The cat is out of the bag. Propellerheads just announced their newest technology initiative. It's called 'Rack Extensions'  and you can find out all about them on Propellerheads web site. Rack Extensions are stand alone Reason devices that you can buy and integrate into your Reason Rack. Rack Extensions have knobs on the front, audio and CV plugs on the back, support undo, automation, and won't bring down your system if they crash. There will be a dedicated store and every extension comes with a demo period so you can try them out. Why did they do this? Are there any downsides? Do I REALLY like the idea, and what can we expect?

It makes a lot of sense for the Propellerheads for a number of reasons. First, they have limited resources to devote to maintaining the core application let alone creating new devices all the time. This is way of giving users more devices while applying resources to the core application. We'll also see a lot of devices that the Propellerheads maybe never would have thought of. Another huge advantage is new devices can be rolled out by them or 3rd parties anytime.

This is a huge deal. 

First, I love the way they will implement this. What they really did was open up the Reason API's for developers so that they can make Reason instruments and devices that are first class members of the Reason rack. You get true Reason instruments that work and behave just like anything else in the rack. 

Second, I like that fact that instead of waiting with baited breath for the next release for the new devices (and then inevitably complaining about what they didn't do) we will have access to new devices all the time. Third, there are instruments that the Propellerheads would never have thought of, or if they did would never have created just because the audience wasn't there to justify the development cost. This is a question of priorities. We will see more and more varied types of devices.

The rack extension solves a problem that has always bugged me about the Combinator. The Combinator UI is flexible with 4 knobs and 4 on/off switches, but it is also somewhat limiting. The advantage of Rack Extensions is that the UI can be completely customized to the type of device you are creating. Look at the Alligator processor in Reason 6, for example. There are like 30 knobs on the Alligator. You couldn't implement that as a Combinator, but you sure can as a Rack Extension.

One thing I always liked about Reason was the fact that I wasn't perpetually looking at the next new thing or looking for yet another plug in. There was something comforting about the rack as an unchangeable box of devices. Everything was in the box, and you could not go out of it. The limitations really forced you to make do with what you had, programming and tweaking to get the sound you wanted. This world is now gone. Perhaps the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, but I wonder if instead of trying to make a sound with Malstrom or Thor, I will be thinking in the back of my head "if I only had the 'fatSynth3000' rack extension..."

I wouldn't be surprised if Reason becomes something like Reason Essentials -- the core application with the basic devices to get you started, and everything else offered 'a la carte' from the Rack Extension store. They might even convert Thor and Kong into single offerings for Reason Essential owners. Reason would be priced very low, at which point you can personalize your rack with whatever devices you want from the Rack Extension store. 

We may see a lot of what used to be ReFills, implemented as Rack Extensions. For example, we will probably see a guitar or string Rack Extension. Maybe in the past these would have been implemented as ReFills, but they might now be Rack Extensions. Is this good or bad? Probably good because these types of single purpose devices can now have user interfaces that are geared specifically for that one use. 

We may also see a lot of niche devices from smaller developers. I would love to see a crazy CV processor. Will we finally see a physical modeling synth for EWI players that can go head to head with the VL70m? Maybe, and with Rack Extensions it is certainly possible.

Reason has changed dramatically with this announcement, but I think it is for the better. It makes the software more personal and offers the musician a lot of choice and customization. Hopefully, we will see some dedicated EWI Rack Extensions, and wouldn't that be cool?

In the video he shows how he has mapped his top 'clear' key on the EWI4000s to the 'Solo Lead' button on the Rotator. See here for a tutorial on how to do this in Reason. I'd like to point out that Bernie has a bunch of EWI Reason ReFills that work great with Rotator. Just swap out the Thor sounds in a Rotator combinator with one (or many!) of his awesome EWI Thor sounds.

I hope this gives you some insight on how he uses Rotator and how you might use it in your musical creations. When you get a chance, head on over to Bernie's web site. He has all sorts of videos about the EWI, Reason ReFills, sounds for Kontakt, and is a generally great guy and a credit to the EWI community.

Great job, Bernie, and keep them coming!

In the last tutorial, we created a 'smart' harmonizer - one that will take a monophonic source and generate harmonies based on a diatonic key. This is fine if you want each harmony voice to have the same sound or timbre, but that's not really that interesting. It's not how a real ensemble works. In a real horn section you have different instruments covering different parts. You may have  a trumpet on top, a bari sax on the bottom and some saxes and trombones filling out the middle. In a string section you'll have a bass on the bottom, violins on top and your cellos and violas filling out the middle voices.

