Tutorials, Truques E Dicas

[spock]

Welcome!

This site exists because over the years, I've accumulated a few little methods for producing electronic music from personal experience and online tutorials. Now it's time for me to share what I've learned and help you become a better electronic musician! For the screenshots on this site, I used Reason and FL Studio, two popular audio software suites. The following tips are mostly generalized and can be applied to various different programs. It's not about the software, it's about the techniques you use with the software that counts. *Notice* this site is still under construction. Please be patient!

 

Most material by Cameron Gaut, other stuff pulled from various web sites

 

 

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Where to start

Don't stop listening to music

What kind of music do you want to create? Do you want to limit yourself to a specific genre, or do you want to mix and match elements to create a new style of music? This site is aimed at electronic music in general, but the advice is applicable to many genres. Whether you want to imitate existing styles or create your own, one of the most important things you can do to become a better producer is to listen to other producers constantly. Before you sit down and create some music, listen to your favorite artists. If the song has lyrics, don't pay attention to them. Rather, listen closely to all the little details that your average listener wouldn't catch. Once you start listening attentively, you will begin to pick up on all sorts of tips and tricks on your own.

 

Get your feet wet

Check out this PDF guide from Computer Music Magazine It will give you lots of info on which computer software to use if you have little or no money at all.

 

To make any sense out of all the knobs and terminology that any software synth will confront you with, check out the University of Oregon's

Electronic Music Interactive.

 

More useful links...

Once you get a sequencer program, you'll want to collect a personal library of vst instruments, samples and effects. Check out these links for the goods.

 

Synth 1 Check out this free vst synth. It doesn't look like much, but you can run many of these and use hardly any processor power. Make sure to get the preset pack as well. From this site (in Japanese)

Buzz Machines: The free "easy-to-use" modular software synth

Freebyte Music Zone: Lots of free audio software links

Free VST Plugins: kt granulator, cyclotron, malty, granola, cosmo, ggrain

More free VST Plugins: Anechoic Room Simulator, Bouncy (Aphex Twin style delay), Crazy Ivan, Cyanide 2.0, H2O, MadShifta, OnePingOnly, s(M)exoscope, SupaPhaser, SupaTrigga , Midi 2 Hz, WinCell, WinGrain

Sample Resource Tribe find samples here and connect with the tribe.net community. Also, try this thread, which is a great list of free sample sites.

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Song Intros

 

 

If you think of a song as an arrangement of layers of audio, then it makes most sense to begin a track with one or two layers. Instead of jumping right into a beat, it helps to ease the listener into the song. The intro gives the listener an idea of what the rest of the song will be like. It sets the mood, and at raves or other dance parties, it gives dancers a chance to catch their breath and rest for a bit.

 

If you are writing a downtempo or ambient song, it's good to start the track out with sound effects with lots of delay on them. Try finding some sounds from the special effect presets on your synth. You want to 'hook' the listener from the first few seconds of your track. I can't tell you how many producers start their tracks with a basic drum loop that stretches on way too long before anything interesting happens. In my opinion, that's a very boring way to start a track.

 

 

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Transitions

If you're like me, you like songs that can tell a story, even without words. In order to create a song that can tell a story, it must be able to communicate different emotions throughout the length of the song. This means that your song may contain several different themes all together. So, your song will need to be able to smoothly transition between the different elements. I find that the easiest way to accomplish this is to gradually (or suddenly) drop out most of the layers in your track, leaving only one or two different sounds or instruments. Then introduce a new element that sounds good with the last remaining layers, and use a buildup to introduce a new section. Now you can drop out those last remaining layers, and now you have a completely different vibe!

 

 

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Drums (and Drum Loops):

No doubt about it, drums are what moves the song along in time. Drums make your beat danceable; it gives a rhythm to your song that people can tap their foot or bob their head to. It's important to pay attention to your drum tracks. Who wants a stale, lifeless loop playing over and over again? Nobody, that's who.

 

EQing cymbals

"Although Cymbals are associated with high frequencies, a boost between 100 and 300Hz can help to emphasize the clunk of the stick on a ride cymbal or hi-hat. The ringing overtones of crash and ride cymbals can be brought up within the 1-6kHz area, while the sizzle of any of the cymbals can be emphasized in the 8-12kHz range."

(from Sound on Sound)

 

EQing the Kick drum:

"The punch component of most bass drums lies between about 80 and 100Hz. Below this area, you'll mostly feel, rather than hear, any boost, and it's easy to overdo. Warmer kick sounds major on the 200-300Hz region. When the kick needs to cut through on smaller speakers, then you might also consider a boost in the region of 2.5-6kHz, which will tend to emphasize the click of the beater."

(from Sound on Sound)

 

If you want a dull sounding kick for mellow tracks, you can apply a lowpass filter to it to create a low thump with no high-end whatsoever. For trance and breakbeats, it's good to add some high frequencies to the kick so it has a little bit of click to it. This will give the kick much more presence and make your track more danceable. You should apply two separate EQ curves to the kick to achieve this. One EQ curve should emphasize the low frequencies (which usually are just below the bass frequency range. you don't want the kick and bass to reside in the same frequency because that will result in a muddy sound) The other EQ curve should be just above the bass frequency range. The combination of these two EQ curves will give you a "saddle" for the bass to sit in.

 

Expressive hi-hats:

 

Figure A

Figure B If you don't want your hi-hat track to sound mechanical and lifeless, then you need to vary your patterns. This can be done with a few different tricks. First, alter the note velocities to create accents as seen in figure A. A good starting point is accenting the first of every three or four hits. Make the velocity on these hits higher than all the other hits. Second, set the hi-hat's volume envelope to the following settings (and as seen in figure :

Attack = 0, Decay = just above 0, Sustain = 0, Release = 0.

Now you can automate the decay time to make the hi-hat hit shorter or longer. This emulates the sound of a hi-hat being closed tighter or looser.

 

 

Fat, smacking snare drum:

"The fatness of the snare tends to reside between 120 and 400Hz. A boxy sound is indicative of comparatively high energy in the 800Hz-1.2kHz range, whereas the resonances of the drum's ringing reside above this, between about 2-4kHz. The crispness of the drum's attack tends to reside more in the 4-8kHz region."

(from Sound on Sound)

 

A well-known trick to beefen up your snares is to combine two snares with complementary characteristics. For example, combine one snare that has a nice snap to it with another snare that has a thump to it. Optionally, you can EQ the snares to accentuate these characteristics. EQ the lower pitched snare with a lower EQ and a higher EQ to the one with more snap to it. This will result in a slap-you-in-the-face snare sound.

 

Try adding a little bit of delay to your snare. A delay of 3 steps will give you an interesting syncopated effect. You can alternately use a delay with a setting of just 2 steps for the dub/reggae feel.

 

Create unique drum loop remixes quickly in Reason

When you use the Dr. Rex loop player, you can easily change the pattern to break the monotony of looping something over and over. Here's how: on the Rex player, there is a button labeled "to track". Press that, and notice that in the sequencer view, the space between your left and right loop points will fill up with colored boxes. Right click (or ctrl+click for mac users) on one of the colored boxes (this is a group of notes), and then choose "Change Events" from the pop-up menu. This gives you many options for changing a group of notes. You want to use the "Alter Notes" functions. This will randomize the notes according to whatever percentage you choose. Now listen to the loop, it will be remixed. Granted, it is somewhat randomized, so you may have to switch over to the note view and change it to your liking. But this is a really great way to come up with drum tracks in a matter of minutes. Try it on a whole bunch of note groups all at once and listen to all of them. Chances are, there will be some remix of the notes that's a real keeper.

 

Double the speed of a Rex loop in Reason

for those times when your loops in Dr. Rex are twice as slow or twice as fast as your song, there is an easy way to slow down the loop or speed it up. In the sequencer view, select a group of notes and right click on one of them. Then select "Change events". You will see an input that is labeled "Scale tempo". If you want to double the speed, type 200% and then press ok. Otherwise, typ 50%. You can experiment with this for interesting loop speed variations

 

Explore some more

Here are a few helpful links dealing with drums and drum patterns

 

Tweakheadz: how to write original drum tracks

Tweakheadz: make your studio drum tracks come alive

 

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Bass

Making your bassline thump

Do you have a problem making your basslines thump in different audio systems? Do they sound nice on one set of speakers, but weak on the next? Are you having a hard time getting the power you want from your basslines without making the mix too muddy? Here are a few tips on how to make your basslines bang.

 

The Frequency Range

If you want your bass to bang in a system with nice subwoofers AND in crappy home shelf systems, it is pointless to use a bass patch whose energy lies only below 40 Hz, because most home systems will not play sounds that low in frequency. You need to make sure bass has a lot going on in the 70-90 Hz frequency range. So just how do you do this? How do you get a sound that is both felt and heard on a number of different speaker systems?

 

Layering Other Waveforms

The sine and triangle wave produces that low thumping bass tone we electronic composers love (e.g. sub bass, 808 boom, DnB drone). These waveforms have few or no harmonics, so they are felt more than they are heard. If using a synth (or even a sampler), try layering these waveforms with a waveform rich in harmonics, such as a square or saw wave. After layering, use the synth's or sampler's low pass filter cutoff to trim away some of the higher harmonics from this new bass patch.

 

Distorting for Harmonics

Start with your favorite bass sound, one that happens to be low in harmonics (like the sub bass and synth bass discussed above), and add some distortion/overdrive. Use anything with a tube (e.g. tube preamps, tube compressors) or a dedicated distortion unit (e.g. guitar distortion pedals, computer plug-ins, etc). This will add harmonics to the bass sound so that it will be heard in a higher register for those people with less ideal speaker systems, but still felt for those of us using speakers with more bass response.

