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A Letter From Cakewalk's President On SONAR "Everett"

Last week we launched the SONAR “Everett,” Release which includes our new Drum Replacer tool. Everyone at Cakewalk is still buzzing about how it can transform a simple loop, or drum tracks recorded in less ideal conditions, into amazing sounding drums. Additionally, we have improved the overall SONAR experience with 40 fixes, the new Sizzle Bus FX Chain for mixing and mastering, and have included some awesome drum content to complement Drum Replacer. And to help everyone get the most of this powerful new tool, we have posted four free Drum Replacer video tutorials.

This release also has a deeper meaning to me. It’s now June, five months after we launched the New SONAR. Drum Replacer is not a minor update.  Third party equivalent plug-ins cost hundreds of dollars, but SONAR Platinum customers receive it at no additional cost. In the annual upgrade model (SONAR X3 or earlier), people wouldn’t have seen this feature until next January. But since we have introduced “membership,” we can bring this to you today, almost 8 months sooner.

There’s been a lot of fuss and confusion about SONAR’s new membership program, and why we created it. It’s NOT a subscription scheme, because you can still own (not rent) SONAR, and never need to make a monthly payment if you don’t want to. SONAR “Everett” is what SONAR membership is really all about. Our ability to develop, test, refine, and release exciting SONAR features to users throughout the year. It’s about continuous innovation. It’s about helping you make better music every day.

Enjoy!
Michael

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Video from Winter NAMM 2015

NAMM

Highlights from Winter NAMM 2015
NAMM was our first opportunity to show off the new SONAR line to the public, and the reception was nothing short of spectacular. To handle the crowds, products were demoed at three locations—the Gibson, TASCAM, and Hal Leonard booths. We met artists, press, and of course many, many customers—and we were equally happy to thrill long-time Cakewalk supporters as well as bring new users into the fold.

Cakewalk NAMM 2015

We wish everyone could experience the excitement of NAMM, but to give you a taste just click the links below to see demos and interviews from the show floor. And—there’s also a sneak peek of the new David Bendeth Signature Series Compressor.

Dan Gonzalez demos the new features in SONAR

Audiofanzine gets a demo of the new SONAR

Keyboard magazine interviews Craig Anderton on Membership

Engineer/Producer, John Paterno shows off Overloud REmatrix

Sneak peek at new David Bendeth Signature Series Compressor

 

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New Cakewalk Store – 60% off SONAR Upgrades

New Cakewalk Store

Shop the NEW Cakewalk Store
We are pleased and excited to announce Shop.cakewalk.com, our brand new store for Cakewalk software, upgrades, plugins, and extras! Cakewalk has partnered with Cleverbridge to offer a more seamless shopping experience and improve access for Cakewalk users around the globe.

  • Cakewalk SSO (single sign on) accounts will let you access the Cakewalk Store, Forum, Support, and Registration with one username and password! All of your previous purchases will be transferred when you create a new account.
  • Intelligent upgrade pricing, once you are logged in you see your best upgrade price for all qualifying products once you add them to your cart.
  • Store checkout pages can be translated in over 20 languages (Spanish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Dutch, Portuguese, and more)!
  • Now accepting purchases in over 20 currencies (USD, Australian Dollar, Canadian Dollar, Euro, British Pounds, Japanese Yen, Swiss Franc, Brazilian Real, and more)!
  • Great products on sale now and new products to come soon!

Visit Shop.cakewalk.com
Create your Cakewalk SSO account

 

SONAR Upgrades

Save 60% off your Upgrade to SONAR X3 (all versions) – Ends Dec. 31
You have been waiting all year for a really great deal on SONAR X3, and you almost missed your chance! Save an additional 60% off your usual upgrade price to any version of SONAR X3 – now through December 31st. Any version you choose is an unbeatable value with something new to inspire great music.

Choose your version below and login to see your best upgrade price!
SONAR X3 includes the breakthrough Comping workflow and VST3 support.
Regularly $99, Upgrades start at $19!

SONAR X3 Studio includes Melodyne Essential with ARA integration.
Regularly $199, Upgrades start at $39!

SONAR X3 Producer includes the fully loaded ProChannel, AD2, and more.
Regularly $499, Upgrades start at $59!

