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Creating Music In The Classroom With Cakewalk

On June 15 2009, Cakewalk Product Manager Samara Krugman discussed music production in the classroom with Keith Mason, coordinator of Music Technology at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee and producer for the Music Tech For ME podcast.

In this episode, Samara explains how Music Creator 5 can benefit the music student. It’s simple interface and getting started tutorials guide users through the process of recording, editing, and mixing their first tracks. Students can add sound effects and backing tracks to their projects with hundreds of high-quality instrument sounds, loops and samples built right into the software studio. With these tools, plus Music Creator 5’s various project views and assistant features, students will learn basic music composition techniques as they work toward arranging and printing their own sheet music.

Visit Music Tech for ME online to hear the interview.

Music Tech For ME covers all aspects of incorporating music technology into the K-12 school curriculum, advising music educators across the globe on the latest advancements in creating and teaching music. Even if you’re not a music educator, you can learn a lot about the numerous technological tools and resources that are available on the market today just by listening to the show.

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The How-to Geek.com Awards Music Creator 5 Four Stars

Cakewalk’s Music Creator 5 gets 4 stars and an excellent review at The How-to Geek.com!

Judged in five categories – Installation, Ease of Use, Features, Performance and Product Support – Music Creator 5 scored 8s across the board as ‘the affordable and powerful multitrack recording program perfect for beginners.’

The program’s help guides, simplified project views, and professional quality virtual instruments garnered much attention from the reviewer as he states:

”There is a bit of a learning curve to begin using Music Creator 5 and they offer a detailed user guide in the software and also videos on their site.  Once you start getting the hang of it everything falls into place.”

“While geared at beginners, there is a large amount of professional and studio quality features included in this package… there is a complete set of virtual instruments you can program to make the sound of your song huge.”

The How-To Geek.com features ‘how to’ articles on all things computers from operating systems and internet browsers to computer games and Microsoft Office™ tools. Need advice on running a certain program?  Just ask for help from a fellow geek on the site’s forums and wiki pages.

Get the full review, complete with installation instructions and screenshots, at the How-To Geek.com.

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Cast Your Vote for One Stop Shop's V-Studio 100 Rap Battle

As you probably have already heard, the new SONAR V-Studio 100 by Cakewalk is taking portable music production to another level. When used with your Mac or PC you get a 24/96k audio interface with high-quality mic preamps and a DAW controller. Away from you computer you get an 8×6 digital mixer an SD recorder to play back beats at your gig or to record those inspiring moments on the road or at home when you don’t feel like firing up your computer. Plus it comes with the VS Production Pack of effects and instruments for Mac and Windows.

To prove our point, we took the V-Studio 100 to Sha Money’s One Stop Shop Conference in Phoenix, AZ and put it to work. With all the up and coming MCs and producers in attendance, we figured One Stop Shop was the best place to test this product out with the Hip Hop community. To paraphrase one of the original gangstas “If we can make it there, we’ll make it anywhere.”

Cakewalk’s resident producer Lil Shamrock recorded a beat on the spot and then threw down the gauntlet, challenging the MCs in attendance to come up and record their rhymes on the fly while the beat was playing back from the V-Studio 100’s SD card.

Watch the video below to check out the finalists, then cast your vote and let us know who’s got it.   The winner is going to receive a copy of SONAR Producer or Rapture. It’s up to you!

This contest will run through Monday July 6, 2009.

Pick your favorite MC

Big Will

monev360

Normous Child

Anthony Dollar

A-Dymondz

Just Before Dawn

Suave

Leno the beast (intro track, no video footage)

sheepskin boots

Just imagine that if we could do this quickly in a tradeshow environment, what you could do in your creative space.

Learn how the SONAR V-Studio 100 will help you make your music anytime, anywhere

Read more about Cakewalk’s activities at One Stop Shop 2009

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Turn Your Riffs Into Hits With Guitar Tracks Pro 4

Cakewalk announces a clean, new look to the guitar-based software title for PC with Guitar Tracks Pro 4 and Guitar Tracks Pro USB!

Designed for guitarists and singer-songwriters, Guitar Tracks Pro 4 is the recording solution that takes your music from riff to hit! You get an amazing virtual guitar amp, a backing band of virtual instruments, precise editing tools, mixing console, over 2GB of sounds and effects, and more -for less than a few hours in the studio.

