Sound from a Virtual Planet

OK, it’s a month later and people are still asking me about the coolest stuff I saw at the Winter NAMM 2008. So I guess I’ll have to come clean with my top 5. For those of us looking for big music technology news, trade shows are more or less sleepers. These days, fewer manufacturers time their release cycles to trade shows. Even Apple, who tries to set their trajectory in January with Steve Jobs’ MacWorld keynote, is more about getting products out the door as soon as they’re ready. So, for most music technology companies, major releases and announcements have already hit the street by January. There are some exceptions…

Although I got scooped on this one by my friend and fellow Berkleemusic blogger, Dave Franz, at the top of my list is Spectrasonics, who know a little something about drama. They skipped NAMM altogether last year while working on "something really big." The fruits of that labor saw the light of day at NAMM this year when patron saint of sound design Eric Persing rolled out Omnisphere.

Spectrasonics has been quite successful at creating powerful and evocative sampled instruments such as Atmosphere, Trilogy, and Stylus RMX. These were based on the UVI sound engine which essentially is a platform for sample playback. With the next generation of instruments, the company wanted to develop their own sound engine that would expand on sample playback and get much deeper into synthesis techniques such as granular, waveshaping, and FM. They came up with something they call the "Steam" engine. While the synthesis and modulation functions here are deep, Spectrasonics has made them immediately and easily accessible to any musician. The sound library itself is massive, comprised of the greatest hits of all their previous libraries along with a collection of new and unique samples. They showed one such sampling session for their demo where an upright piano was set on fire and carefully recorded as it went up in smoke. The sound quality was fabulous and the design was ingenious with things like a Farfisa organ graincloud sounding at once unique and familiar. The only downside of their demo was the September 15 release date. With such a build-up I didn’t meet anyone who didn’t want to leave the show with a copy tucked under their arm.

One of the biggest buzzes at the show this year was the Euphonix MC line of hardware DAW controllers. While primarily known for their high end digital consoles, Euphonix is coming out with a more modest line of products that uses their Ethernet-based EuCon DAW control protocol.

These new surfaces, the MC Mix and MC Control, are aimed at the project studio user with 999.00 and 1495.00 price tags, respectively. Currently, their main competition will be the Mackie Control units. However, a sleek, compact design, well-designed functionality, as well as the responsiveness of their high-speed control will make these units serious contenders.

Next on my list is Access. While it took a couple of years to perfect the technology behind the Access TI (totally integrated) line of Virus synthesizers, these instruments have become one the must-haves in current electronic arsenals. This year Access introduced an entry-level, stand-alone module version of the Virus TI called the Snow. To top things off, Richard Devine spent the weekend holding court at their booth, evangelizing the Virus and the newly released Atomizer companion software.

The software works alongside the Virus OS to beat slice audio input coming into the Virus, map the slices across the keyboard and provide addition processing controlled by the mod wheel and pitch bend. In the capable hands of Richard Devine this became a powerful, real-time performance tool. It looks like Access is pushing the envelope of what we can expect from a hardware synthesizer to include functions that we’d normally associate with custom laptop performance software. Atomizer will be free to all Virus TI users.

Korg had one of the coolest gadgets I saw at the show, and the closest thing to what one might call a glitch instrument. The new Kaossilator Dynamic Phrase Synthesizer takes a small Kaos pad controller and adds 100 different sounds and phrases.

An internal sequencer allows the user to assemble simple melodic/rhythmic fragments and manipulate them with the pad. The device itself is pocket sized, and while it offers little in the way of connectivity or pro features, it’s really fun to play, and downright addictive.

Somehow NAMM brings out the guitar player in everyone, and this year, Mackie’s new HotWire guitar amp was what did it for me. Legendary designer Greg Mackie reputedly spent years on this design, and the result is a remarkable combination of high and low tech in a great sounding amp. At the heart of this is analog tube circuitry. Not just one circuit, but a number of them, so that in fact, when switching between the various amp modes, the actual circuit routing changes, along with the selection of tubes used. Think of it like having a collection of tube amps at your disposal, where you can easily switch between them. In addition, the amp comes with a collection of creature comforts from a tuner and metronome, to on-board digital effects. The amp sells for 1500.00 and is expected to be available in March.

Winter NAMM 2008 Top Five Roundup.

1. Spectrasonics Atmosphere
2. Euphonix MC Controllers
3. Access Virus Snow and Atomizer software
3. Korg Kaossilator
5. Mackie HotWire Guitar amp

The hardest part of getting through a NAMM show is wearing a badge that identifies me with Berklee. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m proud to represent the institution, and while my affiliation opens many doors, there are scores of alums in all aspects of the music industry who love re-connecting with their alma mater. If you want to travel to NAMM incognito, get your badge from Harvard.

The best spokesperson for any product is an artist who uses the product, and uses it well. This year, I was pleasantly surprised to see one of my former students, New York electronic artist Matt Moldover, talking about his work and performing at the Ableton Live booth. While sharing a common school experience with fellow alum Dan Lehrich, profiled in an earlier blog entry, Matt has taken a very different path, establishing a profile as performing artist.

Matt was one of the legion of guitar players that comes to Berklee each year. While most are looking to follow in the footsteps of one fretted deity or another, Matt always wanted to forge his own path, and after getting in the Music Synthesis major, that was combining interactive electronic performance with the guitar. At Berklee he discovered MAX, and soon was on to the idea of extending what he did as a player to sound from electronic sources. Matt didn’t want to play in a band, he wanted to play with sound.

Matt also got turned on to DJ and club culture. Moving to New York after graduation, he found a scene for like-minded electronic performers, and jettisoned his first name, becoming the artist known as Moldover. Being a player and a geek, he was in the right place at the right time when Native Instruments came out with Guitar Rig. The first time I saw him at NAMM, he was the Guitar Rig guy at NI. While he gave knowledgeable and convincing demos, I got the sense a different muse was calling. At a party in LA we had a chance to talk, and I got a glimpse of some of the projects he was working on, the first of which was the Interstellar ReMix Wagon for Burning Man, 2004.

The thing I didn’t quite realize about Moldover was that he was really pretty good at building stuff. His next project was the Octamasher, a performance system fueled by Ableton Live that gave eight “mashers” a tool to communally create a club mix. Social networking and interactive performance might sound like a research project at the MIT Media Lab, but this is a guy with a laptop, hacking a bunch of cheap keyboard controllers and hitting parties…. pretty cool.

Sometime last fall came a new website and the birth of “controllerism.” According the the site, Controllerism is “the art of manipulating sounds and creating music live using computer controllers and software.” Perhaps Matt will be the first to make both YouTube and dictionary.com. But, what I saw from him at the Ableton booth this year was a virtuoso performance that combined electronic music with the spontaneity and inventiveness of a jazz soloist, swapping clips of sound for notes and scales.

Dan Lehrich and Moldover may seem at opposite ends of a very wide playing field, but what really fascinates me is the real passion they both have for creating immersive performance experiences using computers and physical interfaces. While research in the field of interactive music systems continues at the highest levels of academia, it’s really cool to see real innovation happening on the street as well.