Let's Play with SynthScaper

Published on Sep 22, 2017 Tim Webb

"SoundScaper is one of my favorite 'experimental' sound design apps, and SynthScaper builds that into a more practical synth app! If you've enjoyed this series please consider making a gift by becoming a Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord If you'd prefer to help on a monthly basis, instead of per video, there is a monthly Patreon campaign: https://www.patreon.com/discchord_com

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

iTunes: SynthScaper - Soundscapes synthesizer - iMusicAlbum

Propellerhead Figure Updated to Version 2.0 & a Jam From Discchord's Tim Webb

Just Playing: Creepy Carousel - Figure 2.0 Jam Published on Jul 9, 2015 Tim Webb

iTunes: Figure - Propellerhead Software AB

"Recorded during beta testing for the Figure 2.0 update, which adds several new patches and an arpeggiator! I've found the arpeggiator to be an interesting creative tool and I'm abusing it mightily on this jam!

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

What's New in Version 2.0:
• Arpeggiator: turn chords into melodies
• New drum kit, basses, and leads
• Easier and faster sharing on Propellerhead

Let's Play with Shoom (Sound Design & Commentary)

Published on Apr 22, 2016 Tim Webb

"Shoom is a unique 3-part synthesizer that can be used for ambient droning, and traditionally played performances. I use it for both in this Let's Play! If you enjoyed this please consider supporting this series by sponsoring them on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

iTunes: Shoom Synthesizer - Yuri Turov

Poor MIDI Timing and Note Jitter in iOS

Published on Oct 12, 2012 by Kevin McCoy

"This really prevents iOS from being a serious platform for software instruments, despite its merits of having a touch interface and amazing sounding apps. Please comment if you have a solution!"

If anyone has a chance to look into this, feel free to comment or shoot me an email. Obvious things to consider are the app you are testing with, the MIDI interface being used, the iPad & OS versions, and any apps running in the background.

Update 1: discchord wrote in to let us know he ran a few tests. As I suspected it appears to depend on the setup and the device.

"Earlier iPhones were not nearly as beefy as iPads, so developers tried to support them as best they could with crazy high buffers that are easier on the CPU, but slower to react...

Considering how much of a mess my MIDI chain is, I think it is safe to say that a wired MIDI connection is reliable on iOS. Any faults come down to software that isn't designed to cope, or possibly an even worse MIDI setup than mine. Though I honestly can't imagine how that could be; I bought the Uno because it was the cheapest USB-MIDI interface I could buy locally!"

You can find the full results here. Be sure to see the previously linked post there for some initial tests as well.

Update 2: some notes on the results via David Lackey on this Facebook thread. It's worth noting David is the man behind Innerclock Systems and of course a bit of an expert behind timing and syncing gear.

"Again at the risk of sticking my neck in it - I just opened up that 240 BPM Wired 16th File [Quoted as 'There is slightly more wandering here, but still not enough that you'd notice. Take a listen for yourself.'] in Sound Forge and placed accurate markers on the events. At a perfect (no jitter) 240 BPM there should be exactly 3000 samples between each 16th audio event when recorded at 48kHz right. Here are the numbers:

2782/3358/2850/3286/2769/3335/2806/2774/3344 etc etc These variations amount to regular push-pull in tempo by more than 40 BPM PER EVENT in most cases I measured. I don't know about most people here but 40 BPM drift between 16ths is VERY NOTICABLE to my ears at any tempo.

....and I've just realized - those Discchord tests dont really tell you much about iOS Midi stability at all - take them with a large grain of salt - the 16th Midi Events they used are generated real-time by Live and USB Midi Interface - the Jitter probably has as much to do with the source events as the receiving iOS application.

You can see clearly that highly subjective and poorly researched statements like this: 'I hope this puts to rest the notion that MIDI Jitter prevents iOS from being a serious platform for software instruments.' need substantial qualification and backup before they can be taken seriously. For these tests to show true iOS application Midi Jitter we would need to see the jitter contained in the source Midi Events themselves first - or at least use a reliable hardware Midi Sequencer with proven event and tempo stability like an MPC-3000 as the Midi Event Source rather than DAW/USB/Driver generated Midi which is notoriously prone to slop and jitter anyway.

I'll run the same tests on Magellan/iPad2/iOS6 tonight but use MPC-3000/16ths as the Midi Event Source and post the results at 60/120 and 240 BPM."

See the Facebook thread in case any updates go up over time. 

Update 3: David Lackey of Innerclock ran some litmus tests. See this post for details.

Update 4: It looks like the iPad did fairly well with MIDI OUT depending on the app. Via David Lackey on the Facebook thread:

"Just had time last night to test outgoing Midi Event stability from two Apps - Magellan and Little Midi Machine - identical 16th note patterns using identical Roland UM-1G Core Midi Interface - you can see by the numbers that that Core Midi is certainly capable if the coding is up to the task. Little Midi Machine shows no more than 6 samples of jitter between 16th generated Note Events at 120 BPM. Magellan is still up there in the 500 plus samples jitter.

