Every so often, I’m reminded of a simple fact: the greatest machine on the planet remains the human machine. So, yes, it may seem strange to one of the uninitiated to imagine strapping an iPhone to your wrist. And yes, musicianship in the digital age is partly about triggering, not just playing (though Onyx can really blow on his Akai wind controller.) But the bottom line is, the precision of movement and the genius of human musical creativity wins out. However unusual the technological solution, it can still tap into that power.

In the video above, our friend Onyx Ashanti shows off his proof-of-concept work-in-progress as he assembles a new musical rig. Open source patching software Pure Data (Mac/Windows/Linux) is the sound source, proof that you can substitute free software at the center. The controller is an iPhone running TouchOSC (though this makes me want to revisit ultra-portable, open, embedded hardware with sensors). And yes, that’s a Yamaha WX5 wind controller, a digital input tool of choice for those with a wind background. Onyx says this is only to be one of two iPhones.

Expect craziness to come, but I like watching things in progress, too – so I couldn’t resist sharing.

http://onyx-ashanti.ning.com/

Correction: Instead of looking closely at what Onyx was playing, I relied on my memory, and egregiously called the WX5 an Akai EWI. Thanks to commenters for spotting that.

Argos Interface Builder, v0.20 from Dimitri Diakopoulos on Vimeo.

You know the game: you decide you want exactly 8 knobs and 10 faders. But your hardware interface has 8 knobs and 8 faders. And then you realize you could use 4 more knobs.

The appeal of touch interfaces is clear: you get controls that grow and change. So now, a generation of mobile apps is working on giving you that flexibility on touch devices. The iPhone is just the start: now the iPad, with greater real estate, will go head to head with 5″, 8″, and laptop-sized screens running Android, Linux, and Windows.

Argos is an early-stages (but usable), free and open-source tool that could help you be ready. Built in openFrameworks, the C++-based cousin to Processing, the app lets you drag in basic widgets like buttons, sliders, toggles, and x-y pads, and assign them to OSC. That opens up control to various music and visual apps. (The OSC assignment tool does bear some similarity to that on the Lemur, though it’s simpler.) The openFrameworks roots should make this easier to port to multiple platforms.

http://argos.dimitridiakopoulos.com/

Developer Dimitri Diakopoulos, a BFA student at CalArts, is looking for developers and actively working on making this work on the iPad and its additional screen real estate – with other platforms possible, too. (If some of the PC “slate”s simply run Windows 7, you might be able to just switch the thing on, no port required — and run the app you’re controlling on the same machine if you so choose. We’ll have to wait to see what ships.) Stay tuned for more news on this, but this is well worth a look now. (Synthtopia was on top of the story earlier today.)

I’m personally interested to see if the protocol established by open iPhone app mrmr could allow over-the-air template sharing, and whether all these apps can interoperate with TUIO, the touch protocol developed for the reacTable. I said it earlier today, but there is some real potential in convergence, so I invite anyone who wishes to join that conversation. The trick is, you want to initially let people do their own thing, but then take all those “my own thing” solutions and put them together into an actual standard. If you try to impose the standard first, it might not actually work in the real world, but if you fail to standardize, you lose the advantage of interoperability. On the other hand, I think this very quandary is best solved by small groups of passionate developers, not overly-formalized process.

As multitouch becomes more widely available, there’s an opportunity to re-imagine all sorts of interfaces. And yes, that includes the guitar.

I’m way behind on mentioning it, but thanks to all the readers who spotted the fascinating Misa digital guitar. Strings and frets are each replaced with digital touch controls, and the soundboard touchscreen is set up to control notes, velocity, pitch, and filters. In fact, it makes the guitar more like a keyboard, and less like a guitar. But as with all digital instruments, abstracting the gesture from the actual sound means that you can arbitrarily redefine what the instrument really does.

Engadget wrote up the Misa last month

Misa Digital of Sydney has a bare-bones site and waiting list / queries via email.

Don’t want to wait around on a list for the fully-integrated version? Thinking about how you could just strap an iPod touch or iPhone to an instrument and use that instead? You’re in luck. In fact, if you’ve got an Apple mobile and Ableton Live, you can start right now.

Jim Purbrick first experimented with iPhone performance at an open OSCestra. Unlike the Misa, his guitar remains a real guitar. The addition of an iPhone (or an iPod touch, if you’d rather) is simply a way to augment the instrument. In the grand tradition of the one man band, touch control with the open-source control application Mrmr allows him to manipulate Ableton Live tracks.

The solution is an open source Python hack that connects his mobile device to Ableton Live through Live’s LiveAPI. And incidentally, this solution requires far less effort – and yields more immediate integration – than running a Max for Live device. (I have to point that out, because while I’m impressed by Max’s extraordinary capabilities inside Live, there are practical ways in which direct OSC integration is better for controlling Live itself.)

