Discrete Energies

video upload by nbor

"An audio-reactive video made in @cycling74com Jitter. Soundtrack composed in @bitwig studio using @madrona-labs Aalto, with a touch of @ArturiaOfficial Stage-73 V2."

Morning Improv With Buchla Easel Command

nbor

"I have a Buchla Easel Command for a few days, so I started the morning right with a bit of improv."

Bleep, meet Bloop

video upload by nbor

"Playing with a crossfade of the sequencer and arpeggiator to control pitch for extra unusual pitch modulation. Delays added in bitwig."

Live Quadraphonic Mixing in Bitwig Studio

video upload by nbor

"Download the Grid device here! https://bitwiggers.com/presets/684872...

Recently, I've been lucky to perform live sets in Quadraphonic audio. I developed some tools in Bitwig Studio to create animated soundscapes for four speakers. Using modulators and the FX Grid, I can create a huge variety of spatial audio patterns. However, Bitwig isn't really designed for this, so there's a few things you need to do to work around its stereo "bias." Despite the few hacks, it works really well, and sounds amazing. This video gives an overview of how to make everything work."

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"

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."

Contraption

video upload by nbor

"Gearing up for Wednesday's monthly in dt San Jose. I've been trying to make the most of the small synths, as it makes for a very portable situation. With only one effect on one sound, it is all very close to the circuits and raw.

Production notes: A dawless jam run on battery power alone. Roland SH-01A, Korg Volca FM, Meeblip Geode, @1010music Blackbox, and Sensel Morph. The Roland is going through a @MerisUs LVX delay. I found the cheap and compact "G-MARK" mixer from AliExpress for frighteningly cheap. It does a darn decent job, and is crazy small.

There are a couple battery packs - a 150Wh and a 99Wh. I ended up using the 2nd because the blackbox was making too much USB noise when everything was plugged into the 150Wh. There was still quite a bit of noise, but the Izotone RX-8 does a good job cleaning that out."

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."

Contaminated

video upload by nbor

"A plethora of @buchlausa sounds fed into a @MerisUs LVX looper delay pedal, all floating on a VHS world of dreams and nightmares"

Thin Ice

video upload by nbor

"Affected by the stormy end of year, I made this track late on a cold night. 'Thin Ice' is a simple composition with complex sounds. The sounds of breaking ice are played with MPE in @AudioDamageInc Quanta 2 granular synth. @ArturiaOfficial SEM V2 synth provides a dark background, played on the LEM218. A simple generative melody from Bitwig haunts the @buchlausa Easel Command. All treated with a liberal dose of effects. Really, though, you should hear this in quad!"

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."

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."

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."

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."

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!"

Fan of Color

video upload by nbor

"A very low key meditation on color and sinusoids. A complex surface is rendered from sine waves, accompanied by a downtempo track. Graphics generated in @cycling74com Jitter. Audio uses @AudioDamageInc Continua and @madrona-labs Aalto."

Calming Color

video upload by nbor

"Slowly changing colors and moody soundscape. Using @ArturiaOfficial Augmented Voices and Vital in @bitwig studio."

Epoxification

video upload by nbor

"In celebration of the @buchlausa Program Manager card, I take a preset and play with it in 'both' mode. Extra effects applied in @bitwig studio, of course!"

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."

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..."