Details here: http://www.innerclocksystems.com/New%20ICS%20iLitmus.html"

Update 5 via Rob Fielding of Mugician, Geo Synth, & Cantor in the comments:

"This is probably not "MIDI" latency, but audio latency. The issue of iOS using oversized audio buffers is something that a minority of us iOS app devs (me especially) have been screaming about for years, especially just before Geo Synthesizer was released. Controller apps are crippled by this phenomenon at the moment, though the situation improved a lot last year. If the buffer is 512 at 44.1khz, then that's a 10ms buffer. If it's that large, then you will get jitter lower bound as a random variable from 0 to 10ms of latency no matter how fast everything else is. And in practice, there is always more overhead coming from elsewhere, including the hardware scanning for fingers to turn into touches, OS overhead, and MIDI packet sending, etc. I use 256 sized buffers (Mugician, Geo, Cantor), but I don't take MIDI in; so I experience this issue with almost all of the other iOS synths I run MIDI into. The apps that use a buffer size of 512 or higher are generally unplayable with Geo Synthesizer because you can play it so fast; you can really feel the difference between 512 (10ms) and 256 (5ms) buffers, though overhead makes total jitter almost 30ms. But the +/-10ms is enough to throw off rhythm.

and btw... iOS defaults to 1024 sized buffers but can usually go to 256 or 128 (good). Android on the other hand is a joke. Most Android apps have hundreds of seconds of latency (like 8192 buffers and even higher...yikes!) just due to audio buffer sizes, which means that hardware performance increases can never make a dent in the problem. Samsung Galaxy Nexus can get down to 512 I hear, which is almost to where it needs to be. It really needs to be 64, but 128 is doable for some synths, and no synths should settle for more than 256. I think AudioBus requires you to do 256. (But that's a whole new issue, because you are probably effectively chaining together audio buffer lengths when you pass from one app to another.)"

Let's Play with 2XB303 Acid Bass Sequencer

Published on Jul 13, 2018 Tim Webb

"2XB303 does what it says on the tin, with 2 TB-303 clones in a single app, complete with sequencers and effects. Let's Play with it! 2XB303 is available now on iTunes: https://goo.gl/XgYfCu

If you've enjoyed this series please consider supporting it by becoming a Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord If you'd prefer to help on a monthly basis, instead of per video, there is a monthly Patreon campaign: https://www.patreon.com/discchord_com (Patrons of both campaigns get the same benefits, including Ad Free viewing on the site!)

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

Let's Play with AudioKit Synth One

Published on Jun 28, 2018 Tim Webb

"AudioKit Synth One is a completely free and open-source synth for iOS! It is packed full of features, with some great effects, and an excellent collection of presets provided by the community. Let's play with it! Synth One is available on iTunes: https://goo.gl/hgQeKz

If you've enjoyed this series please consider supporting it by becoming a Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord If you'd prefer to help on a monthly basis, instead of per video, there is a monthly Patreon campaign: https://www.patreon.com/discchord_com (Patrons of both campaigns get the same benefits, including Ad Free viewing on the site!)

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

Let's Play with SynthMaster One

Published on Jun 15, 2018 Tim Webb

"KV331's first iOS app, SynthMaster Player, came out 3 years ago as a way for people to explore popular SynthMaster presets. But it lacked all of the fun synthesis elements. Finally we get the full version of SynthMaster on iOS with SynthMaster One! It is available now on iTunes: https://goo.gl/XpLkgn

If you've enjoyed this series please consider supporting it by becoming a Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord If you'd prefer to help on a monthly basis, instead of per video, there is a monthly Patreon campaign: https://www.patreon.com/discchord_com (Patrons of both campaigns get the same benefits, including Ad Free viewing on the site!)

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

Let's Play with Ripplemaker

Published on Jul 28, 2017 Tim Webb

iTunes: Ripplemaker - Bram Bos

"Bram Bos brings us another music app innovation with the semi-modular Ripplemaker. The app is designed for West Coast synthesis, and in this video I go so far West you can smell the salt spray on Fisherman's Warf. Speaking of salt spray... My birthday is in August, and I would like corals for my birthday. If you've enjoyed this series please consider making a gift by becoming a Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord If you'd prefer to help on a monthly basis, instead of per video, there is a monthly Patreon campaign: https://www.patreon.com/discchord_com

If you'd prefer to make a one-time gift, I would make great use of gift cards from either of these coral shops ( my email is in the video @ 23:08 ): http://uniquecorals.com/gift-card-nam... OR https://worldwidecorals.com/giftcard....

