SANTA MONICA, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Singer-songwriter, Gregory Alan Isakov, will share his lyrical hit, “3am,” featured on the hit series “Brothers and Sisters,” at a special fundraiser and awards event, for the environmental education nonprofit Grades of Green. The annual awards and green [...]

BERLIN, Germany /Music Industry Newswire/ — Native Instruments today introduced SKANNER XT, a unique and highly distinctive KOMPLETE instrument, designed by the expert team behind REAKTOR. With a strong focus on unconventional tone and genuine musical expression, SKANNER XT is both an exceptional library addition [...]

PARIS, France /Music Industry Newswire/ — Ohm Force this week announced the release of new 64-bit versions of classic plugins such as Ohmicide (multi-band distortion), OhmBoyz (multi-tap delay), Quad Frohmage (filter bank), Predatohm (multi-band distortion), Symptohm (synth), Mobilohm (phaser), Hematohm (frequency shifter), Ohmygod! (comb filter), [...]

Meylan, France /Music Industry Newswire/ — Based on physical modeling, the new Arturia Wurlitzer V reproduces the acoustic properties of reeds, mechanics and amplification, thus bringing high sonic realism and maximum flexibility over your tone. To get a true classic vibe, it also comes with [...]

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Haken Audio has announced a new firmware and software update for the Continuum Fingerboard. The new version 5.01 includes additions to the innovative programmable synthesizer in the Continuum Fingerboard, the EaganMatrix. The EaganMatrix design was inspired by classical modular [...]

Ramonville Saint Agne, France /Music Industry Newswire/ — MODARTT S.A.S announced this week the release of PIANOTEQ 4, the company’s virtual piano instrument; slated for May 2012. Pianoteq 4 introduces the grand piano D4 which is the result of three years of research of refining [...]

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. /Music Industry Newswire/ — iZotope, Inc., a leading innovator in digital audio signal processing, has released iZotope Iris, a new concept in sound design and sample manipulation in the form of a “visual instrument.” Powered by iZotope’s award-winning visual feedback technology, Iris lets [...]

MELVILLE, N.Y. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Korg is pleased to announce the availability of many diverse expansion libraries and sample sound libraries for the Korg Kronos Music Workstation, including the EXs13 Jazz Drums Expansion Kit, the EXs11 Legendary Strings Expansion Library, and two series by [...]

MELVILLE, N.Y. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Korg USA and the USC Thornton School of Music opened their 2012 Artist Series with a clinic featuring popular Musical Director and multi-instrumentalist, Adam Blackstone (Eminem, Janet Jackson, Drake, Maroon 5). Supporting the next generation of music makers, these artist events give USC music students ‘front row’ access to today’s influential music makers.

Jozefoslaw, Poland /Music Industry Newswire/ — PSP has announced an updated version of their multi-tap plugin. According to the company: PSP 608 MD is perhaps the most fully featured delay plug-in available on the market (VST, AudioUnit, RTAS and AAX format for Mac OSX Universal [...]

LOS ANGELES, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — ASCAP today announced additions to the 2012 ASCAP EXPO 12 line-up, headed to the Renaissance Hollywood Hotel, April 19-21, 2012. As the 7th Annual ASCAP I Create Music EXPO draws near, the confirmed panelist list has grown to [...]

LOS ANGELES, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — In what appears to be yet another clear indication that both the economy and the analog music instrument culture is not losing ground to plugins and emulations in software, Studio Electronics (ne Analogia) have announced a new line [...]

MORAGA, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Tom Oberheim has announced the Two Voice Pro Synthesizer, expanding upon the recreated SEM analog synth modules he rolled out last year. One of the most coveted classic analog synthesizers, the new “Two Voice” looks to be shipping very [...]

IRVINE, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Western Digital (WD) is now shipping their Thunderbolt-compatible My Book storage product, perfect for Apple Mac users that own systems sporting the new high-speed interface. Available through resellers and WD’s online store, the devices come in 4TB and 6TB [...]

AUSTIN, Texas /Music Industry Newswire/ — Hollywood often writes checks the real world just can’t cash, but not this time. You’ve seen them in movies like Avatar and Iron Man…those wonderful semi-transparent touchscreens, and have wondered if they are ever going to be available for [...]

ASHEVILLE, N.C. /Music Industry Newswire/ — While Michelle Moog-Koussa is touched by her father’s enduring legacy as the godfather of modern electronic music, she is driven to see that legacy expand by inspiring children to learn the science of sound through the magic of his [...]