See which upgrade is right for you

 

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Meet the Bakers: Jimmy L

The direction I received for this blog article was “anything goes” and “keep it fun,” so my background story will knock off 2 birds with 1 stone: a blog post that hopefully will not bore readers to death, and a therapeutic time-lapse review for me… 😉 Sorry it’s a bit long, but I am 105 years old…

My weird music industry story:

My name is Jimmy Landry and I am a functioning work-aholic, wait, wait… I mean I am Head of Artist and Public Relations for Cakewalk.  I have thankfully been working for Cakewalk for almost 6 years now (hard to believe).  I have had an interesting career up to this point where I have toggled back in forth from being an artist (signing with EMI back in 2000) to actually working for Major Labels in Radio Promotion, Marketing, A&R and Staff Production (Elektra, Virgin and Capitol Records). I have been a musician since the age of 5 when I picked up my sister’s purple-flowered acoustic guitar she left behind while attending college (– thankfully there are no pictures I know of playing THAT thing 😉 Continue reading “Meet the Bakers: Jimmy L”

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Meet the Bakers: Mike L

I began playing Drums when I was 8 years old after my Dad set up his old kit from the 70’s. I played for a few years until I picked up my first guitar at a second hand music shop in New Hampshire. I played for hours everyday until the noise I was making started to sound like a melody. My friends and I started a punk band at the age of 13. We weren’t the best in my neighborhood, but definitely the loudest. At this point I knew I wanted to play music everyday for the rest of my life.

When I got to high school, I tried to find every music class I could. My first class freshman year was an electronic music class. In this class we used a version of Cakewalk Music Creator. I started becoming extremely interested in music production and wanted to learn everything I possibly could. I started to listen to my favorite albums and try to recreate the sounds I was hearing. To gain some experience, I started recording local bands in my basement by hanging mic cables over pipes for overheads. I remember listening to the album ‘Revolver’ over and over trying to copy what I was hearing.  Continue reading “Meet the Bakers: Mike L”

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Meet the Bakers: Lars W

Music is something I’ve always loved since I was very young. I played a few different instruments throughout school. In third grade I picked up the Baritone horn in grade school and played that through my senior year or high school in the concert band. As I got older my passion for music and different styles of music grew. In high school I started going to local rock shows which is what made me want to be in a band.

Being on stage and connecting with an audience was something I really wanted to do. That’s when I decided to start playing guitar. Not long after that I ended up switching to the bass after the bassist in my first band quit and that quickly became my primary instrument. The more I played shows the more I started to take music more seriously. What started as a hobby quickly became my life. In my junior year of high school I went to a 4 week workshop on Recording Studio Technology at the New England institute of Art. After spending a few weeks in the studio’s there I was hooked. Going into my senior year I decided I wanted to pursue a career in music production and engineering. So I made that my focus and took just about every music elective I could and then I applied to the New England institute of Art for Audio & Media Technology and got in.

While I was in school I studied with lots of inspiring teachers and made a bunch of great connection through doing internships and going to the AES Convetions and local AES events. About half way through college I started freelancing as an audio engineer working for various different audio companies in the Boston area doing live sound, studio recording and location recording. I graduated from the New England institute of Art in 2007 and not long after graduating I landed my gig at cakewalk as a customer service representative. Since then I’ve expanded into tech support as well. Continue reading “Meet the Bakers: Lars W”

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Meet the Bakers: Joey A

How did you get started with music?
When I was about 10 years old, my dad bought this acoustic guitar for himself for $20 or so. I thought it was so cool that my dad knew how to play AC/DC and Kiss songs (correctly or not made no real difference to me at the time), so I asked him to show me everything he knew. I picked up the basic chords pretty quickly and started sneaking into his room while he was at work to play the guitar unsupervised. One day he came home earlier than usual and heard me in my room playing the guitar. He was too shocked at how quickly I surpassed his skill level to scold me, and he said I could keep the guitar. Around the same time, two of my cousins were getting into guitar and I HAD to get as good as they were, so I put in as many hours of practice as I could.

Fast-forward about two years, I was starting to get into electric guitar more and more, and for Christmas I got this multi-fx pedal, and I was quickly obsessed with tone and all the neat things you could alter about a guitar’s sound. This naturally evolved into a passion for the field of audio engineering, and I decided that’s what I wanted to study after high school.

