SOUND ON SOUND
To find the exact phrase, put the words in quotes or join them together with a plus sign e.g. live+recording or "live recording".
To find, say, all live recording articles that mention Avid, enter: live+recording +avid - and use sidebar filters to narrow down searches further.
Every pianist dreams of owning a grand piano, but is it really possible to combine the feel of a grand into a stage piano and combine it with great sounds and master-keyboard functionality?
Kurzweil are well known for their high-quality sounds, but less so for affordable hardware in which to house them. Is the new £350 ME1 the answer?
More words of wisdom proferred by SOS Editor-in-Chief Paul White.
The monotimbral K-Station offered keyboard players an affordable Novation -- but now, for a bit more money, the company have released the KS4 and KS5, which add plenty of new features, better keyboards and multitimbrality. The perfect marriage at the perfect price? We find out.
The AGNULA project is creating what is possibly the first computer system tailored specifically for musicians — and it's all based around the Linux operating system.
It's been 12 months since we first evaluated Windows XP as a music platform, and it now seems to be the OS of choice for most manufacturers. So should musicians who have been holding back now take the plunge and upgrade?
A British company specialising in the maintenance and refurbishment of vintage Neve equipment have produced a new preamp design with a classic sound.
PreSonus' eight-channel Firewire interface is the first to use Yamaha's much-touted mLAN protocol. How does it compare to the proprietary driver systems developed by the likes of MOTU and Metric Halo?
Where can I find a good sampled Joanna? Does processing degrade the quality of digital audio? How can I avoid effects being out of phase when I use Group Tracks in Cubase? How can I get six mono outputs from my VP9000? How can I eliminate hum in my studio? What are the advantages of higher sampling rates? Can you recommend a microphone for recording a guitar?
Score = ***** 5/5 stars. Garritan has released GOS Lite, a three-CD version of GOS available in either Akai or Giga formats using samples from the full library.
Score = **** 4/5 stars. Named after Waldorf's Microwave synth of the same colour, Orange consists of 216 NN19 presets, 12 Redrum kits and 65 REX2 loops on a single CD-ROM.
**** Score = 4/5. Many libraries offer a French horn ensemble within their menu of brass sections, but this is the first horns-only release we've come across.
**** Score = 4 stars. AMG add to their growing Catalyst series of sample libraries with this two CD collection.
When it comes to digital rights management, downloading music illegally isn't really the problem — it's our obsession with it.
Spectrasonics' massive sample-based soft synth promises to be the ultimate source for pads, atmospheres and textures.
An affordable new multi-pattern mic with a subtle tube sound.
The SOS team visit the sleepy Herefordshire town of Bromyard to help violinist Mike Burnham with his folk recordings.
A patchbay can make your studio much quicker to use, but can also be a nightmare to set up, so here's advice on which to choose and how to connect it up for the best results. Plus, tips on building and fitting racks for your gear.
These two new rack processors from Vermona offer flexible filtering and phasing with a range of interesting modulation options.
Analogue synths can't synthesize every sound, but the attempts made to replicate the sound of orchestral strings were so successful that so-called string machines became much-loved instruments in their own right. We begin a voyage into the world of synthesized strings...