We'll expand on the concepts introduced last time, and create a horn section that will stay in a diatonic key, and each voice will have it's own sound. Read on to dive in...

Remember last time we would generate a voice by using two Neptune harmonizers. The first transposed the voice by roughly a 3rd or 5th, and the second was used to 'lock' the transposed voice to a scale of our choosing. It was also set up as an effect to be added to a monophonic voice of our choosing. In the multi-voice harmonizer, we will play it directly - the sound modules will be inside the combinator, and we will use the transpose parameter in the combinator programmer section to transpose the voice, then use a single Neptune to lock the voice to a certain key.

Here is our shopping list so far:

• Combinator
  
• Line Mixer 6:2
  
• NN-XT x 4 (trumpet, tenor sax, trombone, bari sax)
  

Just drag these from the Tool Window (shown with F8) into the Reason rack in order and they will auto route. I'm going to label them from top to bottom trumpet, tenor, tone and bari and load in patches from Rotator Volume 2: Sampler. 

I've used the combinator programmer section to transpose the Bari -24, the Trombone -12 and the Trumpets +12. It's not a bad unison horn section. You can play these in unison and they sound like this:

The next step is to transpose these into a major chord. I'll voice this chord with the Tenor on the 3rd and the Trombone on the 5th. The screen shots below show the transposition.

It sounds like this.

Finally, we can get to the cool stuff. I'm going to keep the trumpet and bari on the root, so I don't have to do anything to them. I want the tenor and trombone to track my key so if I am in the key of C and play an 'A' I want to hear an A minor chord, not an A major. So, I'll add a Neptune to the output of each one like so. I highlighted the routing on the first NN-XT:

Flip the rack around and set up the Neptune with Transpose turned off, but Pitch Adjust turned on. Be sure to turn off Receive Notes for each Neptune in the Combinator programmer.

There is one last step. If you play this as is, you might get some strange results, (or happy accidents). If you want the transposition to be consistent, detune the tenor and trombone about 20 cents. This insures that Neptune will always transpose down if you are exactly in between two notes. For example, a C# in the key of C. 

Here is our original line, now with all the parts playing in diatonic harmony. Yay!

You can experiment with different transpositions and different scales on the Neptune. Here is a slightly longer improvisation where the Tenor is transposed up a 4th then run through the Neptune set to an F pentatonic. The Trombone is set to transpose down a 4th and then locked into the key of C with its Neptune.

Last but not least, the finished patch for you to download. Making harmonies like this is lots of fun, opens up creative possibilities you may not have thought of and might even inspire you to create some new music. Have fun!

In this Reason project we will create a harmonizer, similar in functionality to the Digitech Vocalist series of harmonizers. The completed effect combinator will accept the audio output of any device and add up to three harmonies that track the key your are in. For example if you are playing in the key of C, you will hear a C major chord if you place a 'C', but an A minor chord if you play an 'A'. Ready? Read on to dive in.

So what is a harmonizer? Simply a device that takes a monophonic signal and creates harmonies based on some pre defined characteristics. A 'smart' harmonizer will lock the generated harmonies into a specific key. For example, in a 'normal' patch, you might program fixed harmonies of a major 3rd and perfect 5th, and you will hear only parallel major chords that will definitely not fit in a traditional 'harmonic' tune (however, if that's the sound you are going for, keep going!). What we really want (again, in a tune that uses traditional western harmonies) is have the harmonies track the key. So, I should be able to play the I, ii, iii IV, V, vi and vii chords, switching dynamically between major and minor depending on the root note. Whew!

The harmonizer we will be creating will be super awesome because we will be able to choose a key for each harmonized note - or make up our own scales for each note. Sweet! 

So that's what we are going to create. Let's figure out how to do it in Reason 6. 
First, we will create a new Combinator, and we'll put some devices into it. Right click and select a new Combinator from the Create menu. Then drag the following items from the Tools window while holding 'shift' so nothing is auto routed.

• Line Mixer 6:1 x1
  
• Spider Audio Merger Splitter x 1
  
• Neptune Pitch Adjuster x2
  

Flip the rack around and connect 'To Fx devices' from the Combinator to the spider audio input. Take split out 1 and connect it to channel 1 in the mixer. Take split out 2 and and route in series as follows: Split out 2 -> Neptune 1 -> Neptune 2 -> Mixer Channel 2.  Route the mixer output to the 'From devices' input on the combinator. Your routing should look like this: 

So here is the basic concept behind the harmonizer: We have two Neptunes. The first Neptune transposes the pitch by a fixed amount via the 'Transpose' parameter. This could be any interval we choose, but it is fixed. It does not care which key we are in. The second Neptune takes the output of the first and 'locks' it into the key or scale using the pitch adjust. Here is what the front panel of the two Neptunes look like:

The first Neptune transposes the pitch up 4 semitones, or a major third. C is transposed to E, D is transposed to F# and so on. The output of this is sent to the second Neptune which is set to pitch adjust to the key of C. This guarantees that only notes in the key of C come out. Anything not in the key of C is transposed to the closest note in the scale.