And good news, Windows users – this all works on your OS, too. In fact, the only problem is the lack of an interface builder for Mrmr on Windows, which is something I think we’ll soon solve. (JavaFX would be a nice choice, as you’d have a cross-platform Java interface that looks nice but runs anywhere, without the pain of developing in Swing. That last sentence will be meaningful only to Java developers; everyone else, pretend I just temporarily started speaking in tongues.)

Details and full instructions for the hack:

An Open Source, Guitar Mounted, Multi Touch, Wireless, OSC Interface for Ableton Live [The Creation Engine No. 2 (Jim's blog)]

Videos

For further inspiration, here’s both the Misa and Jim’s own (real) guitar augmented by touch, in action:

What happens when an interface is no longer locked to the screen? What about making control simply work from your hand, on a different screen, with awareness of the world around it? Simple as the early implementations may be, that’s really the vision behind mobile control applications for music and visuals.

c74 is a lovely iPhone-based app that uses a Max/MSP patch to generate interfaces from a patch that run on your handheld. It isn’t just a control surface, though; access to native APIs on the phone also provide other features.

• GPS for specific location. (How you use that is up to you; I recommend the ability to switch between “West Coast” and “East Coast” beats.)
• Accelerometer data, and specific “shake” gestures.
• Compass orientation.
• Proximity. (That means your proximity to the device, though it’d also be fun with mobile to use Bluetooth to tell when different devices are nearby.)

The external is free. It’s currently Mac OS X-only. (If people respond well, perhaps we can see about a Windows build.) The app itself is paid, but see below — Mac and Max/MSP users, I’ve got some codes to give away.

The app is called c74, but it’s entirely unofficial, the work of Dutch developer Leo van der Veen. (The site even has the cheeky name nr74.org; Cycling ‘74, I’d say you have a fan. And, um, I’m glad you’re a small company rather than a litigious big one – that’s better for everyone.)

This isn’t the only app to attempt something like this. The iPhone app Mrmr attempts to produce an entire interface protocol for exchanging templates; I’m collaborating now with the developer of that app on … something. I won’t jinx it by saying more for now; stay tuned. (It’s nothing earth-shaking; I just want to finish it!) The idea of Mrmr is that a performer could beam a control template to a friend, or you could walk up to an art installation and grab the template on your own mobile; eventually, it could even work on different devices (not just Apple ones).

c74 is distinct from that effort in a couple of ways. It’s very specific to the iPhone APIs. It’s really specific to Max, and focuses on generating those templates from a Max patch in a flexible manner. It doesn’t actually even use OpenSoundControl, though the principle is the same – it opens a network socket and communicates wirelessly. (In fact, just as you can represent MIDI messages without using a 5-pin MIDI DIN cable, you can use OSC-formatted messages without needing the whole protocol. And underneath OSC is really just a bunch of standard networking protocols – that’s part of the point. So we almost need another name for general-purpose, open “networking.” Actually, maybe the word “networking” works.)

Right now, there isn’t a whole lot of interoperability between different development environments, different mobile devices (there is a big world beyond iPhone), and different template apps (which are growing in number by the day). But I’m not overly concerned about that. Right now, I think it’s just as well that people try a lot of different experiments.

As that evolves, the next step could really be finding ways of communicating template information in standard ways, based on the real-world experience of how these apps work. TUIO has already caught on as a way of describing multitouch input, as seen first on the ReacTable. What that protocol does is actually fairly cool: it just takes a set of practices used by real artists, and builds the standard protocol around those practices, rather than the other way around. I think it should be possible to continue to expand on these kinds of descriptions.

Want a copy of c74 for your iPhone / iPod touch and your Max 5-running Mac? I have just ten copies to give away. So tell us in comments what Max patch project you’d like to run with this, and convince me that you’ll send us a short video of the results. I’ll take the first ten compelling comments and email you a code. (That means you DO need to leave an email in the comment form; only the site admins and I can see it.)

I’m in touch with Leo, as well, so we’ll certainly keep this discussion going about control in general.

Project site:
http://www.nr74.org/c74.html

Update – important – US ONLY for codes.

Apple’s iPad is here. It starts at $499. It’s a gorgeous, brilliantly-designed device that has the benefits of Apple’s cleverly-engineered, best-in-class developer tools for mobile. A lot are likely to sell. And unfortunately, to me that means bad news for the kind of creative computing we talk about on this site.

To put it briefly, I think the new, mobile Apple is doing immense harm to the computing legacy the company has forged. We could have had a Mac tablet today. Instead, we have a giant iPhone – and that’s a decision that has some serious repercussions. It’s a blow to open source alternatives, but also to open development in general: the power of interchangeable hardware and software, on which everything we do with music and visuals on computers is based.

