Here’s an early Christmas present for Mac and Windows synth lovers: Native Instruments is giving away a simplified version of its Prism instrument for Reaktor as a free (as in beer), self-contained synth. You’ll get access to Prism’s lovely “modal bank” synthesis method, which creates some unusual, shimmering timbres. (In fact, having a simpler version may be the best way to get a taste of what Prism’s deep sound engine can do.) You also get 70 sound, including what NI describes as “seasonal” bells and chimes – perfect for any last-minute holiday music projects – plus bass, more bells, keys, mallets, leads, pads, plucked sounds, and abstract, ambient “soundscapes.”

There’s also access to enough sound parameters that you can create some unique variations of the sounds, including built-in cabinet simulation, filter, flanger, echo and reverb effects, and modal bank and exciter parameters. So this is hardly a “rompler” or simple preset player; you can actually get a lot of different sounds out of it.

Mikro Prism, Free Reaktor Synthesizer [Native Instruments]

If you’re not a Reaktor owner, this instrument runs in Reaktor Player, which lacks its own preset storage but runs inside supported Mac and Windows plug-in hosts.

Thanks to Dave Ryan for the tip!

Sequencers by definition traditionally lock musical patterns into repetitive, unchanging blocks of time. But a new generation of generative sequencers can instead form organic patterns that change and transform.

Nodal is a totally free-as-in-beer (closed-source) sequencer for composing music. (A license is needed for commercial use.) As the name implies, it uses a matrix of nodes to represent musical structure. The best way to understand what that means exactly is to check out the examples and give the app a shot, but is good fun – and capable of creating some lovely, unusual musical textures.

The good news now is that if you’re on Windows XP/Vista, you’re no longer left out of the fun: the app now runs Universal on Mac and on Windows, as well.

Aside from Windows support, also new in version 1.1:

• New, more polished UI
• Keyboard shortcuts
• Internal MIDI synth support on Windows

It does sound as though Nodal may not remain free-as-in-beer, but with some significant updates coming later this year will move into the cheap-as-in-beer territory. Stay tuned.

Composer and co-developer Peter Mcilwain sends along the video here with a live improvisation made in the software. It’s a bit Minimalist-influenced, but shows how you can use Nodal to drive some musical inspiration. Peter also explains just what Nodal means musically to him and the small but growing collection of users taking advantage of Nodal’s paradigm:

Interest in Nodal probably centres around the fact that the software enables sophisticated, or “deep”, generative approaches within an intuitive graphical user interface that is simple and easy to use. Many users say that the program can be learnt within a short space of time and that is fun, inspiring and is fascinating to use. Once a little experience is gained people come to recognize the rich possibilities that the network approach gives them. Nodal offers a wealth of compositional possibilities that enable users to explore transformations of musical ideas quickly and easily.

Much music has been made using processes such as looping. Nodal does this too, but with a number significant additions. For example, it is possible to have loops within loops. The musical diversity that is possible takes Nodal beyond from the concept of a loop into a territory that is more like creating maps of musical pathways with which musical possibilities can be navigated. Musical materials can be played forwards and backwards, recombined or played with different rhythms. All of these transformations can happen in real-time making it a rich tool for computer assisted improvisation.
In fact working with Nodal can be very similar to more traditional composition processes. Here a small musical cell might be created which is then developed, elaborated or transformed into new material. Seen in this way, composing does not necessarily involve making a string of new ideas but instead it is the exploration of different aspects of a single idea. By limiting a composition to a small number of ideas the music maintains coherence and a sense of unity. While composers have done this manually, and in some cases masterfully, Nodal enables the transformation of idea to be automated and extended to transformational processes that would be very difficult to achieve with pen and paper.

Nodal: Generative Music Software

Previously:

Nodal: Generative Music Software for Mac (Free for Non-Commercial Use)

Tiction: Animated, Nodal Generative Music App in Progress, in Processing

Alternative Sequencers: Elysium Generative Mac App and the Joy of Hex

A Mutating Drum Step Sequencer, New MIDI Library for Processing

Here’s a different take on soundware business models: offer your stuff for free, then depend on donations. That’s the tack at Togeo Studios, who have an impressive collection of packs. Wave Attack I, for instance, includes single-cycle waveforms with arpeggiated sequences and leads. Their work is available on BitTorrent, too, which could help defray bandwidth costs. (Well, single-cycle waveforms don’t take up much, but perhaps larger packs might.)

I have to admit, I’m skeptical of the donationware model. The issue is, it seems like a lot of folks just aren’t going to donate – not necessarily for any sinister reasons, but simply because they don’t “get around to it.” Heck, just selling soundware is hard enough. And the brilliant, open source Ardour DAW has struggled to cobble together even a few licenses’ worth of income monthly, despite very reasonable subscription fees and powerful features.

