Hello Friends, March 26, 2018 There are now about 650 of you. If anyone has any suggestions on how I can increase Facebook participation please share your thoughts. ______________________________________ Four Times the Luck ______________________________________ Some of you may have noticed that there are four versions of the song "Lucky." They're named "Lucky _ Part One," "Lucky Part One v019C9d2," "Lucky 1 & 2A," and "Lucky Parts 1 & 2 Featuring Marc Owen Nutto on Guitar." The songs were created in that order. "Lucky _ Part One" had been codenamed v019C which is what I used for myself to refer to the version number. The next version was a further update to that first version and I labeled and named it v019C9d2 which is what I was using to keep track of the versions in the studio. It's essentially the same as the first version but some new instruments were added. Next came "Lucky Parts 1 & 2A." This is an extended version of 019C9d2 that was made in preparation for adding Marc's guitar. "Lucky Parts 1&2.." took that version and added Marc's great guitar on it. The main reason I kept all four versions was to show the evolution of a song. Also, "Lucky _Part One" became so popular [it's currently number one globally in Indie] that I didn't want to delete it when the next version came out. To help a bit in separating the songs from one another I put Lucky _Part One in the Indie category and Lucky v019C9d2 in the Pop Genre where it currently sits at #13 nationally [in the USA]. The various "Luckys" have about 75,000 or so listens combined. My main aim with Lucky was to make something catchy and upbeat. ________________ So, what's new? I made some significant additions to the studio and put out some new songs. Most of the new songs make use of the studio additions. I describe these below. _____________________________ Studio Updates _____________________________ Aside from acoustic instruments, microphones, electric guitar and bass most of the rest of the instruments are synthesizers and are generally of three types (this is just one way to categorize them, there are many ways): 1. Hardware synthesizers that may or may not have a keyboard as one part of them; 2. Combination hardware and software synthesizers - these are hardware synthesizers that can morph into other synthesizers by loading them with new software. They literally do become new synthesizers. For example the System-1 synth by Roland can be changed into any number of other Roland synthesizers by loading it with new software. These other synthesizers that get loaded into it also exist on their own as type I (regular hardware synthesizers) and you wouldn't be able to hear any difference between what comes out of the System-1 with Synthesizer Type X loaded into it versus Synthesizer Type X as a separate stand-alone synth; 3. Software synthesizers. These could be further broken down by type of synthesizer (e.g. sample-based, subtractive, additive, physical modeling-based, and so on), but for now let's just think of them as synthesizers that reside inside a computer. It's that last group where I made the most changes to the studio over the past few weeks or so. I got quite a lot in the way of new software synthesizers these past few weeks primarily from three companies: Sonokinetic of the UK, Native Instruments and Air Technologies. They're all on the web if you'd like to take a look at the sorts of things they offer. I got basically every instrument that AIR offers. Ditto for Sonokinetic. I also got most Native Instruments' instruments except for those designed for "Maschine." I also upgraded Ableton Live 9 to version 10. The Sonokinetic instruments are mostly medieval, world, renaissance or a wide variety of classical instruments as well as some regular and pipe organs, choirs, an accordian. carnival instruments, .. a lot! A couple examples of the Renaissance / Medieval instruments I got include the Hurdy Gurdy and the OUD. These can be looked up on the net for more information. They're pretty interesting instruments. All of their instruments are 'sample-based' meaning they for example record live symphony orchestras in hundreds of ways and then let the synth player control exactly which parts of the orchestra play, what they play and so on. The AIR instruments aside from their take on electronic organs, keyboards and drums (all of which I have gobs of by other manufacturers) are mostly different forms of synthesizers, primarily additive and subtractive types. The Native Instruments' instruments cover a broad spectrum from Alicia Keyes' piano (yup, they sampled her specific piano), drum sets from the 50s, 60s... through today's, all sorts of basses, other pianos, organs, electric keyboards, woodwind instruments, string instruments, brass and on and on. _____________________________ What New Music is There? _____________________________ A couple of the most recent songs are essentially showcases for AIR's instruments ("Oh NO!! I've got POTUS Brain!" - I used only AIR instruments for that song which, btw, is supposed to represent what one would encounter traveling through the brain of our 'unusual' leader) and for sonokinetic's instruments (e.g. "3 Stones of Baalbek," "The Duchess is Coming to Town" which were both done using only Sonokinetic instruments) while "Janey's Got a Tuba" used only Native Instruments' instruments. A few other songs were added since the last newsletter - e.g. "I Lost My Love Somewhere in India" and "Ole' Kyoto" both of which used instruments from Native Instruments as well as others. ________________ This past month has mostly been experimental in nature as I try to learn the many new instruments and DAWs I've gotten. I have a very long way to go to become proficient at these and other instruments so please bear with me as I learn. If there are topics you'd be interested in having me cover in upcoming newsletters don't be shy to drop me a line. Thanks for your support!! Wishing you well until next time, Peter Piper