 

Octaves

If programming with a synth or sampler, use two oscillators (or create a multi-layered sampler patch). Set one the oscillators/layers to be an octave below the other. Lower the volume on the higher octave layer so that it is just heard. This will ensure that your thumping bass patch can be heard in both the lower and mid frequency range.

 

Percussive Attack

Another approach is to layer your bass patch with a percussive sound, such as a bass drum. Lengthen the attack of the percussive sound to make it less drum like. To do this, raise the attack time on the amp envelop of your sampler or synth (this is usually the “A” of the ADSR on most synth’s and samplers). If you cannot do this with your sampler, use any wave editing software you may have (or your sampler’s sample editor) to slightly fade in the percussive sound, then save it as a new sound. Layer this new percussive sound with your bass patch. This will make the bass patch punchier, and thus help it to cut through the mix, even on a system with low bass response.

 

Real Bass

Yet another layering approach is to layer your deep synth bass patch with a real bass. This can either be an actual recorded bass guitar, or a patch in your sample library that sounds like a real bass. Since real basses are usually higher in frequency and more punchy than synth basses, your the deep bass will be heard and felt more on systems with good bass response, but the real bass layered over the top will be heard more for those with less fortunate systems.

 

Enhancements

Another tip is to use a bass enhancement plug-in (such as Waves MaxxBass), which essentially adds psychoacoustically calculated harmonics to the sound in order to trick the human ear into believing that the missing lower bass frequencies are actually there. This occurs because the human’s auditory system has the ability to recreate missing fundamental frequencies from remaining harmonics present in the bass tone. Bass enhancement systems will allow you to bring this out in your bass sound.

 

Compression is Key

Ever made a bassline that switched between lower and higher notes throughout the song? The low notes are fine in relation to the volume, but the higher notes stick out like a sore thumb? Or the higher notes are fine, but the lower notes are too low to be heard? To correct that problem, try a little compression. Do not over do it though, or you will kill all the dynamics and emotion in the bass part. With basses, start with a threshold of between -5db to -15db, and a ratio of between 3:1 to 8:1. If you are using a synth-like bass, a quick attack would be advised. If you are using a more plucked or slappy type bass, use a longer attack to allow for the initial “pluck” to pass through uncompressed, but the rest of the note to be compressed.

 

tutorial from futureproducers.com

 

 

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Melodic patterns:

Sequencing with the pencil

Sometimes it's just easier to draw melodies in a sequencer than it is to actually play the melody on a keyboard. Especially if your music is fast. Essentially what you will be doing is drawing a rhythmic pattern composed of note segments that can be organized within a scale. Most software sequencers have 2 dimensions: The horizontal, or time dimension, and the vertical, or pitch dimension. As the playhead progresses along from left to right, the notes that are drawn on the horizontal lines are played. The rest of this section will be divided into two parts, one for each dimension.

 

 

 

Rhythm

The vertical lines in a sequencer are what slice up musical notes in time. Depending on what resolution you are viewing your sequence at, there can be many variations between how closely the vertical lines are spaced. But before we can look at the divisions of time, we must talk about time signature.

 

The time signature tells you how many beats are in a bar and what note or rest is equivalent to one beat. Most time signatures are 4/4, but things can get interesting when you change the time signature. Whenever the second (or lower) number of a time signature is 4, this means that one beat is equal to a quarter note. When the second number is 8, one beat is equal to an eigth note. For a more detailed explanation, click here.

 

For a 4/4 time signature:

1 bar = 4 beats (4 quarter notes) = 16 sixteenth notes = 32 thirty-second notes

As you can see, there are many different resolutions that you can split 1 bar into. Typically, resolutions of 1/32 and 1/64 are in the realm of microediting because any change of notes at these divisions will sound very quick.

 

Say this out loud to get an idea of what 16th notes are like:

"1 e and a 2 e and a 3 e and a 4 e and a"

This whole phrase is equal to one bar. Each utterance equals a 16th note. Count 'em up, you'll see that there are 16 separate divisions.

 

Vary your note lengths: If you want your melodies to be expressive and interesting to listen to, you must vary your note lengths. After drawing a sequence of notes, try altering the length of the notes and shifting them from the left or to the right in the sequencer.

 

Vary your note velocity: Same as if you're programming a drum track. Unless you specifically want a track to sound mechanical and computerized, you should randomize your note velocities a bit. All the while, loop your sequence and listen to it as you go. You will get sick of it eventually, and that's when you know that it's time for a break.

 

Melody (horizontal lines)

The two most basic musical scales are Major and Minor. Major scales typically can sound happy, bright or easy-going, and a minor scale can sound dark, sad or menacing. Now, in a sequencer, each horizontal line represents one step.

 

There are 12 "half-steps" in each octave (# = sharp, b = flat):

C, C# (or Db), D, D# (or Eb), E, F, F# (or Gb), G, G# (or Ab), A# (or Bb), B

In a step sequencer, each half-step is represented by one horizontal line.

 

All musical scales are basically a repetition of intervals between notes that are picked from these 12 half-steps. (A whole step is two half steps). A musical scale begins at a root note, or a tonic, and each following note's position is determined by the scale pattern.