Music Industry Newswire NEWS: Italy-based Studiologic has announced a new virtual analog keyboard, combining their popular keyboard action (Fatar) with a virtual analog synth engine from Waldorf. While the engine spec sounds familiar to those who have used the Waldorf 3-oscillator type virtual analog structure [...]

BERLIN, Germany /Music Industry Newswire/ — Waldorf has announced a new digital-analog MIDI synth module, the PULSE 2. Available Summer 2012, the Pulse 2 features three analog oscillators in combination with a true analog cascading filter. The promo from Waldorf reads like so: “Sometimes they [...]

BERLIN, Germany /Music Industry Newswire/ — To conincide with the Winter NAMM in Anaheim, German synth wizard Jürgen Michaelis, of JoMoX GmbH, has previewed his latest creation, the Moonwind Analog Filter Tracker. According to Michaelis, “Moonwind is a true analog stereo filter with built-in step [...]

Meylan, France /Music Industry Newswire/ — At the Winter NAMM 2012 show in Anaheim, Calif., Arturia will announce their first analog keyboard, the MINIBRUTE. Arturia announces the upcoming release of MINIBRUTE. The pure analog, multi-wave oscillator combined with a huge sounding classic multi-mode filter, and [...]

Music Industry Newswire NEWS: Akai this week revealed their second of three new MPC-flavored products, as a follow on to the groovy new MPC Renaissance “Music Production Controller.” The small, and shiny, MPC Studio is a slimline (one inch thick) controller that has traditional MPC style control buttons to right side of the familiar 4×4 MPC drum pads, then instead of knobs or sliders on left, are larger DJ-friendly dial-knobs.

Music Industry Newswire NEWS: AUSTIN, Texas — Music Computing introduces ControlTOUCH, “your laptop’s new best friend.” The world keep changing and that’s no different for music production and performance, says the company. Traditional instruments are giving way to computer-based alternatives and the key is to bridge the two worlds without stifling creativity or getting lost in the technology.

Music Industry Newswire NEWS: Just in time for the 2012 January NAMM show, Akai Professional has announced a new line of MPC-branded music gear, starting with the gorgeous ‘MPC Renaissance’ which looks like the Borg step-child of a MPD MIDI controller and the MPC-5000, but better. The Music Production Controller claims to fuse ‘legendary MPC production with the power of your computer’ with a Vintage Mode changing the sound character to MPC3000, MPC60 (8 to 16-bit sound), with 16 backlit MPC pads, 16 Q-Link controls, and adjustable backlit LCD screen.

AUSTIN, Texas /Music Industry Newswire/ — Austin based Music Computing this week announced a new ‘souped up’ version of their computer-based keyboard music workstations, the StudioBLADE Gen2, with a ‘TypeR’ trim package. While it might not tear up the Nurburgring like a Nissan GTR, it does come with carbon fibre and custom livery like many glammed up sports machines.

MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. /Music Industry Newswire/ — MakeMusic, Inc. (NASDAQ:MMUS) this week announced it has signed an agreement to acquire Garritan Corporation, a leading provider of software musical instruments. Under the terms of the agreement, Garritan Corporation will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of MakeMusic. Founder Gary Garritan will be joining MakeMusic as director of instrumental sciences.

GRENOBLE, France /Music Industry Newswire/ — Arturia this week announced some important updates, including 64-bit support for the CS-80V and Prophet-V virtual instruments, bringing both versions to v2.5. The updates include several bug fixes, as might be expected, and some technical improvements. Additionally, version 1.4 of Spark was released.

NEW GEAR: Inventor and iOS app developer Alex Smith of Alkex Instruments is back with his latest foray into MIDI controllers, with his ‘Ball Beats’ MIDI step sequencer product. Unlike his somewhat failed stab at creating a wood and knobs controller for virtual instruments earlier this year, this new product looks polished, and has a boutique coolness…

COLUMN: Well, it began as what appeared to be yet another anti-Apple fanboy rant about Steve’s passing – he’s sick again, Apple is doomed, etc. — not unheard of in this era of fake news, junk news, and mis-read signals about celebrities and their antics. [...]

AUSTIN, Texas /Music Industry Newswire/ — Ahead of a formal announcement, Music Computing Inc. has started to tease release of their second generation keyboard music “power station,” the StudioBLADE “Gen 2.” According to the company, the StudioBLADE (Gen2) is “the world’s most powerful keyboard production [...]

