The name “Jupiter” evokes some strong feelings among synth aficionados. Little wonder, than, that when Roland introduced a modern successor, the response was impassioned. CDM was one of the first to look in detail at the Jupiter-80, and I was surprised – given the tendency of this readership away from massive flagship keyboards – to see it become one of our biggest stories of the year.

Roland faced some serious criticism when the story it told about the new Jupiter was less about synthesis and more about the instrument-emulating Supernatural engine. After all, since the days of the original Jupiter’s launch, we’ve come to think of the synthesizer as its own category of instrument – not an emulation of anything else. Then there was the fact that the JP-80′s weight and cost put it out of reach of many musicians.

If those were your criticisms, the news out of last week’s Musikmesse should be welcome news. First, the Jupiter-50 is a Jupiter keyboard for those of you without big budgets and road crews; it’s lighter and more affordable. The lack of the JP-80′s nifty touchscreen isn’t bad news, either – new iPad integration means you can get deep into programming right from your tablet.

Second, the JP-50 and a new second version of the JP-80 significantly refocus on synthesis features. I spent some time talking to Peter from Roland Europe at Messe about the synth stuff added to the JP. A lot of the effort went into behavioral modeling of classic analog filters. (See CDM’s hands-on video above.) Peter can’t say on camera the names, but you’ll get the trademark filters found on synthesizers from Sequential Circuits (Prophet) and Moog.

The new Jupiter-50, little sibling to the big JP-80 introduced last year.

Most notably, I got the sense from Peter that Roland not only heard but took seriously complaints from the synth-loving public that any new keyboard called “Jupiter” really needed to be a synth. Now, don’t get me wrong: I actually think the Supernatural stuff is pretty cool. I can easily imagine someone who needs versatility onstage or is programming film and TV scores or otherwise needs some great-sounding, wide-reaching instruments will really love it. It’s not anything you haven’t heard from big sample libraries on computers, but you get it in a keyboard you can turn on in a matter of seconds and tour with without needing a dedicated computer tech tailing you around. I think, ironically, those features will seem more appealing when you don’t have to choose between a keyboard that makes those sounds and a rich synthesizer. Now you get both of those things in one unit, and via the JP-50, one that can reach a wider audience.

New in the version 2 JP-80 and on the JP-50:

• Three new low-pass filter models, for a total of four
• New effects structures – yes, parallel routing as previously, but now a total of five structures including serial routing. This gives you the kind of semi-modular effects routing you’d normally expect on a soft synth.
• Quicker access to playing a single sound (without all the zones) called Registration Play, and SONAR integration.

Jupiter-80 Version 2

On the JP-50:

• Same sound engine as the JP-80
• 76-note weighted keys. (This isn’t the same class of keybed as found on the JP-80, but it still feels like a premium keyboard; I gave it a try at Messe.)
• Integrated USB audio/MIDI interface, and USB song player/recorder. This also includes, via an optional wireless dongle, the ability to wirelessly stream MIDI and audio to an iPad or iPhone – new functionality also demoed at Messe last week.

Jupiter-50

No official pricing yet, but word is it’ll be significantly less (of course) than the 80, and availability is planned for late spring.

My colleague Steve Fortner at Keyboard Magazine got an exclusive first look at the JP-50. There’s an extensive video series, but to get you started, here’s the sound programming vid:

See the full hands-on (and this, naturally, covers some of what’s new in the v2 firmware upgrade for the JP-80):
Roland Jupiter-50 Hands-on [Keyboard Magazine USA]

Previously:
First Look at Roland Jupiter-80, Images, and Reflections on the Jupiter Legacy

And little did I know how prescient the cooler in German words I uttered would become. Oops. (Hello from Berlin.)

What if a workstation arrangement keyboard were designed for DJs and synth rockers instead of, uh, whoever normally buys workstation arranger keyboards? Casio has taken the wraps off their new keyboards, and they appear to be affordable, all-in-one electronic beasts. Oh, except one of them has an organ. And an arpeggiator and step sequencer. So you can certainly step-sequence your drawbar organ, if you like.