You may notice that the first Neptune is also detuned 20 cents. This is to help the second Neptune in the case of a 'tie'. Let's take our example of playing a D in the key of C -- if the note coming into the second Neptune is F# should we transpose up to G or down to F? Well, if the note is closer to F, it will transpose it down to F. In this case, I always want to transpose down so my major third becomes a minor third --  that's why the first Neptune is tuned down slightly. I'm going to test this using a 'dry' brass ensemble patch from the Rotator Vol 2 ReFill. I've made the harmonizer an insert effect on the NN-XT voice. Here is what a C major scale sounds like - harmonized with a third above the note I am playing.

If I'm in the key of F major, I can just select 'F' as the 'root' and 'Major' as the 'scale' in the second combinator, or click the little keyboard in the Pitch Adjust section of the second Neptune to define my own scale. Here I have selected a C pentatonic scale:

At this point it's easy to see where I'm going with this. To add another voice, I'll just duplicate the two Neptunes. I'll take one of the outputs from my Spider Audio splitter and send it to the first of the duplicated Neptunes, wire it up the same way as the first (splitter -> Neptune 1 -> Neptune 2 -> Mixer). Only this time, I will set the first Neptune's transpose parameter to 7 semitones, or a perfect fifth.

To really fatten up the sound we can add an octaver by adding one more Neptune and setting the transpose to 12 semitones. Since I want this to always track the note I'm playing, a second, keyed, Neptune is not necessary.

I'm going to stop here but you can add as many harmonized voices as your CPU and ears handle! 

This was a really fun combinator to make and the possibilities are many. I haven't really begun to explore them all, but I'm sure there is a lot you could do with this. There are some pros and cons to this combinator I thought I would mention.

I've spent some time with the programmer and for this downloadable combinator to make it match , I've set the knobs to mix the level of each voice. The buttons control if the 3rd, 5th or octave are above or below the root pitch. The first button enables 'send' mode which mutes the incoming signal, playing back only the harmonies. I even created a nifty combinator backdrop so it stands out in your rack.

Happy harmonizing!

Reason 6 is out and anyone who already had Reason + Record probably has it now, due to the 'pay what you want' upgrade deal from October. I've been experimenting with the three new devices in the Reason rack - The Echo, Pulverizer, and Alligator. So far, my favorite is the Pulverizer. Is it just because I like everything distorted and ugly? Not really - the Pulverizer has a lot of uses beyond complete sound demolition, as its name might imply. I thought I would share three creative uses for the Pulverizer that make our lives as EWI artists easier, or at least a little better. Read on for the tips!

The first, and most obvious use is to just warm up a brittle sound. It's no secret that I LOVE the tape algorithm on the Scream 4. I use it on just about everything. The pulverizer 'dirt' settings give the Scream 4 a run for its money, though, for warming up a sound. Just set the filter to bypass, put the Squash at a low level and set 'Dirt' to wherever it sounds good to you. If you find the sound getting too dirty, you can always mix in some of the dry signal with the 'Blend' knob on the far right of the unit. The 'Tone' knob is an 'extra' low pass filter. Set this all the way to the right to let your entire sound through, move it to the left to mellow your sound. This works great when you set Blend to about 12 o clock. Just wire it up as an insert effect to add some analog warmth to your sound. Here is a subtractor sound with and without some 'Dirt'

Let's continue with our Subtractor + Pulverizer example. We are going to use the Pulvierizer as a universal  breath controlled volume. That way any subtractor patch we load up will automagically have breath controlled volume.  

We'll keep the subtractor routed to the Pulverizer, but let's put them in a combinator by selecting both units by shift - clicking each unit, then right clicking and choosing 'Combine' from the pop up menu. If you remember from the 'Route Breath to Anything' series of tutorials, we can use the RPG-8 as a breath to CV converter. Just create an RPG-8 Arpeggiator while holding shift so it doesn't auto route. Turn off the arpeggiator function.  Then, create a Spider CV Merger and Splitter, again while holding shift. Flip the rack around and connect the Breath CV out of the RPG-8 to the Split A input of the Spider then connect one of the outputs to the volume input on the Pulverizer. It should look like this (click for the full size pic): 

Easy. Try loading different patches into the Subtractor and listening how the volume reacts to breath. One thing to keep in mind, though. Since most Subtractor patches are designed for the keyboard, and we are using a wind controller, you might want to disable the velocity controls. 