 

Here's an example of a C Major scale:

C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C (all white keys)

This can be represented a different way which makes it easy to play any major scale just by counting half-steps:

Whole step, whole step, half step, whole step, whole step, whole step, half step

(W, W, H, W, W, W, H)

 

C Minor scale:

C, D, D#, F, G, G#, A#

Again, represented in terms of whole steps and half steps:

W, H, W, W, H, W, W

 

Learn more about intervals and see some other popular scales here.

 

So, when you're drawing notes in a sequencer, keep your scale in mind. It may help to begin by figuring out a scale and drawing notes stacked up on top of each other as a reference for seeing which notes are in that scale. Now you can experiment by drawing different patterns within that scale and refining your pattern as you listen to it over and over.

 

Expressive melodies

So, you don't want your melodies to be boring? My first suggestion would be to come up with different variations on a melody that you can use as a loop. Then vary which loop you use in the sequencer. For example, if you wrote two melodies (we'll call them A and and then made a variation on B (call that one C), you could sequence A B A C. This is a very common pattern. Or perhaps try A A B B, or A B A B, etc. My next suggestion is automation of several different knobs on your synth. For example, you can automate the cutoff frequency, vibrato, volume, modulation depth, etc. One trick I commonly use on my synths is to route an LFO to the filter cutoff frequency. Then I route the modulation wheel on my keyboard to the LFO's depth (the LFO speed should be synced with the tempo at 1/8th or 1/16th). You could also route the modulation wheel to the LFO's speed for an interesting combo-modulation. The modulation wheel on any midi keyboard is handy for live performances. But when it comes to sequencing, there are no limits to how many automation tracks you can use. I suggest automating many parameters at once to keep things interesting. For an example, listen to the solo synth on my track, "your best shot". In this track, I am automating the cutoff frequency for those intense moments (on a low-pass filter), amount of vibrato (depth of LFO routed to cutoff frequency), and amount of delay (via the auxillary send knob). All of these combine to make for an expressive, almost human-like quality to the synth.

 

 

In this screenshot of my song, (made with Ableton Live), you can see the automation of the vibrato amount overlayed on top of the notes. Listen to the melody shown in this image.

 

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Edits:

Edits refer to the little changes between elements in your song that make it flow well.

 

Buildups

The best buildups I can think of are by Infected Mushroom. They use many of the techniques described below to create tension before a beat busts in and you just HAVE to dance. Buildups will combine many of the following tricks all in one go for full effect.

 

Deconstruction of a buildup:

Listen to this example from infected mushroom's "sailing in the sea of mushroom". Notice all the different components used in this segment to create tension. They used a very long reverse hit, they introduced new, different layers each bar or so. They also automated the cutoff filter of the lead gated synth. Then when the buildup reached its peak, everything was silenced as a drumloop kicked in and another shorter reverse cymbal played. Then it reintroduces the full ensemble of layers for that full intensity effect.

 

Filter cutoff automation

This is a widely used technique for giving an instrument more life, and for creating buildups. In most software sequencers, you can automate knob settings over time. One of these is the cutoff frequency of a filter. Try using a low-pass filter or high-pass filter on a sound and automate the cutoff frequency.

 

Check out this example from "echonomix" by infected mushroom. They are using a high-pass filter and automating the cutoff frequency here.

 

Reverse hits

One of the most popular reverse hits is a reverse cymbal. You hear it all the time in pop or techno songs. The reverse cymbal crash leads to the next bar. It works well as a buildup and transition. To make your own reverse hit, try taking a nice loud percussive sound that hits and then gets quieter from there on out. Then in any sound editor such as Audacity, reverse the sound. Save it and import it into your sequencer with a sampler. Then experiment with the amount of time you have to play the sound so that it reaches its peak right at the point where the next bar begins.

 

Example (94k wav file) : The reversed sound of a metal barrel being hit (I use this one all the time as a precursor to a huge transition)

 

Example 2: a cool free reverse hit on freesound

 

Reverse Reverb

Another popular reversal effect that is used all the time by radio DJ's and pop/electronic artists. I can't accurately describe in words. So listen to the example instead:

Source Sound and Processed Sound

 

In order to achieve this effect, you only need to follow 3 simple steps:

 

Reverse the sound file

Add reverb and/or delay to the sound

Reverse it again

Microediting

 

Microedits in ReasonSometimes it's good to have your music do things a human normally could not. The technique I call microediting has gained much popularity in the past decade, and it is featured in music such as Aphex Twin, Squarepusher, Mum, etc. To get that stuttery, robotic, glitchy sound, you have to zoom in really close on your notes. 1/64 is a good resolution to view at. Listen to this example from my song "sonic zen". That second microediting part can be seen in the screenshot above.

 

Gating

This involves drawing many sequential ON and OFFs in your volume automation. For an example of this technique, listen to this example from "outer shpongolia" by shpongle. The example also demonstrates the reverse reverb technique as shown above.

