I've stumbled across a few techniques here and there for fattening up a monophonic sound, so I thought I would compile a few of them into one blog post. We all could use a fuller, rounder sound, right? With that in mind, I humbly present to you the THK-1000 Sound Fattener!
By the end of the tutorial, we will have created a combinator insert effect that you can use to fatten up any sound. At least, it works for me, maybe it will work for you. Ready? Let's get started!
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With all the work getting Rotator finished, I've been slacking off a bit on the tutorials. It also means I have a backlog of cool stuff I've been thinking about so we will start up again talking about the multi-oscillator in Thor.
Now, the REAL Multi Oscillator tutorial is here on the Propellerheads web site in the "Discovering Reason" series. I'm not going to go into too much detail , and I am going to put my own spin on it to (hopefully) make this relevant to those of us with a wind controller. By the end of the tutorial, we will have created a classic 'blown pipe' EWI sound, but using nothing but the Multi Oscillator in Thor. A natural type sound, created via synthesis only! We are pleased to announce the immediate availability of two new awesome ReFills for Reason - "Rotator Volume 1: Synths" and "Rotator Volume 2: Sampler." These ReFills for Reason enable you to play chords and chord progressions on your EWI wind controller. Your playing will never be the same. I believe our tools should enable us to make as much music as we can and have as much fun as we can doing it. Technology at its best can excite and inspire us to create more and better music. It is with this in mind that Rotator was created. It's a programmable harmony generator that creates a series of chords as you play. The Rotator series of ReFills can inspire you by giving you a whole new way of playing - a way of playing that truly takes advantage of the best technology has to offer. Plus, it's just lots of fun! Rotator Volume 1: Synths focuses on synthesizers inspired by the classic Oberheim and Moog synths. The chords shift and turn as you play, revealing compelling harmonies. Rotator Volume 2: Sampler lets you play virtual orchestras, big bands, ethnic ensembles and more. Each ReFill comes with a 20 page user guide that explains the concept behind the rotator, how it works and how to make your own patches.
I'm super excited to finally release these. I hope you have as much fun playing them as I did making them. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some music to make! Record is Dead! Long Live Record!The Props just announced Reason version 6 and it sure is one heck of an update.
Yikes! I'm just getting comfortable with Thor, and Kong seems to be non-existent in my rack. (Mostly because I haven't had time to mess around with it). As an aside, they have been coming out with something new just about every year now ever since Record 1.0 was announced. I used the Record upgrade to finally upgrade to Reason 4, then I upgraded to Reason 5 and Record 1.5 last year. Now, of course, I'll be upgrading to Reason 6. Read on for what has changed and what is new... Thor, baby! I just got my hands on EWI master Bernie Kenerson's "Thor ReFill Volume 3". Bernie Kenerson's new "EWI Refill Thor Volume 3" is an awesome collection of Thor patches for Reason 4 and 5 that every EWI player should have in their arsenal. One thing about patch libraries is that they reflect the taste and sensibility of the author. We now know that Bernie is one creative player. His patches sound like nothing I have heard before (but in a good way!). I kept asking myself - "How did he come up with this one?" Read on for my quick review... There is a NEW EWI specific web site! Our good friend John Isley has launched EWILogic - the number one resource for using your EWI with Apple's Logic. John is a fantastic player and all around good guy. He has a lot of knowledge about Logic and the EWI and I can't wait to see his insights into this powerful combo. One of the coolest things you can do with Logic IMHO is to ReWire Reason into it and use Reason as a synth within the logic environment. Perhaps he'll have a tutorial on this sometime, along with his own experiences working this way. Head on over to http://www.ewilogic.com, check it out, and give John your support! In this tutorial, I am going to show you how to create a "one man band" combinator patch using a number of DR Octo Rex devices and an NN-XT for our lead sound. (Reason 5 is required for this tutorial). Dr Octo rex is great in that you can load up to 8 loops and control playback of these loops from a midi keyboard, or in our case, a wind controller. Furthermore, the loops will "cut over" to the next one on the bar, beat or 16th note. This is just a simple organ style patch. Somewhat inspired by the Brecker patch used on the song 'Cajun' by Steps Ahead. If you want to hear some amazing EWI playing, the album 'Magnetic' by Steps Ahead has some great playing by Michael Brecker. They did a tour promoting the album and they made a live album - it's called 'Steps Ahead Live in Japan'. Highly recommended if you like jazz fusion.
It's Music Making Month on the Propellerheads web site. Head on over and you can view archives of tutorials and interviews. Great stuff.
Check out this blog post by Aaron Mahnke. In it, he talks about how he writes a novel. I thought the tips were just as applicable to writing music. I really like the idea of removing friction. If you have to launch 3 apps, plug a bunch of stuff in, and spend minutes configuring everything, many times you'll just say "forget it, what's on tv?" That's one of the reasons I like Reason - you have everything you need to get 'er done. You don't have to plug anything in or even turn anything - just open the lid of the laptop or wake your computer from sleep. In fact, Reason is always running on my laptop, just in case I have a random idea. With Reason 5, I like to use the on screen keyboard if I am out and about. It turns the keys of your laptop into a mini keyboard. It's not touch sensitive (obviously), and you really only get about 1 1/2 octaves, but it works in a pinch. Another thing I like to do is always keep an acoustic guitar out, whether hanging on the wall or on a stand. Now, I am by no means an accomplished guitarist, but for some reason it's easy to walk by, pick it up and bang out a few chords if I have a spare minute or two. Sometimes, it will even spark a musical idea. Along the same lines, you can keep your ewi out of its case just lying on your desk ready to go for when inspiration strikes. Do you have any tips for removing friction in your musical endeavors? |
Reason ReFills
Rotator Volume 1 and Rotator Volume 2 Released!
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