Now that we know how to control the volume on the pulverizer output, we can do the same thing to take advantage of the filters on the Pulverizer, too, including the Low Pass + Notch, which doesn't exist on any other synth in the Reason rack. To do this, we can just route from our Spider CV to the Filter CV input on the back of the Pulverizer, like so:

"Low pass 24" and "LP12+Notch" seem to work best, or at least give the most 'traditional' sound, but experiment with the other filters. Now we have breath controlling the filter cutoff and volume and the controls are external to the sound generating device. This is a huge deal and an important concept. By externalizing the breath controlled elements from the sound generation device (in this case a Subtractor) we can swap out the sound generating device with another one, without changing our breath response.  This is a key concept that is used in the Cyclone Wind Synth combinator and one that you can use in your own sound design experiments as well. 

So there you have it. The Pulverizer is a great new addition to the Reason rack for wind synthesists because it is something of a 'one stop shop' for breath controlled sounds. In one device, you can fatten up your sound with the 'Squash' and 'Dirt' controls, and control your volume and filter cutoff via the CV inputs. 

Here is a completed patch and sound example. Until next time, have fun making music!

Sometimes you want to control your Reason devices 'hands-free', like, oh, I don't know, when you have both hands on your wind controller. In this short tutorial, I'll show you how to map an unused note on your wind controller to control the 'Solo Lead' switch on a Rotator combinator. This approach also works if you have a foot pedal. Ready? Let's dive in.

First, right click on the knob or button you want to control. In this case it is the 'Solo Lead' button on a Rotator combinator. Select 'Edit Remote Override Mapping' from the pop up menu.

The next step is to just choose the note you want to use to remotely 'press' the button.

In this case, I'm just going to use D6, which is pretty close the highest note I'll play. I chose this note because I will probably never play it in a normal situation. A common technique among EWI plays is to use the very top or bottom octaves as remote switches to control various settings in your playing environment. It's a lot more useful on an instrument such as the EWI4000s or WX5 with their expanded ranges (at least when compared to my EWI-USB).

Press OK and viola! That's it. If you have a foot pedal that can transmit Midi notes, this will work for that, too.

This will work for any control you find in the Reason rack. Now go make some music.

Last time, I told you about some of the sampled synth waveforms that are available in the Reason Factory Sound Bank. In this tutorial, we will create our own version of the Prophet 5, using samples from that legendary instrument.

There is a lot of information about the Prophet 5 at Vintage Synth.com. The Prophet 5 had two analog oscillators plus a noise generator. We're not going to go for a 100% authentic reproduction here, we're just going to get close using the sampled waveforms. Luckily for us, we have samples from the Prophet 5 in the Reason Factory Sound Bank of the sine, square, saw and noise waveforms. In this tutorial, we'll create a combinator that emulates this setup, plus we will add breath control and some effects to really bring our sound to life. Let's get started with an empty combinator. Our shopping list includes:

• A Line Mixer 6:2
  
• Three NN-19's (for now)

Pretty simple -- just drag them into the combinator from the tools window. If you collapse the NN-19's, It should look like this (front and back). This is a real flexible setup because we can control volume and panning of each voice independently. Each voice also gets its own amp enveloper, mod envelope and LFO.

Open up the first NN-19 and, click the folder icon next to where it says 'Init Patch' and navigate to the Prophet 5 sawtooth patch in the Reason Factory Sound Bank. You can find it here: Reason Factory Sound Bank > NN19 Sampler Patches > Synth Raw Elements > Raw PV Saw.smp. Play your keyboard or blow into your ewi. You should hear a buzzy sawtooth sound.

Next, let's make a few adjustments and add our breath control. I think the attack is a little harsh, so we can move the Amp envelope attack to 18. We can then add some breath control by modifying the 'Controller' section. Here are the settings I used:

• 'Source' to Breath.
  
• 'F Freq' to 35
  
• 'Amp' to 51
• 'Filter Freq' in the Filter section to 70

When you look at the 'Controller' section you have a 'Source' control which defines which Midi events will affect the settings of the three knobs. The source can be Aftertouch, Expression or Breath. Since I have my ewi to transmit breath data from the breath sensor, I will choose 'Breath'. Some players have their EWI set to transmit Aftertouch, so they could choose aftertouch and get the same affect. 

The three things that you can affect with the source are Filter Frequency, LFO amount and Amp amount. Setting the knob to the right means you will add that amount to whatever is set on the patch and moving the knob to the left mean you will subtract an amount from the patch setting. How far to the left or right is how much will be added or subtracted -- and of course, this amount is scaled by the breath, aftertouch or expression. Here are some common scenarios:

"I want the sound to get louder as I blow harder."
Move the amp knob in the controller section to the right. How far to the right will determine the range of volume.
"I want the sound to get brighter as I blow harder."
In the filter section, set the mode to LP12 or LP24, and set the Freq slider to the minimum brightness that you want. Then move the F Freq knob in the Controller section to the right which will raise the filter frequency as you blow harder.

Here are the settings we have now. It should respond to breath control, but it's really nothing to write home about (yet). I circled the parts of the patch that are modified from the original. The arrows point to the parts of the patch that are being modified by the knobs in the 'Controller' section.

Wait a minute! The Prophet 5 had 2 oscillators, not one. Now that we have made our adjustments to our patch, we can just copy this patch to the one below it. From the menu choose Edit -> Copy Patch. Then select the second NN19, and choose Edit -> Paste Patch. On the second patch move the 'Fine' knob under the OSC section to the right. This will give us a slight chorus and thicken up the sound a little.

The Prophet 5 also had a noise generator so I'm going to load that into the last NN-19. The Prophet 5 noise sample is here: Reason Factory Sound Bank -> NN19 Sampler Patches -> Synth Raw Elements -> Raw_PV_Noise.smp. Well, we just can't have white noise blasting all over the place, so let's turn down the white noise in the Mixer 6:2. I set it really low, so that it is only apparent at very soft volumes.While we're at it, we can widen the sound by panning the two saw tooth samplers left and right.

Here is what we have so far:

Adding some effects will really make this sound come alive. I am going to keep the reverb at the main mixer and not include it in the combinator itself. However, I like to include delay and unison in the combinator so let's add those. I'm going to use them as insert effects and route them after the mixer. Like this:

Here is the same line played with reverb, unison and delay:

By now, you should have an idea of what one could do with this basic set up. You could add more voices or swap out the voices for samples from a different synth. You might try adding another NN19 with a sample from an acoustic instrument. You could assign Combinator knobs to control various parameters. 

For fun, I swapped out the Prophet samples with MiniMoog samples from the Reason Factory Sound Bank. Here are the results -- it is a totally different sound.

Hopefully, this little tutorial will get you started creating some of your own sounds using sampled synths.  We created a combinator and stacked a bunch of NN-19's. We covered some of the basics of adding breath control to any NN-19 sound you may come across in the Reason Factory Sound Bank. We even added some effects to liven up the sound, and give it some depth and character. We finished off by swapping out one sound with another. The Prophet and MiniMoog combinators are below.

Was this tutorial too simplistic or not advanced enough?   Let us know in the comments.

We all know how powerful the synths are in Reason - there are worlds of possibilities in Malström, Subtractor, and especially Thor. However, what if the sound we want can only be found on a certain model vintage synth? 
 
Did you know that the Reason Factory Sound Bank contains raw waveform samples of a wide range of vintage synths?

As you can see in the screen shot on the right, the RFSB (as of Reason 5 at least) contains raw waveform samples from:

• ARP 2600 - 5 waveforms
  
• ARP Odyssey - 4 waveforms
  
• Ensoniq SQ80 - 13 waveforms
  
• Korg MS-20 -4 waveforms  - many samples across the whole range of the keyboard
  
• Korg Polysix - 1 waveform, but multi sampled
  
• MiniMoog - 8 waveforms
  
• Prophet V - 4 waveforms (but single samples of each one only)
  
• Roland Sh101 - 8 waveforms (but single samples only)
  
• SID - 7 'SID Bass' multi samples
  
• Yamaha CS-80 - 7 waveforms
  

You can find them here: 
Reason Factory Sound Bank -> NN19 Sampler Patches -> Synth Raw Elements. In the 'Synth Raw Elements' folder, you will find one NN19 patch for each waveform as you can see below. 

That's really handy when you start designing a new sound. So the next time you are pining for a MiniMoog or Prophet V sound, try starting with an actual sample of a MiniMoog or Prophet V, straight from the Reason Factory Sound Bank.

The sounds are hiding right under your nose!