For years, the Mac community railed against the perceived closed nature of Microsoft. Now, many are rallying behind an Apple with a vision more closed than Redmond’s.

This is important to both CDMs, because it’s on both these sites that I, along with readers and contributors, have advocated open computing as a creative outlet, for creation, sharing, and distribution of music, visuals, and knowledge.

I’m entirely biased by my own perspective. There are certain things I care about, that I believe in. I can talk about the technical, measurable values of each of those, but I can only speak for myself. With that in mind, the iPad, in a single device, embodies the exact opposite of all the reasons I’ve invested so much time in computing for the last 25 years.

• It’s a closed platform. As with the iPhone, development for the iPad means reliance on Apple’s tools, on the use of proprietary Apple hardware and software just to build an app. Now, those could be worthy sacrifices for a great product. But it also means that Apple alone distributes applications, and decides which applications developers will be allowed to create – something that has never been true on a computing OS. Since the unveiling of the iPhone SDK, Apple apologists argued that somehow this was a decision made by phone carriers, that surely their beloved Apple was not to blame. Yet Apple has chosen that path for a device that, while it lacks a keyboard, otherwise looks for all the world like a computer – like something that could have been a Mac, with all the power and freedom of a Mac, instead of an iPhone.
• It has no standard ports. Like the iPhone, the iPad has only a proprietary dock connector, ensuring Apple has control over the hardware made for the device. You can throw away decades of the lessons of the value of standard connectors, of the freedom to connect a computer as – to use a phrase Apple popularized – a digital hub. There’s not even HDMI to connect to a display. Clarification: video out will be possible, albeit with a proprietary adapter. And *access* to that video port from software has been a huge problem on the iPhone. See additional notes on Create Digital Motion. Additionally, the possibilities of external hardware are not entirely known. Apple will offer a memory card reader adapter that uses USB. But there isn’t a native USB port on the machine, and this doesn’t necessarily suggest full support for USB; hopefully, additional details will emerge.
• It’s tied to iTunes. As with the iPhone, you can’t use the iPad’s drive as a drive. You can’t connect it to a computer and put on it what you like. You’re limited to using third-party apps as conduits or servers – and even then, you’re limited; critical files for media and reading are controlled by Apple’s market-dominating iTunes app. It’s a storage device you own, but that someone else controls. Maybe that’s acceptable for game consoles, but, again, the iPad has the appearance of a computer. (Except, of course, it’s actually not.)
• Apple alone controls the distribution of media. Apple already has a dangerously dominant position in the consumption of music and mobile software, and their iTunes-device link ensures that content goes through their store, their conduit, and ultimately their control. This means that developers are limited in what they can create for the device when it comes to media – a streaming Last.fm app is okay, but an independent music store (like Amazon MP3 on Android) is not. Now, you can add to that Apple dominating book distribution. At a time when we have an opportunity to promote independent e-book publishing, the iPad is accompanied by launch deals from major traditional publishers. What does that mean for independent writers and content? Updated: As several readers have noted, one positive sign is that Apple’s book application supports the open epub format. We’ll see how this works, and how this interoperates with other devices over the coming days and months. (And it’s important, too – this is not Create Digital Books, but a lot of the information we want to read is published in e-books.)
• It’s not an open computer. It’s not a Mac. The bottom line: you can’t do the things that an open computing experience allows. You can’t connect the hardware you want, develop or run the software you want, or have the open-ended experience computers have provided. That’s not to say a tablet or slate or pad or whatever you want to call it needs to be exactly like other computers. On the contrary: if you believe in the computing experience, you believe it should work in new and creative form factors. (There was a time when the clamshell laptop was a new idea, remember, a time when computers were giant bricks you plugged into a TV.)

Limitations are a wonderful thing. Specialized operating systems for mobile make perfect sense. But that’s a design decision – it’s about the interface, the developer tools, the hardware. A mobile device can work just as well without being tied to iTunes or with actual ports on it.

I know what the objection will be: but this computer isn’t “for” people like me. But that’s the whole problem. Apple threatens to split computing into two markets, one for “traditional,” “real” computers, and another for passive consumption devices that try to play games without physical controls and let you read books, watch movies, play music, and run apps so long as you’re willing to go through the conduit of a single company.

And, of course, this wouldn’t be worth my breath if not for my real concern: what if Apple actually succeeds? What if competitors follow this broken path, or fail to offer strong alternatives? The iPad today is a heck of a lot slicker than alternatives. It’s bad news for Linux, Windows, and Android, none of which have really workable competitors yet. It’s especially bad for Linux, in fact, which had a real chance to make its mark on mobile devices. Edit: Actually, one major advantage of a big, splashy Apple announcement – a number of those manufacturers have started talking about their rivals, already in the pipeline.

