Remember when the internet was a brave new world, full of promise, and felt like a wild frontier where anything was possible? That’s all changed, of course, thanks to the overwhelming dominance (both negative and positive) of social media, but there’s one corner of the web that still entices: music production.

Thanks to developments in APIs involving audio and MIDI, among other things, it’s now possible to use your basic browser as a hub to make music. This isn’t a novelty any more - browser-based DAWs are packed with sophisticated tools and internal applications that often stand up to the equivalent you might have used on your desktop or as a plugin in your DAW.

Let’s explore some of the most useful and intriguing options available in your browser, from classic synthesizer emulations and modular sequencing environments to full-on DAWs.

Bet you never thought you’d be whipping up complete tracks in Chrome, did you?

André Michelle knows a thing or two about making music with web pages. As the founder of OpenDAW, a free digital audio workstation that runs in your browser, he’s fully committed to the idea of non-desktop music production.

“The web is the ideal platform for software,” he says when asked why he’d make a DAW that runs within an internet browser. “It's inherently built to be platform-independent.”

Although web-based music applications have been around for a few years now, André, explains that because of recent breakthroughs, browsers are now a much more viable way to make music. “The web now has enough APIs to cover what music tools need: audio, MIDI, WebGL (for graphics), storage,” he explains. “Developers finally started recognising the potential.”

Additionally, he identifies the ‘Wild West’ nature of the internet as to why it’s the ideal place to pioneer this new avenue for music production. “The web has also always been a place to experiment,” he enthuses. “Users are more open to new ideas, and updates ship far quicker than a desktop app allows.”

Thanks to protocols like Web MIDI - which lets you play a browser-based instrument with a controller just as you would any other piece of software - it’s more viable than ever.

We’ve always thought of DAWs as applications downloaded to a piece of computing hardware, like a laptop or a tablet, but they can also exist on the internet. Browser-based DAWs are very much a thing now, with a number of different ones available, including André’s OpenDAW.

A complete (and free!) music-making platform, OpenDAW offers bespoke instruments like a synthesizer and drum machine, audio recording and effects, and even a way for you to build your own music applications on top of the OpenDAW SDK via scripting. It’s also been made with the concept of democratisation, and education, in mind.

“Sharing is the browser's own territory, so it's effortless,” André says about what a browser-based DAW offers that an offline app doesn’t. “Our Classroom feature lets people work in the same session at the same time through an invitation link, directly between their machines, with no login. It's the most accessible place to start.”

It also takes privacy seriously: “No signup, no tracking, no paywalls, no subscriptions, just create,” André says.

An online DAW like OpenDAW also makes sense if you’re often on the move and need to use a variety of different devices and machines. “Moving across platforms and computers,” is André’s response when asked why some would want to produce in a browser. “Your work isn't tied to one machine or one operating system. It runs on whatever's in front of you, a Chromebook, a borrowed laptop, your own machine.”Freedom, in other words.”

Other online DAWs include Audiotool, which supports third-party VST3s and, as of version 3.0, offers an open-source SDK that allows users to build their own instruments, plugins, and AI-connected music creation tools; BandLab Studio; and Smol Sequencer , a modular sequencing environment.

Of course, there’s more to music-making than DAWs. Sometimes you just want to kick back and have a play with a synth, sampler or drum machine without worrying about all the things that come with launching a DAW. In the same way that you might open a standalone instrument app on your desktop, you can navigate to a webpage and play a browser-based one. And, thanks to the Web MIDI protocol, you can even do it via your regular MIDI controller (although many offer QWERTY keyboard note input too).

Quirky musical gadget manufacturer Playtronica https://shop.playtronica.com/ and Chromatone, a web-based source for musical education, have curated a page called Web Synths Collection with more than 60 instruments available to jam on.

Some of the ones worth trying out include Steve Goldberg’s Juno-106, an emulation of the famous analog icon from Roland; a recreation of Yamaha’s DX7 by Matt Montag loaded with sounds like the famous (or should that be infamous?) E. Piano 1; and Matthew Cieplak’s ER-99, a recreation of the TR-909 drum machine with audio synthesized using the WebAudio API.

WebSynths is billed as ‘a free resource for any musician with internet access.’ This is a running theme with online music-making. Although browser-based instruments and tools don’t have to be free, many often are, retaining that foundational web ethos of democratisation and open-source sharing.

WebSynths currently has two instruments to play with. They are WebSynths Grooves, a booming virtual analog drum machine with some serious sound quality, and WebSynths Microtonal, a beautiful VA synthesizer with a focus on Aphex Twin-like tunings. Helpfully, both provide a way to capture audio so you can capture your sonic creations to use as you see fit later.

One of the great things about web-based music is the variety of instruments you can come across, many of them made by enthusiastic programmers who just like to code and see their ideas come to life.

One such instrument is Mezcla, an SP-404-style sampler. Says developer Capelo on Reddit;

“As a longtime beatmaker, I wanted a way to chop samples and test loops when I'm away from my gear. I built Mezcla to be a fast, distraction-free sampler that runs right in the browser.”

Interestingly, plugin developers are starting to use the browser as a way to allow prospective customers to demo instruments before buying. One such case is Jun Murakami’s Synth-80, an emulation of the Roland MKS-80 that runs right on a web page. It’s the entire instrument, complete with MIDI functionality and a QWERTY keyboard-enabled interface.

While browser-based instruments are undoubtedly not as convenient as plugins, you can still use them in your DAW with a few workarounds. Just as you would with a standalone instrument app, you can route system audio into your DAW with a client like BlackHole for Mac or VB-CABLE for PC.

With Web MIDI now very much a thing, it makes sense that hardware synthesizer editors and librarians would start migrating into browsers. You’re working from your computer or tablet anyway; why not put the editor into the internet rather than on the desktop?

Vintage synth owners know that old gear can sometimes be frustrating to work with. Having all of the menus only accessible through a single-line LCD screen can lead to many a hair getting yanked out.

Thankfully, programmers and patch librarians have long existed on computers to bring all of that arcane programming onto a big screen. As long as the instrument has good MIDI implementation, you can do your programming work from your computer. And now, thanks to Web MIDI, that editor can live on the internet too.

Knob.Monster is a new all-purpose editor. A ‘browser-native cloud SysEx librarian and patch manager,’ it connects to vintage synthesizers via a USB-to-MIDI handshake.

Knob.Monster currently supports the Yamaha DX7 and other FM-era instruments, Roland Juno-106 and Jupiter-6, Korg M1, and Casio CZ synths. The site isn’t free but it does promise an alternative to aging software librarians.

There’s a growing number of web-based editors helpfully targeting specific instruments as well. This is particularly helpful for old samplers like the Akai S5000 and Roland S-330, whose operating systems can be cryptic, to say the least.

New instruments are getting some love too, such as Behringer’s Mini series of synthesizers like the Pro VS Mini and JT Mini thanks to this lineup of free browser editors from Digital Sunset Studios. These are also available as desktop apps, but it’s nice to see the browser version as an option as well.

In the same way that browsers make excellent sense for editors, they’re also ideal host locations for tool and utility applications. No need to clutter up your hard drive when apps can live online. Here are three recently utility programs that handle useful but not necessarily bandwidth-heavy aspects of music production, such as sample slicing and wavetable creation.

Sample chopping is one of those aspects of beatmaking that can sometimes be a faff. Finding the right workflow can be tricky.

Chppr is a free online sample slicer designed to make sample loop preparation fast and easy before you take it to the DAW stage. It lets you upload or record audio, chop it, turn slices into playable pads like a hardware sampler, program patterns, arrange sketches, and export wav files from the browser. It works extremely well and is intuitive and fun to use.

Another sample-related browser utility is WavedStudio. If you work with wavetable-based synthesizers like Serum, Vital or Phase Plant, you have probably thought about making your own wavetables.

While there are standalone apps that let you do this, WavedStudio is surprisingly deep. It’s fairly complex so it’s worth looking at the documentation, especially when it comes to working with the 3D Topology functions and FM operators, but getting to grips with the main wavetable drawing parameters isn’t too difficult. WavedStudio outputs at 64 frames x 2048 samples per frame, which is the standard format for most modern wavetable synthesizers like Serum. Although WavedStudio is currently free, the developer is considering optional paid Pro features after the beta period ends.

Of course, if you want wavetables for Ableton Wavetable or some other synth with a different format, you’re going to need a converter.

You’re in luck, as the internet has you covered here too. Batch Wavetable Converter from Kimura Taro does what it says on the tin: it lets you change wavetables from one frame size to another, with control over frame number, sample rate, bit depth, and even sharpness of the output audio.

And yes, it can do more than one at a time (as you might guess from the name). Kimura also has a single-cycle waveform converter called SCW Resynthesizer and his own additive wavetable creator as well. His whole site is well worth a perusal.

Browser-based music creation is having a bit of a moment then, with so many cost-effective, slick ways to develop your music on any desktop or mobile device with internet access. Just make sure you remember to bookmark your project!

Image-Line has launched an update to FL Studio that makes it the first major DAW to implement agentic AI directly into its workflow.

Available now as a free download for all existing users, FL Studio 2026 also features a redesigned version of its Flex instrument, a new transient-splitting multi-effect, cloud-based project backup and more.

After introducing Gopher – an AI-powered chatbot that offered users guidance from the DAW's manual and knowledge base – with FL Studio 2025, Image-Line has transformed Gopher into an agentic assistant that can access and make changes to your project. Ask Gopher to change the level of a track, adjust a plugin parameter or reorganize your mixer channels, for example, and the action will be performed in your DAW.

Image-Line says these new capabilities are designed to help beginners learn the software and speed up workflows for existing users, and is keen to emphasize that Gopher does not train on user data.

Another tool introduced in FL Studio 2025 that's received a significant update this year is Loop Starter, a feature that helps users quickly generate new ideas via FL's Channel Rack. Loop Starter now draws on a substantially expanded sound library via FL Cloud, and offers users a longer list of genres from which to choose from.

Alongside the updates to Gopher and Loop Starter, FL Studio 2026 features a major upgrade to Flex, its most popular stock plugin. Refreshed with a modern, visually engaging aesthetic, a new browser and a revised sound engine under the hood, the preset-based instrument is now more CPU-efficient and arrives with eight free sound packs that are available to all FL Studio users.

FL Studio 2026 also introduces Transmitter, an all-new effects plugin that splits signal into transient and sustain elements for independent processing. These two parts of the signal can be processed within Transmitter, via its onboard saturation, delay and reverb, or routed to the Mixer to be processed on independent tracks using other plugins. Transmitter is available as part of FL Studio's All Plugins Edition.

In addition, FL Studio's 2026 update brings with it a long list of less flashy but highly useful updates, a highlight of which is automatic cloud backup, meaning that saved projects can now be backed up to the cloud for secure storage.

FL Cloud Project Backup is included with every FL Cloud plan: Free tier users get 500MB of storage, Plus get 5GB, and Pro get a massive 1TB. (FL Cloud is Image-Line's subscription-based add-on for FL Studio that offers users samples, plugins, mastering tools and distribution through DistroKid).

Another addition that caught our eye is FL Studio 2026's new Audio Logger. Running in the background, Audio Logger continuously captures the last 60 seconds of the DAW's master output – a bit like Ableton Live's Capture MIDI function, but for audio – meaning that you'll never lose an idea, even if you forget to hit record.

“Every second spent searching, organizing, or recovering work is time taken away from creating,” Image-Line CEO Constantin Koehncke said in a statement.

“With FL Studio 2026, we’ve removed friction throughout the creative process with a wide range of quality-of-life and workflow improvements, while introducing powerful new creative tools designed to inspire new ideas and help more people make more music.”

For a comprehensive overview of what's new in FL Studio 2026, visit Image-Line's website.

What is it?

Cubase really needs no introduction. It was the first computer-based sequencer to incorporate a graphical arrange window, and it even embraced hard-disk audio before many others. In recent years, it has settled into a steady pattern of yearly updates, and the latest of these is Cubase 15.

As before, it comes in three flavours, with the Pro version delivering the full feature set. As well as the main DAW software itself, you get a cut-down version of SpectraLayers (SpectraLayers Go) and, as usual, a big selection of sound content, virtual instruments and plugins. Steinberg’s aim is to make it a self-contained system without the recourse to third-party additions (though of course many users will have their own favourite additions).

The headline additions in Cubase 15 are the expanded modulator system, a new melodic mode for the pattern sequencer introduced last year, redesigned expression map functionality, stem separation, two new effects, the Omnivocal vocal synthesis engine (open beta), plus a bunch of workflow improvements and functional tweaks. Whilst it's fair to say that a quick glance at this list doesn't point to any game-changing new features, it does cover quite a bit of territory. Let's take a closer look.

Performance

The modulators introduced in Cubase 14 were one of its big new features, and something that the users who had experience with Ableton Live and Bitwig had been calling for.

The update expands on this with six new modulator types – Random Generator, Sample & Hold, Wavefold LFO, Crossfader, Attack/Decay and Morph LFO. Modulators are a great way to create tempo-synced effects (eg, filter sweeps), but the ability to chain them and incorporate more modulator types extends their use into more creative and experimental areas.

It's worth noting, though, that Cubase works on a per-track basis for the modulators. It would be nice to see a global modulator track that can be freely routed to multiple destinations.

The pattern editor introduced in Cubase 14 was primarily aimed at drum sequencing and at the time quite a few users hoped that a more versatile version that could work easily with melodic/musical patterns might be on the cards. Thankfully, we now have it in the form of the Melodic Pattern Sequencer. It is based on its rhythmic predecessor, but to address the melodic aspects of this type of sequencing, Steinberg has added interesting scale- and shape-generation features. This means that even with a few presses of the randomisation button, the results are likely to fit well within the context of your existing track. The more we played, the more fun we had, and although it's still quite basic, especially in pattern management and copy/paste features, this is a really nice addition.

There's no escaping AI right now, and those two letters seem to be assigned to all kinds of products at the moment. In Cubase 15, it's applied to the new stem separation feature, which can split any audio file into vocals, drums, bass, and other elements (ie, all the rest). It performs this directly from the project window, splitting tracks into separate layers. It's quick, works quite well, and is free; however, you'll find better results with specialised software solutions, including online options, where there is significant competition. In fact, explore a little further and you’ll discover that SpectraLayers Go, bundled with Cubase 15, can separate vocals from music and appears to do a superior job – at least on the tracks we tested.

The same goes for OmniVocal, although this time it is clearly labelled as a beta. It's certainly not going to compete with something like Dreamtonics Synthesiser V or Ace Studio in terms of its expressiveness, realism and flexibility, but once again comes as a free addition. Hopefully, as it develops, it will become a little bit more fluid to use, particularly when adding and editing lyrics. At the moment, it can be a bit of a slog to get the most realistic results.

Regarding new plugins, Ultra Shaper offers transient shaping, limiting, and EQ, making it a useful addition. The Pitch Shifter – as the name suggests – is designed for vocal processing and features formant-preservation and saturation modes. It's not particularly cutting-edge, but it works well, though primarily suited to mixdown rather than live processing due to its significant latency.

These and other stock plugins now support UI scaling (finally!), which is a real boon when using high-res displays. We only wish there were a way to apply a simple 2x scaling to older plugins (including some from Steinberg). This would be a simple, unfussy solution for navigating plugins that shrink to tiny proportions in some setups.

One interesting feature of the newly designed hub is Project Preview, which stores a small snippet of a track for quick listening before loading. This feature only works with newly saved projects that have it enabled (allowing you to customise which small, ie, 5-second segment, is previewed). Despite its simplicity, it is surprisingly useful, especially for those who do not employ a helpful naming scheme or work on multiple tracks at once. It's also worth noting that DAWproject support allows sessions to be shared with other compatible DAWs.

A small but significant arrival in Cubase 15 is the automation’s ‘Last Touched Parameter’ feature, which provides quick drawing/editing access to whichever knob or slider you've last moved for any given track. This is a real time-saver, as is the new ability to add volume or pan directly to the Track Controls Area (though we prefer the accuracy of a vertical fader). This is a nice way to tweak levels, and it will be a real time-saver for some.

Finally, Expression Maps have been redesigned. The setup process is now more streamlined, integration with the Key and Score Editors has improved, and per-articulation attack compensation aims to enhance the realism of orchestral mock-ups. For those with large orchestral sample libraries, especially those with compatible instruments that automatically import key switches, this will be warmly welcomed.

Verdict

This release introduces many features to boost your creativity and streamline your workflow, and it is a strong update overall. However, it might seem a bit underwhelming for some, and there is certainly some sentiment on Steinberg forums that the total on offer here doesn't quite justify the annual upgrade cost. Another perspective is to consider the £83 upgrade fee as roughly equivalent to a £7/month subscription. If it were a subscription, we would say it offers fair value for money.

Nonetheless, there are some areas we would like to see improved in the future. Key Command options could be expanded, and the Remote Editor could become more accessible. Fully featured API access, capable of integrating with AI tools (such as Claude and ChatGPT), would be a fantastic addition – possibly even a game-changer – for delivering long-awaited features. We’ve barely scratched the surface of what AI can do – not as a replacement for the composer or producer, but as a time-saving assistant, and it would be great to see Steinberg take a leading role in this.

Opening, closing and project loading times can be slow on more complex projects or setups with many plugins. It would be beneficial to see some optimisation in this area. We also hope attention is given to the comping functionality in Cubase, as there are ongoing frustrations about moving active comps to other tracks and a few other issues that cause difficulty when working with multiple live audio elements.

One of the challenges with a major DAW such as Cubase is that it must accommodate a wide range of users. For every person who finds the expression map functionality or notation capabilities particularly useful, there will be others demanding clip-based playback or improved AI generative tools. Steinberg has to carefully balance its approach to satisfy everyone. Overall, however, Cubase remains a fantastic piece of software that we are happy to continue using.

Hands-on demos

Cubase

Alternatives

Specifications

Apple has announced the release of Logic Pro 12.3, an update to its flagship DAW that brings improvements to two stock plugins, Sample Alchemy and Beat Breaker, an upgrade of its AI-powered harmonic analysis tool Chord ID and a whole host of extra tweaks and enhancements.

As a longtime Logic Pro user, I’ve always been a fan of Logic’s stock plugins - from simple tools like its Overdrive and Pitch Shifter through to versatile multi-effects and powerful instruments like the Alchemy synth, the DAW has built up an impressive and varied stable of stock processors in its decades-long history.

Some of the most recent additions have become personal favourites, including 2024’s ChromaGlow saturation tool and Beat Breaker, an effect introduced in 2023 that slices and dices audio in real time to create glitchy patterns out of any sound source. It’s the latter plugin that’s received a refresh in Logic’s latest update, and for me, it’s far and away the most exciting upgrade of the lot.

Beat Breaker was already a capable and creatively inspiring effect, offering fine-grained control over how incoming audio is rhythmically chopped, rearranged, reversed and processed, but Logic Pro 12.3 expands its abilities with three new modes that open up even wilder possibilities for sonic manipulation.

The plugin's new Filter mode lets you to apply low- or high-pass filters to each slice of audio, with adjustable filter type, cutoff frequency, slope and curve for each segment, combined with a new Resonance mode that adjusts the cutoff resonance per-slice, allowing for fast-paced rhythmic filter automation.

Joining the new filter options is a Pan mode that gives you control over each slice’s position in the stereo field, along with randomization controls that are now available across all modes with adjustable probability and intensity, making Beat Breaker an even more powerful tool for audio-mangling mayhem.

Beat Breaker aside, Logic Pro 12.3 also upgrades the DAW’s Sample Alchemy plugin, a hybrid of sampler and synth that draws on spectral, additive and granular synthesis techniques to create playable instruments from multiple sound sources.

Sample Alchemy’s Granular engine has received a fresh coat of paint in 12.3, adding a new Sync mode that layers multiple parallel grain streams from different points in the chosen samples, offering control over stream count, position, formant-shifting and randomization. Apple has also shared a new Granular Alchemy Sound Pack that shows off the new Sync mode’s capabilities with a variety of loops, one-shots and field recordings.

Logic Pro’s Chord ID function – an AI-powered analysis tool that can identify chord progressions in both audio and MIDI regions – has also been overhauled. Apple promises that accuracy in detection across both single instruments and full mixes has been improved, and Chord ID can now pick up extended chords and inversions even if they’re played on an "out-of-tune piano or a distorted electric guitar".

That’s not all, either: Logic Pro 12.3 also brings with it a new Producer Project that gives users a behind-the-scenes look into Kehlani and Usher’s 2026 release Shoulda Never, and a laundry list of less dramatic enhancements, including significant updates to Flex, the DAW’s real-time time-stretching and pitch-correction engine. For a comprehensive overview, check out the release notes on Apple’s website.

It’s only been six months since Fender officially relaunched Studio One as Fender Studio Pro, and now the feature-packed DAW sees its most notable divergence from the original with an AI-leaning 8.1 update.

In collaboration with the stem separating masterminds at Moises, Fender stresses that the new (ethical) AI-fuelled tools of 8.1 are intended to assist the music creator, enabling them to get deeper into their tracks, build out ideas quicker and save precious time. We can't argue with that, can we?

The key flagship here is the Moises integration which seamlessly grants Studio Pro users the ability to strip out a huge array of pristine-sounding stems from a finished, bounced track.

And, get this, using Moises, you can now generate a batch of new stems or convert voices of already recorded vocals.

Having heard this in action at Fender HQ recently, we were struck both by how clean these dissected stems sound, and how natural - and not noticeably 'AI'-like - the freshly brewed ones appeared to be.

On the stem separation front alone, the results are certainly a step up from other DAW-native stem extraction abilities, with the application now able to cut out elements with far more surgical precision than anyone else.

Indeed, even individual drum elements are able to be isolated with zero spill from the other elements of the kit.

“Usually you just get vocals, bass, drums and others, but here you can separate between vocals and lead vocals and backing vocals,” explained Fender Studio expert and YouTuber Gregor Beyerle at the launch of the new update. “Or, guitars, and rhythm guitars - they can be separately processed from each other. You can also do strings and wind instruments separate from each other, and piano and synth which I think is pretty wild. And also, the entire drum kit…”

Although Moises’ stem separation acumen has long been recognised, the integrations of its smartly generated stems and the seamless ability to switch out vocalists for a range of AI vocal models within the Fender Studio Pro ecosystem could represent quite a leap forward.

And, on the source material that its algorithm has been trained on, Moises reiterated strongly that it only deals with officially and legally-licensed music. It's an approach that is central to the company’s artist-angled ethos.

“[We had to make decisions] to license the content, and to know when to stop,” said Matt Henninger, the VP of Sales and Business Development at Moises. “To not start with prompt and end with song.

“All art comes from giving musicians tools that they can bend, break, destroy [and] wire wrong,” Matt continued, on the recurring theme of disruption throughout music's history. "That is our job. Our job is to provide a tool that can be leveraged in the way that the artist chooses.