ASHEVILLE, N.C. /Music Industry Newswire/ — The Bob Moog Foundation announced today that synthesizer and vocal sensation Tara Busch has donated a three song EP to support its mission of “igniting the innovator inside us all”. The ethereal electronica EP, “Rocket Wife,” created specifically for [...]

NASHVILLE, Tenn. /Music Industry Newswire/ — ASCAP has announced a licensing agreement with Netflix. As stated by the organization: “Good news for ASCAP members…ASCAP recently concluded a licensing agreement with Netflix, which is shifting its main business from physical DVD rentals to its streaming video [...]

Nashville, Tenn. /Music Industry Newswire/ — ASCAP (the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) will stage its 49th Annual Country Music Awards on Sunday, November 6, 2011 at Nashville’s Gaylord Opryland. The invitation-only event will honor the songwriters and publishers of ASCAP’s most performed [...]

BERLIN, Germany /Music Industry Newswire/ — SKYLIFE announces the upcoming release of new SampleRobot 4 Sampling Suite. With the Sampling Suite, everybody who is into sampling will get a complete software package to master all sampling challenges elegantly and fast. Therefore the Sampling Suite offers [...]

DALLAS, Texas /Music Industry Newswire/ — If you like your pop music with a dash of what the hell? You might check out the latest work by controversial American artist Daniel Edwards. Justin Bieber (aka “the Beebs”) and Selena Gomez are presented as a “21st [...]

Syracuse, N.Y. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Sample Logic and System Blue have joined forces to release Rumble – the world’s first Kontakt Player virtual instrument that combines the finest in traditional marching drums with cutting-edge cinematic sound design. This superbly flexible virtual instruments will give [...]

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. /Music Industry Newswire/ — It all started in front of a coffee shop in Daytona Beach, Florida, USA. Pavlina Osta, a 10-year old musician, was playing the steel drums and piqued the interest of a local radio show; this quickly led to [...]

Grenoble, France /Music Industry Newswire/ — XILS-lab, makers of some notable virtual synth recreations such as the PolyKB II, have announced The Synthix, which appears to be inspired by the Elka Synthex, but not a pixel by pixel or identical cloning as the typical Arturia [...]

NEW YORK, N.Y. /Music Industry Newswire/ — ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) and Spotify have reached an agreement for the Spotify digital streaming music service, launched on July 14 in the US, to license the public performance of over 8.5 million musical [...]

PORTLAND, Ore. /Music Industry Newswire/ — In its first OEM partnership with a Taiwan audio manufacturer, Audinate, the leader in digital media networking solutions, and UNiKA Professional Audio, makers of high quality audio equipment, have both agreed to work together in developing future high end [...]

LOS ANGELES, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Los Angeles based Alkex Instruments has started shipping their new MIDI controller designed to interact with Arturia’s Prophet V virtual instrument (and other plug-ins using set-up application). The unit has been designed to look familiar to any Sequential [...]

LONDON, U.K. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Leading electronics expert Kenton is well known for its rock-solid products that form the hub of many a recording studio worldwide. Now the MIDI USB Host joins their range of innovative MIDI solutions.

LOS ANGELES, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — EastWest announced this week the long-awaited update to their PLAY engine, which powers their current line-up of sample-based instruments. Notably the new update, version 3.0.15, released on July 12, offers 64-bit Mac OS support, more voices, and fast-disk mode.

AUSTIN, Texas /Music Industry Newswire/ — Music Computing, the makers of the StudioBLADE line of all-in-one music keyboard production stations announced today the Gen2 versions, which represents a huge leap in performance and value. StudioBLADEs (Gen2) are all-in-one music production stations complete with piano keys, [...]

WOODLAND Hills, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Kurzweil is proud to announce the release of the new Sound Download Library exclusively for the PC3K line of Synthesizer Workstations. Now available for free download on Kurzweil’s website, the first two collections of samples and programs available [...]

Asheville USA and Grenoble FRANCE /Music Industry Newswire/ — This luxurious box set includes Arturia’s award-winning Minimoog-V and Moog Modular V, a DVD of the Moog documentary, an archival book featuring unreleased material curated by Michelle Moog-Koussa entitled From Bob Moog’s Private Archives, and an [...]

AUSTIN, Texas /Music Industry Newswire/ — Music Computing is previewing a new product for musicians to easily add multi-touch capabilities for music creation to any existing monitor. To be formally announced the first week of May, this new product is called MotionCOMMAND Frame. According to [...]

MORAGA, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Synth legend Tom Oberheim has announced two new additions to his line of resurrected SEM analog synthesizers: First, the SEM-PRO, incorporating 21 mini-jacks for signal access; and second, the quite awesome SO4V (Son of 4 Voice). Many of us [...]

REVIEW: While the concept of a music keyboard with a computer inside isn’t entirely new, the folks at Austin, Texas start-up Music Computing think they might have invented the new sweet spot in bridging the gap between the notebook and controller crowd and the people [...]

Champaign, Ill. /Music Industry Newswire – Exclusive/ — Haken Audio has announced a new update to the unique MIDI controller and virtual instrument developed by Lippold Haken. The new v 4.10 firmware adds new features, including a new internal sound model, “Mouth String” (for the [...]

AUSTIN, Texas /Music Industry Newswire/ — Music Computing Inc. announced this week a new affiliate program that invites music industry pros, VARs, installers, and other M.I. folks to become an authorized sales rep for the company. As a “referral associate” the company will pay a [...]

/Music Industry Newswire/ — Cakewalk announced today the impending release in December of the latest version of Sonar, now called Sonar X1. At first glance many multi-platform DAW users will notice striking workflow similarities to Apple Logic Pro, and frankly this is a good thing. [...]

Music Industry Newswire COLUMN: Yesterday, a new Austin, Texas, start-up opened its virtual and physical doors with a new line of music instruments, Intel-based PCs, and accessories for both Mac and Windows-based notebooks. Music Computing, Inc., headed by former Open Labs guru, Victor Wong, and [...]

Grenoble, FRANCE /Music Industry Newswire/ — ARTURIA is happy and proud to announce that Origin Keyboard is now shipping. The Origin project started in 2004 and was aimed at creating a new kind of synthesizer. Ambitious from a features stand-point, innovative in design and sounding [...]

Brighton, U.K. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Sample Magic today announced the release of the DemoGod iPhone/iPad App, putting the world’s largest collection of dance music A&R contacts at your fingertips to make demo submissions a breeze. DemoGod is a brand new iPhone App that contains [...]

/Music Industry Newswire/ — IK Multimedia this week announced a new “free” edition of their venerable SampleTank virtual instrument, appropriately called “SampleTank FREE.” With a 500MB sample library on tap, this free instrument rivals many classic ROMpler keyboards of the past for its base sound [...]

/Music Industry Newswire/ — As if the announcement about the Moog Voyager XL and a new iPhone audio app weren’t enough, music dealers have started putting Moog’s latest creation into their sell systems, even though it’s not officially yet on Moog Music’s own website. The [...]

/Music Industry Newswire/ — For those of us who weren’t paying attention this morning, Apple has released an update for Logic Pro, which is a minor update as noted by the dot-dot revision number of 9.1.2, versus a major update such as 9.2. So, while [...]

Music Industry Newswire NEWS: — Music Computing, based in Austin, Texas, announced today it will roll-out both the new company and a new product line in a special live streaming broadcast October 20, 2010 (12:00pm CST). The virtual product tour and event will be at [...]

China /Music Industry Newswire/ — One of our favorite virtual analog synths for Windows has been updated to a new “enhanced” edition, according the publisher, SonicProjects. According to the company, “OP-X PRO-II is the new top flagship of the OP series and is the consequent [...]

EL SEGUNDO, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — As a long time Novation SuperNova II owner, I was pretty surprised to hear about Novation’s new keyboard, the “UltraNova,” which appears to be targeted to the popular small form factor of synths like the Akai Miniak, sibling [...]

ASHEVILLE, N.C. /Music Industry Newswire/ — For those of us wondering when we’d see something new from Moog that wasn’t a pedal or a guitar, or yet another backlight color for the Minis (“Select” et al.), it was pretty exciting to learn this week about [...]

NEW YORK, N.Y. /Music Industry Newswire/ — ASCAP this week announced a new mobile app for Apple’s iPod touch, iPhone,and iPad. The new app allows members to view royalties, membership info, catalog data, as well as ASCAP’s entire repository of over 8.5 million copyrighted musical [...]

Miami Beach, Fla. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Safta Consulting has announced the latest update to their Gigastudio/Gigasampler sound file player, G-Player 1.2.4, is now available. For those not familiar with the product, G-Player was created to emulate the Gigastudio sound as close as possible. According [...]