There are also some retro-Casio CZ sounds, numbering in the thousands, loaded into these machines, so it seems Casio hasn’t forgotten why we loved them in the 80s.

And we hear the announcement via some charmingly-awkward headlines. They seem not so much lost in translation as something that makes me wonder what the original intent was:
A Groove Synthesizer with Many of the Cool Sounds and Features a DJ Uses in a Club

A Performance Synthesizer Specially Designed for Creating Sounds and Expressive Playing

That’ll otherwise be known as the XW-G1 and the XW-P1, respectively. I’m not sure which name is worse, so I’ll proceed.

I think all of this calls for celebration. Calvin Harris was echoing through my mind as I thought about CZ PCM waveforms:

Here’s what’s actually in these things.

A Groove Synthesizer with Many of the Cool Features a DJ Uses in a Club basically combines:

• A step sequencer with 100 pattern banks and 16 trigger buttons, and the ability to sequence multiple patterns together into bigger patterns
• A 100-phrase phrase sequencer
• Assignable keys (I think; here I get lost in translation)
• Solo synth (monophonic Virtual Analog) and PCM presets you can dial up
• Arpeggiator
• Sample looper with 19 seconds storage, overdubbing, and the ability to load samples as user PCM waveforms
• 61 full-size keys
• A “designated rubber holding space” – read, a mat that you can use to sit other gear on your keyboard

There’s 128KB of memory, but there’s also an SD slot, though it appears you can only use the SD to play SMF files.

You get a surprising amount of I/O: aside from USB, MIDI in and combined MIDI out/thru, you get a mic in, a line in, and a minijack line in. And the whole thing weighs just 5.4 kg (under 12 lbs).

The solo synth is truly monophonic. The routing appears to start with either a PCM or a Synth (hopefully Virtual Analog) pair of oscillators, or a hybrid (1 VA + 1 PCM), then route through filter and amp as expected.

There’s also a noise block, though, so you could presumably program some percussion sounds. And you can route an external input through the filter and amp envelope, via a pitch shifter, which is a bit more out of the ordinary.

There’s also a reverb, chorus, master EQ, and DSP block, though the DSP and chorus and Solo Synth all appear to use the same DSP.

80s jokes aside, in other words, this is not in any way an 80s synth.

A Performance Synthesizer Specially Designed for Creating Sounds and Expressive Playing is more or less the same synth, but with:

• “Hex Layer” for up to six-part combo “ensemble” sounds
• 50 drawbar organ presets
• 2,158 PCM waves, including presets from the CZ series (though I’m not sure if some of those CZ sounds aren’t also on the DJ model)

In fact, the Phrase Sequencer, Step Sequencer, and Arp are all in the “performance” synth, too, along with all the same I/O; it only lacks that loop recorder.

So, DJ version: 10 user wave slots and a looper.

Performance version: More presets overall, with the same synth presets, but “Hex Layers” for ensemble combos and some drawbar organ sets.

In other words, unless you really want to play a lot of organ or I learn it lacks those CZ PCM waveforms, you’d get the “DJ” version.

We know these are shipping in March and April, and that’s about it. I obviously need to pay the Casio booth a visit and find out if they’ll say anything about price, and get a look at these crazy-looking control layouts.

This NAMM, more than is even typical for NAMM, seems to fold back in time. I’m not sure if it’s 1978, 1988, or 1996. Or, at times, I think I may be at Macworld in the iPhone section.

I just wouldn’t write this keyboard off yet, as it might be some fun. It’s biggest challenge is going up against more-focused offerings from KORG that focus on pattern, looping, and other features. I’ll check it out.

Now, I’m just going to be very, very careful talking to US TSA airport security and Customs, because I don’t want to wind up in a “designated rubber holding space” on my way out of here Saturday.

Official PR announcement

Nod to Synthtopia, whom I’m fairly sure aren’t sleeping

One is a keytar. One is a master controller with touch faders and real MIDI and — control voltage, for working with analog gear. Seriously. The keyboard controller market may have faded into a dull, gray blur of nearly-identical models, but under the Alesis and Akai monikers, there’s some fresh-looking variety. Love it or hate it, these are not the same keyboards you’ll get from anybody else at the moment.