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

Retronyms Phase84 for iPad Released & an Update on Wej

Phase84 Available Now Published on Dec 16, 2014 Retronyms

Phase84 has arrived. iTunes: Phase84 - Retronyms Inc - details captured further below.

Be sure to see the overview video by MATRIXSYNTH Patreon supporter Tim Webb of discchord below!

"Phase84 is a next generation phase distortion synthesizer. It fuses gritty digital sounds with traditional analog punch.

Phase84 is an extremely capable synthesizer and features over 110 presets, containing all sorts of basses, leads, pads, bell tones, sweeps, atmospheric sounds, pseudo-realistic tones, and more. While you don't need to know much about synthesizers to get a lot out of Phase84, experienced synth tweakers will be thrilled at the sheer variety of unique sounds that can be produced with this incredibly versatile synth.

*All synth sounds (bassline, chords, lead) were created with Phase84 with no external effects or post manipulation.

This video also features Wej — rugged performance base and wireless MIDI bridge: preorder.retronyms.com"

Quick update on Wej: Since Oct hundreds of people have preordered Wej and Retronyms is steadily approaching 90% of their preorder goal. They have just announced a Wej preorder bundle with Akai Professional — people can get a good deal on one or two compatible USB Midi controllers (MPK Mini and MPC Element) plus a Wej preorder. They're calling it the Mobile Producer Bundle.

And Tim Webb's overview video on Phase84:

Let's Play with Phase84 (Patch Design & Commentary)

Published on Dec 16, 2014 Tim Webb

"Retronyms has released their first synthesizer! This combines Phase Modulation, Frequency Modulation, and Subtractive synthesis for a very unique sound. It has qualities of 80s synths, but with a very modern tone. Here I explore the whole gamut! If you enjoyed this please consider supporting this series by sponsoring them on Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/user?u=107612

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

iTunes: Phase84 - Retronyms Inc

"Phase84 is a next generation phase distortion synthesizer. It fuses gritty digital sounds with traditional analog punch.

+++++
Phase84 is a Tabletop Ready App. Combine Phase84 with drum machines, sequencers, effects, and more inside Tabletop — a free modular music app for iPad.
+++++

Phase84 is an extremely capable synthesizer and features over 110 presets, containing all sorts of basses, leads, pads, bell tones, sweeps, atmospheric sounds, pseudo-realistic tones, and more. While you don't need to know much about synthesizers to get a lot out of Phase84, experienced synth tweakers will be thrilled at the sheer variety of unique sounds that can be produced with this incredibly versatile synth.

So What's Phase84 All About?

Phase84 is what's known as a Phase Distortion synthesizer. This form of waveshaping synthesis has its roots in Casio’s brilliant CZ line of digital synthesizers from the 80s. It is designed to have the warmth of a subtractive (analog) synthesizer, yet be capable of the squelchy tones and sharp attacks of an FM synth. Phase84 in particular can create warm pads, glitchy sounds, dirty basses, filthy sweeps, screaming leads, and anything in-between.

For those familiar with the typical Moog-like (or iMini-like!) synthesis, think of the "shaper" as being synonymous with "brightness" or "filter cutoff”.

Features:
More than 100 presets.
MIDI support.
inter-App Audio support.
Advanced Keyboard section.
Expressive Perform Mode with Groove Gate.
Tabletop Ready App.
Precision Knob mode.
Phat, naturalistic unison feature for super thick pads and sweeps.
Oscillator Section: 9 Params, 2 General-Purpose Oscillators, 1 Formant Oscillator.
Mix Section: 8 Params including Delay Amount and Pulse Width.
Envelope Section: Amplitude and Shaper Envelopes. Fully visualized and interactive ADSR plus special Fade Param.
Delay/Filter Section: Stereo delay with loss modeling and a punchy overdriven analog-style filter.
3 LFOs: More flexible than your average LFO, this has 4 waveforms, optional delay and repeat count, and can go into the audible frequency range."

CLICK FOR MORE »

Jamming in bleep!BOX

YouTube Uploaded by Discchord on Mar 19, 2012

"Was in the mood to do a little acid jam, and the new update to bleep!BOX made that very easy to accomplish! Be nice, I did this in only my first hour of playing with it. Read the full write up here: http://discchord.com/blog/2012/3/19/bleepbox-update-jam-video.html"


iPads on eBay
iPads on Amazon

iPod Touch on eBay
iPod Touch on Amazon

Let's Play with Zero Input Mixing

Published on Dec 21, 2018 Tim Webb

"Apps like Audiobus and AUM have made effects apps a mainstay of iOS music production for years. Let's make some fun textures for our granular synths, using just effects apps and no input!

If you've enjoyed this series please consider supporting it by becoming a Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord If you'd prefer to help on a monthly basis, instead of per video, there is a monthly Patreon campaign: https://www.patreon.com/discchord_com (Patrons of both campaigns get the same benefits, including Ad Free viewing on the site!)