These issues have always been a matter of open debate. Jean-Louis Gassée infamously got an “OPEN MAC” license plate for his car during the early days of Apple Macintosh. The “open” vision was the vision we got. It’s the Mac II. It’s the expansion capabilities of the Mac that allowed PostScript support, which let the Mac launch computer desktop publishing and ensured the survival of the platform. And it was a vision in contrast to that of one (younger) Steve Jobs, who argued against expansion and nearly made the Mac a failure, another forgotten 80s oddity. It was after Jobs was forced out of the company that the Mac platform, the Mac community as we now know it were really forged, built on the expansion and flexibility those later Macs offered. That expansion port was what enabled early products from Digidesign, which would later become Pro Tools – the very birth of digital audio production.

Like I said, I’m biased by my own opinion. But it’d be unfair, after years of being hard on small developers when it comes to issues of openness, if I held back here. This is the world’s self-proclaimed “largest mobile manufacturer,” the company that, as it reminds us in every press release, launched the computing revolution. I wish I understood why they were now running away from some of the basic ideas that made that revolution possible.

This is what I asked in January 2007 on this site, shortly after the original iPhone was launched:

“1. Will Apple lock down the iPhone, blocking Flash, Java, custom widgets, and open development from its new platform?

2. Could Apple’s multi-touch patents actually stifle growth of new, interactive displays?”

Unfortunately, that turned out to prescient. As for point #2, and perhaps no fault of Apple’s, it’s apparent that multi-touch gestures are now missing in prominent platforms like the Android because of fear of litigation. (Yes, the Droid in my pocket has multi-touch and even a multi-touch API, but nothing in the shipping apps, apparently because someone’s legal department got involved.)

And as for point one, just compare what you can do with a Mac to what you can do with an iPhone.

Ironically, at that same show, I saw the very thing the Mac users most badly wanted: a Mac tablet. But because an independent developer had to hack that product together, it was overpriced and not terribly useful. At the same time, I know some people bought them, because that’s what they wanted. They wanted a Mac tablet.

Ironically, the biggest disadvantage of the iPad is that it’s not a Mac. So now we wait and see if someone can come up with intelligent new tablets that are at least more like PCs.

I know who I’m rooting for. And it’s not this.

Clarifications / thoughts from comments:

Of course, comments are here so that we can have a spectrum of opinions, and believe me, I do read and listen – including (sometimes especially) those with a different perspective than my own.

Some issues worth clarifying, respective to the above:

Several readers pointed out that I’m oversimplifying some of the relative historic “openness” of Apple. When the “Open Mac” battle was raging in the early Mac days (leading to the SE and Mac II), the connectors were indeed often still proprietary. The question was more whether to have ports or expansion at all. In the defense of the early Apple engineers, recall that, with the exception of formats like serial, standards were not as evolved as technologies like USB today. Even though there were already IBM clones, they were clones of IBM PCs, literally, not the open-ended PC market we have today. So readers are absolutely right – I was blurring some of the issues here. At the same time, this only underlines my point.

We’re again revisiting the question of what “consumers” need. The reason Jobs was opposed to ports, expansion, and the general ability of a user to service or upgrade a machine was because he perceived a need for a “consumer” device. In other words, he was making the argument then that his design is making now, and that some commenters are making, as well. Jobs was forced out of Apple, and the “Open Mac” won – and the rest is history. But my devil’s advocate question would be, given that computers with expandability won out in the 80s, why are we in a rush to eliminate that functionality now, in 2010, when even average consumers are more demanding and less afraid of technology? Is that who this is really for, or by the very virtue of its limitations, is this just a toy for gadget lovers? (I’m not asking that rhetorically; I think the readers making this argument have a point, and I’d be curious to hear people follow up.)

The other question is whether Apple was “open” in the intervening time period. However, here I have to invoke some history. Apple under Sculley was working very hard on interoperability with IBM, even though that ultimately failed. The Mac platform may have run a different OS, but it also embraced and/or helped popularize serial ports (hello MIDI), SCSI, and 3.5″ floppy drives (standard storage for the time). Under Amelio, Apple even pursued cloning – before Jobs reigned it in. (I’m not arguing that was a smart business decision, but it did at least qualify as “open.”) Mac OS X and modern Mac hardware are replete with standards, the Safari team is by far the most active contributor to WebKit, and the Apple OS team continues to work hard on interoperability.So, I may have been oversimplifying, too, but I can at least say this particular product is not characteristic of some of the more “open” behavior of Apple in other areas.

Finally, many of the comparisons have been made to the Lemur. I agree the Lemur hardware is aging and the software is relatively inflexible (certainly more so than apps made with the iPhone SDK). As for specifics of how the devices compare in multi-touch accuracy, or whether users will be as satisfied with the iPad as a wireless controller versus the Lemur’s Ethernet cord, that remains worth discussing.