I got to meet with Alesis/Akai/Numark today at the NAMM Press Preview, get my hands on a prototype of their new Vortex keytar, and talk about what they’re doing. And I have to say, I’m impressed. (I didn’t get hands on the second model, the MAX49, but will visit their booth in the next couple of days.) Finally, we get the return of the MIDI DIN port for working with a wider range of hardware, without sacrificing USB. One model even does CV for analog equipment. And both can supply their own power so you can use them with iOS. And they at least are interesting enough to have an opinion about them – even if you hate them.

Here’s a look at each of them and what why they’ll be on our radar when they ship later this year.

Alesis Vortex Keytar

First off, let me say it, once and for all: I don’t think there’s anything dorky about a keytar, other than the name. Us keyboardists are plenty capable of being dorky on our own, but don’t blame the instrument.

What keytars are – or strap-on keyboards, if you can say that without smirking – is eminently practical for one-handed playing. For two-handed playing or more conventional piano or organ parts, of course, you’re better off without them. But the keytar lets you move around, play expressive solos, and also free up your hands if you’re using other machines, as in electronic music. Unfortunately, the options out there have been overly large, making them too unweildly for many people to play, and overly expensive, pricing them out of a lot of their market. I’ve played and advocated the Rock Band game controller because it’s lightweight, inexpensive, and nicely made, and it even has a MIDI jack. I actually hear one Harmonix veteran is now at Alesis, so that may be no coincidence. (The Vortex even has a touch strip on its neck.)

The Vortex, though, looks like the first really balanced keytar controller in the market … well, ever. Features:

• MIDI DIN and USB MIDI
• Velocity-sensitive pads in addition to the keys
• 37 velocity-sensitive keys (good number for a keytar), plus channel aftertouch (heck, yes)
• MIDI-assignable accelerometer. And this is cool – it’s not on all the time; you make a quick sweep of the neck to enable the accelerometer in a clever gesture control.
• MIDI-assignable touch strip, but also a full pitch bend wheel underneath your thumb (I rather prefer the latter, but it’s nice to have a choice).
• Assignable slider under your thumb, mapped by default to volume.
• Dedicated sustain button, plus octave selection, transport, and patch select.

With all due respect to Roland, this appears to fix effectively all of my complaints about the Roland keytars at a fraction of the price.

And you can add a strap via standard guitar strap pegs.

The best part:
Q2-2012
MSRP US$399
Estimated street US$249

http://www.alesis.com/vortex

Akai Pro MAX49: Touch Faders, CV

I’ve all but begged manufacturers to explore what an advanced or high-end MIDI controller would look like. The MAX49 likely won’t please everyone, but it’s one compelling-looking answer. Features:

• 49 semi-weighted keys, with channel aftertouch
• 12 MPC pads, backlit, four banks each
• 8 LED touch faders in place of physical faders, four banks each
• Control Voltage and analog Gate outputs for use with analog and vintage gear
• Arpeggiator with latch
• Step sequencer
• MPC swing, Note Repeat, Full Level, navigation – and yeah, I use this stuff, even if the software can do the same
  USB MIDI, MIDI DIN, connect to anything
• Control surface mappings plus full Mackie Control and HUI support – and, sorry, but for all the fancier solutions, sometimes that’s the easiest way to control a variety of software like Ableton Live, Reason, and the other DAWs

So, basically, all the features you want. My only questions are what it looks like in person and how the action feels, particularly those touch faders, as that can be tricky to pull off.

But the features are just perfect. It’s about time to bring back aftertouch and to connect with actual MIDI gear. Adding CV is a delicious addition. And honestly, features like being able to switch on an arpeggiator are far more useful and appealing to average musicians than the hard-to-configure, often-gimmicky automatic control features on many of the keyboards out there. So I’ve got my fingers crossed that the build quality and usability here are good — and that some of Akai’s rivals start taking on similar features. It’s bizarre to be applauding adding features from the 80s and 70s, but some recent progress has been steps backward, not forward.

