Digital software instruments give you opportunities to explore new sounds and timbres, so why not add tuning to the list? Kore@CDM contributor and sound designer Eoin Rossney helps us navigate the potentially intimidating world of microtuning. Microtonal sound simply refers, generally, to tunings beyond the now-standard 12-Tone Equal Temperament we find on modern pianos. First off, microtuning doesn’t have to sound dissonant or “out of tune” - like other choices with synthesis, it can simply give you some new sonic abilities. Native Instruments’ synths are well-suited to the task, as many having tuning capabilities built-in. If you’re using plug-ins to assist your microtonal voyage, Kore is a natural with its plug-in hosting capabilities. But the most important thing is just to dive in somewhere and see what happens - with no physical instrument to retune, it’s something anyone can do.

We’ve got a massive set of resources here to get started. It’s a bit stream-of-consciousness, but take a browse; there’s surely something in here to get you started. We’ll follow up with some specific microtuned instrument examples. Enjoy! -PK

Introducing Microtonal Sound

Before we begin, there are one or two things you should know:

Forcing incoming midi to a scale isn’t necessarily microtuning. Ableton Live’s Scale plugin, for example, maps incoming notes to a scale, but that scale will still have only 12 intervals per octave: Microtonal scales have notes between the western 12 note-per-octave pitches.

Microtonal doesn’t necessarily mean dissonant. In fact, in classical music, some ’subtle’ or meantone tunings can sound more “in tune” than conventional tunings. Ed.: That’s because composers in previous centuries didn’t use the 12-Tone Equal Tempered tuning we generally use on pianos today - on the contrary, many of them would likely think your Steinway grand sounds out of tune. -PK Depending on how you play the scale, some harmonies can sound beautifully pure, but hit a wrong note and things get nasty.

Don’t knock it ’til you’ve tried it. Going through some of the available tunings out there, results can vary from making sound almost inaudible to making your instrument sound quite “alive”, with pitches changing depending on what notes are held.

Quick Tip: Instant Microtuning on PC

To get started, here’s a quick hack for trying out microtonal sound. The easiest way by far to retune your Windows synths is to grab Tobybear’s MicroTuner.  This basic VST allows you to load Scala .scl tunings by drag and drop and then imposes them on your synth. (Scala is the standard format for tuning tables.) This is more of a hack than a proper retuning, but it works.

Here’s how it’s done:
Step 1: Download/install the Tobybear Midibag plugins
Step 2: Download/extract the Scala scale library
Step 3: Place Microtuner in front of your instrument
Step 4: Drag the .scl file onto the GUI
Step 4: Olé!

TRIO SOWARI
Uploaded by Ornitoto

Phil Durrant is familiar to most Reaktor users as Sowari on the NI messageboards, a helpful and knowledgeable presence there. He’s also a renowned experimental musician, having performed with, among others, Ticklish, Trio Sowari and MIMEO, the music in movement orchestra - a collective that includes Christian Fennesz, Peter Rehberg and Keith Rowe. Phil is currently working on his PhD dissertation, which involves building virtual instruments for improvised laptop performance. I interviewed Phil by email shortly after Trio Sowari performed a series of shows in France. Phil not only answered my questions but shared a screen shots of the Reaktor instruments he uses in live performance, with detailed explanations. Here’s what he had to say.

Interpol, the superstar, New York-based band (not the international anti-crime organization) have been touring the world with an intensive, live rig, powered by Kore. Our friend Jonathan Adams Leonard aka sleen, a technological superstar himself, put together their current digital setup, and sends along copious notes on the hardware and software rig. Jonathan has plenty more to share as far as how to make Kore work for live players, but first let’s have a look at the details of the rig itself.

And yes, prepare yourself for some serious hardware and software pr0n from one of the world’s best live bands. No DJ sets here.

(For our previous chat with Jonathan, see Free, Modular Power Tools for Kore 2: A Guide to the Reaktor Toolpack, covering his must-download Reaktor ensembles for use with Kore.)

In French cooking, there’s a sauce base called a roux (pronounced “roo”) that is the foundation of bechamel and other sauces. This is a sequencer macro that is the equivalent for programming sequenced instruments in Reaktor - you can take it in any direction from here. In its most basic form it can send velocity information to trigger percussion, or modulate instrument parameters like cutoff and resonance. With a few simple changes it becomes a pitch sequencer, suitable for use in something like the Frankenloop device.

FM8 is a really brilliant tool for synthesizing electronic drum kits. And because it’s using live synthesis, you can make all kinds of variations in the sound easily in ways that don’t work with sampled kits. Our friend Gustavo Bravetti is a huge fan of FM8 and has added it to his workflow in Ableton Live.

Gustavo’s such a big FM8 fan, in fact, that he’s made up a special FM8 drum kit setup exclusively for CDM, to share with y’all. Because Gustavo works in Ableton Live, he’s set them up in that environment:

The sounds are contained on an Ableton Live dj set, also there is a demo clip for each instrument.
Instruments are copyright free, clips are only intended to preview the instruments.
Let me know your thoughts about the FM8 electronic drum kit 1

File download: (zipped Live ALS file with presets; we’ll have a Koresound soon)

bravetti_fm8drums_1_als.zip

Here’s what it sounds like:

fm8kit.mp3

And just to demonstrate how much change you can extract from synth parameters, here’s a quickie "messed-up" demo I made just by changing synth and effects options in FM8:

fm8kit_2.mp3

Be sure to check out Gustavo Bravetti himself, too. He did an interview for CDM in which he shares all his tricks for using unusual alternative controllers, gestural gloves, and gaming devices for music making. He also talks about the scene in his native Uruguay. Liz McLean Knight did the interview:

Interview: Gustavo Bravetti, Playing Music with Light and Interactive Gloves

How can you make the most of this FM8 kit? Here are some quick ideas, which I’ll follow up in the coming days:

Last time around, we had a look at creating a basic grain delay from scratch. It’s usable, but why stop there? Here are some improvements.