I’m skeptical, but I’m also intrigued. Donationware or freemium models once powered the PC shareware industry and launched the now-massive game company Epic Games (of Unreal fame). Challenging as it might be, these models could open new tools to musicians and would be particularly powerful with open source. It’s something that could help us start new projects here on CDM, while paying our rent / electric bills. So what do you think of Togeo’s work? And that specific example aside, would you be willing to “donate” to software, soundware, and learning materials the way that you do American public radio and TV?

Togeo Studios
Wave Attack 1 Live Pack – mininova [Torrent page]

I love the idea of artists translating their work into interactive packs of sonic exploration – like releasing an album for fellow electronic musicians. If you’re enjoying our exclusive 808 “less cowbell” Live Pack for Ableton Live and want more sound goodness for free, good news. Puremagnetik has released a set of entirely free “artist packs” with drum kits, clips, and (from Neon Stereo) effect racks. Note that even if you don’t have Live or just want to use a different app, the audio contents of these packs will work anywhere.

In this lineup: Gregory Shiff, our friend Elijah B Torn, Paul Rose, Kalahari Surfers, Brian Best, Kamoni (Micah Frank), and Neon Stereo. You do need to sign up for a Puremagnetik account, but there’s no financial obligation.

For more tips and mad scientist antics from Elijah, see our previous story:
Elijah B Torn on Odd Sound Techniques, Ableton Live

And I got to drop by the DUMBO, Brooklyn studio of Puremagnetik’s own Micah Frank, as pictured here. It’s quite small and packed with fantastic gear in regular rotation. The good folks of TRASH_AUDIO had a nice interview spotlight on Micah late last year:
Workspace and Environment: Kamoni
You can also check out Kamoni’s new rig on his site.

All of this is well and good, but being, erm, me, I’d love to see more oddball stuff, too. How about a Pd Pack or Csound Kit – anyone?

Monolake as I’ve said before once released an album with a Max/MSP patch. In a way, this sort of release of sonic content could be a way of releasing music in a different way, one that assumes active participation by your listener. There was a time when people regularly passed around Max patches and sort of influenced each others’ music virally. I think there’s plenty more to explore in this category – and I’d happily buy sonic content alongside music releases, too, from folks I love.

Puremagnetik Artist Page

The simple interface of Ableton’s Operator belies some truly lovely soundmaking capabilities. Our friend Francis Preve, a principle Ableton sound designer who has contributed hundreds of presets since 2004, has a new single out that makes use of some of those sonic possibilities, combining Operator with juicy spectral and granular effects in Live 7. As a gift to Ableton users on CDM, he’s giving us both the rack he used and some tips on squeezing noise out of the Ableton instrument. (By the way, I’m open to tips for other platforms, not just Ableton — ask for what you want!)

First, the EP: “Hasown / Less Cowbell” is out as a Beatport exclusive on Josh Gabriel’s new label, Different Pieces.
Hasown / Less Cowbell EP

Lots of the sound of “Less Cowbell” comes from some creative recreations Fran made of the 808 Cowbell, using Operator and Live effects (hello, grains). This is the actual patch he used. If you think this is some generic cowbell preset, think again: give the knobs a twist, and some wild sounds come out. I asked Fran to walk us through the patch:

“The essence of the original 808 Cowbell consisted of four simultaneous sawtooth waves at the following frequencies: 1.94 kHz, 1.37 kHz, 835 Hz, 555 Hz. By using the all-carrier Operator algorithm, fixed tuning, and a lot of tinkering with the envelopes, I was able to pretty much nail the original sound. From there, it was just a matter of creating a a bunch of Macros to manipulate as the groove developed.”

Here are the assignments for each Macro:

• LFO Rate: This controls the rate for the tempo-synced sawtooth LFO, which is assigned to all four operators’ pitch. The range is 1/48th note to 4 measures.
• LFO Amount: Overall amount of the LFO effect. Note that these parameters work best in conjunction with longer release times.
• Spectral Volume: Controls the volume of the 1.94 kHz, 1.37 kHz, and 835 Hz sawtooth waves. A value of 0 reduces the sound to just the 555 Hz sawtooth, whereas 127 is the full-on 808 Cowbell.
• Spectral Spread: Introduces positive detuning, spreading the frequencies from the root 555 Hz sawtooth all the way up to the 808 array. Great for rises and builds.
• LPF: Lowpass cutoff frequency.
• Falling Grain: This affects four different Grain Delay parameters simultaneously. The result is a dotted eighth-note delay that descends in pitch. Note that since the Grain Delay comes after the Reverb, some really unusual ambient effects can be created by adjusting both Macros simultaneously.
• Release: Overall release for the four operators. Range is 174 ms to 60 seconds.
• Reverb: Controls the decay time and amount of autopanning for a tempo-synced bouncing reverb effect. Used during the breakdowns for Less Cowbell.

