Progress with Cubase

Well, Just a little note on my musical wanderings.

I've been gradually working my way into Cubase 5. Tonight I finally got "Reason 4" (A virtual Synthesizer rack - separate software program) working inside of Cubase and I even figured out how to import a sequence I was working on in Reason over to Cubase! (so I can add Vocals or acoustics to it). I'm doing it really slow because I want to get comfortable enough with it so that when I really start getting creative I'm not spending all my time fiddling with software.

My biggest hurdle is composition... A subject I know so little about. I suppose its like painting. How do you keep it simple enough so that when you add an idea it doesn't turn into a big wet ugly mess? Recorded music is very much like painting in that you take a brush - add some color... then you take your pallet and find another color to dab in and mix with what's there. Things can get very cluttered and very ugly fast! Unless there is design and symmetry and poetry in the brush strokes.

When I get something more substantial.. I'll add it to this blog. I think I can do that!

I'm still trying to figure out what to do with the Brush! I have so many colors to work with, its overwhelming! Whats interesting to me about the modern Software recording studio is that sound is suddenly a very visual process! Here is a picture to illustrate:



I just copied a small snippet of my screen to show here... but all the colored bands on the left are the individual parts in this piece of music I'm making. The instruments and all the software knobs to control the sound is on the right.

Cubase 5 - The upgrade!

Today was an exciting day - for one reason. I received via UPS my upgrade to Cubase 5. If you don't know what that is, it is very sophisticated Music Production Software. I believe the term for it is "DAW" or Digital Audio Workstation software. Simply put, it's a hard disk recording package with lots of included instruments and MIDI recording functions as well. I'm going to install it tonight - and see how well it upgrades and start exploring all the new features.



Just a brief list of some of its new features:

• Loop Mash - a powerful loop editor

• Groove Agent - This used to be a separate product.. now its integrated in - A much more powerful and sophisticated tool for creating beats and drum loops.
  

• Beat Designer - A tool for working with Beat Patterns - Virtual drum machine style.
  

• VariAudio - This is REALLY COOL! A way to take an audio track.. (voice for example) and manipulate the pitches and the timing. You can "correct them" if they're slightly off the mark or make them fit certain scale's you want a part to follow.. slow them down speed them up - stretch or shrink them to fit a particular passage. I'm betting there will be some amazing creative options for this tool!
  

• REVerence - a very sophisticated "Convolution Reverb Processor" - basically allows you to create the acoustics of any sized room or hall in very high fidelity!.
  

Those are just a few. Most people who read this will probably already lose thier attention by the time they get to this sentence. I'm just completely geeking out!

Hopefully in the not to distant future I will put some sound samples of stuff I'm playing with into this blog!

Uncle Buff's Blog

Ok - I'm doing it again. Trying to start a new blog!

Maybe this one will stick! This time I might find more interesting things to say eh? I've got plenty of tools at my disposal.

I have the new Adobe Photoshop LightRoom 2.2 Here is something that came out of that:



Only thing I don't like about this Blogger interface is that this picture looks blurry and unfocused unless you click on it to get the full view.. that seems kind of lame! (Sigh!)

Oh well.. If anyone sees it... give me feedback.. This is just the start! Oh and In future I might be posting little MP3 snippets of musical things I may be fooling with!

EyeInside