"This is the beginning of something just awesome and I can’t wait for people far more creative than me to break it.”

“Our integration with Moises gives musicians powerful new ways to learn songs, practice, experiment and create,” Max Gutnik, Chief Product Officer of Fender Electronics stated. “AI isn’t the destination. Making music is. When technology gets out of the way and helps musicians accomplish more, it’s serving the art. That’s what we aspire to do."

Moises Studio integration is available for all 8.1 users, providing 10 stem separations, 120 stem generation credits (60 minutes), and five voice conversions per month

Another key addition is the AI Studio Assistant. Think ChatGPT or Claude, but entirely trained on the inner workings of Fender Studio Pro - a semi-sentient manual if you will.

This assistant is designed to answer questions quickly without requiring you to leave your workflow, breaking complex processes down into easy-to-understand, step-by-step instructions. Crucially, it's contextual, and can diagnose problems with your mix too.

It can’t take control of your project directly however, but as hinted during our visit to Fender HQ, an AI agent-style update could potentially be feasible in the near future…

“This is the first ever tool that is capable of answering your personal product question that a manual just can't answer, because [a manual] is not contextual, it doesn't know what you're currently seeing and what you’re currently working on,” said Gregor. “This tool is incredibly powerful and it can really answer a variety of different questions.”

From the demo we had, the AI Studio Assistant, which by default sits on a thin side panel at the side of the workflow (and can be moved around at will) certainly seemed super quick and reactive, and could also potentially open up many of Fender Studio Pro’s deeper features by suggesting more effective ways of solving problems.

A particular concern is new users, who might be daunted by the scale of the DAW. “Studio Assistant provides guidance right when players need it, helping remove friction and keep the creative process moving,” said Max.

Another new addition with 8.1 is the easy-to-use Vocal Tune Plugin, which can provide some subtle pitch correction all the way to hyper-effected, Cher/T-Pain-esque hard tonal transformation and rigid formant shifting.

The formant shifting sounds pretty pro to us, particularly when used as a backing to the lead vocal in the arrangement, as demonstrated by Fender Studio’s General Manager, Arnd Kaiser, who explained other use cases; “Just put this plugin on all of the backing vocal tracks. Don't fix the pitch if it doesn't have to be fixed, but slightly shift the formants and suddenly you get the impression that there's different singers,” Arnd explained. “So, before it sounds artificial, you can actually use it in a very natural way. So, that would be my example for a more natural use case of format shift.

“You could even duplicate the same vocal take, and then have a different format shift setting on the left and the right, and you get a stereo,” said Max.

Then, there's Pitch Curves, which allow users to draw in real-time pitch changes onto audio just like any other automation editor, with subtle shaping or extreme, unnatural adjustments.

Beyond these spotlight additions, there’s also been significant upgrades to the Score Editor (articulation-based timing offsets, combined articulation conditions and deeper functionality to yield better realism) and the browser workflow in general, with reorderable tabs and a customisable browser layout so you can tailor your workspace to your own preferences.

The Fender Studio 8.1 update is available now for anyone with a current Fender Studio Pro+ subscription or a perpetual license. For more info check out Fender.com

“How do you know someone's a Reaper user?” the joke goes. “Don’t worry, they'll tell you.” For most people in music or audio production, the closest they’ve come to the DAW is interacting with an impassioned - some may say rabid - Reaper user extolling its virtues unasked in a message board or comments section.

“Perhaps that all Reaper users are extremely evangelical about it?” answers Justin Frankel, the founder of Cockos, the company behind the DAW, when asked what people might be getting wrong about his software. “Yes, there are plenty of Reaper users who go post about how great it is online but the vast majority are quietly using (it) to make their content.”

Counted amongst this vast majority is a growing number of professionals working across a variety of music and audio production professions. One of them is Eyal Levi, CEO of the metal-angled music production school URM Academy and guitarist in the metal band, Dååth. “I used to think that Reaper was a joke,” he says in a recent YouTube video. “If I saw someone using it, I would assume immediately that they're not serious. I changed my mind because I kept on running into situations where ignoring Reaper no longer made sense.”

More and more people are having similar experiences and becoming Reaper converts, despite the complete lack of advertising done by Cockos. It’s all word of mouth. So what’s happening? Why is Reaper winning so many over?

“One of the big things that I appreciate about Reaper is that when you start using it, you have very few decisions to make,” says Justin, who is not only the developer but also a user.

“You open it up, create a track, then if you want to record audio you arm it and select an audio input. If you want to do some virtual instrument stuff, you click the ‘FX’ button and add that to the track. A lot of other DAW software, before you even get started there's a half dozen decisions to make.”

Reaper does a lot of things in unique ways, with functionality that gets out of your way so that you can get on with doing what you need to do. As mentioned by Justin above, tracks are typeless. “You can use any track for audio, MIDI, or both,” he explains. “You can send audio and MIDI from track to track, meaning you can have tracks that function as buses.” You can also mix sample rates - a simple thing, but an extremely helpful one, especially if you’re working with different types of media.

Reaper also lets you work with project tabs, like a browser. Says Justin: “You can have multiple projects open at once, and optionally synchronise them, or send audio and/or MIDI from tab to tab via loopback devices.”

The user interface is also dynamic, supporting editing and other processes during playback. “You can even record audio in one tab and edit the audio file in another tab,” he says.

Then there’s functionality unique to Reaper, like the Region Render Matrix, which lets you export multiple sections of a project as separate audio files simultaneously.

If the DAW doesn’t have a feature that you want or need, you can customise it yourself. “Reaper invites customisation and has a culture built around it,” says Eyal in his video.

If you don’t like the way that it looks (a common complaint) you can change it. And more than just cosmetically; there are skins available that can make Reaper not only look like other DAWs but behave like them too.

“Customisation plays a very important role that might be easy to miss,” explains Eyal. “Most people don't avoid switching DAWs because they're afraid of learning new features. They avoid switching because they don't want to relearn how to work. With some set up, you can make (Reaper) behave close enough to what you already know (so) that your instincts still apply.”

X-Raym is an independent developer who codes scripts for Reaper. He sees not only skins but also workflow customisation as big pluses for someone coming over from another DAW.

“As a pro, you may already have an ideal workflow in mind but be limited by the lack of automation features offered by your (current) software,” he says. “With Reaper, you could have dedicated tools to handle all the boring and repetitive stuff for you.”

For example, Eyal relates a story of being impressed by mastering engineer Mike Kalajian’s workflow in Reaper, particularly when it comes to project management. “The moment a client books a session, scripts kick off automatically, files download, Reaper opens, and everything is laid out exactly where it needs to be before he even sits down,” says Eyal. “By the time Mike starts working, there's no manual setup at all.”

For mixing and mastering engineer Wytse Gerichhausen of White Sea Studio, Reaper customisation is at the heart of his workflow. “One of the things I'm really proud of is the way I can do my hardware input and output routing directly from my Stream Deck,” he explains.

Wytse is now a fully committed Reaper user. After hitting a roadblock working with Pro Tools, he settled on this ‘underdog’ DAW because he thought it would give him a lot of options for a better working process. “I use so many workflow tweaks that I could only have dreamt of back in my Pro Tools days,” he says. “Things like the Region Render Matrix, Subprojects, and (track) auto-colouring are great.”

Reaper allows coding in a few different areas. One is JSFX, Reaper’s homegrown and open-source plugin format (it’s also compatible with the usual plugins).

“These are fully programmable plugins which can be used for all kinds of things: simple effects, loop samplers, sequencers, everything,” says Justin. “And you can program them on the fly within Reaper.”

Another are ReaScripts, which are a little more involved. “ReaScripts can be a one-time action, or they can run continuously in the background, or even have a complex GUI,” says X-Raym. “Scripts are perfect for automating repetitive work, to satisfy a precise task, or to provide customised visualisation for almost anything you can think of.”

JSFX plugins and ReaScripts are available online at various Reaper community homes, often for free, or you can code it yourself directly within the DAW. Says X-Raym: “It’s quite satisfying to be able to create a new (script) from scratch, and even just to modify an existing one. Even very simple features can be a huge help for a project.”

Aside from its impressive performance stats (Reaper often comes out on top in James Zhan’s Apple silicon performance tests) and remarkably small footprint (“We're always keeping the installer size in mind,” says Justin), the software is especially stable. This has made it the DAW of choice for live performance for a growing number of musicians.

“Stability means something different today than it did 15 years ago,” says Eyal in his video. “In the old days, if your computer went down, maybe you lost a take, maybe a session got corrupted. Nowadays, if your computer goes down, you've got dead air in front of thousands of people.”

Electronic musician Tycho has gone on record as not only writing and recording in Reaper but using it for his live shows, where it controls plugins, mixing, and automation, using the tab features to separate songs.

“I'm aware of a number of people using it for live performances, which is cool to see,” says Justin of Cockos. “Even if it wasn't our top priority when designing the application, it is something we definitely try to make work well.”

It’s also gaining popularity with modern metal acts, who need access to not only amp sim plugins but also require track automation, pitch shifting, effects, and more.

According to Eyal, Humanity's Last Breath is one such band using Reaper on stage. “The entire show lives on a single laptop,” Eyal relates. “(Humanity's Last Breath guitarist) Buster (Odeholm) told me that he runs Reaper live because it almost never crashes. And that was a real wakeup call for me because I'd rather chew on broken glass than trust Pro Tools in a live setting.”

Because of that conversation, Eyal switched to Reaper for his own band, Dååth, to use on its European tour in 2025.

“I wanted the smallest possible rig and zero anxiety about reliability. I stuck with the default setup to keep things as stable as possible and it performed perfectly.”

From the outside, the mad evangelising of Reaper users can look alarmingly cult-like. But from the inside, it feels more like community.

“Speaking about users,” says X-Raym, “we often hear that Reaper’s best feature is its community. It’s true. Users help each other on various community spaces, the official Cockos Forum notably, no matter their levels. And so many resources (themes, effects, scripts, tutorials, translations) are made by users, most of the time for free by volunteers who just want to help. The community is very dynamic and welcoming.”

Justin notes the community aspect surrounding Reaper as well. “We have a few hundred very active users who test development builds nearly daily, which is very helpful when we're working on new features and fixing bugs,” he says.

“We get fast helpful feedback from these users. Our development builds are open to all who wish to test them; we don't have a private beta list or anything like that, it's a self selecting group of people who want to be on the bleeding edge.”

Eyal sees this groundswell of community support and word-of-mouth recommendations as leading directly to continued adoption at the professional level.

“New users expect to tweak (Reaper). They know they'll need help and they go looking for it. And that expectation creates a demand for shared knowledge. The more people who start using Reaper at a casual level, the more knowledge gets shared, created, and refined, and that in turn feeds back into why professionals can trust it for serious real world work.”

X-Raym sees it in a similar way: “The more people use Reaper, the more people will talk about it, so more people will try it. And because the experience is often positive, a lot of users stay with it. Cockos is a team of two people, without a marketing team, so their DAW reputation is really organic and based on what real users are saying about it.”

Whether Reaper turns out to be the DAW for you may depend on your tolerance for customisation.

For many, the tool is just the means to an end, not the end itself. Do you prefer to build your own PC, or would you rather buy a Mac and not think about it? If you’re the former, Reaper could be the DAW you’ve been waiting for.

And, thanks to growing industry adoption, you won’t have to hide it any more when clients come by. They may even be a fellow new Reaper convert among them…

Ableton has launched the public beta of the Extensions Software Development Kit (SDK), an “experimental playground” and JavaScript toolkit that can be used to develop Extensions, customized tools, features and add-ons for Live Suite.

Extensions are specialized tools for Live that integrate directly into its workflow and can be accessed via the right-click menu within the DAW. Though only a handful of examples have been shared by Ableton so far, the scope of what Extensions can do is very broad: they can access, analyze, edit and manipulate much of what makes up a Live Set, but unlike Max for Live – which can be used to build custom instruments and effects for Live in Max/MSP – Extensions aren’t designed to generate or process audio in real time.

Ranging in complexity from basic time-saving utilities to sophisticated creative tools with their own UIs, Extensions can do everything from from workflow automation and project management to creative manipulation and idea generation. (They can also run DOOM in your DAW.) The SDK opens up access to tracks, clips, MIDI notes, devices, tempo, automation and more, and Extensions can even connect to external services and systems. Ableton says the capabilities will continue to expand over time as the beta phase progresses.

The example Extensions launched by Ableton with the SDK release give us a sense of how they can come in useful across various aspects of the creative process: there are helpful tools like RNMR, an Extension that can rename batches of clips at the same time and even analyze the contents of a MIDI clip to generate appropriate names.

Another particularly handy Extension is Arrangement Track, which can assist with structuring songs in Live’s Arrangement View. Open it up, and you can quickly build out an arrangement with customized section names and lengths that’s automatically translated into colour-coded MIDI clips in a new track in the Arrangement View to serve as a structural guide. If you want to reorder the arrangement in the Extension window, it'll automatically shift on Live's timeline too.

These two examples are more on the practical, workflow-oriented side of things, but Extensions can also be creative tools. Our favourite of the Extensions released so far is BBenCut, an add-on built specifically for automated breakbeat slicing.

Based on BBCut, a decades-old SuperCollider library that simulated the chopping techniques of old-school jungle and DnB producers, BBenCut features a number of different algorithms and multiple parameters to shape its rhythmic rearrangement, and it's a exceptionally fun and versatile shortcut to getting into vintage break-chopping mayhem.

If you’re a Live user with coding skills, you can use the Extensions SDK to customize Live to suit your own unique creative process by designing your own tools and features. But even if you don’t have any programming experience, we now live in a world where it’s possible for anyone to take a stab at software development with the assistance of AI coding tools – and this means that the average musician or producer can attempt to vibe-code their own Extensions for Live, regardless of technical ability.

However, in our conversation with the company’s Head of AI R&D Lillia Betz, we were told that the Extensions SDK wasn’t created with this use case in mind, and that its release wasn’t motivated by the recent surge in popularity of AI-assisted software development.

“We’d love to be able to say that we did it on purpose, but it was a total coincidence that the time that Extensions is ready to be released is a time at which people are using tools such as Claude Code without coding experience,” Betz told us. “That’s not why the SDK exists, and we certainly aren’t saying that this is what people should be doing... but we know that people are doing that, and if that’s your thing, then go for it.”

Though many Live users will be curious about developing their own Extensions – whether that’s through traditional or AI-assisted means – just as many will be uninterested in development, but keen to experiment with Extensions designed by others. Much like Max for Live, which has opened up a whole world of instruments and effects to those unfamiliar with Max/MSP, Extensions will offer every Live Suite user a multitude of ways to enhance and expand their creativity within the DAW.

Though there are only a few Extensions currently available, once the Ableton community gets its hands on the SDK, it’s fair to say that the sky is the limit on what kind of wild ideas will be dreamed up, and how this could transform the creative potential of a DAW that’s already considered by many to be one of the most powerful music-making tools on the market.

While the Extensions SDK is in beta, Ableton has invited its users to share, discuss and collaborate on Extensions using a dedicated space on its Discord server, and says that the SDK is just the “starting point” for an ongoing collaborative development process guided by community feedback.

The Extensions SDK is available now as a free download. Extensions can currently only be used with the Live 12.4.5 Suite beta.

Visit Ableton’s website to download the Extensions SDK and find out more.

After entering public beta back in February, Ableton has officially released Live 12.4, bringing wireless audio streaming, updated audio effects, improved stem separation and a new educational Learn View to the company's flagship DAW. Live 12.4 is a free update for all owners of Live 12.

Introduced in 2016, Ableton Link is a feature that allows music-makers using Live and Link-compatible hardware and software to link up their devices over a local network for hassle-free, tempo-synchronised jamming and collaboration. Live 12.4 sees the launch of Link Audio, enabling users to stream multi-channel audio between Link Audio-equipped devices over a local network in real time.

Enable Link Audio on multiple machines running Live, a mobile device running Note, or on a Move or standalone Push, and audio from those connected devices will appear as an input in Live, making it quick and easy to monitor, sample and record with automatic latency compensation and no cables in sight. (On both Live and Push, it’s possible to send and receive audio, but with Move and Note you can send but not receive audio via Link Audio.)

This is an immensely useful upgrade to Link that should make life a whole lot easier for producers that incorporate multiple Ableton devices into their workflow, or collaborators working across several Live-equipped machines.

Live 12.4 updates three audio effects: Erosion, Chorus-Ensemble and Delay. An oldie but a goodie, Erosion introduces a lo-fi character to a signal by modulating a brief delay with filtered noise or a sine wave, producing a bitcrusher-like effect. 12.4 ushers in a new version of Erosion that expands its sound design capabilities by allowing for a continuous blend between sine and noise modulation and offering fine-grained control over stereo width; it’s now equipped with a spectrum visualiser too.

Delay’s modulation capabilities have been given a boost with a new LFO section, updated with additional time modes, LFO shapes and waveform shaping via the Morph control. Chorus-Ensemble has been updated with two new parameters that open up access to a wider palette of chorus effects: Time lets you set a fixed delay time and Taps gives you the option to switch to a one-tap delay (Chorus-Ensemble previously used a two-tap by default) reminiscent of vintage pedals.

Live 12.4 also brings a handful of improvements to the stem separation feature introduced with Live 12.3 last year. It’s now possible to highlight a portion of an audio clip in Live’s Arrangement View and separate only that selection, which will be useful for quickly isolating specific moments within a track without having to create a new clip. What’s more, separated stems can now be merged into a single audio file, making it easier to strip vocals out of a mix and leave the instrumental intact, for example.

Also new in Live 12.4 is Learn View, a “redesigned learning experience” that replaces the existing Help View, designed to make it easier for beginners to educate themselves on Live’s interface and key features.

Combining short instructional videos with written explanations, Learn View allows you to view tutorials in a floating picture-in-picture window within Live, filtering lessons by topic and ticking them off as they’re completed to track your progress. Only a handful of video lessons are currently available, but Ableton says new modules will continue to be added as time goes on.

Ableton Live 12.4 is out now. Head over to Ableton's website for more info.

One of the most popular DAWs of all-time, Ableton Live is a powerhouse for production, used by artists such as Skrillex, Deadmau5, Tame Impala, Radiohead, Armin Van Buuren, and loads more. If you want to join some legendary producers and up your own production values, then head over to the Ableton site where you can bag yourself a massive 25% discount on all versions of this intuitive music software.

The sale is only on for a limited time, with the deals set to end on the 29th of April, so move fast if you want to bag your copy for less. It's available on all tiers too, so you can grab Intro, Standard, or the flagship Suite versions with a hefty discount.

We gave the latest version a hefty four and a half stars out of five in our Ableton Live 12 review, with our reviewer stating it was “the best update we've seen in over a decade”. The new browser is really powerful, and the MIDI tools and Scale Awareness features are really powerful creative additions that help it maintain its status as not just a great DAW, but a truly brilliant creative tool for musicians.

It includes brand new instruments in Meld and Roar, which are both really great creative tools, but the headline addition is undoubtedly the Drum Sampler, which is super simple to use and quickie became a go-to sampler for our reviewer. While most previous Ableton updates have been incremental, if you’ve been holding off on updating your copy we can wholeheartedly recommend that this be the one you upgrade to.

Included in the sale are all three major versions of Ableton, so whether you’re just getting started or you're making music professionally there’s a version here for you. Intro is available with 16 tracks and 5GB of sounds, the Standard version gives you unlimited audio and MIDI tracks, with a huge 38GB of sounds and a range of instruments and effects. Finally, the Suite version delivers all of the Standard version features with 71GB of sounds and even more effects and instruments, ideal for those who want to make the most of their productions.

Reason Studios has unveiled the next version of its flagship DAW. Now available in beta, Reason 14 marks the first major update to the software since Reason Studios was acquired by AI music company LANDR in January.

A press release shared following the acquisition promised that LANDR would "gradually introduce new value for Reason users through deeper integrations, enhanced collaboration tools, and creator-focused, AI-powered features", but these have yet to materialize in Reason 14. Instead, the update brings users a redesigned track-focused workflow, an upgraded sequencer, a new reverb device, and more.

Reason 14's revamped interface features a new Track Panel that enables users to manage devices, signal chain, levels, sends and panning from within Reason's sequencer, making it easier to make key adjustments without jumping to a different view. Each track now gets its own dedicated Rack column too.

Reason's sequencer has been bolstered with a number of long-requested features aimed at improving speed and usability, giving users the ability to loop clips and group tracks in Track Folders, while enhancing the Piano Roll with more sophisticated editing capabilities.

Reason 14 also introduces a new reverb device, the RV-9 Reverb Station. A successor to Reasons' RV7000 MkII, RV-9 draws on both algorithmic and convolution reverb to deliver "rich and detailed" spatial effects, offering everything from realistic spaces and hardware emulations to granular and spectral modes.

Along with the RV-9, Reason 14 arrives with more than 900 new drum samples, 50 additional presets for the Europa wavetable synth, and 20 impulse responses for the RV7000 reverb.

The update also brings with it a number of minor improvements like automatic tempo detection when importing audio, and MIDI note chase functionality, ensuring notes will sound even when playback begins mid-way through a phrase. And there's good news for the night owls amongst Reason's user base, as Reason 14 will now be in Dark Mode by default.

"With Reason 14, we set out to rethink the music-making workflow," says Reason Studios Product Manager Mattias Häggström. "By centering the experience around the sequencer and bringing key elements of each track and Rack into view, it’s easier to stay focused on what matters most: making music."

Reason 14 is now available in public beta and due for release in May – we've copied pricing info below. You can join the waitlist over at Reason Studios' website.

Pricing

Perpetual licenses

Reason 14 starting at $299 / €239 / £299

Reason 14 upgrade starting at $99 / €79 / £99

Reason Rack 14 starting at $199 / €159 / £199

Reason Rack 14 upgrade starting at $79 / €69 / £79

Subscriptions

Reason+ subscription (including Reason 14 and Reason Rack 14) starting at $169 / €135 / £169 per year

Reason Rack subscription starting at $99 / €79 / £99

Customers who purchased Reason 13 or Reason Rack 13 after March 1, 2026 qualify for a complimentary upgrade.

Is the new MacBook Neo powerful enough to be used for music production? That’s the question that’s been on the minds of bargain-hunting beatmakers since this $/£599 laptop was announced earlier this month, and with the machine now in the hands of customers, we’re starting to get some answers.

The headline is that, yes, you can indeed run music software on the MacBook Neo, and if your processor and RAM demands aren’t particularly intense, you should be able to do so pretty successfully.

Producer L Dre is one of several YouTubers who have been taking the machine for a spin. In his video, we see him firing up Ableton Live and making a beat using multiple instances of Arturia’s Analog Lab plugin.

