Leading the DAW industry with Windows technology and education for music production

Music productionSONAR X1 continues to be the leading the digital audio workstation for the Windows platform for many reasons. For 25 years Cakewalk has focused almost exclusively on development for Windows operating systems and Windows based computer technologies (see our section on SONAR X1 leading technologies for more information). While cross-platform DAWs may seem like a great option if you are not sure which platform you want to run, those who have chosen to use Windows will appreciate the hardwork and dedication by the Cakewalk development team to fine tune SONAR for Windows. This is one of the most cited reasons as to why SONAR dominates on the Windows PC platform. But today, I want to discuss another reason why Cakewalk is a leader in the industry.

Since 2010, Cakewalk has made a commitment to educating all levels of Cakewalk customers on music production. At Cakewalk, we think that post-sales activities are just as important as pre-sales ones, and nothing is more import than making sure users understand and enjoy the software they are using. Continue reading “Leading the DAW industry with Windows technology and education for music production”

Composing & Arranging with SONAR 8.5

The new version of Cakewalk’s digital audio workstation, SONAR 8.5, includes a wealth of features designed to help composers create the best possible productions.

Whether you’re composing hip-hop, rock, heavy metal or classical music, SONAR 8.5 offers all the tools you need with these fun and exciting new features. Check out the videos to see the Matrix View, Step Sequencer, Arpeggiator & Session Drummer in action:

Matrix View

Step Sequencer 2.0

Continue reading “Composing & Arranging with SONAR 8.5”

MIX Magazine Films Exclusive SONAR 8.5 Videos

MIXMix Magazine caught up with Cakewalk’s Brandon Ryan to shoot three exclusive videos – demoing the new version of Cakewalk’s flagship DAW, SONAR 8.5.

The first video displays SONAR’s sheer power hosting Shawn Clement’s remix of Cori Yarckin’s “Everything You Said” with 140 tracks, 50 plug-ins and a high-res 800 MB AVI video file – all running simultaneously on a PC AudioLabs Intel Core i7 desktop machine. The second video focuses on the new compositional features added to SONAR 8.5 Producer such as the Matrix view, the VX-64 vocal processor plug-in, the powerful arpeggiator and the time-stretching tool, AudioSnap 2.0. Lastly, Brandon gives a brief overview of the new percussion instruments, Session Drummer 3 and the PX-64 percussion strip.

Watch these videos now on the MIX TV page!

Cool Videos Produced by SONAR 8 Users

Over the years, we’ve posted hundreds of videos to Youtube and Dailymotion.  We check the ratings, read the comments and enjoy getting feedback from our users.  We also search these sites to check out the tutorials and music videos produced by our fans and we love to share them with you.  Below are videos highlighting projects produced in SONAR 8 Producer by a few very talented individuals:

Cool Videos on Making Music for Video Games

Composing music for video games is a growing industry and an increasingly important part of our customer base. At NAMM 09′, we hosted a panel discussing this very topic with some of the best known composers around. Many of our customers, such as Stephen Hanson and Diwa Deleon, use SONAR for sequencing and recording music to their favorite video games. We recently came across their Youtube videos and thought you would get a kick out of their creativity:

Musikmesse Day 2: Continued

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.

Signing off,

Carl Jacobson

NAMM Show 2009: Blogged by Cakewalk

Day 5: Well that’s it. The NAMM show is a wrap. Today is Sunday and while it is the last day of the show, there is definitely an air about the place that says the show is finally over and foot traffic is much lighter than it has been the whole rest of the show.

At 5pm when they finally turned the lights down, you could hear a wave of exhibitors clapping and cheering. If I were to tell you it was a quick show, I would be lying. But it was definitely a good show and we were able to reach out to a lot of people with all of our products including our new USB hardware devices and of course, our baby: The SONAR V-Studio 700.

Everyone here did a wonderful, professional job this week and I know we’re all proud of what we’ve accomplished.

As I wrap this up, I look forward to touching down at home in Boston and sleeping in my own bed. Though as much as I don’t mind the 80 degree weather in January, I think it’s the nasty winters at home that really make you appreciate the nice weather when you get it. Although, we could be another 4-5 months off from weather like this at home.

C’est la vie, thanks for reading, oh and scroll down the page to see our videos from NAMM:

Enjoy!

Ian: Out

Continue reading “NAMM Show 2009: Blogged by Cakewalk”