Side note: Nowhere did I say that the alternative to an iPad has to be open source. I’m a huge fan of open source and truly free software. But by the measures above, Windows qualifies as open.

Apple added the ability to connect custom hardware to its iPhone and iPod touch platform last year, so it was only a matter of time before someone made a music hardware interface. Ion Audio, the budget brand of Numark/Alesis/Akai, gets there first, with the Ion iDISCOVER Keyboard. It docks your Apple mobile into a case with a 25-key MIDI keyboard, pitch and mod wheels, and preset buttons for patch and octave changes.

http://www.ionaudio.com/idiscoverkeyboard

It’s just what many of us wondered when we first saw Apple’s hardware SDK; David Battino even suggested this very idea.

Of course, there is a slight problem. Part of the whole advantage of the iPhone is its mobility, which a huge honking dock tends to kill. (For less money, you could just plug a keyboard into your Mac, or buy a low-end CASIO or Yamaha keyboard.)

And then there’s the fact that most of the interesting music apps on iPhone don’t use MIDI keyboards. Ion has to provide their own app to fill the gap, which also makes me wonder whether this will work with any other software; I’m guessing not, but I’ll find out. Update: Word from the CES show floor is that Ion plans to open this developers; whether that’s anyone or just partners or even decided yet, unknown, though I hope to snag them at NAMM. Us hard-core geeks would naturally have preferred a standard MIDI interface, so you could use unusual sequencing apps with hardware synths. (Never mind; I’ll take a MIDI Command, instead.)

That raises another question, though — all due kudos to Apple for providing a hardware interface. When will we see third-party hardware support on a platform like Google’s Android? It seems the “open” philosophy of the platform would be best served by an open approach to hardware, too, and technically speaking, the job wouldn’t be that hard, thanks to the fact that Android runs a standard Linux kernel. That could allow any kind of controller — mass-produced or homemade — you want.

I’ve got lots of questions about the iDISCOVER, though; I’ll try to track down answers this week at NAMM. I’m not quite sure who would want this particular product, but it does raise some interesting issues about mobile music tech, especially given the earlier discussion this week.

Thanks to Derek Dumais for the tip. Oddly, Ion seems to have their own version of Akai’s mini-keyboard, too; it seems to be white instead of black but otherwise appears identical. (Consumers want white, pros want black?)

Software of the year: Propellerhead Record

For all the major releases and upgrades and gear, as well as the dominance of a certain Berlin-based developer, if you had to pick one application of 2009, it’d be Record. Record tops the list not because everyone dropped everything to go use it, but quite the contrary. Record bucked industry trends, and provided a love-it-or-hate-it view of what audio software could be. In other words, it was quite reminiscent of Reason.

Centered on a mixer, emphasizing “recording” (perish the thought), and omitting expected features like MIDI out and plug-in support, Record resists modern-day conventional wisdom. That was divisive enough, even before the debates began over Record’s new hardware key. In the long run, it may be the simple fact that Record brings audio signal to Reason that gives it staying power. But in 2009, Record was the application about which everyone had an opinion.

See our original preview, May, plus details on the "Ignition Key" authorization system

Developer of the year: Ableton

What a year it’s been for Ableton. The company kicked off the year with “Share,” “Extend,” and “Touch,” as well as the release of Live 8. It sounded simple. But Ableton’s tech dominated CDM headlines in ‘09 with the variety of user tips and tricks, rants and raves. How’d they do?

New gear: Hardware was in the spotlight – and ranked highest in CDM clicks – even above the software. Many users embraced Akai’s APC40, the first commercial hardware to really balance a variety of Live’s features, as well as Novation’s affordable, simple Launchpad grid controller. But even as Ableton emphasized the ability of this hardware to work out of the box, hackers set about customizing their own control. We saw the Launchpad used with Renoise (complete with a mocked-up Renoise logo decal), and the Korg nanoKONTROL hacked to integrate more seamlessly with Ableton – even when KORG and Ableton themselves hadn’t worked on support. Lesson learned? Make tools for musicians, and you may find some support and development gets crowd-sourced, whether you intended it or not.

See: Hands-on with the Launchpad, nanoKONTROL Myr for Ableton Live, APC40 Hacking Superguide

Live, meet Max: Max for Live has already led to some incredible work, most notably stretta’s fantastic compositional toolkit for the monome. It earned praise (for setting a new bar for sheer power) and criticism (most notably for lacking a free runtime). Some jumped on M4L, some swore they’d stick to the traditional Max, and others swore they’d seek alternative or free solutions. In the end, Max for Live has wound up becoming bigger than, well, Max for Live. It’s begun a discussion of how live performance should work, and how software should integrate and be extended. And that’s a story that should be with us for a long time.