“Who would have thought we'd be having full Ableton running on an iPhone chip? That's kind of crazy,” he says, as he layers up the synths. In fact, he manages to get at least 14 tracks running with no issues, and there are more than 20 Analog Labs doing their thing before the machine metaphorically falls over.

Given that the MacBook Neo does indeed contain an ‘iPhone chip’ – the A18 Pro from the iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max – and contains just a potentially limiting 8GB of RAM, that’s pretty impressive.

How does the machine fare when running Apple’s own Logic Pro DAW, though? I’m a Music Mogul has been testing that particular combination, running a variety of the software’s more power-hungry features and then stacking up the tracks to find out where it tops out.

Unsurprisingly, the Mastering Assistant, Stem Splitter and Chord analysis features all took longer to do their thing on the Neo than the M5 Pro MacBook Pro that was being used for comparison purposes – significantly longer in the case of Stem Splitter – but they got there in the end. The difference in session export times, meanwhile, was negligible.

But what of those maximum track counts? Impressively, the MacBook Neo managed to play back around 150 tracks of audio and MIDI without falling over. That’s significantly fewer than the 920 that the M5 Pro laptop could deal with, but it’s worth asking yourself how many tracks you actually need?

The MacBook Neo’s limitations did become a little more apparent when running a multi-gigabyte Kontakt sampler instrument – around 20 of these could be stacked up, compared to 170 on the M5 Pro – and the processor-intensive Serum 2 soft synth plugin also pushed the budget laptop’s capabilities. It still managed to run 30 instances of the same preset while playing back a MIDI file, though, which will be more than enough for a lot of people.

In fact, the bottom line appears to be that, if you want an affordable laptop to start making music on, the MacBook Neo is going to do you just fine. Yes, it’s nowhere near as powerful as a MacBook Pro with an M5 Pro processor but, as I’m a Music Mogul points out, he’s been comparing a $5k laptop to a $599 one, so what did you expect?

What is it?

12 years ago, I can remember when the initial launch of Bitwig Studio sparked a wave of perplexed intrigue amongst the in-the-box crowd. Many were dubious as to what this Ableton-spawned upstart could really bring to the table that its well-established parent didn’t already provide.

At that time, many home producers had (by and large) gravitated either towards Ableton Live or Logic as their creative HQs. It was, therefore, an odd point to launch a new contender.

But, in just a few short years, Bitwig Studio’s true aim was clear.

Bitwig wasn’t really attempting to take on these big dogs of the DAW domain. Bitwig Studio wasn’t really intended to be your new professional mix edit station. Instead, Bitwig’s intent was to create a complementary creative playground - with heaps of routing and effect-oriented flexibility. Its emphasis on new sound creation was underlined further when it introduced The Grid - a modular-based instrument-and-effect design system that has been intrinsic to its enduring appeal.

As with Ableton Live, Bitwig balances a clip-launching workflow alongside a more traditional timeline view, but with a more hyper-focused approach on both modulation and unique routing attitudes.

With over a decade of updates and a dedicated user base, Bitwig Studio now feels like more of a (dare we say it…) ‘cerebral’ space. Unsurprisingly, many in the modular synth domain flocked to it, particularly following its more wholehearted embrace of the hardware domain with more CV-angled features in 2019. Bitwig Studio has also blossomed into a full-fat DAW over the years, particularly beloved by the electronic domain.

Now out of beta, version 6 of Bitwig Studio cements the DAW’s standing as the ultimate destination for sound design and expressive modulation. It’s the unlocking of previously faffy actions regarding modulation that version 6 (which we’re reviewing here in its beta mode) has clearly set as a focus, whilst also taking pains to keep one eye on the clock, saving time and trimming fat across the board.

Performance

From the outset, it’s abundantly clear that Bitwig’s automation system has been the main area of focus during the development of this new version. With a much more intuitive feel to the refreshed UI, it’s now extremely straightforward to get hands-on with it.

Whilst the flagship takeaway of version 5 (2023) was a salvo of advancements to its shape drawing-based multi-stage envelope generators (aka MSEGs) for more dynamic control of automation styles, version 6 pulls all the way out for a more comprehensive re-think of the entire structure.

Firstly, there’s been an overall UI refit, with a somewhat darker, more mature colour scheme. There’s a mega-useful Photoshop-esque tool palette on the right-hand side of the UI, too. It’s a tighter approach, making it straightforward to get your hands on the deeper-control tools on the go.

There’s also more fluid control over automation in general, with more slick editing gestures making things feel a bit more responsive. But let’s look at the key flagships of v6.

The new clip-based automation concept is a game-changer, allowing users to treat preset automation in much the same way as a traditional MIDI clip, as opposed to having to carefully edit a track-spanning automation lane. It makes complete sense when you think about it.

It's a clever way to bring automation firmly into the minds of the more instinctive, loop-based creatives who might not want to spend hours of time laboriously drawing or copying their specific automations to a whole slew of track elements. You can cut, stretch, loop and drag/drop automation data just like a standard clip.

Automation Clips don’t replace traditional editing, which you can still tend to the old fashioned-way if you wish. But, it makes for a far quicker process when chopping-and-changing different effect movements across multiple audio or MIDI sources, without having to draw in roughly the equivalent curves by hand (for elements like sudden frequency-ducking or precise filter opening/closing on multiple sources simultaneously). There’s also the ability to export a clip-based automation to your hardware devices. Dragging it onto the instrument on a device within the Grid will generate it as a ‘Segments’ MSEG. Nifty.

Underpinning Automation Clips are Clip Aliases - Bitwig’s new method of chaining together multiple clips within your project. Put simply, this means that any change you make to a ‘master’ clip (be it audio, note or automation-based) will then be mirrored exactly across further copies of the clip and/or chosen linked clips across your project.

Again, it might not sound like much, but it’s one of those updates that has saved countless hours in the studio. It’s particularly useful if you’re planning on applying wholesale effect, filter or frequency-based modulation to a number of mix elements simultaneously. Their pattern is imprinted across the web of linked tracks

But while this quick duplication can keep things creatively focused, there is a danger that overuse could end up with a track that feels a little mechanical on the sound design front.

Bitwig appears to have foreseen this feeling of a lack of humanity, however, with the addition of a ‘Spread’ behaviour within its automation system. This generates random variations to an automation curve every time it’s played. Using the accompanying ‘Hold’ functionality, you can keep specific points set-in-stone.

Whilst these automation-focused enhancements continue to frame Bitwig as a sonic explorer’s software tool par excellence, there are also new additions on the compositional side. The much-requested project-wide Key Signature feature is now fully in play, with 23 scales able to be applied to the entire arrangement or just a subsection of it. You can automate changes to the key signature within your timeline, too.

Complementing this comes a fun new tool that allows us to spray-in notes to the piano roll at the selected beat interval. Bitwig’s under-the-hood algorithm neatly aligns these wayward notes to a master key, often resulting in a slew of new melodic or rhythmic ideas. And, if you wanted to go a little freeform with your own ideas and hand-jam along some potential melodies, a handy Quantize to Key functionality is now able to smartly corral your chaos (alongside any note-altering effects and Bitwig’s in-built arpeggiator) into the preset theoretical constraints.

Theory and mix-based time-sinks are more avoided than ever, therefore, but there’s also a heap of other smaller enhancements that cumulatively add up to a much more nimble workflow. These include a new safety feature which auto-backs up projects made in previous versions of the software, and four new Grid modules which enable quantizing by scale.

Verdict

Bitwig 6 is a big update, and while the main USP are absolute winners in our book, far more of its smaller nuances will undoubtedly become more beneficial over the next few months of using it on our developing projects. The headline features of v6 are a genuine delight, and triple-underline its purpose for being the veritable nerve centre of your sound-exploring needs.

Hands-on demos

Bitwig

Sonicstate

Specifications

UPDATE!! - This giveaway has now ended - UPDATE!!

Recently, we saw the release of Bitwig Studio 6, the latest version of the creative sound designer’s DAW of choice. To mark the occasion we teamed up with Bitwig to offer a select number of our readers the ability to download the 8-Track version of the highly-acclaimed software.

Typically bundled with other commercially-released software and hardware, the 8-Track version offers up the same (newly updated) workflow as the main Bitwig Studio DAW, albeit limited to - you guessed it! - 8 tracks of either audio or MIDI, you also get 2 effect tracks and 2 group tracks.

It’s a fantastic starting point for beginning your music production journey. Or, if you want to just dip your toe into the oceans of sound design potential Bitwig offers, 8-Track serves as a fantastic way-in.

Unfortunately, this giveaway is now over. But check back soon for further giveaways and software offers.

After launching Bitwig Studio 6 in beta last year, Bitwig has officially released the next major update to its flagship DAW, delivering an array of improvements to the software's interface and workflow, along with an overhaul of automation editing, a new Clip Alias feature, project-wide key signature support, and much more.

The headline here is the Bitwig Studio 6's fresh approach to automation editing, which completely reworks the way that automation is handled within the DAW.

Bitwig Studio 6 introduces a dedicated Automation Mode that overlays every track on the timeline with a dedicated automation lane for the most recently-tweaked parameter. The Detail Editor Panel now provides access to all of the automation on any given track, replacing the standalone Automation Editor Panel.

A trio of improved gestures make editing quicker and more intuitive, while new automation behaviors open up additional creative possibilities. The Spread feature applies a randomized value within a chosen range to individual automation points on each pass, while the Hold option tells a point to remain at a flat value until the next one is reached.

These are complemented by an upgraded algorithm that translates automation drawn with the Pencil tool into smooth and easily editable curves.

Bitwig Studio 6 also introduces Automation Clips, which store automation data in a self-contained format. This makes it possible to access the same clip features as Audio and Note Clips – such as stretching, looping and setting independent start times – and Automation Clips can even be saved to Bitwig's library to be used in other projects.

Bitwig's latest update also brings with it a long-requested feature that streamlines the arrangement process and addresses one of the software's most common workflow gripes: Clip Aliases.

These are specialized duplicates of a Clip that share the same content, or Pattern – when one clip is edited, all clips sharing that Pattern across the Project are updated accordingly. Clip Aliases can be deployed in both the Clip Launcher and Arranger, and can be created for Audio, Note and Automation Clips.

Another useful new feature in Bitwig Studio 6 is project-wide key signature awareness, which opens up a variety of creative avenues for working within scales and keys.

A project's key signature can now be selected alongside tempo and time signature in the Transport section. Users are able to choose between 23 scales for any root note, including modes and blues scales, along with traditional major and minor scales. Key signature can also be automated or even modulated using Project Modulators, offering tons of potential for tonal experimentation.

Scales are now visible when editing notes in the Piano Roll, and existing notes can be quantized to sit within the relevant scale or snapped to a chosen scale when drawn in. Six Note FX devices have been updated to work in tandem with Bitwig's new scale awareness, including the Key Filter device, a note transposition device that filters incoming notes to match a particular scale or key, alongside Arpeggiator, Randomize and more.

Bitwig's visual interface has also received a refresh, with the aim of making it more customizable and efficient to use. Editing tools are now accessible from a slim window on the right-hand side, including three new tools: Audition, Spray Can and Step Input.

Audition does what it says on the tin, enabling you to preview any track or clip individually with a single click. Spray Can sprays a row of notes or automation points at the currently selected beat interval, while Step Input lets you enter notes in the Piano Roll via MIDI input without hitting record.

Bitwig Studio 6 is a comprehensive update that makes this already capable DAW even more powerful, bringing users a bundle of long-requested features that promise to enhance workflows by making composition and arrangement faster and more intuitive.

Though Bitwig has a reputation as a forward-thinking DAW geared towards electronic music-makers, this update should broaden its appeal for a more conventional audience, focusing primarily on core DAW functionality rather than flashy new devices and modules, and making Bitwig Studio an even stronger rival to more established players like Ableton Live and Logic Pro.

Bitwig Studio 6 is available now for Bitwig Studio, Producer, Essentials, and 8-Track users. It's a free upgrade for all customers with an active Upgrade Plan as of August 27, 2025.

Find out more on Bitwig's website.

What is it?

For Apple, the releases of the new versions of Logic Pro - 12 on the Mac and 3 on the iPad - are part of a much bigger story. For the first time, users are able to get both versions of the DAW for one payment: the only catch is that that payment is a monthly one, via a subscription to the new Apple Creator Studio.

This comprises not only the Mac and iPad versions of Logic Pro, but also the same cross-platform access to Final Cut Pro and Pixelmator Pro, along with Motion, Compressor, and MainStage (Logic’s performance-focused sibling) on the Mac. There are also some AI features and “premium content” in Keynote, Pages, and Numbers, which users of the free versions won’t get access to.

After a one-month free trial, a subscription to Apple Creator Studio costs £12.99 a month or £129 a year (£2.99 per month or £29.99 per year if you qualify for the very generous education discount).

Wisely, Apple isn’t forcing existing users of the Mac apps down the subscription only road. As usual, if you already own Logic Pro, you’ll be getting this update for free, and the one-time purchase options for Logic Pro, Final Cut Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Motion, Compressor and Mainstage remain on the Mac App Store.

The pricing for Logic Pro for iPad, though? Well, we’ll get to that.

What’s new?

As is its habit these days, Apple is bringing the majority of the big new features in Logic Pro to both versions, starting with a couple of new Synth Session Players. These aren’t actually new plugins - they simply give you extra options in the existing Keyboard and Bass Players - but Apple says that it’s worked with real synth performers to make them as human-like as possible.

Relatedly, there’s also Chord ID, another AI feature that can analyse any audio or MIDI region for harmonic and chord information. This can then be sent to the Chord track and used to guide the Session Players.

Elsewhere, enhancements have been made to the step sequencer, and Logic Pro for Mac gets all the sound packs that, for reasons best known to Apple itself, were previously exclusive to the iPad version.

On the flip side, the iPad version gets Logic Pro for Mac’s much-loved Quick Swipe comping tool, and an exclusive in the form of Music Understanding. This enables you to search for a loop in the Sound Browser using descriptive ‘human language’. Once you’ve found a sound that’s suitable, you can make use of the Browser’s new machine learning capabilities to find similar content.

Performance

In use, it quickly becomes apparent that, while these new versions of Logic might be full number updates, they don’t represent a massive departure from what came before. For context, it took almost 11 years of updates to get from Logic Pro X to Logic Pro 11 (between 2013 and 2024) with plenty of significant point release updates in between. In contrast, it feels like paint has barely dried on Logic Pro 11, which was released less than 21 months ago.

In fact, it feels like the main reason the 12 and 3 suffixes are being added is the launch of the Creator Studio bundle. This isn’t too much of a problem, of course - as we’ve already mentioned, existing users will be getting the update for free - but it is worth tempering your expectations.

Which isn’t to say that the feature additions aren’t useful or impressive. Yes, the Synth Player(s) definitely feel like extensions of what we’ve already seen, but they’re great fun to work with, mainly because they don’t feel like ‘work’ at all, funnily enough. They bring with them some new tone-shaping options - LFOs and envelopes, for example - and the fact that you can send their outputs to any instrument plugin or your hardware synths adds to their creative allure.

For us, though, the big addition is Chord ID, which takes all the Session Players (other than the Drummer, of course) to another level. In our review of Logic Pro for Mac 11 and Logic Pro for iPad 2, we noted that the biggest limitation when using them was that they weren’t capable of responding to parts that you’d already recorded, but now they can.

It’s not a totally brainless process - you still need to drag a region to the Chord Track so that it can be analysed and the chords displayed - but it’s quick, easy, and usually very effective. Yes, Chord ID sometimes gets a chord wrong - particularly when you’re giving it complex voicings to deal with - but these can be edited, and you’re usually left with a good starting point for the Session Players to work from. Said players don’t always get it right first time - just like plenty of real bandmates we’ve worked with - but, with a little persuasion/tweaking you can usually get them to perform how you want them to.

The counter-argument is that if you need to spend time honing your Session Player parts then it might just have been quicker to record them in the first place, but that isn’t an option for everyone - say it quietly, but they ‘play’ a lot more realistically than a lot humans - and for songwriters in particular they’re a godsend. We’d love to see a guitarist added, too, followed by horn and string sections.

Serious producers, of course, might never go near the Session Players, so shiny new toys do they have to open? There are some tasteful step sequencer tweaks, for a start: you can now assign note rows to chord degrees rather than fixed notes; randomisation can be applied to the overall pattern or individual rows; there’s more granular note repeat control; and new playback modes that add some welcome unpredictability.

Elsewhere, iPad users are going to love the Quick Swipe comping - inherited from the Mac version, this makes total sense on a touchscreen. Choosing the best parts from different takes can now be done simply by touching and swiping, making vocal comping while on the move a breeze. It’s also a great use for your Apple Pencil, if you have one.

Music Understanding, meanwhile, may well make you discover parts of the Logic Pro sound library that you wouldn’t otherwise have reached. The browser didn’t always respond agreeably to our ‘human language’ prompts, but anything that speeds up the loop searching process is welcome, and the ‘find similar loop’ option gives you another way to drill down into Logic Pro’s vast collection of samples.

Verdict

As full version updates go, Logic Pro for Mac 12 and Logic Pro for iPad 2 are solid rather than spectacular, but in terms of value for money, the one time-purchase on the Mac - just shy of $/£200 - remains an absolute bargain. If you’re a new user who also wants to immerse themselves in Apple’s other creative apps, we wouldn’t discount the Creator Studio bundle, either, as it gives you an awful lot for a relatively low monthly or annual fee. If you’re eligible to take advantage of the educational pricing then it’s pretty much a no-brainer.

Where it gets slightly more complicated is on the iPad side. This was already a subscription-only app, but only cost $/£5 a month or $50 for a year. Those who are currently on that subscription can stay on it, but for new users, the only option now is to get the Apple Creator Studio subscription, which is significantly more expensive.

This might sting a bit if you’re someone who’s already paid for Logic Pro on the Mac (thus giving you access to future updates anyway) but wants to get the iPad version as well (projects can be shared between the two of them, don’t forget). The only way to do this is to subscribe to Apple Creator Studio, which might feel like you’re paying again for Logic Pro for Mac.

Obviously, the number of people in this position will be limited, but we’d still like to see an option to buy Logic Pro for iPad outright, and a universal one-time purchase option that includes both versions would also be welcome

That fact remains, though, that whichever platform you use Logic Pro on, it’s still a pleasure to make music with. Experienced producers might feel uneasy about the focus being put so heavily on AI and the Session Players, which are more likely to appeal to newbies, but if you’re an Apple user who wants a classic one-stop music production package, it’s still an instant recommendation.

Alternatives

Specifications

NAMM 2026: Ever been tempted by the look of Reason’s Rack of virtual analogue gear, but can’t find space in your heart for another DAW? Well today might be your lucky day, as the Reason Rack is now available as a standalone purchase or subscription for the first time.

Launched in 2000, Reason was one of the first wave of DAWs. Building on the success of Propellerhead Software’s iconic soft synth ReBirth, Reason brought an old-school studio workflow into the software realm, with a faux-analogue design that set it apart from the more digital look of Logic or Cubase.

Over the past 25 years, Reason has been through a lot of changes. Originally a MIDI-only, self-contained application, subsequent updates have seen the workflow expand to add audio recording, Rack Extensions and eventually full VST plugin support.

One thing that has remained constant, however, has been Reason’s distinctive Rack. Modelled on a real-world rack of studio hardware, the Rack is where users load and edit instruments and effects, routing devices through the use of virtual patch cables.

The Rack and its impressive crop of native devices has always been Reason’s strongest suit. With the launch of Reason 11 in 2019, Propellerhead – simultaneously rebranded as Reason Studios – introduced the Reason Rack plugin, which allowed it to be used as a plugin within third-party DAWs for the first time.

Earlier this month, it was announced that Reason Studios had been acquired by AI mastering specialist LANDR. It seems the new owner is wasting no time in making a few changes.

As well as being sold alongside the full DAW, the Reason Rack is now available on its own in plugin form priced at $199. That price gets you the plugin in VST3/AU/AAX formats, including access to 66 instruments and effects from Reason’s stock devices.

Those devices include more than 30 virtual instruments, including highlights such as the Objekt modelling synth, Polytone virtual analogue and Mimic sampler. The rest of the list is made up of effects, MIDI sequencers and generators, and utilities. In all it’s a pretty comprehensive line-up.

As well as being available for standalone purchase, users can also now subscribe to the Reason Rack on its own, priced at £/$99 per-year or £/$11.99 per-month. Reason Studios has also dropped the price of the full DAW, which can now be had for £/$299.

Finally, those that want to go ‘all-in’ can subscribe to Reason+, which includes access to the full DAW, plus extras including a plugin bundle, unlimited distribution via LANDR, unlimited stem separation and unlimited AI mastering.

Reason+ is priced at £/$169 per-year or £/$19.99 per-month.

“Artists have been clear about wanting more flexibility, features and value,” said LANDR CEO Pascal Pilon. “These changes are designed to deliver on those needs while preserving the creative workflow that makes Reason unique.”

Head to the Reason site for more info.

For Apple, the launch of its Creator Studio bundle earlier this week was a pretty big deal. This new subscription package brings together Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Motion, Compressor, and MainStage - plus new AI features and premium content in Keynote, Pages, and Numbers - for a relatively low monthly fee: $/£12.99 per month or $/£129 per year.

For university students and educators, the deal is even better: $/£2.99 per month or $?£30 per year.

This price gives you access to all the apps on both Mac and iPad, so if you use a lot of them, it looks like a no-brainer. That said, it’s worth noting that Final Cut Pro, Logic Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Motion, Compressor and MainStage will remain available as standalone purchases, and both new and existing customers will continue to receive updates.

All of which is interesting enough but, if, as a musician, your only concern is Logic Pro, the bigger news is that both the Mac and iPad versions are getting updates (to versions 12 and 3 respectively) and, as in the previous versions, the focus is on new features that are powered at least in part by AI.

These include the new Synth Player, which is capable of creating both chords and bass parts and joins the existing drum, bass and keyboard Players, and Chord ID, a promising sounding “personal music theory expert” that’s designed to turn any audio or MIDI recording into a ready-to-use chord progression.

Obviously, the idea of using AI in music production is a controversial subject - only this week, Bandcamp announced that it plans to ban music that is “generated wholly” or in “substantial part” by AI from its platform - so we jumped at the chance to quiz Apple’s Bryan O’Neil Hughes and John Danty, who both work in Apps product marketing, on not only the company’s stance on this, but also how Logic Pro’s Player instruments were developed and the future of GarageBand, Apple’s beginner-focused DAW.

So, what is Apple’s philosophy when it comes to incorporating AI into Logic Pro? With products like Suno, which enable you to create complete tracks just by inputting a text prompt, threatening to disrupt the entire industry, how does Apple compete without alienating its users by going against their principles?

“I think it's still early days,” says John Danty. “A lot of these technologies are still maturing and artists and creatives in the community have been pretty clear about how they don't want this type of technology to replace their creativity. They love the notion of it helping them when they need it.