Q2 2012
MSRP US$699
Estimated street $499

http://www.akaipro.com/max49

There are other new Alesis keyboards out this week, but the Akai MAX49 pretty much steals their thunder.

More Vortex Photos

Back to the Vortex, since I got to snap some shots this morning in Anaheim.

Discuss.

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

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

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

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

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

The Hardware, Impressions

Hardware specs:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

MIDI Mapping

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Applications

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

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

Dave’s got a new keyboard, and the headline gives it all away: it’s a Mopho, but adding keys and more control, all for $800.

There’s a myth out there that the computer music user and hardware synth lover are two different people. Au contraire, mon ami. Thanks, indeed, to Dave Smith himself, the computer and the synth get along just fine. But if you’ve got scant few dollars, which synth is really unique enough, elegant enough in use to justify those dollars?

Dave Smith Instruments is on the top of the list. They’ve got personality, accessibility, and terrific sound. And the DSI instruments are even starting to look like they themselves recognize the invention of the computer, with the addition of USB MIDI and software editors. Oh, yeah, and Dave Smith’s creations are also uncommonly good values: analog synths the everyman can afford. The new Mopho keyboard is in late prototype phase, and it already looks to fill that mold.

The Mopho keyboard has all the analog sonic goodness of the mopho synth module, an overwhelming CDM reader favorite in 2008. Like the Mopho module, you get a rich monophonic analog synth on a budget. That voice is roughly the equivalent of a single voice from the Prophet ’08, but with the addition of sub-octave generators and audio input and feedback options. Because you can input audio signal, that makes the Mopho a doubly-interesting possibility alongside a computer, as basically a big modulation source. (The Moog Little Phatty has earned some fans for the same reason.)

The one thing I didn’t much like on the Mopho module was its minimalist controller section. The keyboard is different, as you can see in our rough video walk-through. There’s a clever set of controls that let you manipulate either oscillator 1, oscillator 2, or both simultaneously. The knobs themselves feel lovely, too, and you have a lot more onboard programmability. There’s MIDI-controlled feedback. And there are pots everywhere, without any menu diving – nearly everything is accessible via shift keys.

What I also love about the Mopho is its compact size; it’s easy to carry and lift.

As always, some of the biggest competition to Dave Smith’s synths are other Dave Smith synths. So you do have to weight the Mopho keyboard against the Mono and Poly Evolver keyboards. Those have deeper sound architectures (even on the Mono Evolver), and while they don’t have 100% analog signal path, you don’t (cough) really need that, necessarily.

There aren’t any specs up on the Dave Smith site, and even the final appearance may differ slightly. (I liked the little bit of yellow peeking out from beneath the more refined wood and front panel; I hope that makes it onto the finished model.) But you can expect the Mopho keyboard very soon, some time this spring, at MAP US$799. Stay tuned.

Dave Smith Instruments

(PS, I’m blanking on the name of the gentleman in the video and I neglected to photo your name badge as I should, so since my memory is worse than a preset-less early analog synth, please drop me a line.)

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?)

Strings of tour dates and electronic music often mean crowd-friendly dance music, but there’s a growing, impassioned audience for more contemplative concert sounds, too. Composer-musicians Lesley Flanigan and Tristan Perich are pulling into the last stop on an extended tour of their work, here in New York Friday at Galapagos Art Space. For many, electronic music, in particular that made with computers, becomes about abstraction. For this duo, electronics become a chance to grow even closer to the tangible, acoustic sound – techniques they share in workshops as well as performances.

And would you believe… antique harpsichord?

In the tracks below, you can hear some of the results. Lesley’s work begins with harsh, crackling ambient sounds, but move into delicate, sung harmonies. Tristan’s work goes another direction entirely, combining his 1-bit electronics with elaborate keyboard textures. Those become a kind of post-minimalist jam; “Dual Synthesis” even begins to recall the composer György Ligeti’s micro-polyphony. Tristan’s harmonic language is inventive, set into abruptly-shifting, asymmetrical phrases and polyrhythms.

Allow yourself to slip deeper into their musical world, and the sounds become increasingly welcome.

