Category: Sound design

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So, I’ve been really busy with music over the last few months demoing and compiling new tracks to go on what was originally going to be a short 5 or 6 track EP… but then I got a bit carried away, and it looks like this collection of tracks is going to end up being another album šŸ™‚

I actually really like the format of an album, perhaps this is because I grew up listening to LPs and Cassette tapes, where tracks always were in the same order… though I have to admit, sometimes the shuffle function on my iPod spits out some pretty amazing musical synchronicity!

Anyway… the fourth as yet un-named Winterpark album is currently taking shape, and I’m really happy with how it’s sounding so far… I’m looking towards a mid year release if all goes according to plan. In creating this new album, I’ve been experimenting with live looping and the creation of atmospheric textures from electric guitar.

This Ableton Instrument Ā has been created from one of these Loops. The original guitar loop has a pitch-shifting reverb drenched sound, that classic Eno-esque ā€˜Bloomā€™ sound. When I transformed this into a sampler based instrument rack, I noticed that wherever you play it on the keyboard you can get some really interesting and diverse textures. I hope you enjoy it!

Download LINK HERE

If you like what you hear and want to support the creation of these instruments, please considerĀ donating a dollar!

Listen here:

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Here are a couple of Midi FX plugins that I created for theĀ EnableĀ Music Theory for Electronic Musicians session I presented at in December.

The idea is to have a series of Midi FX racks which allow you to use single key strokes or button pushes to create lush evolving chords.

With *Epic Chord Rack*Ā  you can switch between major and minor, and increase the harmonic overtones of either the Harmony, or Tonic notes in the chord, as well as control to tweak the Maximum velocity out, which can come in handy if you start pushing the velocity messages up too high.

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*Note Remover* uses a trick of three velocity plugins in a row, with various settings to randomly remove the number of notes that the chord plugin splits out.The Macros give you the option to have either more or notes in the chord as well as an output velocity level.

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*Re-Voice* basically ensures that all notes will always sit within about a two octave range, no matter what the incoming note message is. You can assign an octave range via the Macro.

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*Racked Scale* is a couple of scale plugins conveniently grouped together and macro-mapped so you can change between Major and Minor Scale shape, transpose your scale anywhere within a two octave range, and change into any of the diatonic modes within a major or minor scale via the Base Macro.

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GRAB THE LIVE SET HERE

If you have any further questions, feel free to write a reply and Iā€™ll do my best to answer! and if you find this useful, and want to support the creation of these FX, please considerĀ donating a dollar!

cheers, Matt

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I had a rather significant birthday a few months back, and amongst some really cool gifts, I received a boxful of bells (thanks Mum and Dad!). They’re those sort that are decorative/ornamental, and if you check out the picture below you can probably see why they ended up in the Op Shop šŸ˜‰

But they sound great if their own strange way, and I’ve been intending to record them and then slow the dinging sound down to create weird soundscape instruments from them.Ā So, today I finally got around to sampling and manipulating the recordings, and am pretty chuffed with the results. I’ve turned these bells into two instruments; the first plays rhythmic glitchy patterns, and the second is more atmospheric.

You can hear what both these instruments sound like together via the Soundcloud player below

andĀ If you use Ableton Live 9 Suite, you can download the WInterpark Music and Sound Vol.3 fileĀ to play them as much as you like.

Enjoy! and if you like what you hear, please consider donating a dollar!

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In Vol.2 of Music and Sounds, I’m giving away is a fun little Ableton Live Pack that uses a single drum loop created using the Atmos Drum Rack that I gave away last month, but instead of making drums with it, I tried to be as geeky as possible, and actually created three different keyboard instruments from this drum loop. An 80’s Casio type synth, a Drawbar Organ and a Lush sounding Band-Pass Atmospheric Pad.

“WHAT???!!!” I hear the music nerds cry out in awe and excitement!

“UMMMM??? I have no idea what the hell you are talking about” I hear everyone else mumble…..

Think of it this way, it’s like a magic trick, where I pull a rabbit out of a hat, but the rabbit is actually a drum loop and the hat is the keyboard sound… actually, no, hang on…. It’s more like the rabbit goes into the hat, and then is pulled out as three different doves, that then all fly off in different directions.

Maybe just have a listen to this little audio demo, and all that will make a bit more sense.

So…if you run Ableton Live 8 or above, download the Winterpark’s Music & Sounds Vol.2 Ableton Live Pack to check out these magical doves… I mean instruments.

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If you like this, please consider donating a dollar!

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Hi all! I’ve just given away a free track, and made a free drum rack for all the Ableton Live music nerds on my email list, but I thought I’d share the drum rack here to all the people who swing by the website.

So… I recently presented at an Ableton Beats Masterclass in Melbourne and as part of this I spent a bunch of time putting together this cool little drum rack, using the same ambient guitar setup and the OP-1’s drum synth. It’s pretty cool for creating slightly wonky hip-hop inspired down-tempo electronica, and I like to share…

Download Winterpark’s Music and Sounds 1. Ableton Live Pack.

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This one works in both Live 8 and 9 standard versions.

Enjoy! and if you like this, please consider donating a dollar!

:)Matt

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So I recently found this funny little keyboard at Camberwell Market. It’s a Toy Harmonium probably from the late 50’s or early 60’s.

I was immediately drawn to it not only because of the awesome colours on the keys, but also by the completely crazy whirring noise that it makes even before you press any keys down!

It sort of inspired me to make a sample based instrument from it. So… enter the new Ableton Live 9 which I have been playing around with.

I created this sample-based instrument using the Toy Harmonium and a bunch of the new Max for Live gadgets that are in Live 9, and also a kind ofĀ generativeĀ music type demo.

Download it here!

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If you like what you hear and want to support the creation of these instruments, please considerĀ donating a dollar!

and have a little listen to the way it sounds below.

and see it being used as part of a Live in-studio Winterpark performance