 

The matrix gating technique

Here's an example that you can use in Reason 2.5 or above:

Download the example .rns file

 

 

 

Route the gate cv out of a matrix into the amp level in of any device. As you can see on the front side of the matrix, there is a note sequencer and a gate sequencer directly underneath it. Notice in the screenshot I have drawn in a pattern into the gate sequencer. This will automatically control the volume of the Subtractor synth. To create stuttery sounds, play a sequence through the synth while the matrix is on. Start drawing gating notes and see how it sounds. To create tie notes (the wide red columns that take up a whole grid box to themslves), hold down shift while drawing notes. Notice that you can also change the time resolution on the very right knob. This will make your pattern be interpreted at different speeds. For super-stutter, make it really fast =D Now you can program many different patterns by playing with the buttons on the left of the device. You can then automate the changes of the patterns for creating a unique, easy to manage microedited sound!

 

Ping-pong delay in Reason

Ping pong delay is an effect that makes sounds much fuller by alternating a delayed signal between the left and right channel.

 

Download this RV7000 patch for Reason 2.5 or above:

 

How to create this effect on your own (thanks Frost Raven)

Start off by creating an RV7000. Now personally I think you should bus it to your main mixer on one of the aux tracks. To do this, right click on the mixer and create the device, it should automatically attach the device as an auxillary effect. This will allow you to send the audio signal to the effect with the aux send knobs on each mixer track. This will give you control over the dry/wet sound, and you can apply the effect to any track on the mixer. I would not recommend attaching a space/delay type of effect directly on your device; this reduces the versatility of the effect. Okay, now that that is taken care of, expand your RV7000 view by hitting the carrot on the left [it’s the triangle pointing at the remote programmer, right under the patch loading box]. With this open you can now adjust the parameters of the device. The algorithm is set to hall, but we want multi tap, so adjust the top knob on the left side till the algorithm reads "multi tap". Alright, now notice the knob second from the top on the left side. It should be set to tempo sync. By default, it it should be set to OFF, but we want it ON. With this on, the delay will sync to the tempo that you have your track set to. Set the diffusion to about 15 (second knob from the bottom on the left side) and the LF damp about 385Hz (bottom knob on the left side).

 

Now on the right side, for the first tap set the delay to 3/16, (the third knob from the bottom) and have it’s level be set to 2.5 dB. It’s pan should already be -64. Now for tap 2 (change taps by moving the top knob on the right), set the tap delay to 6/16, tap level to 3.9 dB, and the tap pan should be fine at 63. On to the third tap, tap delay is set to 9/16, tap level is set to -2.0 dB, and make the pan set to -64. Tap 4, it’s delay should be set to 12/16, it’s level should be set to -inf and pan set to 0. The last tap is the repeat tap, all you need to do is set the repeat time to 6/16. Now for the bigger knobs on the top of the device. The HF damp should be set to 2, decay set to 92, and hi EQ set to 27. You can play around with these parameters if you want, but what you have now is a really cool ping pong delay.

Your RV7000 settings should look like this:

(note that the settings on the right are specific to each individual tap. this way, you can assign alternating taps alternating panning and levels)

 

The final part of this patch is the EQ. on the left side of the device (with the settings expanded) right under where it says RV7000, notice the three parameters, right now it is on reverb, either click on “edit mode” or on one of the three lights, you can adjust the setting. Switch it to EQ. Notice how the the delay taps change to a parametric EQ. We are going to cut some low end and boost a bit on the top. This will reduce muddiness and increase clarity in your sound. The low gain should be set to -15dB (top knob on the left side), and the low freq set to 261 hz. Now on the right side set the param gain to about 10 dB. Have the param freq (third knob from bottom on the right side) be set to about 1050 hz, and the param Q set to 10.0. Remember to enable the EQ by clicking on the EQ enable button. Your settings should look like this:

 

 

 

The Grand Finale

Download this reason demo to see it all in action.

 

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Mixing

Take a break from your music

After hours of listening to the same track over and over, your ears will probably get exhausted. You will begin to lose your ability to mix the track properly. Take a break from your mix if you can. Sleep on it, and come back to it a day or two later. I guarantee you will hear things or notice things you wouldn't have before. There's nothing that can help you mix a track quite like taking a break from it.

 

 

Sonic Space

Imagine each moment of your stereo track as a box with three dimensions: Panning (left and right), Amplitude (volume) & Frequency.

 

 

This box represents any given moment in time. Due to limitations of my graphic skills, this box doesn't represent a real song. If this box actually represented a true sound, it would be white noise because every frequency would be blasting at full amplitude (0 dB). Also keep in mind that each instrument has a unique sonic footprint, or is composed of certain sets of frequencies. These varying frequencies can range in how far they span across the spectrum. So a real song would not look like my diagram; rather, it would look like a collection of splotches all mixed together. They would not reside neatly inside narrow bands of frequencies like in the diagram.