Kore’s built-in effects are an essential part of the tool, but getting good with them requires fully understanding how they work – and appreciating how to make the most of the minimalist selection of parameters provided. We’ve got a download from Eoin showing off some of the power of the arpeggiator. Not only can it perform the usual vanilla tasks, but you can morph patterns, too. Some of the controls are definitely a little different than what you may be used to (“Force”, for instance), but the results can be something special – especially once you start chaining arpeggiators. –PK

Commenter apoclypse expressed interest in a tutorial for Kore’s arpeggiator, among other things.  We definitely hope to put the magnifying glass to Kore as much as possible, so let us know if there’s a section in particular that you’re struggling with.  With that in mind, here’s an arpeggiator tutorial for you to check out - don’t forget to load up the accompanying Koresound to play with while reading!

Arpeggiator Demo [KSD file, zipped]

While learning the Arpeggiator I recommend loading Kore up in your host sequencer and enabling the metronome (or set up the equivalent in Kore).  You’ll get an even better sense of what’s going on rhythmically if you loop a four-to-the-floor drumbeat in the background.

Kore’s arp isn’t immune to the power of morphing presets, so in the example Koresound provided, I’ve set up 8 morph presets starting with Init and moving from there to demonstrate the features as clearly as possible.  Try following through from A to H and follow the text to see what’s changing - all of the morph presets here are synced to the bar with the Hold (latch) button enabled so timing is locked to your sequencer and you can adjust parameters without having to keep your hand on the keyboard.  I also recommend loading up all of the factory Arpeggiator presets in one source channel so you can see what other effects are possible. 

Once you’ve got our file loaded, you can have a look at some of the capabilities of the Apreggiator by navigating the morph presets. Here’s a description of what’s going on with each one:

Reaktor and Kore 2 complement each other nicely, and one of the ways that is most apparent when using Reaktor effects in Kore. The high resolution control knobs and buttons are a snap to map to Reaktor’s faders, knobs and switches. Creating Kore sounds out of your Reaktor patches is also a good way to keep track of your creations and search for sounds by keywords.

Building and Using a Reaktor Grain Delay in Kore 2 from Create Digital Media on Vimeo.

In this video tutorial I’ll walk you through building a granular delay effect - in essence, it’s more like a granular live-sampler, which you can use with canned loops or audio from live musicians. I’ll also show you how to map its controls to the Kore 2 controller. This is just the beginning! In upcoming tutorials we’ll look at adding modulation, automation and other refinements.

The following download contains a Kore performance and the Reaktor ensembles you’ll need to follow along with the tutorial. Have fun!

Grain Delay in Kore

Note: Because Kore uses absolute paths for presets, you’ll need to manually point it at the included preset using whatever directory you’ve chosen for installation.

There are now plenty of ways to assign controllers to software, via old-fashioned MIDI learn and new automatic mapping features. But one major strength of Kore is that you get a number of benefits these methods don’t generally have (or don’t have all in one place):

• Hardware control with the Kore controller, not only for individual encoders but even navigating between pages and parts of the interface. (You really don’t have to touch your mouse for many features.)
• Visual feedback and navigation using the hardware, so you can always see what you’re controlling.
• Eight things: Because the layout is always eight encoders (4×2), you never have more than eight things to keep track of at a time – much easier on your brain. And you can choose those eight things:
• Custom pages: Rather than paging through the dozens of parameters in many plug-ins, you can make custom pages. This lets you choose which parameters are important and organize those parameters however you like.
• Host automation support: In addition to using control pages for physical control with the Kore controller, you can use these pages to better organize which parameters are accessed by your host. That makes it much easier and more fun, for instance, to draw in control curves in Logic or SONAR or use envelopes in Ableton Live.

Initially, though, you may find the various levels of pages Kore lets you use confusing. Before you can be productive with Kore, it helps to fully comprehend what’s going on with the different pages.

There are three basic kinds of control pages:

1. Channel pages (automatic)

2. Plug-in pages (automatic)

3. User pages (editable)

The only pages you can custom edit are actually the user pages. Both channel and plug-in pages are automatically populated by Kore’s software. It’s easier to see what this means by walking through each. I’m duplicating the manual a little bit here, but I think seeing this stuff in action is a little more manageable.

My main interest in Reaktor is implementing lateral thinking and “musical leverage”, you might call it. Like what Steve Jobs called computers - bicycles for the mind. So I built this bicycle for your music.

It’s a step sequencer with a twist. Each step has a probability that it will trigger. This can create never ending variations on a synth line or percussion pattern. Here, I have it sending midi to a simple subtractive synth, the SimpleXore. It has some neat features too, including filter feedback and a set of recordable XY controllers that add some movement and variation to the sound. Plus, it uses the great sounding Core oscillators and filters that were introduced with Reaktor 5.

Introduction to Frankenloop from Create Digital Media on Vimeo.

Have fun with it and stay tuned - coming soon we’re going to look at using Frankenloop to control synths and percussion in Kore, and also continue learning about Reaktor internals by modifying and dissecting it.

Download Frankenloop

Also available at the Reaktor user library. Vote up the instrument if you like it!

Frankenloop by Peter Dines is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License.