And a few wrinkles: The third prong of Ableton’s initiative was barely visible in ‘09; while a beta is underway, we don’t know much more about how Share will work in December than we did at NAMM in January. Live 8 has been beloved by some, even as others users expressed frustration with stability issues. CEO Gerhard Behles surprised everyone this month on the Ableton forum by conceding the company could do better and promising developers would re-focus on squashing bugs, even putting new features on hold.

As the saying goes, any press is good press. Ableton and their fired-up user base stayed front-and-center on CDM in 2009, even as twists and turns complicated the narrative. The story isn’t quite as clean and tidy as it is was at the beginning of the year, and you can read the full spectrum of comments calling this year everything from a triumph to a failure (and, hopefully, a few more reasonable thoughts in between). But without a doubt, Ableton is the developer of 2009.

Story of the year: Switching from Mac to Ubuntu

After years of tired debates about the merits of operating systems, the potential of the philosophies of open source versus proprietary, and whether Linux is ready for the desktop, in 2009 we saw a new spin: what if you switched to Linux to make your life easier?

That was the question Kim Cascone asked with his switch to Linux. And he wasn’t alone. One of the most-asked questions this year was how to make Linux work for music, particularly as users sought out more-reliable, more-affordable solutions for audio. (Yes, I know – “Linux” isn’t necessarily more reliable out of the box, as “Linux” could mean any number of setups, which I suspect is part of why the question was asked so much.) The popularity of Kim’s story, along with the turnkey Indamixx laptop or the Linux Laptop Orchestra we saw last week, suggest a challenge to CDM as much as a story. It’s the story we’ll likely see more of in 2010.

Linux Music Workflow: Switching from Mac OS X to Ubuntu with Kim Cascone

Biggest opportunity: Rock Band Network

Want a glimpse into the future of the music business? Here’s one way it could look. Rock Band Network provides an extraordinary level of control and customization, allowing your music to work as well with the hit game as music adapted by the developers themselves. As a revenue stream, as a promotional opportunity, and as a new way to play with your music, it looks fantastic. And don’t miss the fact that what made it possible was close collaboration with the DAW Reaper – a big coup for that package. Now, if we could just have the Amplitude Network, too, for electronic artists.

See our inside look at RBN with the folks at Harmonix

Surprise vintage tech: The return of CV

MIDI? What’s that? The biggest surprise revelation in January was that MOTU was set to release a brilliant plug-in called Volta, which elegantly bridged the gap between computers and, through control voltage, analog synthesis. Matthew Davidson (who wowed us with OSC and digital tech in 2009, too, in his monome work) walked us through his creation:

Analog, Meet Digital: MOTU Volta Connects the Mac to CV Synths, Effects Graphically

We also saw other CV solutions, DIY and commercial, Control Voltage on Moog’s Theremin, and in perhaps the hardware product of the year, Moog Music’s exquisite double-band MuRF resonant filter. And yes, the Moog piece even has MIDI for pattern changes and sync, while still making use of CV.

Most annoying story of the year: Anything to do with T-Pain

Yes, the iPhone is well awesome mobile technology. Yes, 2009 was the year in which the music world went from talking exclusively about “albums” to talking about “apps,” too. Yes, it’s amazing how Smule has popularized music technology and alternative interfaces and all that good stuff. Unfortunately, it was tough to focus on some of the wonderful things going on when you had to deal with the sudden and inexplicable success of T-Pain, capitalizing on everyone’s least-favorite effect – AutoTune. Not getting enough overuse of pitch correction on FOX’s hit show, Glee, ruining talented voices of kids and Broadway stars? Now put it on your iPhone, and suck the joy out of the (otherwise fantastic) “I’m on a Boat” video. We all love you, Smule, but, I’m on a phone? I’m in a time machine, trying to escape to some year where AutoTune has finally died.

To cheer up, let’s just remind ourselves why Smule’s chief mind Ge Wang is still cool, while I try to work out how to get off T-Pain’s press mailing list:

Interview: Smule’s Ge Wang on iPhone Apps, Ocarinas, and Democratizing Music Tech

And the Rest

Most important OS release:

Windows 7, for finally making us feel good about leaving XP – and, with the help of tools like Cakewalk’s SONAR and its BitBridge 32-bit plug-in support, giving us a good reason to go 64-bit, too.

Most popular how-to’s:

Instructable: How to Build a Music Studio in an Apartment

Abusing and misusing groove extraction in Live 8

Best reason to attend NAMM 2010:

The hopes of catching Teenage Engineering’s OP-1 synth, in the flesh

Most popular feature, and a reminder of what matters more than the gear:

Take it to the Stage: Reflections on Live Laptop Music from Artists

This analysis piece from a variety of top artists started a discussion about what playing laptops is all about. There was certainly no consensus, but it was – rightfully – the most popular feature story of the year, and something we should cover as often as possible. It’s the reason we’re all here. (Thanks to Primus Luta for putting this together.)

