Category Archives: News

[Muzaq] Bitwig Studio Beta: VST Crash Handler

Well, it’s been quite some time now, since Bitwig released a Beta version to selected testers. After Ableton showed us new features for their upcoming release of Ableton Live 9, now Bitwig shows us a new video of their latest development progress in handling VST-plugins.

Now VST Support looks like having become fully integrated with integrated crash protection: when a VST plugin crashs the Bitwig will not crash aswell. Bitwig will instead allow to reload the crashed plugin or even to reload all plugins.

Watch here

Sample Screenshots here

 

 

[iOS] John Cage Piano App Released

For celebrating John Cage’s 100th birthday, the John Cage Trust just released an iOS and Android version of the CagePiano.

The John Cage Official Website says:

One of the many ingenious innovations of American composer/writer/artist John Cage was his creation of the “prepared piano”, in which he placed objects beneath and between the strings of a grand piano to create an entirely
new instrument.

The sounds of John Cage’s Prepared Piano are now available for you to play on your portable device with this innovative app. Play meticulously sampled sounds of a piano prepared with the actual materials used by John Cage in the preparations for his Sonatas and Interludes (1946-48) as sampled under the supervision of the John Cage Trust.

  • Both paid and free versions allow you to your record your performance and share it via Facebook, Twitter and email.
  • The paid tablet version features all 36 prepared notes, playable at once, plus the ability to save your performances locally, making dramatically unique ring tones possible.
  • The free version offers 9 sampled notes on screen at a time, while a random shuffle button makes available other prepared notes.

Prices and Availability

The iPhone version is free. The iPad version is US$0.99.
The Android version is free aswell. But the Android tablet version is also US$0.99

The free version features only 9 tones at once. The paid version has all 36 notes playable at once.

 

[Muzaq] Universal Audio Releases Shadow Hills Compressor Plugin

Universal Audio just released a software emulation plugin of the Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor for the UAD-Platforms.

Like the hardware version, the Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor plug-in offers selection of three distinct output transformers (Nickel, Iron, and Steel) — taking the signal from “clean” to “colored” and “dirty” — as if selecting from the output stages of three distinct classic analog consoles.

Lemme tell you that just sounds jummy. UAD’s marketing dept. just made 100pts on my scale of 0-100 ;-)

Features

  • Precise emulation of the Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor (licensed by Peter Reardon)
  • Created by the highly trained monkeys at Brainworx, developed for the UAD Powered Plug-Ins platform
  • Separate Optical and Discrete (VCA) dynamics sections for two-stage serial dynamics control
  • Transformer matrix switches between Nickel, Iron, and Steel output transformers — like selecting between 3 distinct vintage console outputs
  • 90Hz sidechain filtering for musical compression of low-frequency program material
  • Large, accurate VU meters provide Optical, Discrete, or Output gain views
  • Custom presets created by Peter Reardon

Price and Availability

The Shadow Hills Compressor is part of the just released UAD-Software v6.3.2. Its pricetag is US$299. You can try-before-buy for 14days…

Ooo Dooh

Check UAD’s cave for more information and special offers…

» Link: Download UAD Powered Plugins
» Link: Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor Plugin

[Muzaq] Universal Audio Teams Up With Bob Katz

Universal Audio just announced they teamed up with world famous mastering engineer Bob Katz (“Mastering Audio – The Art and the Science“) to release the Precision K-Stereo Ambience Recovery Plug-in for the UAD-Platforms.  K-Stereo allows to enhance the stereo depth and the imaging of mixes.

The patented K-Stereo uses

“elements of the Haas effect and other psychoacoustic principles, the plug-in transparently enhances existing ambience and early reflections without adding artificial reverb or changing the ratio of center elements to side elements.”

Features

  • ambience recovery and stereo processing tool, (created and patented by Bob Katz)
  • extracts ambient cues from source material, adding natural depth and width to the stereo field
  • intended for fixing busy or “narrow” mixes at the mastering stage
  • 3-band Ambience Filter EQ for shaping the effect
  • Mid/Side gain controls to adjust the center-to-side balance
  • Left/Right Gain controls for final stereo image balancing and leveling
  • lots of custom user presets created by Bob himself

Price and Availability

K-Stereo is part of the just released UAD-Software v6.3.2. K-Stereo’s pricetag is US$199.

Ooo Dooh

More information to be found at UAD’s lair, check it regularly for special offers. They come more often than you would expect ;-)

» Link: Download UAD Powered Plugins
» Link: Check for UAD’s latest offer of K-Stereo

[MacOS] Codeweavers To Give Away CrossOver For Free On Oct, 31st

Codeweavers do it again. The company behind the commercial version of Wine named CrossOver will be giving away free copies of it again.

On Wednesday October, 31st, everybody can get a free copy of CrossOver with 12mths support.

CrossOver is an emulation layer for MacOS X and Linux. In contrast to virtualization solutions like VMWare, Parallels or VirtualBox, it allows running thousands of Windows applications, tools and games without having to install a legit Windows operating system.

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[Muzaq] Features of Ableton’s Push Controller

Since Ableton’s announcement that the Push controller and Ableton Live 9 are gonna be released in Q1/2013 some videos surfaced on the net explaining how to use Push. Pricetag for Push is $599/€499 including Live Intro.

Although Push looks similar to well known Live controllers like AKAI’s APC series or Novation’s LaunchPad, it features certain details, the other controllers don’t have.

 

Push Features

 

  • powered via USB, brightness gets increased when using the included power supply
  • 2 x footswitch (custom assigned)
  • 64 pads: velocity and pressure-sensitive, RGB backlight
  • 11 touch sensitive encoders
  • 4 line LCD display
  • 12cm touch strip for pitch bend/scrolling
  • 24 LEDs for navigation
  • (it seems it has been designed in cooperation with AKAI)

 

Using Push

1. Playing and Step Sequencing Beats

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[Muzaq] Ableton to Release Live 9 and Push in Q1/2013

 The Berlin based Music software company Ableton AG just announced the most anticipated update of their flagship Live and a hardware device named the Push controller. Both releases are expected to be available in the first quarter of 2013, though Ableton did not officially provide an exact release date as of yet.

According to an interview Gerhard Behles gave the Deutsche Welle in 2010, Ableton sold more than 1 million copies of Live until then.

 

Live 9 Features

  • session automation:  
    automation is now recorded in clips. Automation can be moved between arrangement and session view and vice versa. Edit automation with curves.
  • updated browser:
    sth. many ppl. wanted to see: searching and finding instruments, effects, samples, packs VSTs is now made easier than ever before. Instant search as you type. And sort by various categories.
  • updated and new effects:
    the effects have been reworked. Ableton added an analogue modelled Glue Compressor and a Convolution Reverb (Max4Live), Ableton updated the EQ8 to display a spectrum view and the Compressor to feature Gain Reduction
  • new features:
    audio to MIDI. Melodies and Drums can now be extracted to MIDI. Harmony-to-MIDI extracts notes and chords from audio stems.
  • Max 4 Live:  
    the integration of M4L that has started in 2009 has now been completed. M4L is now part of Ableton Live Suite
  • tons of new sounds

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