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Once the odd man out in the sequencer race, Cakewalk has fought tooth and nail to rise to the very top of the heap. Always popular in the US, the company has become one of the big names worldwide, thanks in no small part to the continued growth of their comprehensive Sonar packages.

With version 7 of Sonar, Cakewalk has once again outdone itself. There are new features galore, refinements of old favourites and a few surprises. While we don't have the space to cover every single one of them at length, there are a few that'll have current users falling all over themselves to pay the upgrade fee, and we reckon that some of the updates may win over a fair few new recruits as well.

The step sequencer

It seems obvious in hindsight, but we never really noticed the absence of a dedicated step sequencer in previous versions. Why? Probably because most other DAWs don't have them either. Sure, they all let you enter a note at a time in a piano roll editor or event list, and some even enable you to tap out your notes on a MIDI controller with no regard for timing, all to be quantised lock-step by the program. However, for true grid-based pattern sequencing of notes and controller data, the best option was to look elsewhere, to an app such as FL Studio or Reason.

Sonar's new dedicated Step Sequencer is poised to give those programs a run for their money. Cakewalk proclaim this to be the most innovative set of pattern sequencers ever bundled with a DAW, and we're inclined to agree (although that claim might be selling FL Studio a bit short).

Step Sequencer is, on the surface, a typical grid in which rows of MIDI notes are stacked vertically, while individual steps are laid out across the horizontal axis. The notes are entered by left-clicking a step, and erased by right-clicking it, while clicking and dragging up or down on a note adjusts the velocity level.

Sequences can have up to 16 steps per beat, with up to 64 beats per pattern. MIDI controller data can be drawn into a familiar controller pane at the bottom of the display. You can tie notes together and apply portamento and very funky swing. Best of all, you can easily create sequencer patterns using odd time signatures, thanks to the Fit Patterns To Quarters function, and all without screwing up the bar/beat count of your tune. This is an obvious inclusion that is all too often found to be missing from competing products.

The Step Sequencer is easy to use, inspiring and loads of fun - it's great to have another way to put tunes together besides piano rolls, etc. Cakewalk has done a fine job of second guessing user needs with such niceties as compatibility with many popular preset drum maps, including those shipped with the bundled Session Drummer 2.

More MIDI

While some developers have neglected MIDI features in favour of ever more powerful audio-related capabilities, Cakewalk has long held
high the banner of MIDI. Sonar 7 numbers a multitude of new MIDI functions among its many attributes.