“So that's really kind of where we've been thinking as well. And these technologies, they are spread throughout the app in really interesting ways. The Mastering Assistant comes in at the very end. Our Session Player technology can step in when you may not play a specific instrument or even give you a hint on a part you might want to suggest to a real player.

“So we see [users] really engaging and as part of an interactive experience more than a replacement.”

How did Logic Pro’s ‘Players’ learn to play, though? As anyone who’s used them will tell you, they can sound extremely realistic, so how were those ‘skills’ acquired?

“Our entire session player technology is built working with real musicians,” says Danty. “And so the focusing around the model is really, ‘how does a musician play?’, as opposed to taking a song that they've been working on and then trying to dissect the performance out of it.

“So it's backwards. That's why it took us an extraordinarily long time to build the instruments that we have. And now our news is Synth Player; it's built on that same philosophy, but the underlying technology, as you've probably seen, is MIDI. So that allows us to go in and speak directly to the audio plugins that we have.

“But then of course you can change them out for a third-party plug-in, which is great. And something we're excited about with Synth Player, too, is that you can, of course, connect that to a hardware synth, which I know many of your readers have in their studios. You can have Synth Player control that as well with a tremendous amount of control.”

Danty says that some of the Players took years to develop (“that's why they sound so realistic,” he adds), but let’s not forget that the first one, Drummer, was released way back in 2013 as part of Logic Pro X, when no one was even putting AI and music in the same sentence. Surely, then, the way a new Player is developed now is entirely different?

“It definitely has advanced since those early days of Drummer, you're right,” says Danty. “That’s correct to assume.”

By way of example, he explains that, although the newer Players are built on the same foundation as Drummer, Apple’s developers had to take it a lot further.

“When you have melodic instruments and harmony and all these different aspects, that really makes things much more difficult. Not that drumming isn't difficult, but we actually had to invent an entirely new way to sample within Logic, a microsampling form of technology.

“In the case of the upright bass, you can have hundreds of thousands of individual nuanced sounds that our AI Session Player can play. And so you can play it on a keyboard, but the highest amount of realism is actually to guide the Session Player to play for you.”

Looking beyond AI, Danty confirms that long-time Logic Pro users who scan the version 12/3 release notes will find other “enhancements, bug fixes and those types of things,” but we don’t yet know what these are.

And then there’s GarageBand, Apple’s much-loved entry-level DAW for Mac, iPad and iPhone. It remains extremely popular, but we haven’t had a ‘full’ new version since 2013, so does this mean that it’s quietly being sidelined?

“We love GarageBand a lot,” replies Danty. “It still remains this incredible on-ramp to, you know, a greater understanding of music. I don't think I've met an artist yet that doesn't have a GarageBand story of their journey so we're especially proud of it.”

Time will tell what that means in terms of future updates, but one thing to note is that, after 28 January, when the Creator Studio bundle is released, a subscription to that will be the only way to get your hands on Logic Pro for iPad unless you’re an existing subscriber. This being the case, if you want to have it for the current price of $/£5 a month or $/£49 a year, you’ll have to sign up before then.

We’ll bring you our review of the new versions of Logic Pro in due course. They'll be released on 28 January.

Fender has announced the launch of Fender Studio, a "connected music ecosystem" that comprises both software and hardware, launching several new products while bringing a number of existing PreSonus products under the Fender Studio name.

The headline here is that Fender is rebranding PreSonus Studio One Pro as Fender Studio Pro 8 and relaunching the DAW with new native amp and effects plugins, a revamped interface and much more.

Fender Studio Pro 8 keeps the essence of PreSonus' well-established DAW intact while integrating a variety of new features and enhancements. The new Fender Mustang Guitar and Rumble Bass plugins offer guitarists an extensive selection of 39 guitar amps and 18 bass amps alongside 125 modelled effects pedals.

The DAW's interface has been given a significant refresh, with a new Arrangement Overview providing a complete bird's-eye view of every session and allowing users to navigate arrangements with zoom, pan and highlight tools. This is joined by Channel Overview, a view that combines key parameters of a mixer channel in a single horizontal interface.

Studio Pro 8's new reverb effect, Studio Verb, combines a broad range of rooms, chambers, halls and spaces with an intuitive spectral display. The Impact drum sampler and Sample One sampler plugins have also been updated with new fade-in/out controls, slicing tools, tempo options and a new modulation matrix.

Alongside this, Studio Pro 8 features Chord Assistant, an intelligent songwriting tool that offers chord recommendations based on existing progressions, while a new AI-powered conversion tool transforms audio files into editable MIDI notes for creative rearrangement.

In addition to the Studio One Pro launch, Fender has announced that PreSonus' Quantum HD and AudioBox Go audio interface lines will also be rebranded under the Fender Studio banner, bringing the existing PreSonus designs into Fender's newly-launched ecosystem with a few minor tweaks, such as new Fender-designed instrument inputs.

Alongside the rebranded interfaces, Fender has also announced the launch of Fender Motion, a MIDI controller designed to integrate tightly with Fender Studio Pro that's compatible with any DAW.

Two models have been unveiled, Motion 16 and Motion 32, both of which feature RGB polyphonic FATAR® pads, illuminated encoders and touch strips, along with timeline navigation and session controls. Fender 32 has 32 pads arranged in a keyboard-style layout with a larger screen, while Fender 16 is a more affordable option with a 4x4 grid of pads.

That's not all: Fender has also unveiled an update to Fender Studio, its free entry-level recording app launched back in May last year, that introduces seamless cross-platform compatibility between Fender Studio and Fender Studio Pro.

“For more than a decade, Studio One Pro has set the standard for modern music production,” said Max Gutnik, Chief Product Officer at FMIC in a press release.

“Its balance of power, creativity and ease of use has inspired countless artists and shaped how music is made today. With Fender Studio Pro, we are taking those celebrated features and enhancing them with a modernized interface, Fender’s award-winning amp and effects models and new intuitive workflows and capabilities that make creating music faster, more inspiring and more connected than ever.”

Fender Studio Pro is available now and priced at $199.99/£169.99 for a perpetual license, or $19.99/£19.99 for a monthly subscription. Upgrade options are available for existing users.

Fender Motion 16 is priced at $269.99/£279 and Fender Motion 32 is priced at $349.99/£369, and both will be available in Spring 2026.

Find out more on Fender's website.

Apple has announced new versions of Logic Pro for Mac and iPad, both of which expand on the AI features that made their debuts in versions 11(Mac) and 2 (iPad) respectively and will be available on subscription as part of the company’s new Creator Studio bundle.

The new features start with the news that Logic Pro’s AI Session Player line-up is getting a Synth Player, which is capable of creating both chords and bass parts. This joins the existing drum, bass and keyboard Players.

Said to be “like having access to a skilled synthesist that can instantly take a musical idea in new directions when needed,” by default this draws its sounds from Logic’s library of synths and samplers, but can also be used to control third-party plugins or even hardware synths. As with the other Players, you do still retain a certain amount of control over your parts’ complexity and intensity, along with various performance options.

The Synth Player and the other members of the family also have access to the new Chord ID feature, a promising sounding “personal music theory expert” that’s designed to turn any audio or MIDI recording into a ready-to-use chord progression. Up until now, one of the limitations of the Session Players has been their inability to respond to a keyboard or guitar part (for example) that you’ve already written, but that’s about to change.

It’s not a realtime thing, by the sounds of it - harmonic content needs to be analysed and the resulting information used to populate the Chord Track - but Chord ID promises to make the Session Players significantly more useful to songwriters.

Elsewhere, there’s the obligatory update to the sound library, and Logic Pro for iPad gets the Quick Swipe comping feature from the Mac version. There’s a further bonus for iPad users in the form of the Music Understanding features, which use “AI-based awareness” of Logic’s sound and loop library to find what you need for your project using either ‘natural language’ prompts or an existing recording.

The new versions of Logic Pro will be available both individually and as part of Apple’s new Creator Studio subscription package, which them with Final Cut Pro, Pixelmator Pro, Motion, Compressor, and MainStage (plus new AI features and premium content in Keynote, Pages, and Numbers) at a price of $12.99 a month or $129 a year. This is a universal purchase, which means that you’ll get access to both the Mac and iPad versions of the apps.

The standalone price for Logic Pro on the Mac stays $200/£200 - the ongoing price for just the iPad version (which is currently only available on subscription for $/£5 a month or $/£5 a year) is still to be confirmed.

Apple Creator Studio and the new versions of Logic Pro will be released on 28 January. Find out more on the Apple website.

Reason Studios, the Stockholm company behind DAW software Reason, has been acquired by Canadian AI specialist LANDR.

According to the press release announcing the move, the acquisition will allow the two brands to, “combine their strengths to accelerate the evolution of Reason, expanding its reach, and deepening its impact across every major DAW environment.”

LANDR states that Reason Studios will continue to operate as its own brand, “maintaining its products, community, and creative DNA.” The announcement does say, however, that the two brands will ‘align teams across two centres of excellence’ in Montreal and Stockholm.

“This isn’t about changing Reason, it’s about giving it room to grow,” says LANDR CEO Pascal Pilon. “We’re preserving each brand’s identity and core market while unlocking new possibilities for creators everywhere.”

Reason was first launched in 2000 by Propellerhead Software, building on the success of the company’s virtual synth studio ReBirth.

Reason quickly gained popularity thanks to its distinctive UI, which emulated the look and workflow of an analogue studio setup, complete with a virtual outboard rack that could house a variety of instruments and effects. That faux-analogue design has been a defining feature of Reason throughout its history.

Despite its popularity, earlier versions were often characterised by what the DAW lacked as much as what it offered. The software was initially MIDI-only and had no audio capabilities until the launch of companion application Record, which arrived in 2009 and was later merged into Reason.

For much of its history, Reason was also entirely self-contained and had no plugin compatibility. Only in 2012 did Propellerhead open Reason to third-party developers, and even then it was only via the DAW-specific Rack Extension format. Full VST support eventually arrived with Reason 9.5 in 2017.

Despite these limitations, Reason has always had a lot of appealing features. The virtual analogue UI remains a fun and intuitive way to work, even in 2025. For our money, Reason has always had one of the strongest catalogues of virtual instruments, including classics like the Thor polysynth and Dr Octo Rex loop player, as well as more recent additions like the physical modelling synth Objekt.

In 2019, Propellerhead Software became Reason Studios. At the same time, the company launched Reason 11, which allowed the Reason Rack to be used as a plugin within other DAWs for the first time.

LANDR launched in 2014, initially as an AI-powered mastering service that used machine learning to automatically apply typical mastering engineer techniques such as EQ and dynamics refinement to tracks uploaded by users.

Over the past decade the company’s offering has expanded to include music distribution, sample and plugin storefronts, collaborative tools and online music making courses.

Reason Studios isn’t LANDR’s first acquisition. The company also owns Synchro Arts, creators of VocAlign and Revoice Pro.

According to its press release, the company will “gradually introduce new value for Reason users through deeper integrations, enhanced collaboration tools, and creator-focused, AI-powered features; all designed to make the creative process more seamless, inspiring, and accessible.”

LANDR has also announced the formation of a new Artist Council that will play a role in shaping the roadmap for future Reason updates. This council will apparently be composed of well-known producers and longtime Reason users, although no names have been revealed as yet.

LANDR VP of Strategy Daniel Rowland says: “Like a lot of producers, Reason was my first experience making music on a computer, and I’ve been a fan ever since. Reason has always been shaped by its community, and this council makes that official, giving power users a direct voice in shaping the tools they rely on, benefitting all of us.”

While it's difficult to predict exactly what this might mean for the future of Reason, witnessing one of the original music software trailblazers being acquired by a brand with AI at the core of its identity feels like a potentially significant moment for music technology.

The acquisition also sees Reason Studios’ former majority owner Verdane realise its investment in the business.

For more details on Reason, head to the Reason Studios website. Head to the LANDR site for more on the company’s other offerings.

Note: This opinion-based, long-read format allows a range of writers a platform to speak about the topics that are important to them. Their views are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of MusicRadar as a whole.

The use of AI in music-making is now more widespread than ever, and it's getting better and better at a frightening rate. But do consumers really care how their music is made as long as it sounds good? And where does this state of affairs leave us as 'traditional' music producers? Is the future of music creation really just a text prompt?

When we first launched Computer Music magazine way back at the end of the 20th century, we jumped on a sequencer-based bandwagon that would end up ploughing through the traffic and leading the way as the de-facto bedrock of modern music creation. As the years went on, ever more sophisticated iterations of the DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) made more and more previously laborious production tasks that much easier to do at the click of a mouse.

DAWs have now not only become the recording and arranging weapon of choice for the bulk of music producers and performers, but also the easiest jumping-on route for a vast number of people not gifted in traditional musical techniques, mixing knowledge, nor recording polish.

In short, anyone with a fairly basic understanding of track creation, mixing and arranging can build out complex pieces of music, very quickly.

A very brief DAW history

DAWs gave power to the people, allowing home music-makers to create release-quality music without having to get signed to a label, and/or fork out money for studio time. The mainstream adoption of the DAW was a not inconsiderable shift, and a relatively recent one at that.

What could be construed as the first DAW was the 1978 Soundstream Digital Editing System that used a late ‘70s computer, an audio interface, and basic digital editing of waveforms using an oscilloscope as a display.

Cubase it was not, but it did lead the way. Digidesign’s 1989 Sound Tools owes at least some of its digital editing prowess to this foundational system.

On the MIDI side of things, Steinberg forged a path with its Commodore 64-based MIDI Multitrack Sequencer (1984) and Pro-16 (1985) sequencers, before developing Pro-24 for the Atari ST and Cubase for the ST, Mac and PC.

Fellow German developers C-Lab followed a similar route with its mid-80s C64 MIDI sequencers (SoftTrack, SuperTrack and ScoreTrack) before likewise jumping to the ST with Notator and Creator. From C-Lab came Emagic and Notator Logic for the ST, Mac and PC.

Audio and MIDI would become partners in DAWs throughout the 1990s, while more loop-based and intuitive products like Ableton Live would join the fray from 2000-onwards.

Yet those early Cubase and Digidesign wares would set a template that is still very recognisable in modern DAWs.

That copy of Cubase v1 for the Atari I stumbled across at college in 1989 used the same(ish) MIDI technology and design as many DAWs of today: tracks going top to bottom, mixing and arranging left to right.

The only difference is that now there are many companies offering extremely similar DAW packages with as many virtual instruments as you could wish for, all bundled together for your virtual studio.

The end of the DAW?

It seemed then, that this DAW-based approach was here to stay.

But little did we foresee the twist in the tale - the rise of generative AI. This low-barrier technology can create tunes by text or spoken prompts alone.

Entire albums can be created by just describing what you want. This not only takes the legwork out of music production, but a great deal (ok, all) of the fun.

AI has numerous other applications of course, it can be deployed in a less do-it-all solution and more of a co-pilot. As the 2020s have rolled on, DAWs (and plugins) have been relying on an increasing number of AI elements to assist in the creation of everything from chord progressions to complex beats, aiding those lacking the prerequisite knowledge.

Like DAWs before it, this new technology is understandably worrying not only to the music software industry but music producers. Those who relied on regular work creating music for advertisements for example (not to mention the videos themselves), will already have been looking over their shoulders (if not in front of them) at the likes of Suno and Udio, as AI peruses their work and sketches up an indistinguishable facsimile.

These generative algorithms are powered by years of studying a colossal archive of previously released, human-made music, arming it with the power to rustle up a decent sounding-response to pretty much any prompt you throw its way.

Musicians were already struggling to make a living from their passion, and the ability to monetize your music looks set to get even harder as AI gets better at impersonating human creators, which it undoubtedly has and will continue to do.

Leaving aside the ethical issues of releasing AI-created music under your name (although there is quite clearly a debate needed over what exactly ‘music-making’ now actually means) it does feel like we should at least try to harness the benefits of this new tech and apply it however we wish.

Having more tools at our disposal has to be a good thing, right?

But is AI music creation actually 'creation'?

And this is the question at the heart of it all, the centre of any debate about AI impacting on our creative industries, whether it be in filmmaking, special effects, video game development or music. Is giving an AI platform a prompt and passing off the results as our own really a fulfilling and creative process?

I haven't got the time or space to wrestle with that big question in full - it’s one of the core debates of the mid-2020s after all.

So, I’ll just get to the point. In my view, no it isn't.

Even as an advocate of embracing music technology over the last 35 years and using whatever tools at your disposal, I still see AI as removing the fun part of music production, its creation.

As an example of this, I recently made some AI videos to use with some recent (non AI!) music I'd produced, and while the process was fascinating, thrilling and scary, and the results way better than anything I could have made without AI, the end results were hardly creative.

They were as soulless and by-the-numbers as you might expect. The whole process left me feeling flat and empty. Creative satisfaction it was not.

With little money to be made from music, the joy has to be in its creation and at a human level, and that is why AI doesn't have a place in my particular set-up.

Who gives a monkeys?

Which would be a great way to end this piece - “two fingers up to AI, and keep music making human!”

A rebellious approach, perhaps, but the truth is, who gives a damn how music is being created these days, as long as it is enjoyed?

There's a good chance that you are already consuming a lot more AI music than you realize, and it's probably not making your life any worse. And who can forget (actually everyone) the very first successful AI band, Velvet Sundown, who got enough clicks and streams to make the headlines.

If more evidence were required, AI has already achieved its first number one with Xania Monet hitting top of the Billboard chart in November 2025.

Unfortunately then, this means that while we might endeavour to push back and carry on our individual human/DAW-based approaches as creatives, it's not really up to us if the listening public doesn't care either way.

So we can either put up or shut up - or start a cause to 'keep music human', but that sounds a bit like when the Musician's Union tried to ban synthesizers back in the 1980s - and it didn't work out well for anyone.

From mods to rockers

'Keeping music human' is still an option, although it's going to be an increasingly difficult one as the join between the two becomes less noticeable.

So where exactly does this leave the (now) traditional use of the DAW? As AI-made music becomes more 'human', perhaps our only option is to make our music more machine-like. Sounds crazy? Let me explain.

When we started Computer Music in 1998 we focussed on traditional sequencing much to the then annoyance of the mod-tracking scene, a network of creators who employed cheap or free trackers to create music based on events; it’s a bit more techie than sequencing, so we took the easier DAW route, with an eye on a large contingent of our readership that consisted of novices to computer music-making.

That tracker scene, however, carried on regardless, and we even got to see it updated in hardware like the Polyend Tracker. So, I do wonder if this is the way the DAW will go, turning into its own underground 'scene'.

Just look how the nostalgia of vinyl has captured people's imaginations, so maybe we'll soon be saying, “wasn't it great in the olden days when we made music on computers and with software?” The good old days of loops and samples.

Maybe us DAW-users will become very much a subculture in music creation which ironically, given its repetitive and machine-like nature, becomes more human than artificial.

It's a difficult future to predict, and we're at that fork in the road sooner than we anticipated. A more strident solution might be to take up arms, learn an instrument and get-up and play it live in front of other people (and get your kids to do it too while you're at it!)

That's something AI will never be able to replicate, which sounds like a prediction just waiting to be broken…

Let us know your thoughts on the future of the DAW, gloomy or otherwise, in the comments below.

BEST OF 2025: Join us for our traditional look back at the news and features that topped MusicRadar's charts in 2025.

Once seen as sonic innovator and technological trailblazer – he was once praised by Roger Linn himself for the “unusual and creative” ways he used his LM-1 drum machine – Prince later seemed to focus more of his energies on extolling the virtues of good old-fashioned musicianship.

In fact, his relationship with technology appeared to be complicated. While he never completely retreated from using synths, drum machines and samplers on his records, Prince would frequently remind audiences at his shows that they were listening to ‘real music by real musicians’.

Having initially embraced electronic instruments, Prince seemed to view himself as the man who was pushing back against the technological tide, and he offered a telling insight into his musical mindset in an unearthed clip from – wouldn't you know it – 1999, when he was being interviewed by DJ/production duo Soulwax (AKA 2manydjs) on Belgian TV.

This, of course, was around the time when in-the-box production was just taking off – DAWs were becoming more powerful and soft synths were disrupting the whole music-making industry – so Prince was asked how he kept things interesting now that he was competing with “any kid with a PC in his bedroom”.

“There’s just one catch,” he interjects. “The kid with the PC in the bedroom can’t play his instrument. He can make some sounds, and then you can get a vast amount of repetition, but if they didn’t take the time to learn their instrument and their scales and to actually speak the language of music then they can’t play with someone like Sheryl Crow – all they can do is watch.”

The reference to Crow came because she’d just appeared on Rave Un2 the Joy Fantastic, Prince’s guest-heavy album from 1999 (there were also appearances from Gwen Stefani, Chuck D, Eve and Ani DiFranco).

The record is something of a mixed bag – in fact, one of the highlights is a hidden track, Prettyman, which has Prince freeing himself from the R&B-pop-soul conventions of the rest of the album and going full James Brown.

And sure enough, when Soulwax asked Prince how he chose the Rave Un2… guests, it was the one on Prettyman that he seemed most immediately excited about.

“You heard Maceo Parker play before?”, he replied.

Image-Line has announced the public beta launch of FL Studio Web, a browser-based version of its flagship DAW FL Studio that the company is describing as a "frictionless music experience".

Though many of the details around FL Studio Web have yet to be shared, a screenshot posted by Image-Line shows a streamlined interface that shares a similar workflow with its desktop counterpart.

Image-Line has confirmed that the browser-based DAW will be compatible with FL Studio, so projects can be started off in the browser and finished off on the desktop app, and it'll also offer access to FL Cloud content and native FL Studio plugins.

Image-Line says that the launch of FL Studio Web is intended to make the DAW more accessible for new users starting their journey into music production, and beginners will be able to take advantage of an interactive step-by-step guide to help them begin "making music in minutes".

Image-Line CEO Constantin Koehncke shared the news in a LinkedIn post yesterday, December 15: "Historically, the barrier to entry for music making has been high. Two decades ago, Fruity Loops delivered a massive step-change in lowering that barrier for hundreds of millions of users. Today, we are bringing it down again!

"FL Studio Web is a gateway into music production and the wider FL ecosystem. We’ve taken the iconic FL Studio workflow and streamlined it for the web, allowing anyone to start creating instantly - no downloads, no complex setups."

While several browser-based DAWs have been launched in recent years – Soundation, Moises AI Studio, Amped Studio and openDAW, to name a few – FL Studio Web marks the first time that one of the major legacy DAWs has been brought to the browser.

FL Studio Web is now in public beta – click here to join the waitlist.

No matter how creative you are, you're likely to have experienced writer's block at least once. All of us go through these periods of creative stasis, where ideas become harder to come by and inspiration begins to feel like a distant memory.

If you're an electronic musician or producer working in Ableton Live, there is no shortage of tools available to help you break out of that creative block. Ableton's generative MIDI tools, introduced last year with Live 12, are a great place to start, but there are hundreds of third-party plugins and Max for Live devices out there that offer fresh and exciting routes to inspiration.

The latest addition to this catalogue of tools comes courtesy of content creator and artist Dnksaus, who happens to run one of the best Ableton-focused music production channels on YouTube. Dnksaus has shared a free Max for Live device called Spawner that offers a simple but effective way to kickstart the creative process.

Spawner does exactly what it says on the tin: it randomly spawns an audio effect from Ableton's library of stock devices. Load up Spawner on to your Main channel, map the Spawn button to a keyboard shortcut and save this to your default Live Set. Now you can instantly add a randomly selected stock device to any track with a single keystroke.

Spawner can be customized to load devices before or after the currently selected plugin in the signal chain, and you're able to deselect any of Ableton's 42 available devices if you'd rather it wasn't in the mix – more functional tools like Channel EQ or Utility, for example, can be removed from the pool of devices that Spawner can spawn. (You can also map specific devices to spawn in response to custom keyboard shortcuts, which is a useful workflow hack.)

While Spawner might seem a little basic, this free device is actually a pretty helpful tool for overcoming a creative impasse. Not only will it compel you to explore Ableton's diverse library of superb audio effects, forcing you to experiment with devices you might not typically reach for, but it's also just a quick and easy way of spicing up an existing idea, or coming up with a new one.

Dnksaus suggests a method inspired by producer and music educator Chuck Sutton that involves loading up an instrument or preset that you like, spawning three random stock devices with Spawner and writing a melody or pattern with just five MIDI notes, giving you an instant starting point from which to develop your track.

When you load up a device with Spawner, it'll generate an instance of that device with its default preset loaded, as if you'd pulled it up from the browser. That's fine – especially if you have customized default presets saved for Live's stock devices – but why not venture one step further into the unknown?

Another of our favourite M4L devices, Dnksaus's Parandomizer randomizes the parameters of any device or plugin that you map it to. We suggest combining this with Spawner to create an instant inspiration generator that brings up a random device with randomized parameter values at the touch of a button. (Unlike Spawner, Parandomizer isn't free, but it's only $5.)

Yes, it's a little bit lazy, and no, this isn't a replacement for the process of choosing effects and manually designing the sounds that you want to hear. But if you're stuck in the creative doldrums or even just short for time, this is a fun little trick that might end up creating timbres, textures and ideas that you've never heard before.

Spawner requires Ableton Live 12.3 or newer, and you'll need Ableton Live Suite or the Max for Live add-on for Standard to run any Max for Live devices.

Download Spawner here. You can also support Dnksaus on Patreon or check out his other M4L devices.

Imagine that you could talk to your DAW. No longer hampered by the movement of a keyboard and mouse, you’re able to load plugins, tweak parameters and adjust levels using nothing more than your own voice.

Now imagine that the DAW could talk back – not only telling you what it’s doing, but answering questions about your project and offering technical and compositional advice like a friendly, knowledgeable assistant. This might sound like a sci-fi music production fever dream, but what we’ve described is the concept behind Melosurf, an experimental Max for Live device that allows Ableton Live users to control the DAW with their voice alone.

Melosurf surfaced last week in a demo video (embedded above) published by an account with 38 subscribers and is not yet available to the general public, but the teaser gives us a tantalizing glimpse of an intuitive, voice-driven workflow that may well be the future of the DAW.

In the video, the creator begins by changing the tempo and key of their Ableton project with a voice command. Neat, but not exactly game-changing. Next, they ask Melosurf to set up compression a sub bass track sidechained to a kick track and roll off the high frequencies with an EQ. That’s already pretty impressive, but what comes next is even wilder.

The narrator then asks Melosurf how to make the bassline in an existing MIDI clip “groovier”. It responds by analyzing the harmony in the clip and how it fits rhythmically with the kick pattern on another track, offering some solid advice on how to inject a little funk into the low-end. “The notes hit right with the kick, so it feels a bit stiff,” Melosurf replies. “Try some syncopation and velocity variation to add more bounce.”

After that, Melosurf is asked to demonstrate how to make a plucky synth lead with Ableton’s stock Wavetable synth. It doesn’t miss a beat before opening up Wavetable and tweaking the synth’s waveshape, envelopes and filter to create a “nice plucky lead” in seconds that sounds half decent to our ears.

How does it work? The creator has provided no details other than to confirm that Melosurf is essentially “a website embedded inside a Max for Live device” that interfaces with Ableton’s API to execute voice commands. While there’s no mention of AI in the video or its description, another video shared to Melosurf’s official account describes it as an “AI assistant”, confirming that an LLM is involved behind the scenes. (Others have previously achieved something similar by using the Model Context Protocol to control Ableton via LLMs like Claude.)

It may well be the most sophisticated example, but this isn’t the first time we’ve seen voice control or AI-based assistance integrated in a DAW: Universal Audio introduced basic voice control over recording functions to its LUNA DAW with a recent 2.0 update, and Image-Line has integrated an AI assistant in FL Studio with its 2025 release – a chatbot named Gopher that’s trained on the DAW’s reference manual, it can provide answers to music production-related questions via its text-based interface. (Another voice-controlled tool worth a mention is Vochlea’s Dubler 2, an innovative plugin/app that turns your voice into a real-time MIDI controller.)

To describe the demo as promising would be an understatement. Implemented effectively, this kind of context-aware, voice-controlled assistant could not only be a major time-saver in the studio, automating the laborious and repetitive tasks that can stymie our creative flow, but also present a fundamental shift in how we make music, making DAWs feels less like tools and more like musical collaborators. That’s not to mention the immense benefit that something like Melosurf could have for visually impaired producers.

While Melosurf isn’t yet available, the developer says they’ll be running a private beta soon and anyone that’s interested can sign up for a waitlist via their website.

With the release of Live 12, Ableton added a host of fascinating MIDI tools to the DAW that introduce new ways to inspire melodic ideas. These are particularly useful for creating quick basslines, melodies and riffs to use within a track.

In our latest video tutorial, Ableton Certified Trainer Tom Glendinning explores a variety of ways to create and develop monophonic patterns in Live. In the video we’re focusing on basslines, although these techniques can all equally be used for melodic lines by simply changing the octave range and sound being used.

Seed MIDI generator

With the launch of Live 12, Ableton added a selection of MIDI generator tools designed to automatically create patterns from scratch within MIDI clips. Each MIDI tool specialises in a different form of programming. Rhythm mode leans towards drum and percussive programming, while Stacks is designed to generate chord shapes.

When it comes to generating ideas for bass and lead lines, the Seed MIDI tool is particularly useful. This uses a few core settings to control the MIDI notes being generated. The first of these is the pitch parameter, which is used to control the range of notes generated. The second is duration, which controls the range of timing and length of notes. Velocity sets the maximum and minimum velocity levels of the MIDI notes.

Seed also has a voices parameter, which alters the amount of simultaneous notes being generated and adjusts the harmonic complexity of any chords. Since we’re looking to create bass or lead lines, which tend to be monophonic, we set this to just one voice. Finally, the density parameter controls how densely or sparsely spread out the resulting notes are.

With auto mode engaged, Live will instantly create a MIDI pattern and the parameters can be adjusted in real time, allowing us to try a variety of different riff and melody ideas whilst our loop is playing. With auto disengaged, Live won’t generate any notes until we hit the generate button, meaning we can fine tune parameter settings first and then create a pattern when we’re ready.

It’s worth noting that Seed creates MIDI notes based on the key and scale set within the MIDI clip, which by default will be set to the same as the key and scale of the overall project.

Shape MIDI generator

Shape is another MIDI tool added as part of Live 12. Where Seed uses preset parameter settings to control the notes being created, Shape generates notes positioned around a custom curve shape that can be drawn or selected in the bottom left of the MIDI clip.

As with Seed, a selection of parameters allow us to set the range of the pitch, velocity and timing of the notes created. Again, we can work with auto-generate on or off in order to control whether changes are mode to the pattern in real time.

Transforming MIDI with Recombine

Alongside its generative tools, Live 12 also added a range of MIDI transformation tools. Rather than creating MIDI patterns from scratch, these allow us to generatively alter existing MIDI patterns using an assortment of parameters and processors.

Here we’re using the Recombine tool. This takes our existing MIDI notes and shuffles them, in order to create a new pattern from an existing one. Using this shuffle feature, we can rearrange the position of the notes in a pattern whilst keeping its general shape and rhythm intact.

Hardware-style sequencing with MIDI sequencers

For an alternative route to bass and lead creation, we turn to the Sequencers pack, which is included with all versions of Live, but needs to be installed via the Packs menu in the browser.

This pack contains a variety of MIDI sequencers inspired by the workflow of classic hardware. We’re using the SQ Sequencer tool, which takes its inspiration from CV sequencer tools.

This generates notes in real time based on the parameters of its steps. We can enable scale mode in order to match the key of our track and use the octave control to alter the range of notes to suit leads or basslines.

One of the most interesting aspects of the SQ Sequencer is its dice controls, which let us randomise the output of various parameters. We can randomise everything from the pitch of the steps to the rhythmic pattern itself, as well as note length and velocity.

Acid sequences with Sting

Sting is a Max for Live device that isn’t included with Live, but you can download it for free. Sting is an acid line generator, inspired by the sequences of acid house and techno, typically created by Roland’s TB-303 and SH-101.

Sting is an incredibly simple device to use. We simply set it to the correct key – or to automatically follow the key of our project – and then click the smiley face icon to generate a pattern. If we don’t like what’s created, we can hit the face again in order to create another pattern.

Various pattern settings let us control the density, direction, length and accents of the pattern. Once we have something we like, we can hit the clip button and the device will create a MIDI clip based around the current pattern.

Tom Glendinning is a session musician, sound engineer, sound designer, music producer, composer, and VJ. As an Ableton-certified trainer he helps musicians be creative with Ableton Live. Connect with him at: https://elphnt.io/

For many electronic musicians, music theory isn’t something that comes naturally. It’s perfectly possible to know your DAW, sequencer or synth inside and out, but have only a basic grasp of concepts such as chord shapes, scales and harmonic relationships.

If you’re a producer that fits this description, it can sometimes be hard to create chord progressions and melodic parts that reach the same heights as your sound design skills. You may know how to input a series of simple chords into a piano roll, but what happens when you want to try something new or more adventurous? How do you venture beyond your tried and tested combinations of chords?

Ableton Live 12 offers a multitude of tools that can be used to work around gaps in your theory knowledge. In our latest tutorial video, Certified Trainer Tom Glendinning explains a range of methods that Live 12’s packs, devices and generative tools can help users explore fresh chord shapes and combinations.

Expressive Chords

Expressive Chords is a pack that comes free with Live 12 Intro, Standard and Suite. It’s not part of the factory library, so to access it you’ll first need to head to the Packs menu in the browser and download and install it.

The pack works by providing a range of preset chord banks. Each chord in these banks can be triggered using a different note play via a MIDI keyboard or any other note input. Expressive Chords comes with a variety of presets based around styles and genres, with chord banks configured to suit a specific sound.

Below the main chord grid is a range of controls altering how the chords are played back. Tilt can be used to emphasise the higher or lower notes in a chord – creating a brighter or darker sound. Invert will create an inversion of the basic chord shape, moving lower notes to the top of the chord.

Strum spreads out the timing of each note in the chord, creating a guitar-like strumming effect. An articulation editor lets users go deeper into how a strum is played by adjusting the spacing of each individual note.

The ‘expressive’ part of Expressive Chords comes in the fact that it is MPE-ready, allowing users to apply modulation and articulation to individual notes in each chord, via a compatible controller or MIDI clip automation.

One thing worth noting is that the chord progressions created by Expressive Chords don’t track the global key settings in Live.

Creating inversions

If you have a simple progression recorded within a MIDI clip, creating inversions on some of the chords is a quick and easy way to add variation and interest.

An inversion is created when we take a note from a basic chord shape and move it up or down an octave, essentially reordering the notes in the chord without changing the actual notes used. That’s easily done in Live’s MIDI editor by selecting a note, holding shift and pressing up or down on the keyboard.

In the video example, a simple one-bar loop is turned into a more interesting two-bar progression by creating inversions in the second bar.

Generative MIDI chords

Ableton Live’s MIDI effect devices include a variety of tools that not only allow us to randomise the notes of incoming MIDI, but also to control that randomisation. By combining these we can generate and capture randomised chords around a set scale.

In the video, Tom does this by combining Live’s Chord, Random and Scale devices, placed in a chain in that order.

Now, whenever a single note is played, the Chord device turns that into a chord based on the intervals set on the device. By default, those intervals and the resulting chord shape will remain the same. no matter what root note is played.

By placing the Random MIDI device after Chord, we can randomise the notes coming out of that device. There’s a percentage control here that adjusts how likely it is that an incoming note will be randomised. At 100% every single note coming from Chord will be randomised to a new pitch. At less than 100%, some notes will remain from the pre-defined chord, while others will be randomly changed to a new pitch.

Using these two devices alone, the results will sound random and messy, not adhering to any specific scale or pattern. By placing the Scale device at the end of the chain, we can make sure all the incoming MIDI notes are mapped to our chosen scale/key.

Now, by playing single notes, we can randomly generate a chord progression. In the video, Tom captures several bars of randomised chords and then edits together a loop of his favourites.

Tom Glendinning is a session musician, sound engineer, sound designer, music producer, composer, and VJ. As an Ableton-certified trainer he helps musicians be creative with Ableton Live. Connect with him at: https://elphnt.io/

When I reviewed Ableton’s compact hardware sketchpad Move last year, I wrote that ‘for some, Move might prove to be a gamechanger, but others will likely struggle to fit it into their creative workflow’. I must admit that, initially at least, I fell into the latter category.

On the (increasingly rare) occasions I get to play around with Live for non-work purposes, it tends to involve processing simple sounds with Live’s more sound design-focused devices, such as its Hybrid Reverb, the pair of Spectral effects or Roar’s multi-stage distortion/delay. Move, which is more geared towards composing than sound design, doesn’t necessarily fit into that way of working.

I’ve always been impressed by Move’s capabilities when it comes to sketching out rough ideas, and I appreciate how it can be used to quickly rough out the basic elements of a track. It just doesn’t necessarily lend itself to the type of music I like to make.

In recent weeks, however, I’ve picked Move back up, and something has finally clicked. This is, in part, thanks to a run of firmware updates that have added a handful of intriguing new features since Move was first launched. (Updating our original review in light of these was my initial reason for revisiting the hardware).

It’s also a result of embracing an altogether looser and more haphazard way of using the device, which has helped to find a genuinely useful and inspiring way to fit it into my creative workflow. But more on that later…

On the Move

When Ableton Move was revealed in 2024, it excited plenty of Live users but confounded others. On the surface Ableton’s new hardware device looked a lot like a micro version of Push, but those expecting a straightforward compact controller were likely left confused by the various things Move both could and couldn’t do.

Move is simultaneously more capable and more niche than one might expect from first glance. Although it has the look of a simple controller or sequencer, Move’s onboard processor and bespoke OS allow it to act as a self-contained groovebox, stocked with synths, drum kits and sampled instruments, complete with a variety of effects and capable of both sampling and resampling.

For all that it can do, however, there are a number of limitations on what Move is capable of compared to Push 3. Whereas Push, in both controller and standalone modes, aims to offer as full a recreation of the desktop Live experience as possible, Move makes use of just a small selection of Live’s instrument and effect devices and in most cases limits these to using presets and a selection of pre-configured macro controls.

For the most part, these limitations are intentional and kind of the whole point of Move. As an instrument, it’s pitched as a sketchpad more than anything else – a tool designed to create beats and patterns that can be further developed in its companion DAW. It purposely foregoes the bells and whistles required to create finished arrangements or build live performances.

In practice, working around these limitations can be one of the most creative and inspiring aspects of Move’s workflow. The limited track count, for example, encourages the use of the instrument’s resampling functionality. By bouncing synth or bass riffs down to slots in a Drum Rack, it's possible to simultaneously free up tracks for additional melodic layers as well as open up new ways to manipulate your resampled loops via the effects in Move’s Drum Sampler.

Drum Sampler is one of a handful of new or upgraded Live devices that have emerged since Move was first unveiled that have clearly been designed with its workflow in mind. It’s more simplistic than Live’s Simpler and Sampler devices, which makes it ideal for Move’s control surface, but also opens up new creative tools with its multifunctional effect slot, which offers on-the-fly looping, stretching, ring modulation and other interesting ways to process one-shot samples.

Similarly well suited is the updated Auto Filter, which adds new creative modes including comb and vowel filters along with a revamped control layout. Auto Filter’s introduction to Move’s toolkit is very welcome as its multifunctional LFO helps to address the instrument’s slight lack of modulation sources by providing a quick and easy solution for keeping sounds moving.

It bodes well for Move owners that Ableton is showing an ongoing dedication to unifying the workflow between Move, Note, Push and Live. Both Drum Sampler and Auto Filter are Device highlights across all of these platforms, and their inclusion helps Move feel less like a ‘light’ version of the Live toolset, and more like one specifically targeted at the DAW’s most immediate creative tools.

Thanks to a regular flow of firmware updates, Move itself has also been improved in a number of ways since it first hit the market. Move’s latest firmware is version 1.6, with v1.7 in beta, and each ‘point’ upgrade has brought improvements that make the hardware slightly more useful in a day-to-day studio context.

Aside from the introduction of Auto Filter, the majority of these improvements have focused on ways in which Move can sample from or interact with other devices. Move can now, for example, sample audio via its USB-C input, which is great for recording directly from a laptop or mobile device (although you’ll still need an adapter if you’re using a Lightning-equipped iPhone).

Ableton has also significantly upgraded Move’s MIDI options, allowing each of its four tracks to both input and output MIDI simultaneously on a selected channel. Move can also now receive MIDI clock from an external source, as well as output MIDI clock at the same time as receiving MIDI notes.

The other major improvement, introduced this summer, is the ability to slice a sampled loop into up-to 16 sections. This is a manual process, which slices a loop in equal chunks by default and requires the users to manually move slice points to adjust those divisions, as opposed to automatically placing slice points on transients, as in Live itself.

Neither sample slicing or the MIDI upgrades radically overhaul what Move is capable of, and in both cases there are competitors on the market that are more capable. For dedicated sampling, for instance, Move isn’t a patch on Roland’s similarly-priced SP-404.

Similarly, as much as Move’s MIDI capabilities are handy, it still lacks dedicated MIDI ports. This means all MIDI communication needs to come through the USB port, which in some cases will require use of an adapter or hub.

The point, however, is that Move is not a dedicated sampler or a hardware sequencer – it’s an accessory for Ableton Live, one designed to generate ideas and complement the workflow of the DAW. And each of these upgrades makes it a little more useful on that front.

Rediscovering Move

Move’s greatest asset, by far, is the simplicity of transferring sounds and ideas created with the hardware to Live. By using Ableton Cloud or the Move Manager, it takes seconds to wirelessly move Sets from one place to the other.

It’s embracing this aspect of Move that has finally made me see how useful it can be. When I’ve tried to create complete-sounding beats or loops, I tend to end up with things that I’m not particularly inspired by, but as a conduit for simply collecting ‘things’ to transfer to Ableton Live, it’s endlessly useful.

For example, in the process of reviewing new gear, I’m lucky enough to get my hands on an ever revolving line-up of new synths and drum machines. I’ll now regularly use Move to sample short snatches of sound from whatever I have to hand.

I might build a Drum Rack with my favourite one shots from a drum machine, or record synth arps and sequences as loops, perhaps slicing these to a Drum Rack too in order to resequence them later. I have an entire Move Set dedicated to sampled chord stabs from various hardware synths.

Sounds, not music

In the past, when I’ve sat down with Move, I’ve always felt inclined to try to make proper music with it. Not necessarily an attempt at a finished track, but a fully fledged beat complete with bassline and melodic elements, and it's in doing this that it inevitably leads me in a direction that I’m less interested in.

Now, I rarely use Move itself to edit or arrange things – beyond, perhaps, throwing a simple kick drum under a synth riff or creating a quick rhythm from one-shot samples. But capturing those raw sounds and simple motifs quickly creates a rich pool of inspiration that’s readily available the next time I sit down at Live itself.

Essentially, by stopping attempting to make proper music with Move, I’ve come to fully appreciate its potential as a platform for half-formed ideas and barely-there sketches. Move is now, for me at least, a fantastic platform for collecting ‘things’ completely detached from musical context – random chords I like the sound of, simple rhythmic patterns, odd percussive sounds captured via the onboard mic.

While none of Move’s recent updates have exactly altered its ability to be used in this way – it’s been possible to sample and store sounds since day one – each iteration adds a little more flexibility, should you want to, say, sequence a quick riff on an external synth, sample a sound from YouTube via USB-C, slice a synth sequence or reverse one-shot sounds in a drum kit.

Move’s latest update, currently in beta, opens up full access to Live’s Drift synth, which adds more routes to potential inspiration. Now, Move can be used to design synth sounds from scratch on the go. What’s more though, thanks to its lovely expressive pads, it makes the device an effective compact instrument in its own right – a mini synth that it’s possible to play with surprising expressivity.

One year on, Ableton’s commitment to opening up new ways that Move can be used has, for me at least, helped turn the device from a neat curiosity into the genuinely useful accessory it was always pitched as.

A couple of years ago, we made the case that Bitwig Studio, having just launched version 5, was worthy of our annual ‘DAW of the Year’ accolade

With that 2023 update, the audio-manipulating scope of this most flexible of DAWs was significantly boosted, facilitating what we said was the, “deepest track and project-level control we’ve ever seen offered by a DAW.” And we meant it.

The advancement of Bitwig v5’s multi-segment envelope generators presented both complex, yet fun routes toward carving new frontiers of sonics, and increasing the colour and dynamism of our sounds tenfold.

In all honesty, we weren’t sure how much more Bitwig could add to this expanded toolkit. We were perhaps a little short-sighted, as with the newly announced version 6, Bitwig has both simultaneously grown - and simplified - the abilities of Bitwig Studio.

Time-saving is the watchword here, with the most significant update to Bitwig Studio 6 being the smoothing of its automation abilities, with a ground-up re-think of just how the DAW - and its user - thinks about automation. Clip-based automation is the new order of the day, with the ability to pinch, stretch, drag and reuse automation curves, housed within a clip, across various parts of your project, and in other projects.

It seems so obvious now that Bitwig has made this switch, but thinking (and manipulating) automation in this way is an inspired move.

Not only does this save time on meticulously and laboriously drawing in automation curves, it also makes you think about that automation movement in a similar way that you might think about the interplay of melody and harmony within an arrangement. It’s all part of Bitwig’s enduring quest to seamlessly bridge the musical and technical.

This new design/functional choice encourages experimentation whilst also making simple effect programming far less complicated. Dragging and dropping these directions as colourful blocks makes the whole process way more intuitive and instinctive. A simple shortcut (pressing A, in this instance) presents the dedicated Automation Mode, revealing the sub-lanes of automation clips within each track.

Those automation curves themselves are now way more responsive in v6, and allow you to bulk adjust a selected section without impacting on the surrounding automation information. Another headache removed.

Whilst we’re on the subject of reducing your studio stress, another major new addition here are Clip Aliases. This new feature provides the means to chain together certain separate clips within your project. Make an edit to one and the whole lot mirror that exact change. A simple example would be multiple instruments playing the same MIDI note sequence. Shifting a note slightly higher on one clip will be reflected elsewhere - you don’t need to tediously copy/paste or manually adjust each one.

Further creative opportunities present themselves via the new ‘Spread’ automation behaviour. This throws in subtle (or not so subtle) random variations to your automation curves, the values adjust on each playthrough. Useful for quickly nudging the track out of a rigid template, and adding a touch of humanity.

Speaking of randomness, there is also a similar tool for when it comes to melodic generation. The Spray Can tool (selected from Bitwig Studio’s all-new-‘Tool Palette’ on the right-hand panel) allows you to ostensibly ‘paint’ notes into the piano roll which scatters them intelligently (whilst being key-aware). It’s perfect for filling out the bones of an arrangement with a series of potentaily melodic pathways, or can be shaped into pulsing arpeggios or lead lines to taste.

And yes, Bitwig Studio 6 now features a project-wide Key Signature setting for your track - or section of a track. The ability to choose from 23 scales is something that has been long wished-for within the Bitwig community and has been implemented perfectly here, without inhibiting the sonic-shaping potential of the DAW.

Snap to Key helps your improvisations to operate within your theoretical parameters, while empowering you to not be fearful of venturing a bit more off-road. Note-specific FX and Bitwig’s Arpeggiator will also obey the overall dictates of your currently selected scale.

All these improvements have been framed around assisting the music-maker to save time and focus on the music, and this is reflected also in the larger visual improvements that have been made to the DAW. Auto-Zoom and adjustable grid visuals and track headers aid navigation and make project-editing a far less daunting task.

Version 6 then is a robust update that very much does not over-stuff itself for the sake of it, but instead works cohesively to empower and assist the 21st century music-maker.

Bitwig itself has numerous deep-dives across on its website which explores each new aspect in greater detail, we recommend you head over there and check them out. With version 6, Bitwig has shaped itself into the most comfortable and supportive environment for all creative musicians.

Bitwig Studio 6 is now in public beta. The beta is free to all Bitwig Studio, Producer, and Essentials users with an active Upgrade Plan (as of August 27, 2025). Users will find the beta installers in their user profile. The release of v6 is planned for the fall 2025.

Two mainstays of modern electronic music, Philippe Aubin-Dionne and Jason Chung – better known as Jacques Greene and Nosaj Thing – have each charted a distinct creative course over the past two decades.

Aubin-Dionne is a Montreal-born producer/DJ that writes sleek and evocative dance music that pulls as much from R&B as it does UKG, its restless rhythms tempered by yearning vocal cuts and warm, expansive chords. While his music is kinetic enough to move a dancefloor, its structures often venture beyond the boundaries of the club; in Aubin-Dionne’s words, these are songs, not tracks.

Chung’s music is slower and more spacious, emerging out of the fabled L.A. beat scene in the late ‘00s, a community of producers, DJs and musicians aligning leftfield sound design with head-nodding hip-hop beats. His cerebral glitch-hop has since morphed into a singular strain of minimal electronica, and recent releases have called on a varied cast of collaborators that includes Toro y Moi, Coby Sey and Panda Bear.

Meeting early on in their career, Chung and Aubin-Dionne spent a decade throwing around ideas whenever they happened to land in the same city, but it wasn’t until 2023’s Too Close that they realized they’d touched on something that transcended their solo outputs, becoming more than just a marriage of two styles. Uniting under the name Verses GT, they embarked on a B2B DJ tour while working on the material that would become their self-titled debut, testing ideas in the club before fleshing them out in spontaneous Ableton jams in rented studios.

The result is a ten-song project that lives in the moody, nocturnal space where the duo's Venn diagram overlaps, a synthesis of styles that’s far more than the sum of its parts. Drawing on their shared gift for building atmosphere and tension through dextrous sound design, it’s an absorbing listen, rising and falling through ethereal ambience, ghostly textures and quavering Prophet pads.

Aubin-Dionne tells us they were trying to capture the vibe of "driving alone at night", and it shows. The album sustains a dusky, sombre tone while touching on multiple reference points: Intention is woozy deep house, Forever channels dubstep rhythms and the reverb-streaked UKG of Unknown and Your Light is a testament to Burial’s enduring influence. Though it’s spare and subtle, there’s sensuality here too, and vocal turns from George Riley, TYSON and KUČKA lend a sense of warmth and humanity to Verses GT's jittery, skeletal beats.

We caught up with Jacques Greene and Nosaj Thing to find out more about the making of Verses GT.

Could you both take me back to your first experiences with electronic music-making?

NT: “I have two memories. I remember visiting a family friend’s house when I was a teenager and he had a Roland JX-305 – I guess that’s kind of like a synth version of the MC-505 groovebox. He was using it to make covers of big trance songs, and I was just blown away, but also kind of heartbroken, because it was too expensive. We couldn’t afford anything like that.

“Freshman year of high school, I had some older friends that got me into DJing and scratching. When I was in ninth grade, I ran into a friend, and he was like: ‘yo, meet me here tomorrow in between classes’. Of course, I met him there, and he gave me a burned CD of Reason and FL Studio. I installed it on my computer and that was it, that was a wrap for me. I was on it every day.”

“I was also in drumline in high school, so I was using that to create drum cadences and stuff. At the same time, I was obsessed with The Neptunes and Timbaland, so I was recreating Neptunes beats. The production in the early 2000s resonated with me because I could understand it. You could go to a Guitar Center and use the keyboards that they were using, like a Triton or a Motif or something. I was like, ‘oh damn, they’re just creating all of these sounds and writing it themselves.’”

JG: “Timbaland and The Neptunes are weirdly also my entry point too. You’re 13 years old, and the fact that they were in the videos and communicating in a very mainstream way that they were the ones making the beats, to me was like… ‘oh, without being the vocalist, there’s room in this kind of music to be a bit of a nerd’. That was a real inspiring window into a role that I didn’t know existed. There was something about how they were presenting themselves that I just understood. Like, you can actually just make beats.

“That was definitely a viewpoint into electronic music for me. Around the same time, I had a very young high school teacher, and I had a bit of a School of Rock moment where he gave me a stack of CDs to take home. There was Autechre, Squarepusher, Boards of Canada, Amon Tobin and Aphex Twin… that was a real jump in at the deep end. I never wanted to play in a rock band ever again after that. I got a cracked copy of FruityLoops, then worked all summer in a shitty bakery so I could buy an MPC1000 on Craigslist.”

When did you both meet?

JG: “We met roughly 15 years ago. I was 18 or 19, and a mentor of mine that makes music as Sixtoo was putting on a monthly party where he was booking Low End Theory-associated, experimental instrumental hip-hop stuff. He brought Jason to play in Montreal. We only started making music a decade after that, and even then it was very loose - whenever I’d be in LA, we’d make a couple tracks.”

When did you decide to join up under a new name and work on a full-length project?

JG: “Two years ago, roughly. We would meet up whenever I was in town and make some music, but then we had this first track that really connected for us personally, Too Close. Both the way that it was made, and just the feeling of it was just like… ‘damn, this is kind of cool’. That one feels more like a real blend of two of our approaches, but a lot of the work that ended up on this album feels like a third completely different thing. In a way, that was more exciting than a fusion.

“Two years ago, we had a moment where we're like, ‘okay, not only do we have a lot of stuff that we both are pretty excited about, but it all feels like it would never fit on my own record, and it would never fit on a Nosaj Thing record’. This is really its own thing. So at that point, we had quite a lot of demos, but we also had a defined sandbox of what this project was and what it wasn’t. Then we could then begin to work towards something where we knew where we were going.”

What were the limitations of that sandbox?

JG: “Part of it was in the arrangement and the process of reduction. Letting our instruments take up space, reducing layers, it was a headspace thing. Also it was some of my kit, some of his, depending on where we were recording. The Prophet-5 takes up a lot of space on the album, and we ended up really honing in on one reverb that gave a sense of space to the whole record. Part of it was definitely subconscious; we didn’t sit down with a notepad. We just looked back at this stuff and said, the sound of our record is drums that kind of feel like this, it’s sections that feel loopy and heady... It’s like driving alone at night.”

NT: “Even after Too Close came out, when we first decided to get out there and do some B2B sets together, those experiences really helped to inform our sound. A couple of the singles that came out, testing them in the venue and then having conversations the next day or at the airport about what worked and what didn’t work, that really helped us shape the sound as well.”

Tell us about your collaborative process as a duo. How does that play out in the studio?

JG: “We almost surprised ourselves by switching roles. People that have followed both of our music for a long time would maybe be surprised to find out that on a lot of the songs Jason was the one cutting up a vocal, for instance. We traded roles a lot.

“One of the very important ways this record came together was through Ableton Link. In Ableton Live, if you're on the same network, two computers running Live can be perfectly synced, and we could have both of them running through the speakers. So there was this real jamming element. Pretty much every single song was started in the room together – after that we could argue over a snare sound months later over shared files, but everything was started in the same room, and we’d just have both laptops running.

“To be honest, I'd say the most exciting tracks to us were literally wordless. We'd start working, stop talking to each other and enter this weird trance-like state. One way that really differs from when you're making music alone is that you can only do one thing at once.

“On the track Unknown, for instance; we're working at Nosaj’s studio in LA and he goes over his Prophet-5 and he’s playing a few different melodies. But while he's doing that, I'm responding, I'm over at the arrangement, being like, ‘okay, if he's playing this kind of thing, maybe we can remove the shaker’. There's this real call-and-response going on as multiple things are happening at once.”

The press release mentions the album was recorded across a number of different locations?

JG: “Yeah, we booked a couple places. Part of it was because we were on this extensive back-to-back DJ tour last fall. We were very much in the midst of finishing a lot of this music, and we were testing out our own songs at night and being like, ‘maybe we should edit this little thing, or maybe this part should be a little longer’. Playing tracks out, you can really get direct feedback and see how they occupy space.

“One moment we both remember fondly: we were DJing in Leeds and we reached this part of the set where we’re playing this very hazy, moody deep house. I turn to Jason and I’m like, ‘the way the room feels right now, remember this. We need a track that feels like this.’ Not even going back to the particular songs we were playing, but just trying to make a note of how the dancers are responding and how thick the air felt in the moment.

“The next day, we’re on the train back to London, and we’re asking around for studios we can book for the day. That’s when we wrote Intention, one of the tracks on the album, with the title being a reference to entering the studio with an intention. That was one of those where it’s like, 55 minutes after entering the studio, the bedrock of the track is done, because we had such a particular idea of what we wanted.”

Could you talk us through one or two instruments or pieces of gear that were fundamental to the making of the new project?

JG: “The Prophet-5 definitely feels instrumental in that it has so much character that you can really let it do its thing. A lot of the stuff that we are gravitating towards are things that carry a lot of their own personality, in the way that you don’t feel you need to drench it in 1000 different effects. Once you dial in exactly what you want from it, you can really let it breathe.

“The Prophet-5 is a good example of that, and the Erica Synths Perkons drum machine is another example. I go to my Chroma Console effects pedal a lot. I like pedals as a way to bounce out extremely digital stuff you've done, like MIDI drums or whatever, and then send that top end percussion through it, just to spice it up a little bit.”

NT: “Definitely Erica Synths, Intellijel, Instruo. They make amazing modular pieces. Our setup was pretty minimal. We don’t have tons of gear.”

JG: “But everything is good. It’s the way I want a restaurant or a fashion design to be. I don’t want a jacket with 100,000 zippers and patent leather, I just want a well-cut simple jacket. The studio set-up reflects that approach; it’s not about having a thousand different things happening at once. It’s a perfectly dialled pad sound, or the perfect little scratchy hi-hat.

“After that, though, you still obsess over those things. We worked at Motorbass in Paris, which was a really special day for us, and there’s some crazy stuff there that we had a chance to work with – there’s a Yamaha CS-70 on the record. The guy’s got a wall of Pultecs and really nice compressors, and we’re like ‘this one snare, how do we make it really pop?’ Just sitting down with him and making sure that we really fine-tune the few things that are there.”

NT: “Software is so good now, as well. We used a lot of Arturia stuff, there’s a lot of Pigments across the record. I had a realization during Covid and sold all my gear that requires menu-diving. Every piece of hardware I have now is immediate, and it’s mostly analogue equipment.”

JG: “That’s where the Erica Synths stuff comes in, it’s so fun to use. Whenever I see a video of Erica Synths gear, they’re making noisy slam techno. [laughs] It’s fun to repurpose gear into another genre. Even when it comes to sample packs, it’s cool to make techno using UK drill drums, for instance – it’s cool to take something and bring it somewhere else. To me, having the Perkons do a really small, elegant percussion pass where you’re only using a certain section of the drum machine, is where some of that gear becomes exciting, when it can still surprise you.”

You mentioned you’re both using Ableton. At what point in your career did you switch to Ableton? Why does it work for you?

NT: “I’ve used Ableton since 1.0, which is kind of crazy. You got a free copy of Ableton Lite with the M-Audio Trigger Finger Pro. That was before it was even a full-on DAW, it was almost like ReCycle, just for chopping and stretching loops. I’ve been using it since then and slowly transitioned from Logic to Ableton.”

JG: “It was Ableton 4 for me, in 2004, which is insane. In FL Studio, the design feels like you're playing a PlayStation music-making video game. It’s fun when you're like, 13 or 14, getting into it. And that’s not to say that people that use it as adults are childish, that's not what I'm saying at all. But I think for me, there was something about Ableton that in its look and feel and use has always been that perfect blend of serious-feeling but extremely playful.

“I've never fully gelled with Logic and Pro Tools, they kind of feel like Microsoft Excel to me. [laughs] I don't feel a sense of play when I'm using them. Ableton has managed to get so good with time, the built-in stuff is just unbelievable. But there's still that genius of switching between the Session and Arrangement views. Really early on in making electronic music, I was playing live, and the fact that my projects could be ported from the studio to live extremely easily in the same kind of architecture was always really appealing to me.”

Phil, you’ve spoken before about how much you love your $40 Alesis 3630 compressor, saying that it’s often the “the tools of the people” and “the pieces of shit” that have the most character. Did you use anything on this record that falls into that category?

JG: “That’s a good question. There’s no 3630 on this record, which is too bad. In the last few years I’ve become slightly obsessed with an early Access Virus, the Virus B. A lot of the supersaw basslines on this record, that’s the Virus. In a way, to me that’s a bit of a tool of the people, because there’s not that many polysynths under $900 anymore. [laughs]

“What else? Jason, you showed me this one: Cableguys HalfTime. There were a few of these funny little one-trick-pony plugins that you pick up for $20 in some kind of plugin sale, but they end up unlocking a very strange texture or giving a huge amount of personality to something.”

Something I really liked about the record is the use of subtle textural elements to bring atmosphere to the music, like on Left. Can you tell us about how you create those kinds of sounds?

NT: “A lot of times I just cranked up the preamps and allowed the natural noise of the drum machines and synths to come to life, and we’d just leave it in.”

JG: “We obviously love heavy texture in music, from Madlib to Burial – two good reference points to this record – but we’re not sampling vinyl here, and it would be disingenuous and maybe a little boring to have vinyl crackle on the record for no reason. We were using some stuff that had genuine ground noise and surface noise, and instead of hiding it, within reason, we’re allowing that to enter the recording.

“Sometimes the pots are a little scratchy on a module, for example, and the Erica Synths stuff is super noisy. A lot of the fuzz on Unknown is letting a lot of that ground noise live in the track, and it gives an interesting sense of space and character to everything.”

Did you experiment with any new techniques on this record? Did you learn anything new?

NT: “Just from working with Phil, and seeing how he approaches arrangement, I learned a lot. That’s what I learned the most, arranging new ideas and thinking about what arrangement can be.”

JG: “What’s fun about it, and what felt so fresh to me is that the only reason a lot of these songs could end up the way they are is because they were made in person with someone else. When I’m alone, I end up with completely different results.

“My instinct has always leaned towards stacking different melodies or counter-rhythms, and sometimes there’s maybe one too many layers. But with Jason, there was more of trusting that this one element is enough to hold someone’s attention. Adding something else won’t augment this feeling or this groove or emotion, it’s actually going to detract and confuse your brain. It was an exercise in reduction and focus that I’ve never quite been able to get to on my own.”

I suppose when you’re working collaboratively, you become accountable to someone else. That’s an entirely different headspace – it’s not just about you any more.

JG: “Yeah. Another thing that was really cool – as we started finishing some tracks remotely was, sometimes we’d send each other an idea, and it’d be something that maybe I would do that Jason would never do, or vice versa. But then I’d catch myself and think, ‘it’s cool if part of this song is a Nosaj creative decision and not my way. It’s cool if there’s a push and pull’.

“It was about allowing that feeling of like, ‘yeah, I would never do that’, in a way that would at first make me uncomfortable, but then I’d sit with it for a couple days before I even reply – because in the end, maybe it’s more interesting, and it broadens the scope of the creative decisions that are made on the record.”

NT: “I agree. That’s the fun of it, you know what I mean? Especially for what we do, as solo electronic producers or beatmakers in our own head, starting out in headphone mode for so many years. Phil and I, our tastes are pretty aligned, not just in music, but even in food, and film and things like that. So there were moments working remotely when we had to just trust the process. If I was traveling, or Phil was traveling, and one of us had to finish up one part of the song, the trust was 100% there. That’s all part of the fun.”

Verses GT is out now on LUCKYME.

Hot on the heels of yesterday’s unveiling of Live 12.3, Ableton has released updates for its Note iOS app and Move hardware. While there are a few differences between these two updates, they share one key headline feature – adding full, unabridged access to Live’s stock synth Drift.

This isn’t the first time users of either platform have had access to Drift sounds – patches based on the Drift engine have been available in both Move and Note since each product debuted. As with most of the devices ported across from Live, however, those sounds have previously been offered up as presets that users could shape and modulate via a selection of pre-defined macro controls.

Now, for the first time, Note and Move users have full access to one of Live’s synths complete with every parameter available in the DAW version and the ability to craft patches from an initialised state.

Despite their visual differences, Move and Note share a lot of fundamental similarities. Note, which launched in 2022, brings a stripped-back version of the Live workflow to iOS devices, allowing users to play and sequence MIDI clips as well as sample and sequence audio, plus manipulate sounds with a limited selection of Live’s stock effects.

Move is a standalone hardware device designed as an on-the-go sketchpad companion to Live, although under-the-hood it essentially runs a variation on the Note app.

Both formats control instruments and effects via a bank of eight parameter controls, which are adjusted via the touchscreen in the case of Note and using a bank of eight touch-sensitive rotaries on the Move hardware.

In each case, in order to control Drift, these controls can cycle through multiple banks of parameters for adjusting the synth’s oscillators, filters and modulation tools, along with a top-level bank of macros.

The key difference between the rollout of Drift across the two platforms is that, while it comes to Move as a free firmware update, access to the full version of Drift in Note requires an in-app purchase, although this is fairly reasonably priced at $3.99.

In either case, having access to the full range of Drift parameters is an excellent addition. As Live users will likely already know, Drift is a fantastic-sounding, wonderfully versatile analogue-style synth capable of creating both faux-vintage tones and modern timbres. Particularly when combined with Move’s expressive pads, it can create some highly dynamic and vibrant synth patches.

The Note update is out now, and also adds an assortment of bug fixes and minor workflow refinements (all of which are free, and don’t require the purchase of Drift).

Move’s latest firmware update, v1.7, is available today via public beta. Along with the upgrade to Drift, the update also introduces the ability to adjust the brightness of the Move hardware, and adds a pair of new acoustic drum racks.

The update follows hot on the heels of other recent Move updates. Version 1.5, which arrived earlier this summer, significantly improved the device’s MIDI capabilities and added much-requested sample-slicing capabilities. V1.6, which left the beta stage just yesterday, introduced the ability to reverse samples in Drum Racks.

The Note app is available from Apple’s App Store priced at $/£6.99. Move is available now priced at £419/$499. Find out more about Note on the Ableton site, and join the Move public beta here.

After a few years in which Ableton has worked on a variety of extra-curricular projects – launching Push and Move hardware, updating its Note app – the past 12 months have seen the Berlin brand turning the bulk of its attention back to its flagship DAW. Case in point: Live’s 12.2 update is only a few months old, but Ableton is already launching its next free ‘point’ release, Live 12.3 – which enters public beta today.

Scanning the release notes for 12.3, it quickly becomes clear why Ableton is keen to turn this update around quickly. Its two most significant new features both see Ableton addressing areas where Live was notably a step behind some of its key competitors.

The first big addition is AI-powered stem separation. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, it’s highly likely you’ve encountered similar functionality over the past few years.

While the ability to divide fully mixed tracks into component parts has been around for a while via dedicated tools such as Hit’n’Mix’s RipX, the technology has come on in leaps and bounds over the past couple of years, and is increasingly becoming integrated into mainstream music making software.

Real time stem mixing is now standard in most DJ software, and stem separation is already a feature embedded into production tools including Serato Sample, FL Studio and Logic Pro.

Live’s version is provided by Music AI and it can be accessed in Live’s audio clips, either in Session or Arrangement view, or within the browser. The separation works in the now-standard manner of dividing the audio file into stems labelled drums, vocals, bass and other, which appear as their own individual audio clips that can be treated like any other audio within Live.

In our early tests the quality seems on a par with similar functionality in Live's rivals. It's certainly a welcome addition, although its application is likely to be most useful for those regularly making remixes or DJ edits.

Perhaps more immediately useful for a lot of Live users is Splice integration within the DAW’s browser. Again, this isn’t unique to Live – similar functionality is already part of the workflow for Studio One and Pro Tools – but for the ever-growing amount of producers who regularly use Splice’s library of sounds as part of their production process, the drag-and-drop functionality is likely to be a major time-saver. What’s more, the ‘search with sound’ feature promises to help find sounds within Splice’s online library based on the rhythms and harmonies already present in your project.

But there's more...

As is often the case with these ‘point’ updates, however, some of the most exciting features are those lurking beyond the headlines.

Following the refresh of Auto Filter in Live 12.2, another of the DAW’s workhorse devices gets an overhaul here. This time it’s the turn of Auto Pan, which now becomes Auto Pan-Tremolo. The addition of tremolo functionality is essentially acknowledging the way in which many users were making use of the device anyway – by aligning the phase of Auto Pan’s left and right channels, it was already possible to use it to duck the volume of audio and create tremolo-style effects.

