In the recording world what I have seen to be the coolest and best release at this years NAMM show 2012 is UA’s Apollo. It's a high-end 24-bit/192kHz recording front end, but it also enables you to track through the UAD range of powered plug-ins! It'll be available in Duo and Quad processing in the first quarter 2012, with prices estimated at $2200 and $2600 respectively. It’s a Firewire 800 interface but It's worth noting that a Thunderbolt option card is set to be made available too, which will enable "lower latency, reduced audio buffer size, improved performance at high [...]  Read more   

Pro Tools has been developing rapidly and the latest version, 10, and it brings a ton of new features to the plate: improved RAM Caching, Clip Gain, 32-bit floating-point recording, multi-track beat detective (PT9), etc.
These are all great additions to the industry standard recording application.
Purchase a new Mbox Mini (1 Mic), Mbox (2 Mics), or Mbox Pro (4 Mics) with Pro Tools 10 for a great hardware/software combo. These are great for the home/project musician and perfect for the aspiring engineer/producer heading off to school.
All Pro Tools 10 systems come with the required iLok key. In addition, purchase a Pro [...]  Read more   

Its been over 20 years since they made a synthesizer with the very popular CZ series.
Yes, you get access to the original Casio CZ synth sounds in the XW-P1.
The six oscillator monophonic solo synth engine sounds amazing and was designed with the performer in mind. The regular sounds have 64 note polyphony so it does sound huge. It only weighs 11 pounds. This gig ready 61-key synth has a lots of sounds ranging from pianos to brass to bass and drums. There are over 400 presets to get you started but it has 4 real time control knobs for editing [...]  Read more   

I just installed Cubase 6.5 update on my home and store system and it really rocks! It’s a 50 dollar paid upgrade if you have Cubase 6 registered on your system BEFORE Jan 1 2012. If you registered Cubase 6 after that date or a brand new customer, the update is free to you!! First off since I’m a keyboard player I was very intrigued about how the 2 new VST synths sound - Padshop and Retrologue. Both are VERY good sounding and are very easy to use. Steinberg has posted good videos and sound demos on their website at [...]  Read more   

There are times when a keyboard is so incredibly powerful that you keep discovering more and more useful things inside.
Last week I played a concert of original songs accompanying singer-songwriters. I used to carry a 30” rack full of MIDI synth modules and 3 keyboards to get all my sounds. With just the Kronos and one Combination per song, I could split and/or layer up to 16 different keyboard sounds, played sampled background vocals and was able to turn any of the sounds on or off with a switch and the sliders controlled individual volumes. The best was that the [...]  Read more   

Roland product specialists Peter Lafferty and Mark are coming back and will be bringing in the Vguitars - especially the GT-100 Mega Multi-FX Amp Effects Processor featured at NAMM and currently the only one in Canada!! Take advantage of their expertise in Roland products this Saturday.

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I have had the use of Yamaha’s new Motif XF6 workstation to prepare for a number of varied style performances. We should not forget keyboards like the Motif XF while not necessarily being the latest, hottest in the media, they are full of many “I did not realize it could do that function” surprises.
Patch remains there although not talked about in Yamaha ads. In the “Song Mode” usually thought of for sequencing MIDI tracks you can have up to 16 voices (patches) and switch between them and not lose any notes or effects being used from your last voice. Speaking [...]  Read more   

The quest for a real Hammond B3 sound complete with Leslie 122 and as much dirt and grind in the sound as one wishes has been what many of us have been searching for over the years. After owning 3 real Hammond B3 organs and multiple Leslie 122’s, most models have only been close until the new Nord Stage 2 organ. You can keep it clean or have the Deep Purple dirt in your sound, split the longer 73 note keyboard and have accurate slow fast rotor changes. The great thing about the Nord is that it is designed to [...]  Read more   

We just received MOTU’s new and anticipated Mach 5 V 3 universal sampler virtual instrument software!! MOTU has improved the Mach 5 interface and now the included library is 45GB on 7 DVD’s to enjoy!
It has a great one window user interface for great simplicity but it also very deep deep synthesis, unlimited layers and fairly easy scripting to improve your dynamic performance of the larger sounding instruments. One of the main reasons I like it so much is it has universal support for many 3rd party sample formats that I have been using since the late 80’s (aging myself) [...]  Read more   

We now have the very cool FXpansion acoustic drum software BFD Eco now on sale for the rest of the year at $35! It used to sell for well over $100. This is the entry level acoustic drum software package from award winning and drum library leader FXpansion. This as far as I can see is FXpansion’s answer to the very popular Toontrack drum software called EZDrummer. EZ Drummer is also on sale as a digital download from Cosmo.
The promotions are:

EZ Drummer $79.99
Superior Drummer 2.0 $199.99
EZX Titles for $39.99 (each)
SDX Titles for $99.99 (each)

These titles are also on sale until [...]  Read more