 

In order to achieve a full, loud sound like the pros, you must fill this box in each dimension. The most common thing that prevents amateurs from getting a full sound is not filling this box properly. They combine sounds that overlap each other too far, which forces them to lower the volume of the song to prevent clipping (remember, the height of this box, or the volume/amplitude, cannot exceed a certain limit. Once it does, you will get distorted sounds, this is known as clipping). In order to maximize volume, it's necessary to designate space inside this box to each element so that they all fit nicely together. The result of not thinking in these terms will result in muddy sound.

 

More on mixing

Here's a handy PDF chart that will show you the frequency ranges of different instruments, and how to EQ them to achieve certain sounds.

(from Computer Music Magazine )

Includes: Kick drum, snare, hi hats/cymbals, bass, vocals, piano, electric guitar, strings, and acoustic guitar

 

Also, check out these links related to mixing

 

Tweakheadz: EQ and the limits of audio

DNBScene EQ tutorial: Thinking inside the box

Sound on Sound: improving your stereo mixing

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Even More Music Links!

future producers learn from other music producers in these great forums

Huge free Software and music resource list

cd baby tips assorted tips, thoughts, and articles for musicians

marketing your music plenty of tips on how to succeed in the music biz

electronic music interactive a complete online tutorial about electronic music

sound on sound recording techniques, sound advice, Q & A's, etc.

free music utilities programs that show you chords on the piano and guitar

freeware collection has a good mp3 organizer utility, and much more

allmusic.com find info on any artist, album, or song

music map discover new music based on bands you already like

music robot find nearly any song in MIDI format

practical music theory lessons, trainers, utilities, and more, to learn how to play music

recording vocals it's harder than you may think, but not with this guide

ASIO4ALL audio drivers to reduce your MIDI latency for PCs

 

 

That's it for now

I hope you enjoyed yourself. I'll continually add to this, so keep checking back for updates! Leave a comment below if you enjoyed this site.

 

http://www.modcam.com/emusic/

 

ps:grandes dicas....mas do site lê-se melhor .......a preguiça não dá pra mais

[Space_Shuttle]

fixe fixe era isso em portugues

[spock]

Tens algum programa de tradução.....mesmo que algumas expressões não façam sentido pode sempre ajudar .....no site tem algumas imagens que complementam o texto, também ajuda

[Space_Shuttle]

Brigadao, isso vai dar ganda jeito

[spock]

Rob Papen - Albino 2.

 

 

Rob Papen - Albino 2.

Review written by Rudi Cazeaux.

www: Traxmusic.org.

 

 

Great Expectations It is an avoidable fact of life that most people are never fully satisfied with what they have. No matter how good something is, we always long for more...

 

When I first wrote about Albino's previous incarnation, you may recall that I was very impressed by the quality of its sounds, the depth of its synthesis engine, its friendly interface, and of course, the sheer number of first-class presets designed by Rob Papen himself.

 

What particularly impressed me at the time was the breadth of its sounds and the smooth character of its "silk 'n cream" filters. One sentence summed it perfectly for me: "an inspirational synth!"

 

However (as you've no doubt noticed), we are a hard bunch to please at TraXmusic.org and there were a few areas I felt could be improved on. One of the suggestions made to the designer was the inclusion of an arpeggiator facility. Another one was that when Albino mark II came out, it ought to be patch-compatible with the previous version.

 

There is nothing worst than creating patches on an earlier version of a plugin and editing them to fit song, then finding out that your sequencer insists on using the old version. The other main area for a much vaunted improvement was the patch selector, and the integration of the controls and patch lists into the host sequencer. A load of extra patches would be nice too!

 

I am very pleased to say that Rob Papen and Pete Linsener have come-up trumps on all areas. As you'll see they've also added a number of extra refinements of their own. Instead of going over the facilities ported over from the original Albino, I'll concentrate on the new stuff. For a detailed discussion of the original, including installation, you can refer to the previous review.

 

New AND Improved It's always very pleasing when a much-loved product is made even better. It looks like all the suggestions from the previous versions have been taken on board. We'll take a quick look at the new facilities... A Whiter Shade of GUI Albino 2 has been given a fresh coat of paint and has re-emerged in a nice livery of off-white and red. I liked the original design, but I like the new one even more. The contrast seems higher, and after the muted browns of its previous incarnation, the re-worked design feels both fresh and modern.

 

 

If this were a hardware synth, it would take place of pride in my home-studio. To my eyes it's a good looking interface and looks even more "hardware" based than its predecessor. I am very pleased to report that the basics of the GUI have not been tinkered with. There was no need to anyway, as the original design was spot-on in the first place. The on-screen controls are still very, very smooth and are a tweaker's delight. The knobs for instance, have just the right amount of virtual "friction" and smoothness and are a joy to use.

 

 

An added bonus is the presence of "mini-LEDs" that confirm the position of the knobs - the usual pointers on the knobs are still there but this adds a nice visual touch. Not only is it very pleasant to look at, but it's also very reminiscent of some top-of-the range hardware Euro-synths. Well done!

