All posts in Music

DA Guita Rig – Part 3 – It Works!

by Tracy Evans on April 23, 2012 in Gear, Music with No comments
ableton-rig-mess

I have been traveling a bit with the new DA Guitar Rig and am happy to find that it all actualy works. This is a bit surprising as there were many unknowns in putting this mess together. Here is a quick rundown of some of the pros, cons and future enhancements of the system.

The sound and signal from guitar to laptop is awesome. The Sonuus i2M USB device injects a clean signal with very low latency into the Ableton Live brain while the 1.6 GHz MacBook Air barely breaks a sweat, even with 8 to 10 channels of processing craziness happening at once.

Read more about the craziness

One Man Bands – Tatsuya Nishiwaki and the Roland Jupiter 80

by Tracy Evans on March 11, 2012 in Gear, Music, Video with No comments
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Composer, performer and technologist Tatsuya Nishiwaki demonstrates the Roland Jupiter 20 synthesizer with his 20-part prog-rock tour de force. While the video includes a lot of tricky production value, the performance of the music is no trick. Tatsuya plays each part live for the camera in a WYSIWYG frenzy.

Nishiwaki-san’s performance started me thinking about the subject of one man bands. According to Wikipedia, the 13th century reveals the earliest known records of a single musician playing multiple musical instruments (a three-holed flute and tabor.) Five hundred years later technology would help expand the number of instruments. The photo at the right shows the height of 1865 cable, lever and pulley operated music technology.

Less than a century more would pass before the first multitrack tape recorders freed a new generation of multi-faceted musicians from the indignity of strapping cymbals to thier knees. Les Paul pioneered this emerging technology in the recording studio as well as on the stage. His use of overdubbing allowed Mary Ford to harmonize with her own vocals while he backed her up with layers of guitar. In the example below they become a two-person, 26-piece band by performing live over a 24 layer master tape.

Show me the live Les Paul video…

Your Third Amp – The Yamaha THR-10

by Tracy Evans on March 6, 2012 in Gear, Music, Video with 2 Comments
The Yamaha THR-10 practice amp

The desktop guitar amp is a great idea that has yet to find it’s ideal form factor and price point. A few friends and I have seen, played and returned or Craigslisted many in a search for small sonic delight. A few of the more interesting ones were the Vox JamVox (nice software), the Zoom ZFX (cool case), the Fender G-DEC series (backing tracks galore).

Yamaha enters the fray with the THR-10, part practice amp, part USB audio device and part nightlight. Yamaha want this to be your “third amp.” Check out this comprehensive demonstration and interview with by Yamaha Product Specialist Julian Ward.

Continue reading →

DA Guitar Rig – Part 2 – Cable Management

by Tracy Evans on March 3, 2012 in Gear, Music with No comments
drawing-closeup

One of the design goals of the DA Guitar Rig is to conquer cable management. The mystery box in the middle of the drawing above represents this aspiration. It is an octopus of leads routing data, analogue audio and power to each device.

On the right is a photo of my first attempt at creating such a beast. It is an old computer bag containing every cable in the system, a USB hub, digital to analogue audio device and a power splitter. All necessary cables are cut to appropriate lengths. When multiple cables lead to a device, those will eventually be loom bundled. The cables never leave the bag. They unroll and attach to each device, but always lead back to the central bag/hub. No loose cables equal no lost cables. I also keep a small stash of replacement cables around just in case.

Continue reading. It gets better.

Instruments for Finger Drummer – Part 2 – Wavedrum Mini

by Tracy Evans on March 1, 2012 in Gear, Music with No comments
korg-foot

The previous article of this series looked at an open source software solution for tap, tap, tapping out percussion parts. The next stop our journey to Finger Drumming nirvana takes us to the other end of the spectrum, right to the front door of the mighty Korg Corporation (株式会社コルグ), multinational music manufacturer and electronics innovator.

No stranger to rhythmic artists the world over, Korg literally made waves in 1994 with the introduction of the Wavedrum, a solid professional piece of kit with a price to match. Last year Korg came out with a new model, the Wavedrum Mini Dynamic Percussion Synthesizer.

Continue – Wavedrum mini and a video review…

Instruments for Finger Drummers – Part 1

by Tracy Evans on February 28, 2012 in Apple, Gear, Music with No comments
SmackTop

Be it nervous habit or creative outlet, finger drumming on desktops, steering wheels and just about anything within reach is a pastime we can all relate to. Wouldn’t it be great to harness that nervous energy and translate it into to something actually musical?

