Tonylongmusic.co.uk

New Synth App for the iPad desined by Waldorf and Rolf Wöhrmann

This has made my day – Waldorf who have made some great hardware synths like the Blofeld and the new Pulse 2 as well as Software Synths like the Largo and Lector have now joined up with Rolf Wöhrmann to make a fantastic App for Apple’s iPad, iPad 2 and now iPad3 that should be available to you this Summer.

The iPad is an ideal  platform for wavetable synthesis and will more than likely take it up a notch  to a new level. This will  make it possible to go deep into wavetables and show the sound in 3-D and offer completely new ways for sound creation and manipulation.

This new approach to wavetable synthesis allows for the transposition of the spectrum and the balance of periodic and sound spectra entirely independent from a wave’s position extending the wavetable technology  we have now by two new dimensions. It also allows for formant shifts as well as numerous other unheard sounds and as well as this the number and length of waves in a wavetable will no longer be restricted – Wow

Musicians are MIDI mad and this application will cater for many MIDI interfaces from IK Multimedia, iConnectMIDI, MIDI Mobilizer II by Line6, Alesis ioDock or the Camera Connection Kit by Apple and the SynthStation by Akai. App collaboration standards like Sonoma‘s Audio Copy/Paste, Intua‘s Audio Pasteboard and Virtual Core MIDI will also be supported like the upcoming AudioBus standard and KORG’s WIST synchronization technology.

I am really looking forward to trying this out as I am the Pulse 2 – keep an eye on http://www.waldorfmusic.de/for further information.

Musikmesse 2012 Roland Wireless Connect

Everything is moving fast with portable devices like Apple’s iPad,iPad 2 and now iPad 3 thinking about the Music Industry and how useful they can be. Musicians love control, controllers and definately sound and light and these devices are now overflowing with Apps and new ideas flooding in on a weekly basis. Each main company of musical instruments like Korg and Yamamaha are joining in to make the musical experience better, more intersting and fun. Roland have now started to look at this by preparing their new products to be able to interact with the iPads and iPhones.

At this year’s big Music event in Frankfurt, Germany – Musikmesse, Roland have anounced the Wireless Connect. This basically works by plugging their USB stick into one of their new electronic instruments. You can then  jam along using your iPad or iPhone as a wireless aid. Have a look at this You Tube clip to give you some idea. I personally think this is just the start of much better things to come:-

  Read the rest of this entry »

Here is something simple but very clever, and my first thought is why hasn’t someone come up with this before? Stochastik Drum Machine by Xitive Inc is a great Apple iPad App Drum Machine with over 1000 sounds. It is not just any old drum machine because it has such a clever difference. This little gem lets you set a possibility or rather a probaility that a drum sound in your rhythm will trigger. What a great idea, I think it is even better than Roland’s idea when they introduced a ‘Human Feel’ – I thought that was ‘Wow’ at the time, but this one makes so much sense and to some extent behaves just like a drummer would. For example let us say you are a drummer playing your basic four to a beat rock pattern, you know after 30 seconds you are going to bored as hell with it and just to impress the band or ensure that the bass player doesn’t fall asleep, you going to slip in an off-beat bass drum beat, double the snare, syncopate with some extra hi-hat hits. Whatever you going to do, you will not do it all the time and you are going to vary it, keep the spark alive and do the unexpected.

Read the rest of this entry »

Music Technology On Line are offering a free file created by the talented Dan Krisher which is a control surface for the iPad that adds extra control to your Roland JP-80. This “JP-80 Mixer” runs via the MIDI Touch app which can be found on the iTunes app store.

For more information go to jupiter80.music-technology-online.com. At the end of this Blog there is a You Tube clip that  demonstrates the functionality of the “JP-80 Mixer” control surface. The control surface offers the following control for your JP-80: Global control of Upper, Lower, Solo and Percussion parts, Independent On/Off control of tones for the Upper and Lower parts, Independent control of Cutoff and Resonance for the Upper and Lower parts, Independent Toneblender control for the Upper and Lower parts and Independent Matrix controls of the Cutoff and Resonance for the Upper and Lower Parts.

OK  before you start, make sure that your Roland Jupiter 80 is updated to Version 1.10 or later. OK follow these simple instructions:-

1. e-mail Music Technology On-Line at :- music.technology.online@gmail.com. They will send you a reply email with the attachment “controller.miditouchpreset”.

2. If you haven’t got the iPad App “the MIDI Touch control surface application by Domestic Cat”, go to the iTunes app store and download and install it.

3. Upload the controller.miditouchpreset file to MIDI Touch by syncing your iPad to iTunes and copying the controller.miditouchpreset file to the MIDI Touch app.