 

 

 

I won't bore you by going through the rest of the interface again as it was covered in the original review. Let's just say that the whole thing is a joy to use and enhances the whole experience of using Albino. I Arpeggiate, You Arpeggiate, We Arpeggiate. The most eagerly awaited addition to the new Albino is of course that "must-have" for any self-respecting modern synth: the arpeggiator. Before I go into details about the new addition, I want to say how nice it is to see a company that responds to the needs and desires of its customers.

 

Too often we seem to concentrate on the inititial price of a plugin and seem to forget that for most of us it also represents an investment both in time and effort. It often signals the start of a long relationship with a particular product or manufacturer. With the Albinos (Albini?) you're not just buying sounds and presets but ongoing support as well. This is something that might be intangible but it counts for a lot. So how have the developers managed to integrate the arpeggiator into Albino? Simple: through the addition of a cunning button marked "AP" right next to the modulation section - which makes perfect sense if you think about it...

 

 

 

Clicking the said button reveals an extra page in the modulation area complete with 32 programmable steps. Thirty two is a nice number, easily divisible into the most used musical sub-beats, 2, 3, 4, 8, 12 and 16. This gives you a huge amount of flexibility. Of course if you don't want to, you don't have to use all the steps - simply pick however few or many you need.

 

Another nice touch is the fact you can make it into a gate simply by selecting a min and max value with nothing in-between. Perfect for creating trance-gate type sounds as we'll see later. You have complete control over each step value from 0 (off) to 126 (full).

 

 

There is also a "tie" settings to link adjacent steps together. Once you've designed your pattern, simply assign it to one or more destination in the excellent modulation matrix. As you would expect, it can be assigned to Pitch for those "classic" step-sequences, or any other destinations such as filter cut-off for more contemporary "trance-gate" effects for instance. You can choose from any of the following modes:

 

Chord

Modulation

Up

Down

Up/Down

Down/Up

Up/Down"+"

Down/Up"+"

As played

Random mode

These work as expected, the only unusual options being "Chord" which triggers all the notes as a chord instead of arpeggiating through them and "Modulation" which is perfect for gate and other rhythmic effects as mentioned earlier.

The "+" indicates that the bottom-most and top-most notes in the chord are placed twice

An interesting option lets you choose the velocity from either the keyboard of the pattern itself, or any settings in between. This is particularly useful to avoid robotic patterns where the velocity of the notes becomes predictable after a while. With this facility you can add light and shade back into your playing. There's no need to worry about the absolute settings, simply play as loudly or softly as you want to, and the arpeggiator will follow.

You can also control the relative length of each step with a knob and sync them to the host using a variety of settings.

On the other hand should you want more of an "old-skool" sound, you can also achieve it by moving the knob all the way to the "a" position. It is nice to have such choice and it is quite a unique feature.

Another useful feature is the "swing". This is controlled by a simple knob, placed right next to the arpeggiator area that lets you go from a staid straight mode all the way to a full-swing one. This used to be a feature of the early Linn Drum machines, but it seems to have fallen by the wayside with many modern manufacturers. It is nice to see it make a re-appearance here.

A "latching" mode can be activated by selecting the correct re-trigger mode.

 

Thankfully, you can also save, load, copy, paste, and initialise the patterns, which is useful to save or re-load those cool-chilled patterns you'll no doubt come-up with. Simply click on the Arpeggiator label and a drop-down menu will appear presenting all the various options.

 

 

 

 

 

Browsin' Time The preset browser has been improved and as a result is much more usable - I was particularly pleased to see that the current folder is displayed at the same time as the actual patches and can be selected directly as pictured below:

 

 

 

Presets The complement of presets by Rob Papen has been increased to over 1,100 patches, including some new arpeggiator patches. The only downside is that it'll you take you even longer to wade through all high-quality presets!!!

 

 

 

 

 

Miscellaneous Facilities A chord memory mode had been added to let you store chord "shapes" as part of a preset. I found this useful to recreate those "minor diminished chords" effects you get when using a sample from an existing piece. Perfect for playing fast chord patterns on your keyboard.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was also glad to see the addition of a SYNC option for analog oscillators 2 and 4 - this proved very useful when creating "harder" sounds. It added a nice bite to the normally smooth trademark Albino sound.

 

 

 

 

Some new digital spectrum waveforms have been added to increase the number of possible sounds. There are listed in the manual albeit a large number of them are simply described as "Spectr5" to "Spectr50" and don't really give you much of a clue as what type of sound they might appropriate for... One new function I really enjoyed playing with was the "Spread" function for conjuring some ultra-fat detuned sounds. It brought back fond memories of those warm, drifting analogue oscillators from long ago, but in a fully controllable way, giving you the best of both worlds.

 

 

 

 

On the FX front, an additional two effects have been brought into service, a Flanger and a second Chorus. The new Chorus sounded warmer and less fizzy to my ears, with a kind of vintage feel to it.