More Top 2009 Lists

Beatportal

Francis Preve takes on the top ten releases of the year for Beatportal, and I can’t help but agree. Having made my list of what caused the most controversy, these are the tools that – big splash or not – deserve some technological recognition.

MetaSynth remains a fascinating and unique tool for sound design, finally in a more modern release, and one I hope to work with more soon.

Logic 9 was a huge DAW release, though to that list I’d add SONAR 8.5 – two radically different tools, each markedly more mature this year.

FXpansion DCAM Synth Squad looks like the most brilliant soft synth of ‘09, and I’m long overdue in spending some quality time with it.

Dave Smith’s Tetr4 synth might make the top of my list if it didn’t have to compete with other fine synths from … Dave Smith.

Then there’s Melodyne, which resulted in some unique and creative results this year.

A must-read: 2009 Studio Technology Top 10

MusicRadar

MusicRadar, the online site that accompanies Computer Music and Future Music (among others), reviews the year month by month. But the list you want is:

In pictures: the best hi-tech gear of 2009

Yours’

Of course, in the end, what all these stories have been about is the full spectrum of ideas from our readers. So have at it. And Happy New Year.

A traditional music score can fill reams of paper. But make music generative, and a tiny amount of musical DNA can breed musical events. How little DNA is needed? How about 140 character worth – enough to fit into a single Twitter post?

That’s what’s possible in Mixtikl 2, which dubs its Twitter musical “vectors” “tikls” – pronounced “tickles.” There are three platforms, each priced separately:

• Mac / Windows desktop + plug-ins (standalone version, VST plug-in for your favorite host, and even a plug-in for playing and customizing mixes right in your web browser). Cost: US$19.99.
• Windows Mobile: smartphones and PDAs (yep, an eBay purchase could be wise right now) for playing and customizing mixes. Cost: US$4.99.
• iPhone / iPod touch: Mobile generative playback and synthesis, pricing TBA. This version isn’t available this instant, but is expected for approval in the upcoming days.

There are numerous improvements, but it’s the “vector audio” concept that’s the most evocative in the new release. For examples of what works in Twitter, here are some links from the developers, including some holiday-themed picks: (Updated with new link; previous code was for RC1, not the final build)

Mixtikl 2 : the Tweet Music Maestro

Mixtikl actually binds together a range of musical materials, from pre-defined tunes and audio assets to generative files and custom mixes of the two. There are other powerful features, two including the Partikl multi-synth and a built in “network” effects system.

There’s more work to do for Intermorphic: right now, Mixtikl, as the name implies, is a mixer. If you’re interested in producing your own musical patterns, editing rules, and the like, these features will have to wait for an upcoming release. But right now, you do get a taste for some of what they’re working, and if you’re not yet interested in investing, 30-day trials are available.

Intermorphic Mixtikl 2 Announcement

And yes, you can bet this will get the attention of those in the know in the Tweetosphere. None other than British celeb geek Stephen Fry is playing around with it.

You’re now approved to DJ with your iPhone. Or at least the app is. I’m not sure if I can take credit for getting Apple’s attention, but Apple has approved the TouchDJ application from Amidio. That’s big news, partly because developer Amidio has consistently been at the forefront of musical development on the platform, including their Noise.io synth and wild hexagonal JR Hexatone Pro.

This also is a big blog to the theory that Apple is intentionally blocking DJ apps — and a big boon to the theory that the App Store is just plain clogged, even if it may be disproportionately affecting more sophisticated applications.

Features in the release:

• “Visual mixing,” with a clever interface that uses overlays atop side-by-side waveform views
• Pre-listening using a special left/right adapter
• Faux vinyl and spin effects
• Real-time scratching, looping, positioning, EQ, effects, re-pitching
• Onboard sampler with 3 WAV sample slots, recording from the mic
• Uses a separate MP3 library with companion apps, since it isn’t possible to DJ from the library you sync from iTunes

Now, to me, that last point is a fairly significant one. You have to load tracks you wish to DJ separately, in MP3/M4A format. And I’m sure that this will start various debates about whether you’d want to DJ on your iPhone in the first place. But don’t look at me — I just work here. I’d be remiss if I started out the week talking about apps stuck in iPhone limbo, only to ignore them immediately becoming available. And I will say, Amidio is one of the smartest mobile music developers out there, so it’s worth checking out the range of what they’re doing.

Whether petitions and news stories did help this app to get to the top of the queue or not, I have no idea. I think maybe I’ll start running screaming headlines with things I want in them, if only for good luck.

Tomorrow on CDM: “You Know What Annoys Me? The Fact That We Don’t Have Unicorns. Magic Unicorns. Who Speak OSC.”

