Gadget Reviewer Rob Beschizza spent the weekend with Cakewalk’s SONAR V-Studio 100. After hooking up the portable device to his computer via USB and plugging in his guitar through the Hi-Z input, Rob discovered that he did not need an amp to produce great sounds. In a matter of minutes, Rob was blown away by the device’s ‘triple play’ of powerful features:
“The key point is that it’s a unique box, combining MIDI controller, portable multi-track recorder, and mixer, all in a case the size of a Harry Potter hardback.”
Rob also liked the unit’s SD Recorder function (or as he called it ‘screw software’ mode) for recording on the go; saying that it gives the SONAR V-Studio 100 an ‘aura of awesomeness’.
Read the rest of Rob’s short & sweet review and see close-up shots of the V-Studio 100 at Boing Boing.net
Future Music Magazine met up with Cakewalk’s Brandon Ryan in Frankfurt, Germany at Musikmesse 2009 in March. Brandon was demonstrating the many functions of SONAR V-Studio 100, giving them a tour of all the knobs, buttons and controls. Watch the video below to get a close up look at Cakewalk’s own Swiss Army Knife:
Day 2 of Musikmesse started out real well. I opened up the tradeshow daily to see that we had gotten a write-up on page 2 about the fact that the V-Studio console was going to be available to SONAR 8 customers as a stand alone control surface.
I think one important point that was missing from the article, and I couldn’t expect it be written there, was that this is another example of Cakewalk listening to our customers. Some SONAR 8 users told us that they have spent quite a bit of money on their I/O and that you really only need the best control surface possible for SONAR.
We listened, and with just a little bit of work on our part, we will now be able to give them what they asked for, starting this summer. I still personally feel that if anyone had the full experienceof using the entire SONAR V-Studio 700 system together with the I/O and Fantom Synth, they would rethink their decision to only buy the console, but I guess I’m biased.
I kept reading the daily and I also found this nice photo of Ben Klempel and Massimo Barbini posing with the V-Studio 100. Massimo is the Managing Director of Edirol Europe, our distributor in Europe, and a really inspiring guy… I’m gald he’s on our side.
Brandon of course, was in his usual form, knocking out the crowds with his V-Studio 700 Demos.
There’s another good video from the show online. In this video, which should play after an ad, Sonic State interviews Julian from Edirol Europe about the V-Studio 100 and the VS 700C.
Also, the video I wrote about in the blog a couple of days ago, that Craig Anderton shot is now available online at Harmony Central.
When you get to the page, click on ‘Preview Video’ to watch Craig’s pre-show coverage. Alex, Steve, Brandon and I stage a mock argument about what’s important about the V-Studio 100 at around 4:20. You might get a laugh from it.
Ok… I can’t contain myself so we’re going to have blog dessert first and jump right to the end of the day. SONAR V-Studio 700 won the MIPA award for Best Recording Hardware!
If you’re not aware of what the MIPA is or what it means to Cakewalk, just imagine that you won a Grammy award. Over 100 music products magazines worldwide come together each year to vote on what they feel are the best and most innovative products of the last year. So it is such a incredible honor that SONAR V-Studio 700 was selected for this!
Greg Hendershott, Cakewalk’s Founder and CEO and Mr. Kimitaka Kondo Managing Director of Roland Corporation were hand to accept the award.
I’ve uploaded a video clip from the event of our winning the award and Greg and Mr. Kondo’s speech:
The stage was filled with many happy people, as they called up the winners of all categories.
Charly Steinberg won a Lifetime Achievement award tonight for his work over the years to move music technology forward. It was a moment of sheer transcendence for me to see Greg and Charly together. Cakewalk won a MIPA tonight in a category that beat out Steinberg’s latest offering, and Charly the founder of that same competitor was honored for his life’s work.
Despite how fiercely we have competed over the years, the two of them greeted each other like old friends and had a genuine, warm moment congratulating each other. It really reminded me that we’re all in it for the same reason… to make music and to help people make music. And maybe we shouldn’t forget that are competitors are just like us in that regard. In alot of ways, they help us make better products for you, because we have to continue to innovate to stay competitive with each other.
Anyway enough of the philosophical ramblings. Here’s another photo from the evening, it features some of my favorite people, members of the Cakewalk and Roland team.
From left to right: Masahiro Minowa, Michael Hoover, Robin Kelly, Koichi Mizumoto, Greg Hendershott, Alex Westner, Carl Jacobson (me), Steve Thomas and Brandon Ryan.
Those are genuine smiles you’re seeing in this picture. This team and many other people back in the offices of Cakewalk and Roland, put in a tremendous effort over the last couple years to make SONAR V-Studio 700. To be recognized with a MIPA for that work, really made it all worthwhile.
Well, I need to run to a meeting. Part 2 of Day 2 will be coming soon.
Create Digital Music is one of the industry’s top blogs featuring the latest news, tips, product reviews, forums and articles on digital music making. Yesterday, CDM was among the first outlets to introduce SONAR V-Studio 100!
“The V-Studio 100 is set up in a way that appears to come close to what I think a whole lot of us need as laptop musicians. And despite the Cakewalk name, it’s actually aimed at users of a variety of Mac and Windows tools…”
See what else they had to say about Cakewalk’s newest product, the portable music production studio for Mac and PC.
Well, it was such a good first day of the show, i’m not really sure where to begin. I guess starting at the beginning of the day is a good place.
Things started to look good first thing in the morning when I received the Messe Show Daily, and saw that the editors had decided that SONAR V-Studio 100 was one of the hottest announcements at the show and it deserved front cover placement on day 1.