 

 

 

 

In a small but useful change, the Phaser FX has now gained a Stereo control which can be used to achieve interesting spatial widenings. The oscillator controls now have four small on/off buttons to let you switch them in and out. Particularly useful when auditioning individual oscillators or simply to turn them off to save CPU.

 

The back panel has gained a keyboard velocity curve to let you tailor the plugin to your own playing style and a facility for micro-tuning and alternate scales for those of you who are adventurous or into ethnic, experimental or early music. The tuning files can be created from Scala settings (a standardised way to describe scales and tunings) which is a nice touch.

 

 

 

 

 

My initial impression is that all these new facilities (including the arpeggiator) fall under the "extremely useful" category. I get the feeling that none of them were added simply to "bump-up" the feature count. Alongside the other improvements mentioned earlier, Linplug and Rob Papen have also taken the opportunity to increase the integration into the host.

 

I am pleased to report that the presets in the current directory now appear in Cubase SX, giving you the opportunity to select them directly and also use the host's "filter" option to only list preset names containing certain characters such as "snare" for instance. It also responds to "pan" and automation controls and if you want to use an external controller box the rather slick ECS automation facility is still available. Any Niggles As I remarked earlier, we are a hard bunch to please at TraXmusic.org... There are one or two areas where I feel Albino 2 could be improved even further (for the next version maybe?):

 

the arpeggiator is all I could have hoped for and works wonderfully, but I found myself longing for a slightly different layout... instead of a matrix with four vertical columns of numbers in the modulation pane, it would be really nice if it was laid-out in a straight line occupying the area where the twin FX panels are currently located. A simple set of two switches on the right could be used to toggle between "FX" and "AP". That way you could design your step in a more drum-machine-like or trance-gate like fashion and besides I reckon it would look really impressive to see the "lights" flicker across the screen as opposed to the existing position. I've included a "mockup" of how I think the arpeggiator could be to become more ergonomic below:

 

 

 

Although the integration into the host has been greatly improved, it is still not possible to automate every parameter. The benefit of host integration are that you have complete and graphic control of each parameter. If you mess-up a filter sweep for instance it's good to be able to edit in the appropriate control lane.

Except for these two minor niggles, it is really hard to find any fault with this synth. It does everything it sets out to do with poise and provides excellent sound. In use the programme always felt totally reliable and dependable. The new GUI is even better for use during long sessions - you'll probably find yourself spending plenty of time with it as it's so easy to use. ConclusionAs you can probably tell, you can probably tell that I am very impressed with Albino mk II.

 

All the original facilities that made it one of the great plugins of recent years have been retained and plenty more has been added. Besides the sound quality, which is as good as ever, and the monumental collection of presets, the thing which sticks out more than anything else is that Albino 2 is even more inspirational than its parent - here are three short demos done purely with Albino:

 

 

 

Demo1 - trance-gate in action

Demo 2 - sweep

Demo 3 - drive + drums

 

 

One important "intangible" is the feeling you get that the team behind Albino are thoroughly professional and totally committed to improving it. You get the sense that they eschew gimmicks and concentrate on the things that really matter. In a strange sort of way, Albino (1 and 2) remind me of a hardware unit.

 

The lay-out is clear and functional, the various controls are spaced "just-so", and the whole thing has plenty if character and is very user-friendly. As mentioned earlier it exudes a sense of solidity which is very appealing. If only Peter Linsener could find a way to make Rob Papen's signature and the Albino 2 logo glow gently in the dark when you first switch on the plugin it would make my world perfect. In view of all the nice things I've said about Albino 2 I've got no choice but to give it a Traxmusic Gold Award.

 

You can't ask for a better endorsement than that.

Contacts: UK Distributor: www.timespace.com

Price: £132.95 inc VAT

 

Rating (4 / 4):

A thoroughly thought-out

and executed plugin!

 

 

 

Requirements

VST2.0 or AU capable host software

Mac OSX 10.2 or higher, 500 MHz or higher CPU PC,

Windows 95 or higher, 500 MHz or higher CPU

Review PC The computer used for this review had the following specification:

AMD Athlon 2.2 XP

19" monitor 1280 x 1024 resolution

512 MB RAM

Roland UA-100G Sound Card

Windows XP

Cubase SX 2

All soundclips © Rudi Cazeaux 2004

 

Review written by: Rudi Cazeaux.

www: TraXmusic.Org.

 

- - -

 

All Manufacturers' Trademarks Acknowledged.

 

© 1999 - 2004 TraXmusic.

 

http://www.traxmusic.org/albino2.shtml

[spock]

Já agora fica aqui o link com reviews de quase todos os vst que a malta usa

 

http://www.traxmusic.org/reviews.shtml

 

altamente!!!

[JonHerer]

http://babelfish.altavista.com/

 

 

 

Pa quem precisar de traduções,,, este é o melhorzinho que conheço

[Space_Shuttle]

JonHerer andava mesmo a procura disso

 

Thanks

[JonHerer]

All of you ableton geeks

 

 

http://www.vtc.com/products/live5.htm

 

 

 

 

 

è do ableton 5... mas já dá uma grande ajuda