I asked the two artists, known under their solo names as well as part of the ensemble Loud Objects, to send us some sounds and notes from the road. Be sure to catch them tomorrow night if you can, and I hope we’ll get more music from them soon, as well, especially with Tristan’s upcoming 1-bit album due soon. (And naturally, with Loud Objects and Handmade Music, we hope to share some of the electronics behind some of their sounds, too.)

Music to hear

Lesley Flanigan: “Snow” (for speaker electronics and voice) from her album Amplifications

Snow [MP3 download]

Lesley Flanigan: “Thinking Real Hard” (for speaker electronics and voice) from her album Amplifications

Thinking Real Hard [MP3 download]

Tristan Perich: “Dual Synthesis” (for harpsichord and four-channel 1-bit electronics) excerpts from live performance at Eliot Street Collective, Denver, CO

Dual Synthesis, excerpts/live [MP3 download]

Tristan Perich: “qsqsqsqsqqqqqqqqq” (for three toy pianos and three-channel 1-bit electronics)
from live performance at Issue Project Room, Brooklyn, NY

qsqsqsqsqqqqqqqqq [MP3 download]

Notes from Tristan and Lesley

We’re on the home stretch of our US tour; we’re sharing a blowout homecoming show with New Amsterdam Records and the NOW Ensemble on December 18th at Galapagos.

The tour has centered on two performances: Tristan’s new composition for antique harpsichord and 1-bit electronics (Dual Synthesis), and Lesley’s work for hand-crafted speaker feedback instruments and voice (Amplifications). We both deal with similar ideas of physicality of electronic sound, treating electric instrumentation as acoustic. Each of our sets has paired traditional instruments (harpsichord and voice) with our own primitive hand-built electronics (1-bit circuits and amplifying feedback circuits). A few of the early shows alternated with Tristan and Kunal Gupta’s noise soldering project, the Loud Objects.

We hit up a multitude of different kinds of spaces, from art galleries in San Francisco, Chicago and Nashville, community-run venues in Providence, St Louis, Denver and LA, colleges like Wesleyan and Ball State, a bar in Milwaukee, to a science museum in Little Rock and a ton of other spaces in between. We also got to debut our new albums: Tristan’s 1-Bit Symphony (which will be officially released by Cantaloupe Music in the Spring), and Lesley’s Amplifications.

It was great to check out the local experimental scenes, and share shows with our favorite musicians along the way, like Joe Grimm, Lucky Dragons, Jib Kidder, Travis Weller and Blevin Blectum. A bunch of people even told us they found out about our work on Create Digital Music.

Oh yeah, we also hosted a couple Loud Objects noise-toy making workshops along the way (you remember how we like to do this ).  One was at Noisebridge in San Francisco and another was at a prep school in Little Rock. We’re hoping to get involved with more schools doing this stuff. You can check out what we’ve been making on loudobjects.com.

Looking forward to finally getting back to NYC!

For more information:

www.lesleyflanigan.com

www.tristanperich.com

Feel free to forward comments / questions for Lesley and Tristan and I can send them their way for follow-up.

All photos courtesy the artists.

KORG has other new product announcements, and I think both are going to be big hits for them.

The SV-1 stage piano falls well into the category of “why didn’t anyone else do this first?” First, it looks beautiful – finally, a keyboard designed for the stage that actually looks good onstage. (I don’t know, maybe manufacturers assume us keyboardists are ugly?) Second, it combines all the sounds many gigging keyboardists need, instead of an odd assortment that covers some bases but not all, or overkill workstation keyboards that do too much and get too complex. Third, it’s finally a hardware keyboard that learns some recent lessons from software – you need to model the characteristics of the real thing, and people expect good amp models, and the like. Fourth, it’s… okay, it’s just really, really pretty, which I expect will change how everyone feels about the whole package.

Updated: Yes, in fairness, Nord has potent competition waiting for the KORG, and available first. I think either the Nord Stage or Nord Combo win handily if organ sounds are important, and both are designed to double as external controllers if you do like software. The Nord also has more bells and whistles for editing and sound control. On the other hand, the KORG will clearly appeal to people who are in it mainly for the electric piano side of the coin. And pretty as the Nord is – as much as they’re both shades of red – I think the KORG is still pretty darned sexy-looking.