Yesterday, I talked about two complaints of music developers writing applications for the iPhone. These come from developers who are really iPhone fans, who just want to get their software released and (for many music devs) better categorized on Apple’s store. Pajamahouse Studios, maker of the new Sonorasaurus remix application, follow up with a more detailed explanation of their situation.

These are not rejections; at least rejections are generally accompanied with some sort of suggestion of what would need to be changed. They represent the dreaded iPhone developer “limbo,” in which an application is neither rejected nor approved. For Sonorasaurus, that’s been the state of affairs for over two months. As the developers explain, there seems to be nothing unusual about their app:

• Library access: It doesn’t access the iPhone/iPod music library. (no application is allowed to do that, which incidentally limits a lot of the DJ app possibilities of the device) Clarification: The status of the music API itself is unclear; some developers report just this sort of approval delay when trying to use it. [Source] Also, access to files inside the media library is not directly possible, which can be compared to the status of Android.
• File access: A separate http server is provided, with a parallel library, for users to store their own tracks – again, something found on numerous other approved applications. This doesn’t use the included library.
• Included music / music distribution: Five included songs are for testing only – something found in a number of other, similar applications that have been approved. The application is not an alternative to iTunes for distribution.
• Media decoding: Custom MP3 decoding technology – something not provided on the iPhone – was separately licensed. Clarification: This was not meant to imply that you can’t do MP3 decoding; the developers meant to make the point that they were not violating patents or licensing by using their own decoding, which presumably they did for the purposes of building a DJ app.

Of course, whatever the reason, we’ve seen in past applications suddenly approved after weeks or months, so who knows what will actually happen with this app.

Read the full explanation:

In Limbo Pt. 1 [Sonorasaurus]

While reading that, though, I also have to observe how significant these workarounds are. Without launching into an Android versus iPhone debate – believe me, there are many, many things to criticize about the Android as a platform, especially relative to music –  none of these is an issue on the Android. Forget platform wars or fanboys. Alternatives are good. I’d hope that we do have more than one approach to how to do this. These approaches should have to compete with one another, as they offer different tradeoffs and advantages.

If music is becoming an application, this kind of freedom is important.

Point by point:

• Library access: Android’s standard, supported APIs provide access to the media library and user playlists. Clarification: this includes direct access to the files and the ability to read from the buffer of these files (with some effort), in public, documented, approved APIs, with no chance of having an app rejected for the use of these APIs. My understanding is that this is not exactly the case on the iPhone.
• File access: Users are free to put files on their SD card over USB, and off-load those files – neither possible on iPhone. And yes, these will be integrated with the media library; iTunes-style sync isn’t necessary.
• Included music / music distribution: Including songs is actually a bit of a challenge, but you can freely download content and store it on the SD card. Because Google doesn’t have an equivalent of iTunes, that includes creating your own alternative distribution methods – meaning a label or music store can do make their own outlet.
• Media decoding: Decoding technology is included on the phone, including the ability to decode the open OGG Vorbis format. Clarification: Some folks read this to mean that the iPhone can’t decode MP3s, which was not what I intended; the key point here is that Android has in-box support for free formats and byte-level access to the audio buffers they give you, by default, straight out of the user’s media library. That is not entirely the case on iPhone.

Beneath all of this is the major fundamental difference, which is that you can install applications for Android whether or not they’ve been approved for Android. There’s actually a checkbox in the Market that allows you to opt into installing other apps you’ve downloaded directly from a developer or from another source.

Again, I don’t mean to make a pro-Android argument. In fact, I believe many of these items are also true on Windows Mobile, Symbian, and upcoming Linux platforms; I just happen to be working on Android now, so I’m more familiar with it.

What’s important is that this represents an alternative approach to how to provide music as an application, one in which the user is free to load content on and off the device.

Specifically, this paragraph jumped out at me:

Another problem would be that Apple could see this as a means to circumvent iTunes as a means to sell and distribute music. This we also addressed. These songs can only be used within the App. They can not be removed from the app / device for use elsewhere (iTunes on the desktop, burning to a CD, etc).

Now, we hear from many developers that the iTunes integration is something that attracts them to the platform. Likewise, many content creators will want just these sorts of restrictions.

But what if you want fewer restrictions? Let’s say you’re an artist releasing Creative Commons-licensed tracks, and you want to encourage remixing, sampling, modification, and free use of your tracks. Or what if you’re a label or artist collective, and want to experiment with new ways of using mobile for distribution, beyond what’s possible with iTunes and Apple’s stores? The same qualities that may attract someone else should, I think, concern you. I don’t think that necessarily means you shouldn’t write an iPhone application with your music, but perhaps you should also consider trying an alternative platform.

There seems to be a growing sense that the iPhone Way is The Only Way. Obviously, that’s not the case. This very debate demonstrates just how much room for interpretation the distribution of content can produce.