Modulate This! - Electronic & Experimental Music Tech, Technique, & People

As Modulate This! Turns 7 Years and 7 Months I'm Taking a Sabbatical

After 7 years and 7 Months of posting on Modulate This! I’m going to take a sabbatical from technology blogging.

The timing is right. Over the last year I’ve spent time going even deeper with Ableton, Maschine,  Absynth, Zebra, ACE, ElextraX, Predator, Fab Filter Plugs, Blofeld and  Resolume. I’m also jumping into the Electron world with Analog Four. I’ve really transcended a lot of the “tech” (and have built up a nice palette of patches from INIT)  allowing me to  focus on music creation. Also, my 2013 show is in great shape.

So I’m really looking forward to a very creative late spring and summer working on new material, performing shows, and finding new ways to express ideas with keys, AudioCubes, pads, grids, antennas and interactive visuals.

Also, summer is just around the corner I plan to spend more time in the wonderful mountains around Boulder (I took this shot today during lunch while on a mountain bike ride on a bluff overlooking Boulder).

If you want to keep up with my artistic work stop by:

• My artist site – www.MarkMosherMusic.com
• Subscribe to my artist blog via RSS 
• Join my artist newsletter
• Hang out on  soundcloud or twitter

Have a great summer – and take some time to get out of the studio and enjoy the burning fireball in the sky :^) All old posts remain active so have fun reading posts created to date.

See you soon,

Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

Elektron OS Update and General Sysex Utility

Elektron synths use sysex for OS updates and data saves. I was poking around on their web site and found they had a handy utility for sending and receiving Sysex. they have windows and mac versions.

You can download the app here http://www.elektron.se/support-and-downloads.

I used it to upgrade my Analog Four to the current  OS 1.06 and it worked great.

Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

Using Elektron Analog Four to Add Tap Tempo and Tempo Nudge to My Blofeld

I just picked up an Electron Analog Four to add 4 analog synths + seq + effects to create an additional compterless workflow. I’ll also use it as source audio for Live and Absynth patches.  One of my other goals was to pair it with my Blofeld for live jams and performances.

While I love the character and user interface of the Blofeld, one thing that drives me batty is there is no tap temp or tempo nudge for the arp. Analog Four to the Rescue!

Setup is pretty straight forward.

1. Go into global settings on Analog Four and configure to transmit clock. See p. 44 of Analog Four manual.
2. Hook up MIDI out from Analog Four to Blofeld in.
3. In Blofeld global settings make sure you set clock to “Auto”. See p. o3 f the Blofeld Manual for info on global settings.

Now once you start a pattern on the Analog Four it' starts transmitting clock and any changes to tempo via direct tempo setting, nudge, or Tap Tempo are transmitted to Blofeld. See p. 28 of the for details of Analog Four manual on tempo manipulation.

I’m getting best sync results on the Blofeld so far by setting the arp to “on” not “hold” so I can time the down key to start on the beat with the Electron 4 – and then retrigger with next note on.

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Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

Ableton Live 9.0.4 Now Available

Registered users visit https://www.ableton.com/en/account/ for free update.

9.0.4 Release Notes

Bugfixes:

• VST / AU plug-in devices could be inactive after loading a Live set containing a large number of plug-ins (regression in Live 9.0.3).
• The "grab_control" function which allows to gain control over a control surface's button matrix via Max for Live would not work anymore (regression in Live 9.0.3).
• Fixed a bug which could cause the File Manager window to reopen after launching Live.

9.0.3 Release Notes

Improvements and feature changes:

• Added a new skin: "Disco".
• Added a new option to the "Record/Warp/Launch" preferences pane: "Start Transport with Record". If activated, the transport will start immediately when clicking on the Session- or Arrangement-Record buttons. If deactivated, it prepares for recording as in Live 8, so you have to launch a clip in Session View or click the 'Play' button. You can hold down the Shift modifier key when clicking on the record buttons to invert the behavior temporarily.
• When recording automation on top of an existing automation envelope, and quickly clicking on different positions in parameters like sliders, X/Y pads, etc., Live now records a latching automation envelope instead of jumping back to the previous value.
• The Compressor device does not clip input signals at +20 dB anymore. 
• Added control surface support for Novation Launchkey series.
• Added control surface support for M-Audio Axiom Air Mini 32.
• Added a user satisfaction survey. After several hours of usage, Live will ask you to rate the software on the next startup. You can submit a star rating or simply dismiss the survey.
• Updated manual, lessons and translations.