Several approaches to this have recently surfaced, from free open source software to expensive offerings from consumer electronics behemoths. Finding ones way through this labyrinth of choices can be challenging, so as I explore a solution to add to my guitar system, I will share what I find out over the next few weeks in this series of articles.

Continue reading →

The DA Guitar Rig – Live, AdrenaLinn, Lemur and more

by Tracy Evans on February 22, 2012 in Gear, Music with 10 Comments
Gear-Chart

Here is a look at my latest guitar setup. The previous system was built around a Roland GR-55 Guitar Synthesizer: a great gadget, but quite complex. So after selling it on Craigslist, as well as a few other items, I started building this new rig based on staying “in the box.” This is the plan for this never-ending work in progress.

MacBook Air, Ableton Live and AdrenaLinn Sync

Live is one freaky DAW. Part workstation, part recording studio, part performance tool, part instrument. There are so many ways to approach Live it can be a bit boggling. For the moment,  I am  using it for plug-in hosting (Native Instruments Guitar Rig, AdrenaLinn Sync), a few synths, backing tracks and the thoughtfully designed Live Looper.

Continue reading →

Beatles Album Cover Animation

by Tracy Evans on December 18, 2011 in Apple, Music with No comments
yellow-sub

This iTunes advert is worth watching frame by frame as you fly through 12 Beatles album covers. There is some nice motion graphics work here and what appears to be some new cell animation, and even a bit of 3D, done in the same style as Yellow Submarine.

The First Chord of A Hard Days Night

by Tracy Evans on December 14, 2011 in Music with No comments
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In this excerpt from his CBC radio program, Randy Bachman (The Guess Who, Bachman Turner Overdrive) explains the opening chord to the classic Beatles tune, A Hard Days Night. George Harrisson once described this sforzando 12-string sting thus:

It is F with a G on top, but you’ll have to ask Paul about the bass note to get the proper story.
George Harrisson – (source The Beatles Bible)

Bachman’s interest in this strident kickoff chord took him to the source. During the recent remastering sessions of the Beatles collection, Giles Martin invited him to Abbey Road for a listen. “What do you want to hear?” asked Giles, two-time Grammy winner and now official custodian of the material. Randy went straight to a ProTools assisted examination of that iconic signature, a chord that opened the song, the album, the movie, and sonically defined the The Beatles early mop-top era.

Roll on down the vinyl highway with Randy’s Vinyl Tap, Mr. Bachman’s critically acclaimed CBC radio show. And special thanks to SonicState.com for turning me on to the video.

Peter Gabriel Picked a Peck of Paper Tickets

by Tracy Evans on December 13, 2011 in Music with No comments
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Printed concert tickets are rapidly becoming a relic of the past. Today, there are probably more tickets coming out of home inkjet printers than popping out of countertop trapdoors in ticket booths. Even inkjet prints will soon be supplanted by cell phone simulacrums.

I for one will regret the passing into history of this bit of memorabilia, having saved almost every concert ticket from my teenage years to date. Long after the T-shirt have faded and the battle scars healed, a little box of show stubs remains my own ticket to fond memories of the past.

PeterGabriel.com is looking for any tickets, trinkets or other items you may have for the upcoming  25th anniversary of the So album, as they prepare for a special release edition. They are asking “you to help us build the story of So with your own memories”. So if you have any original So merchandise, posters or tickets from the tour, pop over to petergabriel.com/so-submissions and upload a scan and your story.

Here’s Peter with more info:

Play Piano like Chico Marx

by Tracy Evans on December 7, 2011 in Music, Video with No comments
chico-marx

Chico Marx played 88 keys like no other. His showy technique was visual enough to play to the back of a packed broadway theater, and was as much of a joy to watch as to hear. In the video above actor/comedian/corrector of common mispronunciations Wayne Federman deconstructs Mr. Marx’s phalangeal choreography.

To complete the lesson, be sure to check out Chico’s masterful 1935 performance of  All I Do is Dream of You from A Night at the Opera

Willie Nelson and Family – Nov 2011

by Tracy Evans on November 14, 2011 in Music, Video with No comments

As required by a little known Texas law, state residents are required to pay homage to Willie Nelson once every two years minimum. Tonight I happily fulfilled my obligation.

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