In addition to all the specs and such, KORG has the manual online, so you can get into the details.

SV1 Support

Oh, yeah, just one gripe – I always think it’s silly when you put a window in front of the tube. But I won’t knock it; I expect it helps on the sales floor. At least the side that faces the audience looks like a racecar.

Now, I have just one request for the whole industry: some of us really do like our computers. Can we please, please have one top-flight software keyboard controller that’s worth spending extra dollars on and looks like it means business? Unfortunately, the industry has decided the “pros” want nice hardware keyboards, and anyone using software is probably a basement producer – which is why you see the pros, when they want a software controller, using hardware like the Yamaha Motif for the job even when there’s no actual sound coming out of it.

The other announcement is a redesigned WAVEDRUM. For those of you who haven’t discovered the Cult of Wavedrum (and the rival Roland Handsonic), this may be a bigger deal than you think. As it happens, the electronic music world often wants stuff that doesn’t fall in a predictable category. Digital virtual bongo head? Why, yes, people want that – to play virtual conga or tabla, or just as a controller for other sounds. The new Wavedrum is built with more sounds, more effects, and more sensors for a wider sonic palette, including newer features like physically-modeled sounds and the ability to apply different effects to different parts of the surface. I’m guessing it’s still no match for boutique controllers, but it could give the Handsonic a serious run for its money – not least because it looks a heck of a lot better. (Hey, it matters.)

WAVEDRUM Product Page

Let us know if either of these items strike your fancy and I can dig up more from my Long Island neighbors at KORG.

It aims to do what for sampling what the insanely-popular microKORG keyboard has done for synths: that is, invade bedrooms and bands everywhere, and inspire a kind of love that other hardware finds elusive. But it also combines the micro-keyboard form factor and mic with everything that has made the KAOSS Pad series popular. It’s kind of a bundle of things about KORG that the masses love. So, perhaps that’s why the microSAMPLER leaked well before its introduction. I’m about the last to cover it, I think, so let’s see if I can get right to the point of what the microSAMPLER looks to be, and what it isn’t.

It’s a sampler for keyboard lovers. As the video notes, the world doesn’t need another sampler with pads. The keyboard is put to good use. It’s velocity-sensitive, though with mini keys to keep it compact. You can map different samples to different keys, slicing up your sample so that different lengths (from a 64th note to two measures). You can give keys different one-shot samples, for drum-style sounds. You can play looped samples. And you can map a single sample across the keyboard.

It’s built for capturing live. The mic has been torture-tested in lousy acoustic environments and onstage in the microKORG. It’s the design of the interface that makes this fun – and potentially worth considering over the software solutions that aim to do the same stuff. “Auto-Next” mode lets you tap in BPM from a source and automatically slice on the fly.

That isn’t an iPhone slot. The microSAMPLER has slots in which you can stick stuff, as noted by engadget. Yes, the photos and videos show iPhones and iPods, but they aren’t a dock, and you can put something more interesting in there – like a Game Boy or a PSP running LGPT. Rich Formidoni, the specialist you see in the video, tells me he’s tempted to use them for pretzels or mints. Heck yes. You can even sample the crunching sound. And I have just two words: aftermarket cupholder. (Coming soon to the CDM Store?)

You can resample and add effects. Resampling lets you “bounce” samples with effects or grab your playing to produce new samples. And the effects are borrowed from the KAOSS series, including tasty and distinctive-sounding ring modulator and grain shifter effects.

Loops and patterns. You can overdub pattern recordings into a pattern sequencer, switch between patterns, and take advantage of a loop recording feature derived from the KAOSSILATOR.

It’s really, totally ugly. I mean that as a compliment. Like somewhere deep in the Korg product design archives, the case design for the microSAMPLER has been lurking in a pile of schematic drawings from 1986. Not ugly in the bizarre way, like when KORG unveiled a camouflage version of the microKORG (handy for use in a duck blind). Ugly in a cool way, as if we’ve always had microSAMPLERs. Is “timelessly dated” a phrase?