As well as introducing the dedicated tremolo mode, the new Auto Pan-Tremolo adds some really handy new features, including the ability to fade in the attack of the pan/tremolo effect as well as have it respond dynamically to the level of incoming audio.

It’s not quite an upgrade on the level of Auto Filter’s radical overhaul, but it does make one of the DAW’s most useful tools significantly more versatile.

Another significant new feature, somewhat hidden at the bottom of the press release, is the ability to set A and B states for every instrument and effect in Live. This is potentially incredibly useful, as it allows the users to experiment with two radically different sets of settings for any device and flip between them with a click of a button of the keyboard shortcut ‘p’.

There are improvements to the way in which Live bounces audio too. With 12.3 the DAW introduces a new Bounce Group functionality, which lets users bounce an entire group of tracks down to a new audio file with all its processing applied – which will prove handy for any users turning their projects into stems for mixing or live performance.

There are some cool new Packs and Max for Live tools added as part of the update too. In the new Generators Pack, users of Live Standard and Suite get access to a new percussive MIDI tool named Patterns, along with Sting, an acid bassline generator based on the popular Max device of the same name.

The excellent Sequencers Pack – full of great tools for generative creativity – adds the ability to create reproducible arrangements. The recently-added Expressive Chords gets updated too, with tools to make it easier to customise and transpose its bank of chord shapes.

Push it

There’s a lot of great news for Push 3 users in the update too. For one thing, the big headline features – stem separation, Patterns, Sting, group bounce – can all be accessed from Push in both tethered and standalone modes.

Push also gets some excellent upgrades all to itself though. The first of these is the ability to use class compliant audio interfaces with Push 3 in standalone mode. This means it’s now possible to vastly expand the amount of ins and outs available beyond those featured on the hardware itself. This could already be done via the use of the ADAT connection, but hooking up a standard audio interface is undeniably an easier and more convenient option.

The latest firmware update also adds a new XY control mode where Push’s expressive pad grid can be used to control effects Kaos Pad-style as well as apply punch-in effects by pushing an individual pad. There are also upgrades to Push’s sequencing workflow, allowing for touch sensitive control over velocity levels while step sequencing, as well as introducing a new Rhythm Generator layout for sequencing percussive patterns with Drum Racks.

Both Live 12.3 and the accompanying Push update are out in public beta today. Head to the Ableton site to read more and join the beta program.

Between devices like the Saturator, Pedal, Amp and recently-added Roar, Ableton Live has multiple tools that can be used to add distortion. While these might look fairly similar at first glance, these differing distortion tools can be used to create some very different effects, and can do more than simply rough-up sounds.

In our latest video tutorial, Ableton Certified Trainer Tom Glendinning explains a range of ways we can use distortion effects to creatively shape and mix sounds in Live. To hear these in action, he starts with a simple project making use of some drum variations, a sidechained bass part, chord stabs and a slightly wonky lead sound.

Tightening up drums with Saturator

The first element treated with distortion is a Drum Rack. Here Live’s Saturator effect is applied across the entire drum kit, which helps tighten up the drum sound and add a touch of extra weight. Saturator is used in its Analog Clip mode, which means it acts like a classic hardware limiter. As the Drive control is raised, it causes the peaks to distort slightly, which helps to both compress the drums slightly and add colouration.

Adding body to a kick with Pedal

Sticking with the drum parts, distortion is next applied to the kick drum. Here Live’s Pedal effect is used. This is a stompbox emulation that would commonly be used on guitars or synth lines, but it can sound fantastic on kicks too. By enabling the Sub option, we can distort our low-end kick without losing any of the bass frequencies. The Overdrive setting is used here with a medium amount of gain, which adds a nice analogue-style distortion that adds character and presence to the kick.

Distorted dub delays with Roar

Roar is the newest distortion effect in Live. Although it’s primarily used for adding grit and saturation, its routing and modulation options mean that it can be used for a lot more than just straight distortion. Here it’s applied to chord stabs to create a dub techno-style delay. This works by making use of Roar’s built-in feedback loop. By increasing the feedback time and amount, we can create echo-style delays that we can sync to project tempo. Best of all, we can apply distortion to just the feedback effect, which is great for gritty, characterful dub effects. The Shards mode works particularly nicely, creating sharp, crackly delays.

Pumping bass distortion with Road

Another appealing aspect of Roar’s design is the way that it can create rhythmic effects. Here we apply it to a bass part, and use the noise source in Roar’s modulation matrix to apply randomised modulation to the level of distortion being applied. Roar is then placed into Serial mode, to make use of two distortion lines. In the second stage, Roar applies additional distortion to our bass part triggered by a sidechain input from the drums.

Lead character with Erosion

The final distortion tool used in this example project is Live’s underrated Erosion device. This can apply distortion based on Noise, Wide Noise and Sine modes, which can be very characterful. Here we use Live’s LFO device in order to modulate the frequency of Erosion’s Wide Noise distortion, which adds some pleasing movement to the project’s lead sound.

Auto Filter is easily one of our most used devices in Ableton Live. It's long been a workhorse tool ideal for shaping sounds, blending elements in and out of arrangements and manipulating tracks for live performances. As of the recent Live 12.2 update, it's received a massive glow-up with multiple new filter models, LFO options and more.

In the first of a new series of tutorials, Ableton Certified Trainer Tom Glendinning walks us through several ways these new filter functions can be used to add character and movement to a variety of track elements. To demonstrate this, Tom uses a track sketch inspired by classic French house composed of drums, bass, keys and a funky guitar loop.

Comb Filter

The first track element that Auto-Filter is applied to is a keys loop. The new Comb Filter mode is used to create a phasing effect that runs through the chord pattern. This is only really audible when the filter moves through the frequency range, so Auto Filter’s LFO is used to modulate the cutoff. By increasing the Phase Offset option, we get variations in the cutoff position between the left and right channels, adding extra stereo width.

Resampling Filter

A second instance of Auto Filter is also added to the keys track. This time it’s set to Resampling mode. This creates an effect similar to bitcrushing, emulating the low bitrate tone of old school samplers. This is set with a cutoff of 12kHz to create a subtle retro ‘ringing’ tone.

Vowel Filter

Next Auto Filter is applied to the track’s bass part. This time the new Vowel filter mode is used to create a vocal-like tone that makes the bass sound funkier and more retro. Auto Filter’s envelope follower is used here to create cutoff modulation that follows the volume level of the incoming bass signal. The LFO is used for additional movement, and a little Drive is added for a touch of grittiness.

Side-Chained Filter

Another Auto Filter is added to the end of the bass effect chain. This is left in the default low pass mode, but the sidechain functionality is used so that the cutoff frequency responds to the level of a secondary input, in this case the keys. This creates a rhythmic effect where the bassline fades in and out as the chords play.

Notch+LP Filter

The next element is a guitar loop. Here Auto Filter is used with the Notch+LP mode engaged, another new addition with Live 12.2. This filter mode combines a low-pass filter rolling off the top end frequencies with a more surgical notch filter lower down the spectrum. Here a little resonance bump is applied along with some modulation via the envelope follower and LFO, which creates a more funky and vibrant effect. The LFO is placed in Spin mode, which creates an effect where the guitar moves around the stereo field.

DJ Filter

Finally another Auto Filter is added to the master channel. This is used in DJ mode, which applies low- and high-pass filtering depending on the direction in which the cutoff is adjusted. This is perfect for live performance or for creating arrangements, allowing us to filter out frequencies as a track builds towards a drop.

Tom Glendinning is a session musician, sound engineer, sound designer, music producer, composer, and VJ. As an Ableton-certified trainer he helps musicians be creative with Ableton Live. Connect with him at: https://elphnt.io/

Universal Audio has announced an update to Luna, its free DAW, that introduces a number of AI-powered assistive features including voice control, instrument detection, tempo extraction and more.

Originally launched in 2020 as low-latency recording environment for owners of UA hardware, Luna was made available free to all Mac users in 2023 before a Windows version was launched in May 2024.

Luna has a toolbox of UA's analogue emulations baked into its mixing workflow, integrating the sound of classic channel strips, mixing consoles, and tape machines into the DAW itself.

Luna's 1.9 update brings the vintage-inspired software squarely into the 21st-century with several AI-powered tools designed to make the recording process easier and more efficient, some of which we've not seen in any other DAW.

First up is Voice Control, which allows users to start and stop recording by saying "Hey Luna" from anywhere in the room, a feature intended to help musicians stay in the creative flow of a performance without having to interact with their DAW. (This feature is currently only supported on Apple Silicon Macs.)

Luna 1.9 also introduces Instrument Detection, which analyzes incoming audio to identify instrument types, automatically naming and colour-coding the relevant tracks accordingly.

Also new in Luna's latest update is Tempo Listen, which monitors incoming audio as you perform and sets the DAW's metronome to match your playing, and Tempo Detection, which automatically detects the tempo of any audio file dropped into the timeline. Luna can also extract a dynamic tempo map from tracks or stems with tempo changes and timing variations using its Tempo Extraction feature.

“We believe that the best audio tools can ‘disappear,’ and feel like they are simply a part of the creative process," Universal Audio CEO Bill Putnam Jr. said in a press release.

"We think the new AI-powered tools in Luna 1.9 start to make it feel like a behind-the-scenes music recording partner, not just a DAW. Ultimately, we always look forward to hearing what our users think."

Luna 1.9 is a free update for all macOS and Windows users, and no UA hardware is required. Though the base version of Luna is free, it lacks a number of analogue emulations and additional features that you can find in UA's paid-for version, Luna Pro.

Find out more and download Luna on Universal Audio's website.

Image-Line has announced the latest update for FL Studio, its flagship DAW, bringing with it a host of new features that includes several assistive tools aimed at helping music-makers "jumpstart their creative process".

The headline feature in FL Studio 2025 is Gopher, an AI assistant trained on FL Studio's reference manual and knowledge base that provides instant answers to music production questions in the user's native language.

Providing everything from FL Studio support to more general advice on production, mixing, songwriting, theory and more, Gopher is designed to offer quickly accessible guidance without having to leave the DAW. (If you're curious about what it can do, you can test out Gopher in your browser here.)

Also new in FL Studio 2025 is Loop Starter, a feature that helps users quickly generate new ideas via FL's Channel Rack. Pick a genre from a list of nine different styles that includes amapiano, drill, trap and EDM, and Loop Starter will automatically load up a stack of tempo-synced loops from FL Cloud's sample library to Channel Rack and create editable step sequencer tracks loaded with one-shots.

Ideas can be instantly re-generated on a per-track basis, enabling users to quickly audition sounds until they find a combination that works as a starting point for a production, which can then be exported to the Playlist. Loop Starter is included with all editions of FL Studio and makes use of samples from FL Cloud's free tier, so you don't need a subscription to use it.

FL Studio 2025 also brings a simple but commonly requested improvement: more Mixer Tracks. FL's Mixer has historically topped out at a maximum of 125 tracks, but Mixer Tracks can now be added and removed, with support for up to 500. Audio Clips have also been updated, adding the ability to stretch, pitch and reverse audio directly from the Clip Properties window.

FL Studio's latest update also introduces Emphasis, a multi-stage mastering limiter plugin that's exclusive to the DAW's All Plugins Edition, and Mobile Rack, a collection of 36 low-CPU instruments and effects from FL Studio Mobile, now available on desktop.

Image-Line has also replaced Image-Line Remote with FL Studio Remote, a new and improved application for iOS and Android that enables you to control the DAW from your mobile device.

FL Studio 2025 is now available as a free unlimited trial or a free update for all license holders.

Find out more about the update on Image-Line's website.

PLUGIN WEEK 2025: Last year, we published a comprehensive guide to making music with Linux, showing you how breaking away from the 'big two' operating systems (Windows and macOS) can open up some unique creative possibilities in the studio.

In this feature, we're following that up with a round-up of the most powerful music-making software that works on Linux. Below, we've got several Linux-compatible DAWs and apps alongside a host of Linux-friendly plugins, all of which can be used to form the basis of a powerful Linux-based set-up. If you want to explore beyond the software in this list, this Reddit thread would be a great place to start.

DAWs

1. Ardour

Ardour includes all of the features you’d expect from a pro-grade audio workstation – recording, editing, routing, mixing, effects, instruments, automation and the rest. It comes in an interface that will feel familiar to anybody who’s worked with DAWs like Cubase and Pro Tools; easy to learn for newcomers. It’s somewhat unbelievable that this stable, powerful and professional DAW is FOSS (free and open-source)!

2. Bitwig Studio

Supporting both linear and non-linear arrangements within the same tracks, and with a vast array of in-built processors, instruments and tools, Bitwig Studio contains everything you need to create your latest masterpiece. The DAW is not FOSS, of course, and so licences must be purchased, but Bitwig has to be praised for releasing a Linux-native version of this mind-blowing creative toolbox.

3. Waveform 12

The original Tracktion DAW, released back in 2001, spent time under the ownership of Mackie before returning to the original creator, Julian Storer. Since then, Tracktion has morphed into the pro-grade DAW Waveform. The latest iteration, Waveform 12, is available in both Free and Pro editions. It runs well on a standard Ubuntu installation, but we struggled to get it going in Ubuntu Studio (due to a fixable desktop environment mismatch).

4. LMMS

If you like making music in a fruitier fashion, then LMMS is for you. Much like premium DAWs such as FL Studio, LMMS is heavily centred around creating and layering loops and musical patterns, and comes with its own collection of instruments, effects and audio content. LMMS supports standard plugin formats, is fully open-source, and is also available for Windows and macOS.

5. Reaper

There are two ways to get this popular and widely used DAW running in Linux. The easiest is to install the Linux-native version, but the Windows version of Reaper also runs well via Wine. Whichever method you choose, what you end up with is the same: a slick, professional and highly capable DAW. Reaper is not FOSS but is attractively priced and worth every penny.

6. Renoise

Trackers, which were popular during the days of the Atari ST and Amiga, are a particular branch of sequencer, designed to create patterns by triggering short samples and loops. Renoise brings this classic approach right up to date, combining a classic tracker interface with a modern sampling, automation and mixing environment. If you don’t need the full DAW then there’s also Redux, a combined sampler and tracker in plugin format.

Plugins

7. Decent Sampler

Fans of Venus Theory’s YouTube channel will know of Decent Sampler. This free sample player has a standalone app as well as Linux-native VST/VST3 plugins, and is similar to Kontakt Player. It links to an ever-growing library of pro-level instruments, including many produced by Venus Theory.

8. LSP 

The Linux Studio Plugins package – LSP for short – is a large collection of effects, processors and meters supplied in every Linux-native format (including standalone versions that can be used directly in JACK). The plugins are excellent, offer many high-end features, and all feature attractive GUIs.

9. Samplv1

Love the immediacy of old-school sampling? Samplev1 could be for you. The classic sample playback engine hosts just one sample at a time, so there’s no getting bogged down in key groups and velocity layers. The sample is fed into a set of standard synthesis modules before going to an effects section.

10. u-he plugins

We love u-he’s collection of high-end synths and effects, from original creations such as Hive, to modelled classics like Repro. We also love its free plugins! What we love even more is that all of u-he’s instruments and effects are available as Linux-native plugins.

11. Vital 

With three powerful wavetable oscillators, dual filters, and many modulation sources that are super-easy to route to destinations, Vital is one of our favourite synths. It’s similar in many ways to XFer Serum, including the inclusion of tools to help build custom wavetables. Where it differs, though, is in pricing – there’s a free edition, a $25 Plus edition, and $80 Pro edition – and the fact that it includes native Linux support. Vital indeed!

Apps

12. Audacity

Audacity is a long-established cross-platform audio capture, editing and processing app. As well as wave editing, Audacity offers multitrack recording and mixing capabilities, although its limited capabilities in this area mean that it isn’t exactly a DAW in the classic sense of the term. Nevertheless, Audacity is an invaluable component in any music-making setup, ideal for capturing performances, preparing samples, and many other common studio tasks.

13. Carla

We’ve already talked here about Carla, but its capabilities deserve a bit more attention. Carla is a plugin host that integrates tightly with the JACK system. It supports every imaginable plugin format, including both LinuxVSTs and, with Wine installed, Windows VSTs. It’s excellent for use on stage as a live instrument and FX host, whilst its integrated patching and transport controls make it the perfect hub when creating music too.

14. VCV Rack 2

If you have ever wanted to get into modular synthesis but worry about having the space or money, then VCV Rack 2 is for you. VCV runs as a standalone application but can expose its audio, MIDI and CV ports via JACK, making it easy to patch in to the rest of your studio. Hundreds of professionally produced modules are available within the free edition, with even more being available if you buy a Pro licence.

PLUGIN WEEK 2025: One point which is undeniable, is the immense power and ease offered by even the most humble of DAWs. But, as a consequence, we’ve also become accustomed to sidelining the human performance, and nowhere is that more important than with acoustic instrumentation.

The widespread and commonplace use of elements such as quantise and pitch correction, has resulted in some DAW-recorded music sounding a little sterile.

As we move towards an age where music can quickly and easily be generated by AI, many critics predict that the presence of an organic or humanistic performance will be the very thing that the public will want to continue to hear.

So if you yearn to make your tracks sound more acoustically believable, we explore some of the tricks of the trade, adding kudos to your performance credibility.

Let’s cut to the chase, and embrace a couple of basic but important points.

It might seem obvious, but if you are trying to sound like a specific acoustic instrument, it makes sense that you would want to seek out the best possible sound or sample that you can.

Don't rely on your eyesight! Just because a sound is described as a particular instrument, doesn’t necessarily mean that it will stand up to the test of sounding acoustically accurate. Thankfully, we live in an age where there are sample libraries to cover just about every corner of the instrumental globe, but even so, always question the description.

Be objective, and decide for yourself whether or not the sound is realistic. Trust us, there are many sample libraries out there that do not always provide the sound that it says, on the tin!

The second point is less obvious, and more practical. Given that the majority of us are confronted by some form of pianistically-shaped keyboard, alongside our DAW, it's important to put yourself in the mindset of the instrumentalist that you are trying to reproduce.

It's no good playing a keyboard like a piano - if you are trying to sound like a guitar or a flute!

Always think about the way that a particular instrumentalist might approach playing their instrument. In the case of a guitar, it only has six strings, so don't construct a chord that uses eight notes - it’s unplayable on a guitar!

Similarly, flutes only play one note at a time, so unless you are constructing a flute section, play single lines at a time.

Most electronic music, and particularly more commercial styles, tend to engage large doses of quantise. This is the parameter which tightens up everything that you play, to the nearest specified note value. It leaves no room for rhythmic manoeuvre or error, locking everything that we play to the nearest specified note-value.

It’s certainly a useful function, but not for generating a humanistic and subtly imperfect performance.

Nowhere is this concept more obvious than with the instrumentation from the rhythm section of a band. Let's take the drum kit for a moment; if we quantise the kick, snare and hi-hats, they all land on a beat at exactly the same time. It creates an exceptionally tight sound, which we really like in the right placement and style of music.

Now, think of how a ‘real’ drummer may approach this; they may be hitting a kick drum, snare and hi-hat, all at the same time, using two hands and a foot.

Is it truly realistic to expect all of those elements to land exactly at the same time? If any of these elements are slightly adrift, with a slight error or inaccuracy, it’ll be perceived by the human ear as a good thing!

Strange as it might seem, we quite like small degrees of human inaccuracy, and when it comes to the nuance of performance, that inaccuracy translates to a better groove, in many cases.

We can apply a similar thought process to other instruments, such as the guitar or keyboard. If we consider the way that a guitarist plays, they strum (often using a plectrum) across six strings or less. The very act of strumming means that the notes will not all play at the same time. It therefore makes sense that if you are trying to replicate a guitar part on a keyboard, using a straight quantise will kill any chance you have of sounding like a real guitarist.

Similarly, when playing a piano part on a keyboard (and much like our previous example of a drummer), all the notes within a chord, will play a few milliseconds apart, which will be lost once quantisation is applied. Thankfully, there are some editing examples that we can do, to help create a level of realism.

If we return to our theme of strumming guitar, try playing a chord, but with one note quickly following another, much like a strum.

If this is tricky for you to perform at the keyboard, you can also achieve similar results with basic editing on the screen. In our example above, we have very slightly nudged the start of each note, to re-create the appearance of a guitar strumming. A slower strum, would require the start points to be further apart, whereas a tighter or faster strum, could be lessened.

Creating an effective piano part is even simpler, particularly if you find yourself reliant upon the quantise function.

Record a keyboard part, in your usual way, and then quantise it, as illustrated in the below image.

Locate your DAW’s ‘humanise’ page, and apply a very low level of humanise, concentrating on the timing of the front of each note. This will lessen the hammer-like effect, created by all the notes playing simultaneously. In our example, you can see the subtle deviation at the beginning of each note.

It's worth noting that the concept of these two operations can be applied to other instruments, so you could try humanising a bass part - particularly against a tight drum part.

Another useful setting, which is often overlooked, is ‘part delay’.

With the best will in the world, members of a band will never play entirely together. Bass players often tend to play a little way behind the drums. Try selecting a bass part, and just delay it by a few ticks or milliseconds. You can try a similar process with guitar and keyboard parts, but always be prepared to listen, and be objective to your delay amount.

Orchestral instrumentation is a slightly different beast, but one that can adopt similar traits and sensibilities to our rhythm section cousins.

One of the most fundamental differences with string, woodwind and brass instruments, is that (for the most part) they are monophonically constructed. Much like a monophonic synthesiser, they can only play one note at a time.

In some scenarios, they can adopt a form of extended technique which allows the playing of overtones (or additional notes on stringed instruments, through a technique called Double Stopping), but this does not tend to be the norm.

Because of the monophonic makeup of these instruments, they tend to be placed together in sections, comprising of a certain number of players.

It is this section arrangement that allows them to produce chords as a group. However, the monophonic design of the instrumentation also makes them ideal for playing lyrical phrases very smoothly.

In sample library terms, this is often regarded as the Holy Grail.

Great expense, time and effort is put into libraries that can recreate authentic legato performances. Legato is the musical Italian term, meaning ‘tied together’ or smooth.

If you are playing any one of these instruments from the keyboard, and if your library allows, try invoking a degree of dynamic expression, which is often applied with the movement of the modulation wheel.

If you don't have a modulation wheel on your keyboard, you can apply the parameter on-screen to induce a similar effect. Always try to avoid accidentally playing two notes at a time - it’ll be a dead giveaway that your lead instrument isn’t real.

If you find yourself working in particular styles of music, geared towards the acoustic, you would be well advised to consider the purchase of some of the more outstanding commercial products available. They could make life considerably easier, in your pursuit of the acoustic.

If you frequently require help in the drums, bass and keyboards departments, Toontrack is the one company that can help you.