New Features Include:

• A simplified multi-track recorder interface makes it easy to record, edit and mix your music

• Create, edit and print your own notation and tablature; an included fret-board view makes it easy to match notes to the guitar neck

• A suite of pro effects including Cakewalk’s Boost 11 Peak Limiter and Native Instrument’s Guitar Rig 3 LE to give you an arena sized sound right in your own studio

• Over 2GB of audio loops and samples spanning rock, blues, country, and bluegrass from Smart LoopsTM, Digital Sound FactoryTM, and Groove MonkeeTM

• Perfect your chops with a collection of Guitar World instructional videos featuring: Steve Morse, Dave Mustaine, Jimmy Herring, Paul Gilbert, Joe Bonamassa, and others.

• Play along with loops recorded by world class drummers including: John Blackwell (Justin Timberlake, Prince), Jerry Marotta (Paul McCartney, Peter Gabriel), Nick D’Virgilio (Genesis, Tears for Fears), Ed Greene (Steely  Dan, Barry White) and Danny Gottlieb (Sting, Pat Metheny Group) courtesy of Sonic RealityTM

• Burn CDs and upload your finished projects directly to the web with Cakewalk Publisher; share your music with friends and family on websites, blogs or social networking sites

PLUS Guitar Tracks Pro USB includes our portable, high quality audio interface, the UA-1G. Optimized for guitarists, the UA-1G features a special 1/4″ jack with Hi-Z option for recording and 24-bit/96-kHZ Stereo I/O for playback!

For more information:

Watch a Live Demo From Sonic State

See the full Guitar Tracks Pro press release

Please visit Guitar Tracks Pro 4 and Guitar Tracks Pro USB online

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Happy 127th Birthday to Igor Stravinsky!

To honor one of the most influential composers of the 20th century, we thought it fitting to post this amazing rendition of Le Sacre du Printemps or The Rite of Spring, arranged in SONAR by Cakewalk user Jay Bacal.

The two-movement piece is shown as a series of four videos – two of which Jay has yet to post. Performed on a 16GB Quad-core Windows VISTA 64-bit PC, Bacal used Vienna Symphonic Library to emulate the pristine sounds of the orchestra and arranged the piece using SONAR 8’s Piano Roll view.

Known as Stravinsky’s most controversial work, The Right of Spring caused a great riot at it’s debut, at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris, France in 1913. Performed by the Ballets Russes, the intensely rhythmic score and primitive scenario – the setting evoking pagan Russia – shocked audiences accustomed to the more modest conventions of classical ballet!

Please don’t cause another scandal but feel free to tell Jay what you think of his latest project on the Cakewalk forums!

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Angels & Airwaves Cover Featuring Studio Instruments – Drums

A Studio Instruments fan, who goes by the name of Tadqim on Youtube, posted this video late last week and we wanted to pass it along. Using the Drum kit, included in Cakewalk’s Studio Instruments, Tadqim added his own beats to the Angels & Airwaves hit ‘Call to Arms’.

Cakewalk’s Studio Instruments-Drums allows users to make backing tracks with a realistically animated interface that looks just like a drum set! Now included in the latest recording and editing software for beginners, Music Creator 5.

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SONAR 8 Review: Make Music Professionally At Home

Today’s musicians face a tough job market and an even worse economy. To cut the production costs of making and recording their music, many musicians are building their own DIY recording studios at home. These studios are creating some of the industry’s best tracks with off-the-shelf yet extremely powerful software and hardware solutions.

In response to this growing trend, Mark Eustace from This is Tamworth (an all things local publication of the Tamworth Herald, UK) recently took a look at SONAR 8, calling it “a raft of virtual instrument, effects, plug-ins, and all the production tools you would ever need to record and master your own hit record.”

Discover the power of SONAR 8 with Mark Eustace in the latest edition of This is Tamworth.

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First Impressions of V-Studio 700: Danny Klein

Just a few weeks ago, Cakewalk’s Zac Kenney met up with Boston-based bassist Danny Klein at Guitar Center-Boston to pick up his SONAR V-Studio 700. A Cakewalk pro-user since the Pro Audio days, Danny was looking for a new controller to use in his SONAR-outfitted studio. After many years producing his music with the Roland JP-1000 and then with an Alesis Mixer, Klein started to seek other alternatives. Since it’s a controller dedicated to SONAR and would speed up his workflow without the aid of a mouse, Danny knew he just had to get the SONAR V-Studio 700!

“I use SONAR V-Studio 700 because of the quality of the system (and the quality and reliability of Cakewalk / Roland products), the many features at a reasonable price, the ease of setting up and using the system and the seamless integration with my SONAR 8 Producer, making this system all I need to make professional recordings in my home studio.”