You do need a copy of Operator to try this out, but even a demo copy of Operator will do. Live 7 only is needed, though of course Live 8 beta will work, too. (And I do expect we’ll have a load of new things to talk about once folks wrap their heads around the new release.)

Download it exclusively from CDM, right here (please do not directly link to this file; just link to the story):
Less_Cowbell_Operator_Patch.zip

As for the EP, you can grab this week’s release from Beatport, and next week Toolroom will feature the tracks “Yin” and “Yang”, collaborations between Francis and electro “it-boy” Wolfgang Gartner. Check out Francis’ MySpace page.

Personally, I love the idea. It’s all the rage to release special online toys to play with samples or iPhone apps or remix tools or whatever, but the full-blown preset means you can really make something quite different. (It’s something Ableton co-founders and members of Monolake once did with Max/MSP.)

Let us know how you like the patch, and if it inspires other ideas.

Previously:
Free Tutorials, Techno iPhone Ringtone from Francis Preve, Celebrating Single “Caboose”
Exclusive: Free Ableton Live Slicing Pack by Covert Operators

Very often, computers and music gear greedily consume whole corners of the room. Here’s a tidy alternative, modest in space consumption as well as in cost.

So, what’s so wonderful about DIY creations by our friend Sasa Djuric (aka fibra)? It isn’t just that his stands are recycled from monitor stand parts. It’s not just because the free ReBirth for Windows and an Asus netbook make for a wonderfully affordable computer music station. It’s not even that his cases for the x0xb0x 303 clone and a MIDIbox project are beautifully executed, or that magnets on the stands more effectively support those gadgets and place them in an ergonomic position.

What’s wonderful to me is that these designs relate the scale of those music-making objects to human hands. You just want to put your fingers on these devices and make some music.

From the Flickr set, Sasa explains:

This universal stand was part of the monitor once. I attached a piece of thick still and and 2 neodymium magnets recycled from hard drive.

[on the now-free-as-in-beer software running on the Asus netbook] …yes, in the name of good old times. ReBirth was my very first step in music making. I couldn`t even imagine I`ll build myself clones of all those machines.

He tells CDM:

I used 2 stands that are leftovers from monitors that are installed into an info kiosk. One is bigger than other which is allows me to cascade few machines. This was a really quick project as I used what I had laying around. Thick piece of steel is wood joint. Magnets are from a hard drive; the
tin plates glued on the eee and other machines are cutout from CDROM drive case, rubber comes from a blood pressure meter…
pretty much everything is recycled.
Besides the x0xb0x and eee you recognized, you can also see a ClockBox – MIDI clock generator (midibox project).

Really beautiful work – economic use of materials, clever design, and it could let you put a drum machine in your kitchen so you can cook music and food for a brilliant evening.

More on the elements of this project:
The x0xb0x is a fully open-source 303 bassline clone
The clockbox is a project based on the Midibox platform (see site, blog)
The Liliputing blog has great netbook coverage
ReBirth lives on as freeware at the ReBirth Museum. This is Windows, but if you don’t want to swap Windows onto your netbook, you can run it in WINE on Linux. (have to try that myself!)
Flickr set

All photos by Sasa Djuric, used by permission.

What’s new in the world of music technological creations? It’s stunning how much people are creating in their private workshops and bedrooms. I’m pleased to have the chance to share it virtually here, and Thursday night in person in New York City.

We’re proud that Handmade Music returns to Brooklyn’s 3rd Ward this Thursday, presented by createdigitalmusic.com with XLR8R.com, Make, and Etsy.com and sponsored by Pabst Blue Ribbon. (Free beer.) It’s a party, a science fair of music tech and instruments, a show-and-tell, and a noise-making jam, for musicians, tech lovers, and the musi-curious.

Free (+ free beer while it lasts)
Thursday, January 15
7:30-10:30pm (drop by for as long as you’d like)
3rd Ward, Brooklyn NY
Facebook event page
Going.com event page
RSVP to handmade (at) 3rdward (dot) com — walk-ups welcome, but it helps us to know how many folks are coming!
Directions to the Space

If you’re in town, you’ll want to be there. For everyone else, we’re working on getting lots of documentation for you of the projects, so stay tuned. (We’ll have to have an all-global virtual Handmade Music Night soon!)

Here’s a look at the projects. It’s a bit like having an all-DIY, oddball music tech trade show – eat your heart out, NAMM show! (Warning: one slightly not-safe-for-work clip of a mannequin getting felt up.)

Dueling Gestural Interfaces

GCe2 // GestureSynth from Mouse & the Billionaire on Vimeo.

