Composing and Producing Electronic Music

Hello all, this is the first of a series of posts centered around Racks in Live.  Racks are Live’s way to handle all things parallel, and one of the major reasons why I choose Live over any other DAW.

Have fun. Make music.

-L-Don

Hello all, one of my students was asking about using white noise and filter sweeps to create dramatic transitions.  I started experimenting with the idea and had a ball playing with the possibilities and exploring sound.  So, here is how I responded:

Hey guys, the white noise sweep is a cool effect, here is my version.  I have attached the screenshot and the preset, you can drop it into a MIDI track and hold down any note to hear the sweep.

The noise generator is Operator, I have the first two oscillators set to create noise.

Noise Operator

Then the filter  in Operator is used to create the sweep, It is a band pass filter and its envelop is controlling the cutoff frequency of the filter.  You may want to adjust the Attack parameter of the filter envelope to control how fast the filter moves to the top, Resonance will change how obvious the filter is, and you may want to play with the Shaper and Drive amount, very cool.

Filter section of Operator

After the operator is a Frequency Shifter that adds a nice movement to the noise, notice the settings, I am using a tiny amount of shift, I find that is the best way to use the effect(it adds a nice modulating phasey quality, any more and it turns into a crazy Dr. Who effect), and Dry/Wet is set below 50%.

Frequency Shifter and delay

Next is a delay to add some lingering motion to help glue the sections and an EQ to tame the high end and boost the bass.

Here is the preset: NoiseSweepAdg

Drop it into a MIDI track and hit a key on your keyboard to hear it in action.
Enjoy, and thanks for the challenge I enjoyed building the patch, and I will probably use it in my future productions.  Feel free to use it yourself, and explore explore explore!
Loudon

Hello all, I have been meaning to put these videos together for a while.  Reason and Live work really well together, I think the folks at Ableton found the absolute best way to work between the two programs and the key is the External Instrument device, check it out:

and to take the idea even further:

And here are the template files that I used in the 2nd video, I am curious to know if all the routings are maintained on other computers:

ReasonLiveTemplate Project

Have Fun. Make Music.

Loudon

This is way off topic for a Live blog, but I created a video on how to use Reason and ProTools together and thought I would share it with all of you:

Using the instrument track like this is a great way to work with Reason and Protools, I just discovered this today, an just had to share it with the world.  Being a Live blog, I have to admit that Live’s external instrument device and Live integration is even better(I’ll post a video on that sometime soon)!

While I am on the topic of Reason, here is another video I made about using the Combinator to layer sounds and control synths, Combinator is very similar to Live’s effect racks(but not as good of course!).

Have Fun. Make Music,

Loudon

I have been seeing a ton of videos of people doing live remixes and stutter edits using Ableton Live and perhaps a controller like the Akai APC40.  Well, I figured it time to throw my hat into the ring, so here goes a short video on how to use Beat Repeat for live Stutter editing.

Here is the Effect Rack Preset, so you can try it out yourself:Repeater

There are some important points not mentioned in the video, so read on if you are going to try to make this effect from scratch.

Important Settings for Beat Repeat:

Chance needs to be zero, that makes it so the repeating only happens when the repeat button os on.

Ins needs to be on, not Mix or Gate.  That way when the repeats are going, the original audio cuts out entirely.

Have Fun. Make Music.

L-Don

Hello all, this is usually where I post cool stuff about Ableton Live, but I have really been getting into the Alchemy sample manipulator by Camel Audio.  It is just an amazing program with a huge range of sonic possibilities.  Once you master all the parameters and possibilities in Live’s Sampler, it will be time to think about moving on to something that offers even more control.

For a traditional sampler, creating true-to-life sampled instruments, Native Instruments Kontakt is the way to go.  While Kontakt has some awesome sound design tools, Alchemy kills it in that regard, and I find the Alchemy interface easier to deal with. The the constant scrolling required in Kontakt gets tiresome fast. Anyway, here is a great video on Alchemy if you are thinking of making a purchase:

http://www.synthtopia.com/content/2010/02/02/camel-audio-alchemy-tutorial/

Oh, and because I can’t help put a bit of Live stuff in here as well, check out this cool vid, 20 Ableton tricks in 8 minutes:

http://www.synthtopia.com/content/2010/02/02/20-ableton-live-tips-tricks-in-8-minutes/

Both of the links are at synthtopia.com, a great blog for the latest in music tech goodness!

Have fun. Make Music.

-L-Don

Hey all, I have been playing with my new APC40(which I am totally in love with), and thought I would show you some of the ways to navigate the session view with the keyboard and a dedicated controller.

Have Fun. Make Music.

L-Don

In Week 2 of my class every student makes a custom drum rack and posts it to the class. In Week 3 everyone downloads all of the drum racks and makes a “Mega Kit” from all the parts.  It is one of the most fun parts of the class, and each semester the submissions get better and better.  I post a couple video responses each semester, here are a couple that I made this semester, some great tips here, I hope you enjoy!

Have Fun. Make Music.

L-Don

Hello everyone, a student posted in one of my classes asking about this cool warped ambient piano he heard on a recording.  It seemed like a cool challenge so I tried to make an instrument that would give a wide variety of spooky warped piano sounds.  I created a really cool patch and used some of the more advanced features in Sampler and Instrument racks, so here is the video explaining it all:

The coolest feature I have used here is Zone Shift in Sampler.  I explain it in the video, but you need to play with it to really get a feel for how it works.  Say you have Zone Shift at -12, then Live is going to play the sample from an octave up, but transpose it down to the pitch you played.  So, by moving Zone shift you are transposing all the samples, but the instrument still plays at pitch, try this on EVERYTHING, it is awesome.

The next great technique in the video is how I set up a delay. It is an effect rack with two chains, the first is for the delay and the second for the dry signal.  After all the delays a compressor is added, but it is listening to(sidechained to) the dry signal. This way when the dry signal is present, the delays are quiet, but as the dry signal fades away the delays get louder, Very Cool.

If sidechained compressors are confusing you, please see my earlier post on the topic.

Anyway, Here is the Project so you can download and play with it, you will need the Live Suite keys piano patch to use it, I tried to include it in the project, but the patch is just too big.

Have Fun, Make Music,

L-Don

Simple ratios like 2:1 and 3:2 play a very important role in sound an music.  In this video I explore how important they are when creating sounds with Frequency Modulation synthesis.  The techniques are demonstrated here on the Operator synth in Ableton Live, but could be applied on any synth that offers FM.

Have fun. Make music.

L-Don