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

Review: TC-11

YouTube Uploaded by Discchord on Dec 23, 2011

"TC-11 brings a lot of innovation to synthesis on the iPad with a mind-boggling assortment of controls. This review takes a look at just a fraction of the many possible ways to play with your patches. According to the developer the next major update will include recording and AudioCopy, so I look forward to that!

TC-11 is available on iTunes: http://goo.gl/0rxB4 (If you use my link, I get a cut! Thanks!)
I am available on Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/discchord"

iPads on eBay

Tutorial: Epic MIDI Madness in Genome (w/ Sunrizer, Bassline, Molten & MoDrum)

YouTube Uploaded by Discchord on Oct 9, 2011

"The recent update to Genome MIDI Sequencer lets it play in the background, making it perfect for managing other apps. I did a crazy experiment and it worked! Here is how to get all your Virtual MIDI capable apps playing along together.

It's available now on iTunes: http://bit.ly/ntc42p (If you use my link, I get a cut. Thanks!)
I'm available now on Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/discchord"

iTunes:
Genome MIDI Sequencer - White Noise Audio Software
BassLine - Analog Modeling Synthesizer - finger
Molten Drum Machine - One Red Dog Media
MoDrum - Synthesis-based Drum Machine - finger
Sunrizer synth - BeepStreet
iPads on eBay
iPod Touch on eBay

The Dilema [Live Hard Psy]

Published on Jan 29, 2016 Tim Webb

"Here's a little nursery rhyme for real victims of CIA torture and experiments, who can't talk about their experiences for fear of being labeled a conspiracy nut. And a heartfelt "Fuck you!" to conspiracy theorists.

Free MP3 Download: https://soundcloud.com/discchord/the-...

Gear:
• Drums: Elektron Analog RYTM
• Gritty Pad: Elektron Analog Four
• Bass: Moog Minitaur
• Acid Lead 1: Roland TB-3
• Acid Lead 2: Cyclone TT-303
• Controller Software: TouchAble for iPad
• Vocals: Me!"

A new track from the 1st supporting MATRIXSYNTH Member, discchord.

Let's Play with Kronecker - Clockwork Synthesizer

Published on May 25, 2018 Tim Webb

"I love iceGear's apps. Every single one is a new innovative invention to explore. Kronecker continues that tradition with an entirely unique synthesis engine. Let's Play with it! Available on iTunes: https://goo.gl/GAciVD

If you've enjoyed this series please consider supporting it by becoming a Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord If you'd prefer to help on a monthly basis, instead of per video, there is a monthly Patreon campaign: https://www.patreon.com/discchord_com (Patrons of both campaigns get the same benefits, including Ad Free viewing on the site!)

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

Let's Play with ENKL (Patch Design & Commentary)

Published on Jun 10, 2016 Tim Webb

iTunes: Enkl - monophonic synthesizer - Klevgränd Produktion AB

"Klevgränd Produktion's ENKL synthesizer looks simple, but there are a lot of depths to explore! If you enjoyed this please consider supporting this series by sponsoring them on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

Review: CASSINI Synth for iPad

YouTube Published on Aug 8, 2012 by Discchord

"One of the best iPhone synths is now available in a large iPad version! I take a deep look at what you're getting here. Visit the site for more Music App News, Reviews & Tutorials: http://discchord.com

It is available now on iTunes: http://bit.ly/QgaeDY (If you use my link I get a cut. Thanks!)"

Let's Play with Model 15

Published on Nov 27, 2017 Tim Webb

"Moog's Model 15 is a massive beast. In this Let's Play I focus on a couple of my favorite features! If you've enjoyed this series please consider supporting it by becoming a Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord If you'd prefer to help on a monthly basis, instead of per video, there is a monthly Patreon campaign: https://www.patreon.com/discchord_com (Patrons of both campaigns get the same benefits, including Ad Free viewing on the site!)

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"

iTunes: Model 15 - Moog Music Inc.

Everyone Can Play Music #17: Synthesizing Hi-Hats

YouTube Published on Jun 1, 2012 by Discchord

"This lesson builds on what we've learned about the Ring Mod, from Lesson #16, to synthesize metallic and lively Hi-Hats.

iMS-20 is available on iTunes: http://goo.gl/Zw8I4 (If you use my link, I get a cut and this has helped me buy better recording gear. Thanks!)
I am available on Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/discchord"

Let's Play with DM2 - Drum Machine

Published on May 27, 2016 Tim Webb

iTunes: DM2 - Audionomy

"DM1 has been one of the most popular drum apps since 2011, and now we've got a sequel that differs greatly from the original! This one is synthesis-based instead of relying on samples! If you enjoyed this please consider supporting this series by sponsoring them on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/discchord

Be sure to visit http://discchord.com for the latest music app news!"