We have not one but two fascinating takes on gestural objects as music controllers. Brian Kerr is bringing his research into new dynamic interfaces for music, drawing upon an academic background in industrial design, as M Bethancourt brings the Gesture-Controller Exploration 2 (GCE-2).

Mouse & the Billionaire (M Bethancourt): GCE-2

M Bethancourt has created a really gorgeous object, so I’m eager to see it in action. Check out the site for research, presentations, ideas for use, and more. And clearly we have to get Mouse & the Billionaire and Brian Kerr together – they’re working on similar lines, so they’ll either learn from each other or break out into a big gestural music battle. (or, ideally, both!)

The Gesture-Controller Exploration is an ongoing study in innovative musical controllers that explores the relationship between movement, physical space and musical performance. The most recent incarnation is the GCE-2 (Gesture-Controller Exploration 2). Dipping, swinging, swaying, tilting, and turning the The GCE-2 sends signals to the computer, informing its sound-making functions. This allows for a more satisfying performance experience, leveraging the power of the computer and helping the electronic musician to use physical means to create and manipulate digital electronic sounds in new and interesting ways.

Link: http://www.mouseandthebillionaire.com/gce 

Brian Kerr: Dynamic Musical Interfaces

Prototype Video 1 from Brian Kerr on Vimeo.
Prototype Video 2 from Brian Kerr on Vimeo.

My blog link: http://dynamicmusicalinterfaces.blogspot.com/

Vimeo link: http://vimeo.com/briankerr

I’m currently completing my industrial design masters thesis at Pratt Institute. My working thesis title is, Dynamic Musical Interfaces. I’ve started to document my first prototype, which is a wireless gestural controller for Max/MSP. One of my main goals with this project is to create an physically expressive performance device for computer music that is engaging for both the performer as well as the audience.

I love that Brian’s design was able to make use of a 3D printer, because I believe someday these will be as commonplace as the Canon multifunction sitting on my desk. Brian writes:

I worked in the parametric 3D CAD program, SolidWorks to design the exterior casing of my controller. After it was built in with this software environment, I converted the file into an STL format and printed it out with a 3D printer. The bottom of the controller has a potentiometer joining the half sphere with the upper section. To stabilize this connection, I built a pair of channels into each of the parts and inserted little plastic ball bearings for support (I’ll add photos of this later).

Mannequin Parts as Instruments

Richie Brown says he’ll have to see how much he can carry with him on the train from New Jersey, but he’s got a stockpile of wonderful technology oddities he’s created. He writes:

I’ve recently come into possession of several mannequin parts which I have used to house several electronic musical instruments. This marries two of my favorite things: surreal humor and blippy bloopy sounds. One project is the Torso Theremin. It is made from a circuit bent cassette tape recorder. I’ve included a video link here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox2xCvWxPwY

Another is a Leg Maraca as seen in this included video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CLKh28t0Sk

I am also working with graphite’s electrical conductivity and resistance value to make drawings that can be played like instruments.

Wearable Leather-and-Snakeskin Controllers and Other Goodies

Rucyl is already a favorite on this site for her terrific creations, like this over-the-shoulder, wearable (if not so animal rights-friendly) snakeskin-and-leather MIDI controller. I believe she’s bringing this along,

See previously: Sexy Computer Nerd: Rucyl Mills’ Wearable, Over-the-Shoulder MIDI Controller

And her new site: http://www.rucyl.com

She’s also working with King Britt, one of my favorite musical peoples, among other collaborations. She writes: “I’ll be releasing a new album in a few months on my own label, as well as some upcoming collaborations with  Xaphryn Follicle, King Britt, DJ Kiva, and Sarah White. I’m also working on an even smaller version of the elektro-07.”

Prepared NES

You’ve heard of prepared piano. Notendo, aka Jeff Donaldson, will be in with his prepared Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) for a bit of blippy goodness, explaining how it all works.

notendo.com

notendo @ last.fm

Premiere of Music Coverage from Make:TV

Maker Channel 101 Screambody, Laser Harp, Cupcake Cars, TV-B-Gone from make magazine on Vimeo.

Phil Torrone of Make Magazine will be on-hand to talk about how the Make community is adopting TV – both old-school (PBS) and new-school (online). We’ll have screenings of some of the music projects from the Make:TV show that premiered this month. Bring popcorn!

And More

Walk-ins of unusual creations are encouraged. The Make crew usually bring some of their stuff in. Machine+1 has promised “An atmospheric guitar and synth deluge- in the fashion of live looping- using custom, handmade footswitch controllers triggering software.”

There’s usually some surprise I didn’t expect. You really are encouraged to bring out stuff you’re working on, even if it’s not yet awesome / functional. Hopefully we can do some of this sharing and learning increasingly online, as well.