Each Spring the Musical Instruments world descends upon Frankfurt, Germany for the planet’s largest MI trade show; Musikmesse. Cakewalk’s had a presence at the Frankfurt Musikmesse for decades and with one small exception this year was no different. This year I was a part of the crew. And this year I wrote a blog about it!
A 3 Part Resource for D.I.Y. Acoustic Sound Treatment and Room Development
As a conclusion to my series on Building Cost Effective Acoustic Treatment, I wanted to put a link to all three articles in one place along with a “before and after” video. I also wanted to put this up on our forum in one place in case anyone has any questions about what I did with my studio. If you are planning on trying to save some money by building your own acoustic treatment panels these three articles are worth reviewing.
Part 1: Building a sound cloud over your mix position
The effort to build all this acoustic treatment was not minimal, but well worth it. Besides saving a lot of money I was able to customize the panels so that they fit the room well. Using the QuadCurve EQ which comes with SONAR X3Producer is where I can really tell the difference in my environment. The QuadCurve EQ is very advanced and allows the user to surgically tailor frequencies. Now that I have my room treated properly, I can really hear the difference between the EQ modes.
So the first step is to get going with a version of the SONAR X3 family, and then do your homework and figure out the best listening environment FOR YOU.
Looking for a way to create dub style delay effects in SONAR? Look no further, by following these steps you can easily get that classic dub sound.
First, insert two stereo busses into the project. The first bus “Delay feed” will send the drum signal to the other bus “Delay” which will house the delay plugin. Continue reading “Create Dub-tastic delay effects in SONAR!”
The success of SONAR X1 user Chris Standring’s groundbreaking 2010 CD Blue Bolero, which topped several year-end lists and produced a No. 1 single, made it tough for him to create a follow-up record; but all early indicators are showing that he managed quite nicely with the new Electric Wonderland recording which came out yesterday.
As of this morning, Chris woke up to find out that Electric Wonderland has hit #1 in its genre on the Amazon.com sales chart, as well as #1 on the BDS Radio Tracking Chart (Billboard) for the same genre. I would say that’s a setup for a pretty great day, especially considering the “sales” climate of the music industry in general. Electric Wonderland is a 10-song CD of original songs that fuses elements of the last record Blue Bolero’s orchestral touches with a deft jazz-pop touch that’s been a hallmark of Standring’s stellar career.
One of the changes Chris made on Electric Wonderland besides going from SONAR 8.5 to X1 was mixing the record on his own. Continue reading “How Chris Standring Used SONAR X1 to Hit Two #1 Chart Positions”
If you thought NAMM was something, wait until next week when Musikmesse 2012 opens itself to the world in Frankfurt, Germany from March 21st – 24th. The planet’s largest Music Industry trade show is looming just over the horizon and we’ll be there to show off our latest wares, gadgets, and goodies, including a new brand new, yet to be released ProChannel module.
We’ll formally announce the new module at the show. In the meantime, check out the picture below to spot the module in action. But don’t tell anyone I gave you the drop, OK?
Continue reading “Musikmesse Preview And New ProChannel Module”
If you’re a SONAR X1 user then you’ve probably already seen that the free SONAR X1d update has been released for all versions of SONAR X1. And if you’re a SONAR X1 Producer Expanded user, then you’ve probably already noticed that you’ve got a shiny, new EQ in the ProChannel called the QuadCurve EQ.
However, you might be wondering what exactly the deal is with the new EQ and and what the differences are in the four modes.
Hopefully by now you have a version of the award winning SONAR X1 running on your machine, because A&M/Octone recording artist K’NAAN wants to hear from you; musically. With this exclusive opportunity through Cakewalk, Roland, Indaba Music and A&M/Octone, you can sign up for this contest and download the actual stems to craft your own work of art. If that work of art is chosen by K’Naan and his label, it will result in a nice chunk of cash or a Cakewalk/Roland gear package for you. Continue reading “Remix K'Naan's New Single to Win $1000 and SONAR X1 Production Suite”
[Click on any picture for higher resolution] For the last couple of weeks I have been writing about how I’ve been building custom acoustic treatment panels for my new project studio which is running SONAR X1 Producer Expanded. I started with the sound cloud over the mix position and then showed how I basically cut out all the corners of my room (a square room unfortunately for me) by building corner traps. This week I’ll dive into probably the most important component; the wall panels.
The wall panels are really important for me for a few reasons. (1.) They absorb the first sound reflection from the speakers so that the frequency waves are tamed down, and (2.) They absorb the sound in the room in general to control echo and reverberation. I do a bit of professional moonlighting work on the side including songwriting/production for ESPN Sports Center as well as other commercial stuff, so it’s important for me to have a controlled environment to listen to my mixes and productions on SONAR so that what I deliver is the real-deal. As I stated before, it’s pretty much impossible to create a perfect listening environment unless you are building a room from scratch (floating room, sound proofing inside the walls, etc…,) but it is possible to greatly improve your surroundings. In my own opinion, I think the way to look at it is to figure out what it is you are trying to accomplish before you purchase or build anything. I think some of the important questions to ask are:
*How much can I afford to put into the project?
*Is it important for the place to look professional?
*Will a vibed-out room make you or whoever is using the room feel more creative?
*What are the basic sonic trouble elements to the room?
*Will the room be used for mixing or recording?
*What genre of music will the room be used for (i.e.> Hip-hop with a lot of low end, Jazz, etc…) Continue reading “How Building Cost Effective Acoustic Treatment for the Music Studio Will Help Your Music Production; Part 3: Wall Panels”
Softube’s new Mix Bundle for the Pro Channel in SONAR X1 Producer Expanded includes five awesome sounding modules that will make your mixes come alive!
In addition to three distinctly different EQs (Passive, Active and Softube’s own creation the Focusing EQ), the Mix Bundle has the TSAR-1R reverb and a great FET Compressor. I used these two modules for my demos at this year’s NAMM Show and I wanted to share my experience with them this week. Continue reading “Softube's Mix Bundle for SONAR X1 Producer Expanded's Pro Channel delivers the goods at NAMM”
So maybe you have SONAR X1 Production Suite running on a killer computer, and now you might have a sound cloud over your mix position; what’s next? Last week I exemplified how I built and installed a hanging sound cloud and this week I will go into detail how I built corner traps to help tame my unorthodox (square) production room. Before reading this post, you may want to visit my article from last week which goes into some detail on room shapes.
My room, unfortunately for me is dead square. This is about the worst case scenario so I had to do some research and talk to a lot of friends who are acoustic professionals such as Gavin Haverstick of Haverstick designs. With my room being about 13.5’ x 13.5’ and 7.5’ ceilings, he has my mix position at 62” off the front wall. So with my positioning about right, and a sound cloud overhead to take out the first ceiling reflections, the next thing to do was try to knock out the corners of the room where bass frequencies could become a big problem.
I decided to make custom corner traps based on my personal situation. Once again, every room and everyone’s needs are different, so if you are on a tight budget, I think it’s best to first figure out what’s important to YOU. For my situation, here were my goals for corner traps:
