

• CC messages, custom MIDI channels, definable ranges
• Faders that snap, fade, and bounce
• Incoming values can display on pads
• Pitch bend or modulation, via sliders or the touch pads or the drum pads
• Accelerometer control
• MIDI learn on the controller (which is something of a novel idea)
• Blink pads with MIDI sync
• Integrated help

Here’s how that MIDI learn notion works:

In fact, MidiPads is the only controller I’ve seen with robust-enough bi-directional control to put it in the same category as Lemur for iOS. It lacks Lemur’s extensive library of controllers, and there’s really nothing stopping you from scripting something similar with Lemur. But if pads are really what you care about, this could be an excellent shortcut at a fraction of a price. And put together, these two apps could really justify the use of the iPad as a powerful control surface. (More on Lemur next week – lots of developments there, and finally, a video I shot with the Liine guys.)

Congrats to independent developer Stefan Goehler of Germany for the great work! (I’m finding what y’all are drinking now that I live in this country, because it’s … working. I’m downing the Club-Mate, but my coding hasn’t improved yet.)

€4 / US$5.

You can grab (and review) MidiPads via the exclusive, multi-platform CDM Apps collection, as one of our highlighted apps:
MidiPads @ CDM Apps
Or try the free edition: MidiPads Lite

Developer site: Crossfire Designs

Consumption, or creation?

When it comes to notation and musical scores, the iPad (and tablets, generally) has fallen on the side of reading rather than writing, display rather than creation.

Notion for iPad, a mobile version of the desktop notation software, looks poised to change all of that. See video, above, for an overview of the features. Highlights:

• Entry, editing, and playback for notation and guitar tab
• Built-in samples, including keys, guitar and bass, and the London Symphony Orchestra as recorded at Abbey Road Studios
• Enter notes by tapping a keyboard or 24-fret fretboard, or select and drag and drop
• Mixer and effects
• Orchestra and guitar articulations and marks
• Text/lyrics support
• Import MIDI, MusicXML, GuitarPro, and export to PDF, MusicXML, and MIDI
• Look for guitar tab, MIDI, and MusicXML right inside the app – this could be a huge feature

There are also in-app purchases of instruments and effects and so on.

It’s a big deal, I think, and a huge release. Even if you use software other than Notion on desktop, I can see this as – at last – a way for people comfortable with notation to sketch ideas and enter MIDI and scores from a music stand. I look forward to testing it. (Anyone know of any other candidates in this category? Since Sibelius focused on score reading, Notion seems to be the first major release of this kind for a tablet.)

Thanks to everyone who sent this in.

http://www.notionmusic.com/products/notionipad.html

By the way, what’s up with the lines at the end of the video?

You Honor Tradition!
You Defy Genre!
You The Create Future! [sic]

You have come to fight as free men, and free men you are. What would you do without freedom? Will you fight?

They may take our lives, but they will never take our freedom!

(Sorry, I may have broken into the speech from Braveheart there. It could be the London Symphony Orchestra music. Alba gu bra!)