Bugfixes:

• The Trial version of Live 9.0.2 could hang on startup.
• Live would not work as a ReWire slave on Windows.
• The performance of the Ableton Index process has been improved, especially on OS X. 
• The Ableton Index process would sometimes not scan all folders after adding them to the sidebar.
• The Ableton Index process could block the GUI during saving and exporting of Live sets, presets or clips.
• Scanning folders containing a huge amount of files could take longer than necessary.
• The Browser would not update its content pane after a change in the file system if the selection was somewhere outside of the Browser.
• Expanding the Audio Unit folder in the browser's "Plug-ins" label could be slow for users which have a lot of library content installed.
• Live would not save a clip self-contained after dragging it to the Browser and confirming the name of the new clip by clicking anywhere outside of the Browser. 
• The Session Record button would not turn off if the recording was aborted, e.g. by stopping or deleting the currently recording clip, disarming a track, etc.
• Under certain conditions, MIDI notes would not get recorded into a clip slot after deleting a previous clip.
• Overdubbing into MIDI clips could unnecessarily bloat the undo history file.
• Fixed a graphical glitch which could occur in the representation of the filter curve in EQ Eight's Frequency Display.
• Several MIDI control surfaces would not correctly shut down after quitting Live, e.g. motorfaders on the Mackie Control would not return to zero, Axiom Pro devices would not exit Hypercontrol mode, etc.
• The "Project Mix IO" control surface would not work.
• The channel strip buttons on the Mackie Control XT would not work.
• Fixed a bug where the key navigation in track headers would not work properly when certain control surfaces are selected.
• When using control surface scripts, the blue hand would sometimes not map to any device, e.g. after creating a device and then deleting it by using undo.
• Live could sometimes crash on quit in case a faulty MIDI remote script throws an exception in the Python console.
• Fixed a crash which could occur in Live Intro when right-clicking on a drum rack chain.

Changes for Push:

• Using the touch strip to change banks in drum racks now requires to pick up the current value, to avoid changing banks accidentally while playing.
• Fixed incorrect intervals in the Locrian scale.
• The velocity curve setting would reset to the default value when opening a new Live set.
• Changing the pad sensitivity settings could be slow if a drum rack was in focus.
• Updating the LCD display could be slow when switching between Drum and Note mode.
• The Push LCD could remain blank and no mode would be selected after holding the 'Browse' mode button.
• Fixed a bug where 'Browse' mode would be exited after swapping a Max for Live instrument.
• Tracks created by dragging an instrument would sometimes not be automatically armed if Push is connected.
• The "Arm Exclusive" preference would not be respected when Push was connected.
• Fixed a bug where recording wouldn't work properly if the default clip launch mode was set to 'Toggle' mode.
• Fixed a crash which could occur when using the 'Quantize' function.
• Fixed a crash which could occur when using Push to delete a device whilst recording automation for this device with the mouse.

Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

Watch Paul Harriman Eigenharp & EWI Performance at Awakenings, April 13 2013

Watch embedded video

Paul Harriman playing an Eigenharp Alpha and an Akai EWI 4000s. Video background by Jez Creek. This was performed at Awakenings, in Burton-on-Trent, UK.

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Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

 

Listen to Ambient Album “7​.​83 Hz” by Jack Hertz

Checkout this wonderful ambient album by Jack Hertz  http://freefloatingmusic.bandcamp.com/album/783-hz.

“The music on this album was inspired by the documentary ‘Resonance - Beings of Frequency.’ Where I learned that the planet Earth has a resonant frequency of 7.83 Hz. Originally detected in 1899 by Nikola Tesla, it was Winfried Otto Schumann who formulated the theoretical aspects in the mid-1950s of the global resonances that are now referred to as the ‘Schumann resonances.’

The notion that the Earth is an oscillator onto itself was so inspiring. A flood of ideas for new ambient compositions came to me. Since frequencies under 20 hertz cannot be perceived by the human ear. I incorporated the Earth's tone in other ways. Using them as a basis for sound modulation, binaural beats, pulses and the frequency intervals of LFOs, filters and oscillators based on the fundamental 7.83 and multiples such as 14.3, 20.8, 27.3 and 33.8 Hz. As it turns out, the use of these frequency intervals worked out such that the finished tracks unintentionally complement each other when played simultaneously in various combinations.”

-- Jack Hertz, April 2013
jackhertz.com

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Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

Theremin And Electric Kantele

Watch embedded video

Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

Here is Something to Listen To While You Work Away Today - Bauhaus's "Bella Lugosi's Dead" stretched to 9 hours!

Via boinbong… Bauhaus's "Bella Lugosi's Dead" stretched to 9 hours!

Listen via embedded video

Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

Infected Mushroom at Coachella (2013-04-12)

Open the pod bay doors HAL…. Watch embedded video

Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

Battles "My Machines" by Daniels Featuring Gary Numan

Just found this video featuring Gary Numan. Don’t try this at home kids! Watch embedded video.

Uploaded on Sep 6, 2011

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Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

How to Turn on Fabfilter Twin 2 Ring Modulator

Here is a quick tip on a feature you might have missed on Twin 2. The little snowflake button between Oscillators 1 * 2 is the Ring Mod Button. Screen shot above is from a patch I quickly pulled together from “Clean” patch with a few tweaks. Resultant waveform display in s(M)exoscope.

Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

Photos from How to Destroy Angels Denver Show 4/21/2013 + Making of Tour Video

I went to the How to Destroy Angles show in Denver last night at the Paramount Theater. Here is a Flickr Photo set of some shots I took from my iPhone.

The band posted a this cool photo on their blog http://blog.destroyangels.com/post/48579040947/loopcloses-how-to-destroy-angels-on.

The show was great and visuals were incredible. If you are curious about the visuals and how they made them, checkout “Making How to Destroy Angels” video below. For even more info here is an article in Wired.

Watch Embedded Video

Mark Mosher
Electronic Musician | Composer | Performer
Boulder, CO

Teaser Photo of U-HE Diva’s New Modules

I just nabbed this off of the the U-HE Facebook page…click image to see full-sized view..

New Diva modules arriving in June: Digital Osc, Uhbie-Filter and Arpeggiator/Sequencer. Here's a preliminary screenshot :-)

I pulled further detail from some of Urs’s posts on KVR:

It's got two oscillators. Each with 8 waveforms. Each waveforms has two "Control" parameters that can be modulated.
Most notably:
- TriangleMod: Does a foldback-distorted triangle wave combined with a symmetry-warp function
- SuperSaw: Does a sawtooth with 6 additional sawtooth mixed in, ad variable detune
- Feedback: Does a sawtooth with distorted feedback at variable (tuned) delay and gain
- Noise: Does noise with adjustable bandpass filtering and cutoff
- PWM: Does PWM with an invented-by-u-he pseudo-resonance control
- plus another sawtooth and triangle waveform
Both oscillators can interact by Ringmodulation, Sync and Crossmodulation.

Urs also mentioned the Uhbie filter will also be in Zebra 3.

On the arppegiator Urs indicates:

The sequencer can work in step mode, where the white keys switch to "dub", "replace", "ins", "del", "startify", "<" and ">". The 3 black keys to the right become "CC", "pause" and "tie". CC records ModWheel, BreathCtrl and Expression for each step.

You can also record live, while the sequencer is running. You can layer notes, replace them, pause them, tie them on the fly.

On palyback you can switch between 7 sequences at any time. You can either noodle over them on the keyboard, or use the keyboard to transpose the sequence. You can even layer sequences in realtime, e.g. to add a little variation here and there.

The arpeggiator is very basic but very powerful. It can program the sequencer, and it can transpose it.

Mark Mosher
Synthesist, Composer, Performer
www.markmoshermusic.com

Watch Eddie Jobson’s “In the Dead of Night” Live Concert Footage

I was wondering around YouTube and bumped into this live performance of Eddie Jobson’s classic “In the Dead of Night”. 13 minutes of killer prog :^)

Mark Mosher
Synthesist, Composer, Performer
www.markmoshermusic.com

My 100th Patch with Absynth – LFO Rotors

I went on a bit of a synth “walk about” in the last year and mainly went deep with one synthesizer for programming from INIT – the mighty Absynth. Yesterday maked the 100th patch I’ve made with it.

This a sound design experiment using three samples as oscillator sources. Sample 1 is a recording I made of my daughter 10 years ago (I left the beeps in from the low budget digital recorder I used at the time). Sample 2 is crowd noise from a CU Basketball game. Sample 3 was made by resynthesizing a bell through an additive synth called Morphine which I then loaded into Absynth in granular mode.

I then turn down the volume on all oscillators and use LFO’s with square waves running in mono-mode and in series to modulate the OSC volumes. So the LFOs act as a gate shaped by the LFO waveform turning on the audio round-robin as the samples play out. I then modulate the LFO speed with a performance slider all the way up to audio rates as the piece progresses.
This is ALL absynth including effects (resonator with surround motion).

So thanks to Brian Clevinger for making Absynth (which will continue to be a main focus). Also thanks to John Bowen for showing me his Solaris Synth rotors a few weeks back when I was in Seattle for Pacific Northwest Synthfest which inspired the sound design concept behind this piece. You both have made amazing instruments!

Mark Mosher
Synthesist, Composer, Performer
www.markmoshermusic.com