SUNRISE, Fla. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Sonic Reality announced today that their new Neil Peart series drum sample instrument library, Neil Peart Drums Volume 1: The Kit, is shipping in the NI Kontakt-compatible edition (requires SR’s Infinite Player for authorization). The BFD2 version was announced [...]

Music Industry Newswire Update: As a long time supporter and customer of Open Labs (see my reviews of the Neko TSE and XXL models on this site), I was surprised, like many, to see the notice of auction for OL’s assets and IP announced July [...]

Worcestershire, U.K. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Our friends at Camel Audio Limited announced today another great free sound bundle for registered users, bringing yet another massive infusion of sound patches and creation capabilities to their flagship Camel Alchemy virtual instrument. According to the company e-mail, [...]

WARSAW, Poland /Music Industry Newswire/ — PSP Audioware let us know today they have announced a release of their new delay plug-in: PSP 85, the successor of the PSP 84. According to the company: “PSP 85 is the product of our eternal fascination with the [...]

Recklinghausen, Germany /Music Industry Newswire/ — Access Music has announced their latest “special edition” keyboard, “The WhiteOut Keyboard” limited edition, which will only be produced as 150 units with laser engraved serial number. If your favorite Virus Ti is the Polar edition, but you always [...]

COLUMN: — Open Labs yesterday announced and demonstrated their new software application, a ground up reboot of their Open RiFF, now at version 2.0. This new version of RiFF introduced last year brings a huge number of enhancements for hands-on music making with all Open [...]

COLUMN: One of the more interesting tidbits I’ve run across this week, was the rumor of a new product from venerable synth builder Tom Oberheim. He apparently told a person that a new “Two-voice” model would be in the works for later this year, possibly [...]

LIVE NEWS: Open Labs announced today that they have refreshed their product line to their new generation 6 (“Gen 6″). The standard Miko and NeKo series have been upgraded from the prior Core 2 Intel processors to the Intel Core i5 3.33 Ghz. The upgraded [...]

Worcestershire, U.K. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Camel Audio announces Luftrum: Ambient is “a journey between worlds, from summer afternoons to the icy depths of space.” With dense washes of warm, shimmering pads and soundscapes, gentle guitar and piano arpeggios, music boxes, delicate, and ethereal sound [...]

COLUMN: One of my great joys in life is loving a product made by a great company that stays in business year after year and perhaps decade by decade. I can count these types of companies on one hand as I settle into my 40′s, [...]

COLUMN: In a somewhat stealthy mode, Open Labs has finally put up a page on their site promoting custom paint colors, bigger hard drive options, extreme motherboard upgrades, and various customization options for new and existing OL customers who buy one of OL’s keyboard or [...]

SYDNEY, Australia /Music Industry Newswire/ — Audinate Pty Ltd, a leading developer of digital media networking solutions, announced it has secured $4 million in additional funding. The latest investment round was led by existing investors, Starfish Ventures and Innovation Capital. Audinate is making traditional analog [...]

COLUMN: — When the word went out that Dave Smith was going to introduce something “new” at NAMM in January, many of us immediately presumed it would be a keyboard version of the highly popular Mopho. And, lo and behold that’s what was revealed. Due [...]

COLUMN: — Avid/Digidesign announced this week the latest update to their DAW application, Pro Tools, with a notable update in version 8.03. This new version supports Apple Snow Leopard (OS X), and has a public “beta” for Windows 7 32-bit AND 64-bit support. Also, notably, [...]

COLUMN: I’m back with our “final” batch of super end of the year deals for musicians, most of which expire very soon, or by end of the month (Dec. 31). Some are “while supply lasts,” so jump on them while you can. Today I have [...]

COLUMN: During their O-Live broadcast/webcast today, Open Labs revealed their newest music PC product, called SoundSlate, which has the Open Labs UI, and about 10,000 sounds built-in, with support for dual monitors. It’s a stand alone music PC that fits in one standard rack mount [...]

COLUMN: Hello again, and I hope some of you are finding these holiday music instrument and software count-down deals of interest. There are certainly more and more of them popping up in anticipation of black friday (day after Thanksgiving in U.S.), and the general economy [...]

REVIEW: If you’re a long-time user of Propellerhead’s REASON application, or just coming back to it with the new version 4, as I am, then you are probably impressed by Reason’s new capabilities, and its general ease of use. Reason is very cool because it’s [...]

COLUMN: Here I am again with a bunch of new music instrument deals. Couldn’t wait a week for these since many of them are only good for a short time, or only during November. If you’re looking to buy yourself some gear for the holidays, [...]