It’s lo-fi when you want it to be. You can sample at a full 48 kHz (though, oddly, not at 44.1), but you can also crank down to 12 or 6 kHz for retro sampling capabilities. Updated: there is a decimator, too. I didn’t see it in the specs, but the microSAMPLER in fact has a 24-bit to 4-bit decimator effect. You can resample that, so while you can’t natively sample at lower bitrates, you get the same result.

It weighs only 4 pounds, and connects to your computer via USB, with editor/librarian software for Windows and Mac and import of WAV/AIFF files.

It runs on batteries.

Sample memory: 8 banks, 39 samples per bank, 160 seconds maximum per sample, for a total of between 21 and 170 minutes of mono samples depending on your sampling rate. (Check the specs.) That seems just enough to sacrifice some of the flexibility of computers with the accessibility of hardware.

US$750 I believe is list price, so, given what we’ve seen from KORG products before, expect a street below that.

The KORG piece is not without competition. Roland has just unveiled an updated version of its popular SP-404, the SP-404SX. It’s really the opposite of this unit; it’s a conventional, compact rectangle with pads as controllers. (Actually, it’s too bad Roland doesn’t have an option for a gooseneck mic for the SP-404.) At the other end of the spectrum, Native Instruments and Tim Exile have their own software-style solution to how to sample creatively live, using Reaktor under the hood – which means you get some very different-sounding granular effects than what’s accomplished by the KORG DSP. That’s to say nothing of loop samplers in the recent versions of Logic and Live. And I’m personally intrigued to see other takes on how to put together live samplers. In fact, I don’t think you could really compare any of these methods – we’re lucky enough to have commercial and DIY solutions that provide a range of options. So mostly what I’d like to see, aside from looking at the hardware, is people doing interesting creative an artistic work with these capabilities. There’s certainly no excuse for boring performances. Sample on. (Now, I’d better go off and practice.)

Updated: how loop recording works. In fact, you can get LoopStation-style loops which loop at the length of the initial recording. But likely to be more ideal is the ability to match tempo on the fly. Here’s an explanation from product specialist Rich:

The length of a conventional sample won’t determine the system tempo… but when you’re using the Looper effect, which records like a Kaossilator, it will continue to loop the same amount of time you used to record.

It does work the other way around, though. Samples can be set to timestretch on the fly, on an individual basis, to fit whatever the tapped system tempo is.

I think that actually covers what most people want – even if it would be cool to set the primary tempo to the length of a loop.

Depeche Mode’s latest album, “Sounds of the Universe,” is due April 20 internationally. I got the chance to cover the band for Keyboard Magazine, speaking with Martin Gore and Andrew Fletcher as well as returning producer Ben Hillier, who was a big part of the signature sound of 2005′s “Playing the Angel.” Martin developed eBay and KVR Audio addictions during the making of the album, so you can imagine just how much gear love was part of the process – with the talent of the musicians and Hillier’s vision as a producer managing to keep the resulting sound open and polished.

You’ll get to read the finished story in the May issue of Keyboard – meaning there’s still time to subscribe if (ahem) your subscription may have lapsed. But my editor at Keyboard got a great brainstorm. Ben Hillier and 140 dB sent us some spy photos from inside the studio, so Keyboard has posted those shots and challenge their readers to identify just what’s going on.

Depeche Mode Behind the Scenes – Part I
Part II (with contest)
Part III

I’m doing this for entirely selfish reasons. One, I’d find it hilarious if a CDM reader won the contest. Two, I’m quite curious about the gear that isn’t identified with numbers or labeled in the captions. Now, I know what some of it is, but consider it a bonus challenge to those who find the first five too easy. (Well, some are very blurry shots, so that should help keep the difficulty amped up…) For those extras, feel free to comment here. (Well, obviously not the contest entries, or you’ll spoil the contest.)

As a thank-you, the winner gets the new album and a free subscription to the magazine.

This is not the contest image at top – it’s Martin Gore with the very gifted recording engineer Ferg Peterkin (whose name I also find strangely comforting).

Good luck. I’ll keep my mouth shut. We’ll have more available online, including some words from Ben Hillier on the techniques used in production, when the issue ships – stay tuned.