4. Make sure to set the JP-80?s USB driver to “Generic”. (This is found by going into the SYSTEM Menu, selecting “Beep/Misc” and changing the driver setting. Make sure you WRITE this change to the JP-80?s System settings.)

5. Connect the Apple iPad Camera Connection Kit to your iPad and your JP-80.

6. Power down the JP-80 and power it back on and Reboot your iPad.

7. Launch the MIDI Touch application.

8. In MIDI Touch, touch the name of the default demo control surface “Drum Pads Small” to open the “Saved Controller Menus”.

9. Select the JP-80 Mixer and it will load into MIDI Touch.

Here is the You Tube clip:-

INTRODUCING THE ALESIS IO DOCK FOR THE APPLE iPAD AND iPAD2

I am new to the world of the iPad where there is now an iPad 2 and shortly arriving the iPad 3 and as a musician, I was very surprised to find out just how many Apps (applications) are out there that are so useful to me, many of them Free or very liitle – $.99 which is £0.69. One of my first thoughts as I started to investigate and move up the ladder from an iPad Muso newbie, was how do I best connect my new iOS portable music wonder to all my other MIDI equipment and the outside world? I found to my surprise that there are not many devices available and a visit to my local Apple store confirmed this leaving me with the thought that Apple have missed a golden opportunity here. I started off by looking at the IK Multimedia iRig MIDI and Line 6’s MIDI Mobilizer which they suggested in the store. These looked OK to me, were not very expensive and were small and portable and I could connect to all of my MIDI equipment. The problem seemed to be that this is all they seemed to connect to. The iPad itself has only two connections, so what about a studio setup where you want MIDI, Audio outs, USB connection, Audio In, connection for Mics and Guitars etc? Yes, you could buy more IK Multimedia iRig products that they have to connect Mics and Guitars but this leaves you with a mess of leads and connectors with limitations due to the lack of iPad connectivity. I then found the iConnect MIDI box which despite its bulky appearance seemed to be more like what I wanted. It had great MIDI connectivity and plenty of USB but unfortunately no Audio connections. Then along came the Alesis IO Dock which started me thinking that this is exactly what I need.

Read the rest of this entry »

OK lets kick off this great show with the Akai MPC Fly designed for iPad2. Have a look at this quick YouTube Clip to get some idea of what this is about:-

Read the rest of this entry »

I wish you all a Happy New Year, see you in 2012!

2011 marks a successful year for Tony Long Music as we build the site for you to gain information and enjoyment.  We are extremely proud that we have managed to attract more new followers and customers than ever before! We thank you for choosing this Site and our Soundsets, Music and Samples.

Aside from attracting new followers to the Site, we have also put a lot of effort in reviewing products to assist you with purchasing or to give you tips on how to use products. There have been some great products in 2011 such as the Korg Kronos, Roland’s Jupiter 80, Novation Ultranova, Sonar X1, the 3 types of Korg Monotron and iZotope’s Ozone 5. 2011 has seen a further increase in Music Apps for the iPad and iPad 2 and I look forward to see how this will go even further in 2012 with the release of the iPad 3.

Don’t forget the release of our third great soundset for the incredible Access Virus synth – ‘Creative Distortion’. Have a listen to the YouTube clips that demo the sounds.

Finally, we are less than 3 weeks away from Winter Namm 2012. It will be nice to see some long overdue ARX boards for Roland’s Fantom G Synth and perhaps a TD30 kit. From Yamaha I would like to see them move away from the Motif and bring something new to the table and Korg really need to sort out the problems and Editor for the Korg Kronos before they proceed any further.

Anyway have a great 2012 and thanks for visiting my site.

Happy New Year

Best Wishes

Tony

Animoog Pro Synth App for the iPad made by Moog

Can you imagine having a Moog on your iPad? well now there is Animoog, which is the first professional synthesizer designed for the iPad. It is powered by Moog’s new Anisotropic Synthesis Engine. It captures the vast library of sounds from the famous Moog synthesizers and applies it to the moderntouch surface paradigm,enabling anyone to quickly sculpt incredibly fluid and dynamic sounds that live, breathe, and evolve as you play them.

The good news is that if you are an iPad owner, you can currently purchase it at the incredible no-brainer price of 69 pence – yes that is what I said 69 pence or $0.99. The price will unfortunately rise to £20.99 after 30 days.

The heart of Animoog is Moog’s Anisotropic Synthesis Engine (ASE), a technology that has been in development at Moog for nearly six years. This looks an amazingly entertaining instrument that I am sure is going to be both fun and educational. There will be people who discover the joy of making music using a synthesizer through Animoog who might not have otherwise giving people a nearly-free opportunity to explore a truly inspirational creative tool.”

Read the rest of this entry »