Alex Westner, Cakewalk’s Director of Product Management is pictured here with the Show Daily…
The show floor was humming with excitement. Our European Distributors Edirol Europe did a great job with the booth. And they take a more rock & roll approach to our produce demos than we usually do in the states.
They hired an amazing group to do SONAR V-Studio 100 product demonstrations that showed how a band would usually use the product. I thought their demos were a lot of fun. Chris is here explaining to the audience the benefits of having an audio interface, daw controller, digital mixer, and SD Wave recorder all in one compact device.
I imagine it looked something like this.
But the audience clearly enjoyed themselves.
Craig Anderton, came by and shot a very entertaining product video with Alex, Brandon Ryan, Steve Thomas, and myself about the SONAR V-Studio 100, I don’t want to give any spoilers, but keep an eye out on Harmony Central for the video.
MusicRadar.tv also came by to get the scoop on the V-Studio 100. They interviewed Alex and the video is already online. You can check it out below.
Not sure if you saw the announcement yesterday, but we have extended our distribution into a bunch of new markets. I got to meet some of the new distributors today and talk to them about our products and our marketing. They were really a great group of people and I think we’re mutually very enthusiastic about working together.
Greg, Brandon, and Robin are pictured here with our new friends Subhash Khandelwal of Rivera Digitec (Mumbai, India), Roy Viljoen of Paul Bothner Music (South Africa), Magdey El Bouhy of ADawliah (Saudi Arabia), George Triantafillou and Nikos Stamoulis of Venediktos Stollas (Greece), and Ron Nevo and Ilan Murad of Halilit (Israel).
Steve, Alex, and I then attended the Lesser Awards Ceremony put on by PPVMEDIEN, one of the biggest publishers of music magazines in Europe. Two years ago, Kinetic won the Lesser Award for Das Bestes Groove Tool and SONAR 8 was nominated for an award this year. We didn’t win but it is always an honor to be nominated and we had a good time at the event.
One change for the Award Ceremony was that the Surf Rock band was replaced this year by the Justin Nova Band. I liked what I heard and expect good things from this group.
Well, quite a bit for day wouldn’t you say? I’m looking forward to see what tomorrow brings…
Signing off,
Carl Jacobson & Alex Westner (pictured and filmed above)
A few weeks before the launch we got to sit down in the studio with Shayna Zaid and the Catch. Their live shows have been packing crowds in NYC and colleges up and down the east coast. They’ve shared the stage with Norah Jones, Harry Connick Jr, Raul Midon and The Roots.
Their music has gone on to see much success with 8 songs licensed to “Young & the Restless”, 4 #1 singles in Shayna’s Native Malaysia, a 1/4 million Myspace plays, and Finalist in the 2008 International Songwriting Competition, among many other honors. As you can see, they know what it’s like to be a touring and recording act so we asked them for their impression of the SONAR V-Studio 100. Watch the video to see what they thought.
“Brilliant! Finally something that encompasses everything we need to professionally go mobile. With killer mic pre’s, an onboard SD recorder/player, an audio/midi interface and a DAW controller, the V- Studio 100 lets us create on the road – and at home.”
Quite Nyce is one half of the emerging Hip Hop duo RADIx. They’ve recently been featured on MTV2 and in URB magazine. And have toured with Das EFX, Onyx, the Beatnuts and many others.
Their debut album MONSTAPLEx is set to be released this April and features Afrobatik on a guest track. Quite Nyce also has a side project called Champs vs. the League, which just toured the UK and Germany with Akil from Jurassic 5.
Quite Nyce is a man who needs a complete solution that he can take on the road, so when he got a sneak peak of SONAR V-studio 100 last month he described his reaction as “speechless.” Contrary to that comment, he ended up having alot to say about the V-Studio 100. Watch the video to get his impressions.
Sharkey has performed and produced with such heavyweights as Eminem, Everlast, Mickey Petralia, Mario Caldato Jr., Jedi Mind Tricks, The Black Eyed Peas, and Wyclef Jean. His first solo album “Sharkey’s Machine” featured guest appearances by Cannibal Ox, The Pharcyde, Grand Puba of Brand Nubian and Cherrywine from Digable Planets.
2008’s Monster Maker with C-Rayz waltz was a critically acclaimed foray into the world of alternative hip hop. In 2009 he’s set to release Dastardly with 2009 Grammy-nominated artist Kokayi.
Based in Maryland, but doing regular sessions in NYC, Nashville, and LA, not to mention DJ sets, we thought Sharkey might appreciate a sneak peek of the V-Studio 100…but we didn’t expect him to try to walk away with it. Watch the video to hear his impressions and more.
Producer, DJ, multi-instrumentalist, and long time SONAR expert, Johnny Juice was an original member of the Bomb Squad at the age of 15, and has been doing productions for Public Enemy, Reverend Run, and countless others ever since.
The man is always working; his credo is “sleep is for the dead,” so he’s always looking for tools that speed up his workflow, travel with him, and sound great…and if they can combine more than one function in one device, even better.
Because of his long history with SONAR and relentless schedule, we asked Juice to put the V-Studio 100 through its paces. Watch the video to find out if it passed his test.
“This unit is ridiculous. I can bounce with it on the road and use it for backing tracks AND recording, and then import my work when I get back to my studio right from the SD card.”
Gadget Reviewer Rob Beschizza spent the weekend with Cakewalk’s SONAR V-Studio 100. After hooking up the portable device to his computer via USB and plugging in his guitar through the Hi-Z input, Rob discovered that he did not need an amp to produce great sounds. In a matter of minutes, Rob was blown away by the device’s ‘triple play’ of powerful features:
