Feel a bit like I'm dusting off this blogger today. I recently picked up a summer job fo money, and money = synths, so I'm a slave to the paper these days. I have big things coming your way, and this blog is only just getting started. Here's a quick update on what's going on in the keyboard world...
More below....
Moog just announced updates to their Little Phatty OS yesterday. The new software is available free from their site. Here's a quick rundown of the features via the site:
Volume Velocity Sensitivity: The ability to map note velocity to output volume with fifteen adjustable levels of sensitivity saved per preset. [Tribute Edition hardware does not currently support this feature]
Legato Glide: Automatically engage the pitch glide between legato notes. Non-overlapping notes snap instantly to a new pitch. The user is able to play or sequence dynamic bends and slides mixed with cleanly-articulated notes.
LFO Reset: The ability to reset the LFO cycle at the start of each note. Two LFO trigger modes provide dynamic new modulation possibilities.
Sustain/Hold Mode: A sustain pedal or control voltage plugged into the CV GATE input jack can now be used to send MIDI Sustain on/off, and to polyphonically sustain MIDI notes from the Phatty keyboard.
14-bit MIDI: All Phatty synths can now send and receive high-resolution 14-bit MIDI messages for critical voltage-controlled parameters.
MIDI Output Filtering: New options control which MIDI CC messages are sent from the Phatty, for maximum compatibility with external gear.
Expanded MIDI Clock sync options: 22 clock divisions including triplet values for both LFO and Arpeggiator MIDI sync. Clock divisions range from 32nd triplets up to 4 bars.
Improvements to Arpeggiator:
Global Arp Setup menu: Set important arpeggiator parameters at a global level. Arpeggiator also remains active when presets are changed.
Gate Length: Adjust the arpeggiator note length from 50% to greater than 100% (overlapping), for a range of new sonic textures.
Arp Clock Send: Arpeggiator can now send MIDI Clock, MIDI Start and Stop messages, allowing you to synchronize other gear to the Phatty internal clock.
Improvements to Polyphonic Mode:
New polyphonic note-allocation scheme: Uses a “round-robin” algorithm to share notes across multiple Phatty synths in a natural and very playable way.
Polyphonic arpeggiation: Multiple ways to use the Arpeggiator across a poly chain of Phatty synths, from tight integration to completely freeform.
- Some of these are great new features. I know from looking around the forum they're debating adding a sequencer function in a similar manner to the Alesis Micron. Sounds like a great addition to me!
- The Tetra AU/ VST combination is finally on its way. Beta testing has begun, and if you have this synth with your DAW, you know it's a pain to edit while running the program. All of the Tetra users are breathing a heavy sigh of relief because this software is so long overdue. Word is it was planned a while ago but the developer Soundtower got too involved in other projects. At least there is a silver lining to all this!
The very awesome Fear of Tigers podcast rolls on with another great hour and a half of fresh dance tunes. Every time I think he's outdone himself, he ups the ante a little more. I recommend downloading all of these and putting them on for homework, computer time, or car rides. To be honest, it's better than anything you'll find on the radio today for dance music.
Finally, the track I'll leave you with today, Human by Human League. If you're any fan of the Human League, you know this song was actually written by Janet Jackson's songwriters for the League after their record company wanted to make them into a bigger pop sensation. While this album was partially the cause of the downfall of the band, it's still a nice slice of 80's cheese to top off your day. But hey, I'm only human.
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