I managed to hone my musicianship enough to get accepted to Berklee College of Music right out of high school, and I took on a Music Business major, a Music Production and Engineering major, and an Acoustics & Electronics minor. During summers I interned for various music-related companies, not the least of which was the world-famous Blackbird Studio in Nashville, TN. It was throughout these college years and internships that I learned a lot about myself, particularly that I knew I wanted to work in the music industry to some degree, but I wanted audio engineering to remain entirely fun for me; I wanted to keep it around as a serious hobby but not make it my full-time profession. Continue reading “Meet the Bakers: Joey A”

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Meet the Bakers: Willy J

Sometime in middle school I started listening to bands like Static-X,Slipknot and Fear Factory and decided to start playing drums as well. My neighbors thought it was really cool. So cool they even invited local law enforcement over to listen to how awesome my high school band was. I got into school band and eventually jazz band and decided that I wanted to try the Bari Sax. I played on a busted old school loaner bari sax that was probably more suited as a gravel scoop than a horn but I ended up loving it.

This is about when my time with Cakewalk products started. Some buddies and I decided one summer that we should record ourselves, because you know – there wasn’t a big enough market for angsty teen rock bands. One friend got a set of drum mics and I end up getting a mixer that came bundled with Logic 5. That was way back in the day when Logic supported Windows. It didn’t work out very well and I ended up buying a copy of SONAR 2 XL. Yes – I actually bought it. I know, unheard of for a teenager that was tech savvy in the days of Napster.

I spent that entire summer playing around with mic positions, effects and learning how to mix. The following school year I was dual-enrolled in a local community college and took a few courses on recording. We used these old Tascam 16 and 32 track machines and would mix everything down to 2-track tape. It was a great experience although sometimes I wasn’t sure if the machine was about to take off like a helicopter. I have yet to have the opportunity to apply my capstan cleaning skills in a real studio. Continue reading “Meet the Bakers: Willy J”

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Meet the Bakers: Dave L

How did you get started with music?

The Beatles began my lifelong love and appreciation of music, at the age of 9. I consider myself extremely lucky to have grown up in an era with some of the most iconic bands in history. Being able to see The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stone, Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Ten Years After, Deep Purple .. live! …was simply amazing. Not too mention the ticket prices were only $7.50!

For the past 50+ years, music has been one of the most important aspects of my life. I played flute and clarinet, in the high school band as well as attending Berklee and the University of Lowell, where I taught electronic music labs in my freshman year. At Lowell, they had an ARP 2500, (2) 2600s and one of the first Synclavier commercially produced. Working in several local music stores as well as repairing all sorts of gear also added to my skills. I continue to utilize my technical skills whether its custom designing an on-board guitar preamp or here at Cakewalk.

Continue reading “Meet the Bakers: Dave L”

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Meet The Bakers: Dan K

I became obsessed with music when I was around 11 years old and my brothers left behind their collection of cassette tapes when they went on to college. They were mostly classic rock albums – Led Zeppelin I, II, and III, Jimi Hendrix’s Are You Experienced, Pink Floyd’s The Wall and everything in between.

I had a musical background already taking piano lessons, but it wasn’t long before I picked up my mom’s nylon string guitar and started learning how to play – first the chords, then on to as many solos as I could learn, one note at a time.

Eventually I studied more formally, taking up blues, jazz, and classical guitar, but once I realized I wouldn’t *quite* be the next Jimi Hendrix, I got my feet wet writing songs of my own. Since then, I’ve recorded a handful of EPs (not to be confused with the other Dan Kaplan, who writes and records solo harmonica albums), a full length album, and I just finished mixing my first full length album, Chasing Daylight, with my band, Magnolia. You can listen to the first single here.

 

Fun Facts:

  • I was an all state flute player in NY when I was a kid. I don’t remember why I started playing the flute, but I probably thought it’d be cool to be the only boy. Now it just comes in handy for the occasional jazz flute solo (i.e. never).
  • I had a song, “Around the Bend” featured on The Discovery Channel’s Deadliest Catch a few years ago. Still probably one of the highlights of my life.
  • I *might* be related to Johnny Appleseed.

Position:
Graphic Designer

Years @ Cakewalk:
5+ years (gulp)

Instruments:
Mostly guitar and piano, but I’ll hit or try to play anything I can get my hands on