Danny Klein grew up in New Jersey and came to Massachusetts to study at Worcester Polytechnical Institute in the 1960’s. While attending WPI, he befriended J. Geils and Magic Dick, who taught Klein how to play a washtub bass. The trio formed the ‘J Geils Blues Band’. Eventually they hooked up with ex-Hallucinations percussionist Stephen Jo Bladd and his vocalist, Peter Wolf, as well as keyboardist / songwriter Seth Justman… thus setting the stage for 17 successful years touring as the ‘J. Geils Band’ from Boston.

The group recorded 17 albums and toured with the Rolling Stones, releasing such hits as ‘Centerfold’ and ‘Freeze Frame’. In February 2009, J. Geils Band reunited for the grand opening of the House of Blues-Boston and played two sold out shows at the Fillmore Theater in Detroit. Currently, the band is leaving the door open to new opportunities, hoping to play together again, soon.

In 1994, Danny founded the blues band ‘Stone Crazy’ (produced by J. Geils). The group released its first 14-track, self-entitled album in 2005 and performed its ‘bluesy grooves’ at select clubs throughout New England.

Danny’s latest project, ‘Danny Klein’s Full House Band,’ is a group of Boston’s well known and most talented musicians who come together to celebrate the music of the J.Geils band. Danny Klein’s Full House Band performs at many charitable events throughout the Boston area.

We congratulate Danny on all of his accomplishments and hope he enjoys working in studio with the new SONAR V-Studio 700!

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Play Along Jazz Contest Gets Your Music Heard By Jazz Pros

Take the next step in your musical journey this summer at PlayAlongJazz.com. Devoted to giving Jazz musicians the tools they need to succeed, Play Along Jazz gives you the chance to play with some of today’s finest musicians, to learn from their live playing, and to combine your musical voice with theirs.

How does it work? At Play Along Jazz, you will find a list of Jazz standards from which to select: you have the option to choose your tracks (stereo drum track, mono bass track, stereo guitar track etc) and mix the session yourself (what we call “Mix Your Own”) or download a stereo file that has one of the tracks omitted: drums silent for the student drummer; guitar silent for the student guitarist, etc. Downloads are priced for students and each month you will have the chance to play along with a new stream for free. There’s also an email request link so that you can suggest the addition of tunes that interest you.

Through August 31, 2009, when you purchase 15 downloads at Play Along Jazz.com, you will have the chance to submit one of your Play Along songs for review by some of today’s top jazz professionals. This acclaimed panel will select one special song from one aspiring artist that shows the greatest potential in creatively improvising in the play along environment. The winner will also receive a complimentary copy of Cakewalk’s most intuitive digital audio workstation, SONAR 8 Producer!

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Cakewalk Pro User Spotlight: Sparks the Rescue

In an ongoing effort to support and promote all the amazingly talented artists and producers that use our products, we are excited to announce the Cakewalk Pro User (CPU) Spotlight Series which will be posted here on a regular basis.

Right now, more than ever, aspiring artists are taking control of their music creation to capitalize on what will be known as the independent music age. These independent spirits are taking their money saved for studio time and investing in their own future by purchasing the studio tools themselves. With so many choices on the market, we salute the artists in this series who are capitalizing on SONAR’s unlimited track count, or the crystal clear sounds of Rapture, or the fat pre amps in the V-Studio 100 and the V-Studio 700, or the… well, you get the point.

Whether these CPU Spotlight artists are on a major or independent label, producing for labels, or simply doing their own thing, they all have three things in common: they’re all tremendously talented, they’re all doing their own thing and they all depend on the quality of Cakewalk products to achieve professional results.

CPU Spotlight #1: An interview with Sparks the Rescue at the famous Stone Pony in Asbury Park, New Jersey – Take one mic-swinging vocalist who throws himself to the floor, the crowd, the walls and into his band mates; add two guitarists providing vocals and an insane amount of movement; mix in a bassist with an impressive set of lungs providing screams and harmonies; and top it off with a rock-solid drummer holding it all down – this concoction renders Sparks the Rescue, a group of guys in their early 20’s from Portland, Maine.

Logging in over 200 shows throughout New England, Sparks the Rescue has shared the stage with Hawthorne Heights, Just Surrender, As Tall As Lions, Dave Melillo, Roses Are Red, A Change of Pace, Showbread, Chiodos, A Static Lullaby, Saosin, Boys Night Out, Stretch Arm Strong, Emanuel, The Static Age, Glory of This, and many others.

2007 saw the release of ‘The Secrets We Can’t Keep’ digital EP, preceding a full-length album on Fearless Records which is available now in stores and on ITunes.

Check out our first-ever Cakewalk Pro User Spotlight featuring Sparks the Rescue and stay tuned for more in the near future!