What Happens When You Use A Buchla Easel Preset?

video upload by nbor

"I had the privilege to use an advance copy of the Buchla Program Manager. It's a pretty different experience to dial up a preset and start jamming with the Buchla Easel Command. It took me to a different place than I usually go with the Easel! Combined the Richie Hawtin + Akai Fire Bitwig scripts, the incredible Arturia CS80 plugin, and some modular...well, I didn't get as much work done as I had hoped."

SOMEWHERE In Northern California, Chapter 1. Live composition and remote performance.

video upload by nbor

"In an experiment in remote performance, production, and presentation, I gathered some sounds from the internet, the studio, and the environment and put together this short film that documents the location, the mood, the instruments, and the process of creating a piece of electronic music "off-grid" in a remote location. Rather than simply film myself composing for literal live performance, I surround the piece with context and indulged in fascinations. An abstract narrative emerged as I pieced things together..

Thanks to Ali and Aperna for the wonderful place to stay and studio to prep in, Thanks to @1010music for making such a cool device! Thanks to @Mevo Camera from Logitech for the WiFi cameras that made multi camera shooting possible."

nbor Live In Studio 6 22

pt 1 HD 1080 video upload by nbor

"A live performance, prepared for a livestream for Piqued program #33. The initial seed was a sequence I wrote on the Model:Cycles, which I then built around with some melodies on a MeeBlip Geode, and improvisations on the Korg Minologue and Buchla Easel Command. Additional guitar work was overdubbed."

Live In Studio 6 22 pt 2 HD 1080p

video upload by nbor

"A live performance, prepared for a livestream for Piqued program #33. This was built around some sound designs in Bitwig, and a simple drum beat. The beat was expanded and made more complex with note modifiers and randomness. Additional layers from guitar solo and Buchla improvisations round out the composition. Video feedback effects were created using a 19" CRT and some image modifications in Max/Jitter."

Hallowtone

video upload by nbor

"I've been slowing making a sampler instrument using a chromatically sampled acoustic guitar, activated with an ebow. After some major editing work, I loaded the notes into a sampler and did a bit of sweetening. I use MPE in the Bitwig sampler to tame the sounds and mix them in stereo. Sweetened with a bit of Newfangled Elevate."

Analog Fume

video upload by nbor

"One of those things that happens when you start trying out the new drum machine (MFB Tanzbar Lite) and then you need a bass line, and then you need a lead, and then you need to quickly mix it up. So here's a mouse-mixing session, bringing these simple loops into something more than a few bars. All recorded and mixed in Bitwig. Other instruments are the Korg Minilogue and Arturia Microbrute."

Reticent Calm

video upload by nbor

"While playing around with some music reactive visuals in Jitter, I got carried away and composed a bit of music for it."

Music By Hand

video upload by nbor

"A solo performance on a fascinating instrument. Each finger connects to the pitch, filter, and pan of a simple sawtooth oscillator in Pure Data. The pitch is quantized to a scale mode. Reverb is added, based on the distance of contacts. It's incredibly sensitive, and a joy to play, like giving a sonic massage. I hope you enjoy this performance!"

A Bass Moment with meeblip geode

video upload by nbornbor

"I recorded this to demo on a FB group, but goddamn, I love the sound of this thing, so it's in my catalog here. Sending a simple MIDI bass line to the Geode and playing with the knobs is so satisfying. There's a very odd transient in the attack on this synth that sounds almost mechanical, like there some spring loaded mechanism in this box that triggers the sound. I love it.
No compression or eq on this, just raw crud from the synth."

Unstable Articulations

video upload by nbor

"Intending to just try some things out, I ended up indulging in an extended jam, then doing some overdubs. Although it's a very different sound and structure, I'm pulling influence from early 70's Miles Davis, which so often pulls off that psychedelic miasma vibe so well. YouTube is really not the best place for this type of music, I suppose, but it will have to do.
I didn't capture the guitar work on video, but got everything else. The guitar is so heavily processed and only occasionally appears, so it doesn't really add much to show it. Once again the Bucha Easel Command is featured. Some pings from the modular, and drums on the 1010 Blackbox, the Thunder is used to play Newfangled Generate synth. Everything was refined in Bitwig, quickly mastered with Newfangled Elevate.

The drums are one of the several drum kits you can download for Blackbox:
https://forum.1010music.com/forum/pro..."

Appropriate of Noting

video upload by nbor

"An indulgent moment where I organize chaotic sound, instead of finishing my work.
I've been rewiring my studio for better flexibility, and this means I need to check connections. When you check a connection for a Buchla Music Easel, it is inevitable that a fascinating sound will emerge. I suddenly loose focus on the task at hand and must capture what feels fascinating, adding other sounds and organizing the chaos around me.

The single camera needed something more fitting of the dark, exotic audio, so I spend some time creating something more sympathetic with the sounds under hand."

Nighttime Wanders

video upload by nbor

"Excerpt from an evening of figuring out some sounds with the Buchla Easel and modular. Snyderphonics MantaMate and Expert Sleepers alter duties by using some of the less obvious features."

Taming the Beast

video upload by nbor

"I built two 84hp cases to condense a variety of eurorack modules and small cases into a unified instrument. It is all functioning now, so I'm starting to create with it. Here are my first efforts to make sense of what I have, a mid-tempo techno improv. Several euclidean rhythms and random voltages are driving this, along with interaction on the Sensel Morph."

The Modular Lives!

video upload by nbor

"I designed and built a couple eurorack case from scratch. It now lives! This is the first audio from this wonderful new adventure."

Cicada Conundrum

video by nbor

"Late night in the studio, and I find the Easel Command is alive."

Patina of Purity

video by nbor

"After spending sometime making some presets for sonicLAB Fundamental (a very unusual activity, as you bathe in sine waves), I wondered how they might fit into a musical piece. I joined an odd patch with Audio Damage Phosphor and Arturia Buchla Easel V as they seemed appropriate. Phosphor is all additive synthesis of sine tones, and the Buchla Easel is just....great. I enjoy the contrast of the chaos from Fundamental and slow tones from the others. Overdubs played on t.he Sensel Morph, using MPE"

Dissolve

video by nbor

"Working things out with some new material in Bitwig Studio, Newfangled Pendulate and Generate, Madrona Labs Kaivo, and ASM Hydrasynth.The mix is rough, but there's a start, middle and end, so here you go!

More Music: http://nbor.us​
Gear:
https://www.newfangledaudio.com​
http://bitwig.com​
https://madronalabs.com/products/kaivo​
https://www.ashunsoundmachines.com/hy...​
https://morph.sensel.com​"

A Window In Felton

video by nbor

"There's a lovely spot in a funny little cabin in Felton CA that lends itself to ambient music. Very slow, possibly even boring, but it certainly fit the vibe I had, not far from ancient redwoods.

I have been trying out super portable setups, and this is about as portable as it gets: battery power for 1010 Blackbox and Sensel Morph, filmed with phone. Sounds are from a variety of sources - a couple stock sounds from 1010, some recordings I did with my son, some sounds from the NASA archive, etc.

More Music: http://nbor.us

Gear:
https://1010music.com/product/blackbox
https://morph.sensel.com"

Yet Another Big Sound

video by nbor

"Another sampling of the Meeblip Geode yields some really luscious soundscape. I just want to float on this stuff."

Folk Music For A New Year

nbor

"A simple tune for the new year. I recently got the model:samples and needed to add some synths to the krautrock beat."

Disappear

nbor

"I became really enchanted with this patch I made on the Hydrasynth, and it felt good to play, so I improvised some chords to chill out. Still figuring out this new setup, so apologies for the blurry top of my head!"