Music • Sound • Video • Art

This is a 'key' purchase. Get it? Key? You know 'Key' as in Key....

I’m a big fan of Waldorf gear.

I own a MicroWave II and a MicroQ (yet I STILL troll around on eBay for a MicroWaveXT and a plain old Q). My current studio set up is not really optimized for using them easily in compositions — my mixer/ergonomic set-up for using actual gear “has issues” at the moment — but the MWII and microQ are a blast.

Waldorf released the Blofeld in the last year or two. Interesting, but something about it said “cheap” to me (stereo outs only might have had something to do with that). Probably unfair. In any case, Waldorf announced the Largo some months back and this promised to be the Waldorf experience on (virtual) steroids.

Having messed around with it for an hour or so, I’d say it is.

General Features

• up to 256 voices per instance (depending on available CPU power)
• up to 4 layers per sound
• 4 stereo outputs (alternatively 1 stereo sum)
• host automation of almost all parameters
• MIDI Controller automation of the most important parameters

Per Voice

• 5 Oscillators
  • 3 Main Oscillators
  • 2 Sub Oscillators
• Virtual Analog Models:
  • Pulse with Pulse Width Modulation
  • Sawtooth
  • Triangle
  • Sine
• Wavetables:
  • 68 wavetables taken from the legendary Microwave and Wave synthesizer as also Q and Blofeld wavetables
• Frequency Modulation between Oscillators and Noise Generator
• Oscillator Synchronization
• Ring Modulator for Osc 1 / 2
• Noise Generator with Noise Colour
• 2 independent Multi Mode Filters
  • Filter FM
  • Resonance up to Self-Oscillation
  • Low Pass 24 dB / 12 dB
  • Band Pass 24 dB / 12 dB
  • High Pass 24 dB / 12 dB
  • Notch 24 dB / 12 dB
  • Comb Filter with positive / negative Feedback
• 2 Drive Stages per voice with adjustable Drive Gain and selectable Curves
  • Clip
  • Hard
  • Medium
  • Soft
  • Sine Shaper
    and more
• Modulation Matrix with 16 Slots, freely programmable
• Modulation Speed far into Audio Range
• Modulation Sources include all internal Modulation Sources plus various MIDI messages
• Modulation Destinations for almost all continuous sound parameters
• various pre-routed Modulation Destinations with selectable Sources
  • Pitch Modulation
  • Oscillator 1 / 2 / 3 Frequency Modulation
  • Oscillator 1 / 2 / 3 Pulse Width Modulation
  • Filter 1 / 2 Cutoff Modulation
  • Filter 1 / 2 Frequency Modulation
  • Pan 1 / 2 Modulation
  • Amp Modulation
• 4 Modifiers for transforming Modulation Sources with various Algorithms
• 3 fast LFOs
  • syncable to MIDI Clock
  • Note Retrigger with adjustable Start Phase
  • monophonic LFO
  • Keytrack
  • freely drawable LFO waveform with 16 steps (only LFO3)
• 4 fast Envelopes with selectable types
  • Single Trigger / Retrigger per Envelope
  • ADSR
  • ADS1DS2R (2 Decay/Sustain stages plus adjustable Attack Level)
  • One Shot
  • Loop S1S2 (Loop between Sustain 1 and 2)
  • Loop All (Loop over all stages)
• Poly, Mono, Dual or Unisono Mode with selectable Voice Count, Unisono Detune and Stereo Spread

Per Layer

• powerful Arpeggiator
  • Hold and One Shot modes
  • syncable to MIDI Clock
  • Direction Up, Down, Alternate
  • Range up to 10 Octaves
  • various methods to modify Note Sort Order
  • freely programmable Arpeggiator Pattern with up to 16 Steps
• programmable per Step:
  • Accent
  • Timing
  • Length
  • Pause
• 2 Effect slots per layer
• Effect Types:
  • Chorus
  • Flanger
  • Phaser
  • Overdrive
  • Delay (2nd effect slot only)
  • Reverb (2nd effect slot only)

Damn.

Initial impressions: This puppy sounds really, really good.

I’m participating in the RECORD Betas and wanted to post a few thoughts. Note that the NDA prevents me from discussing any details or juicy stuff, but head over to Propellerheads‘ beta sign up site and get a copy for yourself.

My initial impressions were not what I would call “over the top” with enthusiasm. I actually found the interface a bit confusing at first: The screen is JAM PACKED with stuff (nothing you can’t figure out from the screenshots and micro-tutorials on the Prop’s site). On a 13″ macbook screen (my main machine was in the shop the first time I fired RECORD up), it is just too much (although the function key based focus switches help.) Anyway, I am talking about my first impressions here and my first impression was that there is a disconnect between what I was looking at on the screen (a LOT of stuff) and the product’s marketing (“stripped down recording simplicity”).

My next mental hurdle was due to my being familiar with REASON. (Note I said ‘familiar’ and not ‘expert’.) There are enough similarities in the interfaces and many methods of doing things that – as a prior user of REASON – I tend to forget that I’m not IN REASON. So when something is different, I tend to really stumble on it.

For example, the mixer in RECORD is really great and extremely capable. But to take advantage of it fully (IMHO), I have to structure my REASON racks differently.

This thing is great.

In REASON 4, I tend to use multiple Combinators as sub-mixers for various instruments (or sometimes whole sections) in a song. You don’t have to do that so much here because the mixer has a very robust per channel insert scheme and plenty of sends. So much so in fact that I think each channel can give you a lot of the functionality that a combinator formerly would have. (Again, this can be divined from the microtutorials and released info so I think I’m safe NDA wise.) Sure, I can simply use Combinators as before and plug these Combinators into a channel in the mixer and be done with it, but that is probably not the best way to go for a number of reasons I can think of (efficiency, ease of automation and editing being three).

You ever think about your personal “technology horizon?”

Everybody has a different technology horizon — the point where they stop learning new technologies, interfaces, concepts, and decide they are fine where they are and “don’t get why we need all of this newfangled stuff anyway.”

I got a glimpse of mine in one area a few years back: I used to be an avid PC gamer. A complete mouse and keyboard guy. The new ninetendo-style handheld controls simply threw (ok throw) me for a loop. Don’t like ‘em; not particularly interested in getting to grips with them. So that’s an example where I got off that particular technology bus then and there.

In a similar way, the technology we use for making music completely flummoxes the teachers at my music school. They are all older, traditionally trained, and on “traditional” instruments. So I wonder what will come down the music making pike in the future that will seem so different, so unlike what I’m doing now, that I will have a hard time making the leap (but to my 1 year old son will be commonplace and “no big deal” years from now).

Well, an example may be below. This is an audio-visual touchscreen synthesizer. It’s a different way of interfacing with an instrument and it opens up new ways of thinking about sound creation.



CASTALIAN / New concept Audio Visual Touch Sequencer from nucode on Vimeo.