COLUMN: As many of you who know me already know, I’m a bit of a bargain hound, or deal hunter, or whatever you might call it. Every month I get a raft of “wow” deals on music gear, software, etc., and while I had started [...]

COLUMN: This week Cakewalk announced the latest update to their venerable DAW platform, SONAR. While it’s been updated annually with full incremental versions, sometimes to the criticism by users (e.g., “why not fix all issues with current version before launching a new one?”), Cakewalk’s team [...]

REVIEW: I’m a big fan of Open Labs’ music workstation instruments, so I was pretty excited when they announced the rebirth of their XXL model this spring, which was not available last October 2008 when I bought the NeKo TSE (previously reviewed for this magazine). [...]

COLUMN: Applemania 2009. In one of the most anticipated tech stories this week, Apple’s visionary leader Steve Jobs took to the stage at the Yerba Buena center in San Francisco. The initial announcements included a new version of iTunes with Genius mixes, a cleaner look [...]

COLUMN: The kind folks at Best Service today offered our readers a free “demo” version of TITAN, their new virtual instrument which contains samples from over 200 classic synths and modern gear. Unlike most demo apps, the TITAN demo provides a full copy of the [...]

COLUMN: Access Music has announced that their latest non-beta OS for their Ti line of keyboards is available for download. They are also formally announcing their new website is live, however it’s still a bit buggy as of today when I visited the English version. [...]

COLUMN: Sonic Charge announced this week the update to their nifty “organic” virtual synth, Synplant. Version 1.0.1 fixes some minor things, including Cakewalk Sonar support (a problem I experienced, and which held up my review, which will appear here around Labor Day weekend). According to [...]

COLUMN: Roland’s new “keytar” (guitar-like keyboard) is now shipping. The AX-Synth is a remote shoulder keyboard with onboard sound generator, ribbon controller, D Beam, modulation bar, and more. With specs similar to the current “Juno” keyboards, the AX is a long-awaited successor to Roland’s older [...]

Humble, Texas /Music Industry Newswire/ — It’s official! As rumored this past week, MySpace has entered into an agreement to acquire iLike. The folks at iLike, founders Ali and Hadi Partovi, have sent all registered users the following update: We’re sure you have a ton [...]

COLUMN: Best Service has announced a new massive virtual instrument sample library containing over 200 classic and modern music instruments. Claimed to be the “biggest and most extensive synthesizer sound collection of all time,” it truly appears to be a step-up from past efforts like [...]

COLUMN: As a long time fan of Open Labs, I’ve been watching pretty closely the development of their new “MPC Killer” (they don’t use that term, but I do), since it’s a truly remarkable bit of kit, dubbed the DBeat. Officially it began shipping this [...]

ORCAS ISLAND, Wash. and MONTEBELLO, Calif. /Music Industry Newswire/ — TASCAM, a division of TEAC America, Inc. and Garritan Corporation announced the completion of the sale of technology assets relating to GigaStudio, Gigasampler, GVI, Gigapulse and all Giga products. Gigasampler revolutionized the music industry when [...]

COLUMN: Well, I took the plunge this week and decided to upgrade about 50 or so albums in my iTunes library to the updated “DRM Free” option now offered by Apple for many popular albums/songs found in their store. Unfortunately, this has turned into one [...]

REVIEW: I would probably have liked this album more if it was comprised of personal friends, or the brother of my girlfriend, or fronted by the lads working part-time at the local Auto Club, but coming in cold I found the album “The Butterfly Net” [...]

WINTER NAMM 2009 /Music Industry Newswire/ — At a press conference this morning, Open Labs announced their new line of “generation 5″ keyboard workstations. The new models include the 37 key MiKo LXD, 61 key NeKo LX5, and deluxe NeKo XXL. All models have Quad [...]

COLUMN: Inevitably there are those of us who seem perpetually busy and end up finding gifts at the last minute, regardless of any plan to start early. The holiday just creeps up, and time flies when least wanted. So, what do you get your friend(s) [...]

REVIEW: The concept of the so-called workstation keyboard is certainly not new; with a wide range of current such products on the market from big guns like Korg, Roland and Yamaha, stretching back in time to the Korg M-1. These products seek to fill the [...]

REVIEW: I’ve been a fan of the late (and sadly missed) Bob Moog’s various sound creation inventions since the mid 1970s. I first saw one of his theremins at a Southern California museum and while the rest of my family perused the other modern art; [...]