Beginning with their entry-level EZDrummer, EZBass and EZKeys suites, Toontrack provides some of the finest acoustic band sounds around, shored up by outstanding playing, presented in MIDI file form.

These can be dragged and dropped into your project. Entry-level they might be, but basic in sound, they are not!

Furthermore, Toontrack provides an extensive collection of expansion libraries, kits and sounds, geared towards specific styles of music. You can also elevate your drum tracks to the next rung, with Superior Drummer, which brings some of the finest kits recorded in the very best studios in the world, with outstanding studio drummers on hand to get your groove going.

Replicating lead guitar sounds is always a challenge, within the MIDI-based DAW, but for groove and rhythm guitar orientated, Native Instruments has produced a series of Kontakt instruments, from libraries such as Electric Storm to Acoustic Sunburst. There’s even a Session Ukulele library, should you want to go more folky.

UJAM continues to produce their diverse range of Virtual Guitarist, providing rock styles to folk classics, all located within stylised plugin packages.

Orchestral sounds are also very widely available, with some of our favoured champions being Spitfire Audio, Audio Imperia and Cinematic Studio Series. Orchestral packages can be rather expensive, but there are cheaper alternatives, with no loss of quality.

East West offer an exceptionally enticing subscription service, called ComposerCloud+, allowing the downloading of their entire catalogue, for a mere $9.99 per month. They have an eye towards West Coast cinematic scoring, which is evident in their catalogue and quality of the samples.

Or for a slightly more affordable angle, Orchestral Tools offers a significant number of orchestral packages, with the added ability to buy instruments separately.

This means that if you only need violins, you can just buy a violin section, without the need to buy the whole string library. It will work out cheaper to buy the entire section, as an overall purchase, but it's certainly a consideration if working to a budget.

It's easy to get swept along with technology, and equally easy to forget the most basic philosophy of all - how does your track sound.

The watchword for success in replicating acoustic instrumentation - in the electronic domain - is to always think like the musician you are trying to replicate.

Doing a little research into tracks that inspire you could go a long way too, so never be afraid to learn from past masters, however young or old they may be.

PLUGIN WEEK 2025: Our goal with our recent batch of 'Start Here' features has been to help you make and release stellar music, armed with just your computer and DAW, even if you have no prior experience. Across these features, we aim to detail every aspect of music production in as clear a way as possible, with straightforward advice and tips to help you make better music.

So far, we've explored MIDI, Interfaces, recording external synths and much more. In process terms, we have introduced the DAW - the Digital Audio Workstation - at the heart of computer music making, we have detailed how to start a track, arrange a track with loops and also how to finish a track.

This time around we're looking at mixing a track and how you can make your ideas sound better with good mix practice for the instruments, vocals, beats and more so that everything in your song shines!

Luckily, DAWs come with fantastic mixing features, including faders to adjust volumes of instruments and mix effects like EQ and compressors to tweak the sounds.

As with a lot of things when it comes to music production, being a little restrained yields benefits, so not only will we explain what to have in your mix, but what to avoid - less is often more when it comes to mixing, and small tweaks here can mean big results there.

Whatever music you make, though, learning how to mix it is almost as important as hitting on your musical idea in the first place. A good mix will put that idea on show, whereas a bad mix could well bury it forever. Before we go into the details of mixing, we now explain what the process is from its first principles.

What is mixing?

What is mixing?

When you mix your music you are simply making sure that all of your instruments, ideas, melodies, vocals and beats can be heard without hindering one another.

On a very basic level, this means making sure that certain tracks aren't too quiet while others aren't too loud and drowning out everything else.

Mixing means letting instrument tracks breathe, giving them space where required and certainly not letting them clip - that is when the audio pushes the visual feedback into the red on your virtual mixing desk.

As well as volume considerations, mixing is about compression and EQ. The former is making sure that signal levels remain even; you might have a bass guitar track that is quiet in some places but loud in others.

A compressor allows you to boost the quiet parts and compress the loud ones so you get a more even signal. EQ on the other hand is all about taming different frequencies, maybe cutting the low end of that wild bass synth so it's not too muddy, or boosting the mid frequencies of a vocal so that it cuts through a mix and can be heard better.

Finally, there's the concept of panning. In a stereo mix (there are surround mixes, but we're focussing on the more standard left and right stereo channels here) you have a stereo soundstage in which to place your instruments, which not only lets you keep clashing instruments away from one another but can offer a lovely, wide experience for your listener. We'll tackle all three of these areas – volume, EQ/compression, and panning in more detail below.

Why do you need to know about mixing?

Why do you need to know about mixing?

We'll assume that you have a few ideas either looping in your DAW over several audio and MIDI tracks, or you have a fairly advanced arranged project ready to mix.

The first thing to do is to set all of your fader levels at 0dB which on most DAWs leaves you some headroom to go up, although we'll more likely mix downwards so 0dB will be your peak. Some people advocate -6dB to give yourself even more headroom but for the sake or our workshop, 0dB is just fine.

The main principles, then, are to be able to hear every track at first. You can do this by adjusting fader levels.

Pull them down from 0dB rather than up to keep that headroom - the important thing is that channels must not clip or go into the red part of each mixer channel.

You will probably find that even by adjusting levels, some sounds will clash, as everything so far is playing through the centre of your stereo soundstage, and that's where panning comes into play.

Panning simply lets you spread your instruments and vocals across a stereo spread from left to right.

While it's really up to you where you place instruments and vocals, there are some rules to follow, should you wish. One good piece of advice when mixing a live instrument/band-based piece of music (anything with traditional guitars, bass, drums and vocals) is to picture the band on stage and pan the relative positions of the instruments in that way, so drums and bass in the middle, guitars panned slightly left and right; maybe backing vocals panned to one side too.

Generally speaking, low frequency instruments - your kick drum and bas guitar, for example - stay central as does you lead vocal, but otherwise, fill your boots and experiment.

The one mixing rule that you should abide by is that 'if it sounds good, it is good', even if you break all of the other rules!

With compression, you can use it creatively to crush a sound and get some filthy distorted beats, for example, but in a mixing scenario, it is used more subtly to keep levels even. It's especially good for wayward vocals, guitar, bass and acoustic drums, where playing might not be even and some notes and beats might be louder than others.

A compressor literally compresses the higher volume sounds so that they are more even with the lower, at the same time boosting quieter notes so that they are more of a match for the louder ones. You do this by setting a threshold, a level that you want your volume to be, and the compressor will lower any signals above this at a speed defined by the attack value which controls how quickly the compression takes place and a release value, which is how quickly it stops.

On a basic level, EQ is used to boost the frequencies you want to hear and cut those you don't, but it's not just a matter of adjusting bass and treble as all of your instruments will sit in specific frequency ranges within the 20Hz to 20 kHz range of human hearing.

Broadly speaking, these ranges and instruments are as follows: sub bass is 20-60Hz, the lowest end of human hearing and often difficult to hear unless you own a subwoofer, but particularly important in bass heavy dance music.

The bass range is 60Hz to around 250Hz and covers your bass guitar, some male vocals, and parts of your kick drum.

The lower mid frequency range is next, covering 250Hz to 500Hz and takes in guitars, vocals, and some bass guitar elements. The mid frequency range is around 500Hz to 2kHz and deals with a lot of vocals, some percussion and keyboards.

The upper-mid range goes from 2kHz to 4kHz and takes in account female vocals, snares and strings, and finally the higher frequencies (4kHz and upwards) deal with very high percussive frequencies like cymbals.

We'll cover some of the main EQ rules in our key points on mixing below but generally the idea is to use EQ to emphasise what you want to hear by boosting certain frequency ranges, the width of which is defined by a Q value, and cut the frequencies you don't want to hear.

Overall it can sometimes be useful to think of a mix in three dimensions: panning left and right, volume up and down and EQ/compression front to back, and really the idea is to spread a mix so it fills a canvas. Use some of our tips below to help you get your mix picture perfect but remember rules are only a guid line, and if it sounds good…

10 key mixing points

10 key mixing points

1. Volume and panning are probably your first mix practices and just by getting these two right you should be well on your way to creating a good mix. Remember with the former not to mix too loud as it will be easy to end up pushing everything upwards to compete. It's often best to pull back channels to emphasise others rather than pushing everything up.

2. Generally speaking, mix decisions are about subtle tweaks here and there rather than dramatic edits. You don't want big volume differences between tracks and nor do you want extreme panning unless you are a more experimental composer. Similarly over-boosting and cutting certain frequencies might well muddy your mix so don't overdo it.

3. And taking this point further, always mix at low levels. Keep you maximum headroom at 0dB but also your overall volume level down. You might end up mixing for long sessions and you can easily damage your ears mixing at high levels. Sure, you can blast it out on occasion but keep the volume levels low for the bulk of the session.

4. When you mix, it's good to have an EQ and compressor on every channel. You could and maybe should have this set up in your DAW template so that whenever you start a track, all of your channels are set up and ready to go. This is particularly useful for some mix engineers who advocate cutting the low frequencies on every channels bar the bass synth, bass guitar and kick drum - using a high pass filter on an EQ - as these are really the only channels which should be using low frequencies and every other channel might have stray frequencies in this range which muddy the bass.

5. Inevitably, some instruments will clash when panning, a very common one being both the kick and bass if they are both placed centrally, and this is where EQ comes into its own, because it too can be used as a separator. For the kick and bass, you can use use the EQ's UI to see which parts of the frequency range are clashing and use a band pass or bell shape to boost this clashing area in one part and cut it in the other, perhaps nudging up frequencies around the cut to keep the instrument's presence in the mix.

6. One EQ rule worth following is 'boost wide and cut narrow' so keep the Q value larger when boosting certain ranges and low when cutting. This is because cutting is often used to remove problem frequencies, like keyboard or guitar body noise and ringing, so needs to be surgically narrow to avoid degrading more of the original recording. Wider boosts, on the other hand, sound more natural than narrow boosts which can sound overly dramatic.

7. If after your EQ-ing, your individual track sounds too degraded when you solo it, don't worry, it is all about how it sounds in a mix. You might well have cut the body out of a drum loop, for example, so that it sits well with a bass guitar. Yes it sounds weedy when you solo it, but as long as it sounds good in the context of a mix, you're good to go!

8. Modern DAWs make it very tempting to ladle on track after track when mixing, but even if you are a master of panning, EQ and compression, sooner or later you will end up with a massive wall of sound and a muddy mix. Again, restraint is often the option, so pull back the track count and let your initial ideas shine brighter and you will make more impact. Take a leaf out of Finneas and Billy Eilish's book; they sold 10 million copies of Eilish's debut album with songs with often just four instruments on. (Ok they might have had hundreds of vocal tracks, but you know what we mean!)

9. Use a reference track to mix. Load in an audio file of a finished track by your favourite artist, in the genre you are producing within, and try to 'mix up' to it. That is, try and reach the same dynamic range as your reference track to get the same kinds of peaks and troughs. Don't expect to reach the volume levels as that is done in the mastering stage (which we will cover in an upcoming Start Here) but a reference track will give you a good indication of the kinds of level differences and EQ targets you should be aiming for.

10. And finally the good old tip that we can pretty much put in any mixing or production feature: try your finished mix out on different playback systems - car, bluetooth system, headphones etc - to make sure it sounds good on all of them.

If, for example, it sounds consistently bass-light on these systems, it might suggest that the monitors or headphones you are using to mix are too bass-heavy and you are overcompensating by pulling back the bass when mixing. If so, you'll need to adjust the bass on your monitors downwards. Most have controls to do this.

Further reading

MusicRadar further reading

First off, here's 9 quick and effective ways to improve your mix

Here's some guidance on making your mix sound more pro-level

Want some guidance on setting up some solid mixing chain templates that will be perfect for a range of music styles? Look no further.

Sometimes it pays to defer to a smarter set of ears when handling some of mixing's more problematic challenges. While they don't have ears, these plugins and tools can certainly bring some on-the-fly know-how to improve your mixing - and save your precious time.

We asked some professional mixers to dispense some of their many years of experience in tip form, here's what they shared.

Getting vocals right and to sit comfortably in a mix can be a real challenge. Here's a route you can apply to your own mix templates to capture and mix a lead vocal effectively

While you're here, you may as well grab a selection of the very best free mixing plugins you should certainly add to your arsenal. Here's 6 of our recommended ones.

Mixing and mastering are processes that feed off and out of each other, to that end much of the wisdom pertaining to one directly affects the other. Here's a selection of mixing and mastering techniques every bedroom producer should know

Beats can prove a particularly troublesome spot to get right in the mix, here's an approach we recommend.

While a technical process, mixing very much depends on the ears, intuition and emotional responses of a human. Or does it? Here's where we put a new AI mixing-assistant to task and square it off against a real human mix engineer

PLUGIN WEEK 2025: The sample buffer is one of the dark arts of the digital audio domain. Ever got up to a microphone, started to record a vocal take, and found yourself hearing a delayed signal coming back at you? Or, perhaps you are playing a virtual instrument, with an impressive delay between the triggering of a note, and the sound emitting from your speakers.

Both of these scenarios relate to the sample buffer, but with some management, these issues can be improved or even eliminated!

The sample buffer is a setting which is controlled by the user, designed to influence the amount of time being set aside for your computer to process audio. It affects the signal as it enters your system, normally via some form of audio interface, before the processed audio is returned to you for your monitoring pleasure.

Your computer is doing an awful lot of processing while recording digitally. As your audio is inputted or processed, your computer is fighting furiously to crunch the signal into digits.

This number-crunching takes a short amount of time, creating a delay to the signal which is described as latency.

This can be managed, but regrettably, you are never going to completely eliminate latency from your system. You can also employ workarounds to achieve the best results.

One day of course, computing technology will be so powerful, latency will be negligible - but we are still some way off from this benchmark.

The amount of induced delay in the signal, is assigned via the ‘sample buffer size’ setting. You will find this setting in one of your DAW’s setting or preference panes, described as something like ‘I/O Buffer Size’, with an accompanying drop-down menu relating to the number of samples being set aside for the processing buffering.

Most systems will offer you half a dozen or so numerics, ranging from 32 samples up to 1024 samples. The lower this number, the lower the amount of latency, whereas a higher number will induce large amounts of latency.

In real terms, this means that the lower value is affording less time for the computer to process the data, where as a larger number affords the computer to more time.

So which option is best? It could be tempting to choose the lowest buffer size value available, which will in theory generate the least amount of latency. That is undoubtedly the case, but in reality you are likely to experience instability. This could range from glitching in your audio, to your DAW exclaiming that it does not have enough processing power, before bringing your song to a shuddering halt. In the worst case scenario, the DAW might even crash!

It is therefore in your interest to select a value which strikes a happy balance between latency, and giving your computer less reasons to grumble.

Knowing which buffer size to select depends on a couple of factors. The primary influences will be your package and the speed of your computer. More up-to-date/faster computers, will be able to cope with a lower buffer size, but before you rush to the computer store to purchase the most up-to-date machine you can afford, the size of your project will also affect how the buffering performs.

When you start a project, you are likely to spend most of your time tracking-on, either from audio or instruments in the software domain. It therefore makes sense to set your buffer size as small as your computer can handle, without interfering with your working practice.

As your project increases in size, and hopefully nears completion, you will likely enter the phase where you begin to think more about your mix. At this stage, you may add more plugs and effects to the project, meaning that there is more audio processing for your computer to undertake. So it makes sense to increase the buffer size at this stage, so that your computer can handle the increased processing of data. The short delay between hitting the ‘play’ button and hearing your track start, will be largely unnoticeable.

As we hinted earlier, there are also some workaround solutions which may help your cause. One of the most useful and effective relates to the recording of audio.

When you purchased your audio interface, you were probably directed towards the company website to download the latest drivers for your product.

As part of this process, you may have been advised to use a software product alongside your DAW, which looks a little like a mixing desk.

Thanks to some clever software engineering, most companies have a solution which provides an exceptionally low latency signal path, working alongside your DAW.

This means that you can monitor your live audio through the interface software, as you record, without the annoying delay coming back at you.

You will however have to mute the ‘live’ channel in your DAW, otherwise you’ll hear the signal twice!

Normally, the accompanying software just springs into life, the moment you start work, and it's a good idea to embrace this working practice, as you’ll achieve better results using this 2-step solution.

Meanwhile, if you find yourself working with virtual instrument plugins, you are entirely at the mercy of the buffer size.

This can be immensely annoying, particularly when working with larger orchestral sample libraries, which are renowned for inducing large amounts of latency, especially in complex legato string patches.

One trick-of-the-trade is to employ a keyboard which has an inbuilt sound engine.

By engaging an internal sound from your keyboard (such as a basic piano) it will act as a musical counterbalance to your delayed sample, providing musical and aural feedback which makes tracking orchestral or latency-heavy patches far easier.

It's not ideal, but it’s a useful and workable solution!

Auto Filter is one of Live’s tried and tested effects, and is (mostly) based on emulation of hardware filters. Not only shaping the frequency spectrum, a filter can also bring a repetitive sound to life, transforming it into something with dynamics and movement.

It’s always been a favourite device of ours, and recently it received an update in Live 12.2 - probably the biggest Auto Filter update so far. This includes new filter types and circuits, enhancements to the LFO and sidechaining, and new options for managing the output.

Here we’ll be looking at some of our favourite Auto Filter features, including a few updates alongside the classics. In our audio examples, you'll hear four bars of the unprocessed sound before hearing Auto Filter in action.

1. Basic manoeuvres

Open up Live 12.2, then add and trigger a drum loop. Drop Auto Filter into the same track, then click and drag the yellow XY dot in the black rectangle. As you do so, you’ll see the Freq(uency) and Res(onance) values changing on the left-hand side. These are core sound-shaping features - Frequency selects a frequency to cut or boost, and Resonance sets the amount of cut or boost at the selected point. Hearing these move is what filters are all about. A real-time spectrum visualiser for the output has been added to Auto Filter, giving you a visual representation of what’s happening.

2. Not my type

The most important aspect of filtering is choosing what type of filter to use - this determines what range of your sound will pass through unaffected. Auto Filter includes low-pass, high-pass, band-pass, notch, and morph filters, as well as new additions, including DJ, which gives an easy way to control low and high pass with one control. This is a great one for just playing around and getting an effective result quickly, try it, it’s very DJ mixer-like. Vowel is also interesting, attempting to resemble the character of the human voice, with the ability to cycle through each vowel. Hear both the DJ and Vowel filter types below.

3. Circuit training

Auto Filter includes emulations of classic analog hardware filter circuits, and it’s absolutely worth taking your time to experiment with these, there’s no ‘right or wrong’, just see what works for your music. These circuits work in conjunction with the chosen filter type, and will add another layer of character: SVF is a clean state variable filter, while the new DFM circuit internally feeds back more distortion for a more aggressive sound. MS2 is based on classic Korg hardware filters, and PRD is based on the Moog Prodigy’s filter. These circuits can sound very distinct from each other, especially when pushed to extreme settings. Below you can hear the PRD filter type going from low to high.

4. Get moving

We already mentioned how important movement is, and there are options for how to achieve this, other than dragging the XY control around. Auto Filter’s built-in LFO is applied to filter frequency, with controls for rate and depth, and importantly it can be either synced to the project tempo or left free-running on a specified Hz value for a more organic feel. The LFO can be quantised, with three available settings for this: Off, Steps, and Sample & Hold. We like using Steps to imprint a really obvious pattern feel, and cycling through the range of steps from 2 to 64, listening to what they do.

5. Going for a Wander

Of course, everything in Auto Filter can be automated, like pretty much everything else in Live, but the LFO feels more hands-on. One thing we particularly like to do is take the PRD circuit, set Res to around 90%, Freq to around 600 Hz, LFO waveform to Wander (come on, who’s not going to use something called ‘Wander’?), Amount to around 30%, rate to 1/4. You don’t have to use those exact settings, of course, but it’s a good starting point depending on your source material - there’s a lot of potential for movement there.

6. Break the chain

You can use sidechaining to ‘lift’ the timing from another track or a live input, and apply it to the filter frequency. Click the little triangle at the left of Auto Filter to reveal the sidechaining controls, turn on the External switch, then select a source track. Even if the source track is muted, the audio signal from it will reach the sidechain. You could even create a special sidechaining source track for an independent input. Move the Freq control until it hits a good spot. The sidechain mix control is useful for blending the effect in and out.

7. Just a phase

When the LFO is active (on any Amount higher than zero), we have two stereo modes to choose from: Phase and Spin. These controls manipulate the available space between the LFO’s stereo channels. If Phase is on, moving the control and changing values at the right of the switch will offset the left/right signal, indicated in degrees. At 0 they are totally in phase and you only hear one unified signal, as you move the control upwards the stereo width becomes obvious. Spin does the same job, but the offset occurs automatically over time.

8. Drive me crazy

Auto Filter has new options for the output stage at the end of the chain, with the Drive control at the top-right dialling in a more saturated sound. Try combining the Drive with a high Resonance setting and a modulated Cutoff to create a dramatic sweeping effect with added punch. You may be advised to enable Clip, which will help to contain any peaks. The Output control sets the level of the wet signal, while the Dry/Wet below balances the original source sound with the filter output.

Live’s Auto Filter is an effect device that works wonders for simple mixing tasks but also rewards in-depth exploration, opening up an array of possibilities for creative sound design. Our favourite features are probably the LFO Step quantisation - there’s something about it that draws us in, and we will overuse it. The LFO Phase controls are also fun to play with, as they really start to work the stereo image a bit harder. In fact it’s so easy to get carried away with Auto Filter, sometimes we have to rein it in to avoid swamping the rest of the track we’re working on. But give it room to shine, and it will.

Avid has released the latest version of Pro Tools, and with it unveiled an unexpected partnership with Splice that integrates the leading sample platform directly into its flagship DAW.

Following Studio One's update late last year, Pro Tools is now the second DAW to fully integrate Splice, allowing its users to browse, preview and access the company's millions-strong library of royalty-free samples without leaving their session.

Pro Tools users will now be able to make use of Splice's AI-based Search With Sound feature, which analyzes audio clips from the DAW timeline to suggest Splice samples with a similar rhythm, key or tempo. Pro Tools users will be given access to more than 2,500 free Splice samples, but the full library requires a monthly subscription.

“Whether producers and artists are sketching out ideas, building out tracks, or applying final touches, Pro Tools’ Splice integration provides a more powerful environment for creating music – giving users the ability to quickly find the perfect sound while staying in their creative flow,” said Kenna Hilburn, Avid's SVP of Product.

“Putting Splice directly into the creative workflow is core to our mission,” added Splice's Kenny Ochoa. “This integration makes it easier than ever for Pro Tools users to access our AI-powered discovery and world-class sound library - right where they’re making music.”

Alongside the Splice integration, Pro Tools 2025.6 brings with it a raft of updates that includes MIDI improvements, AI-powered Speech-to-Text functionality, an expanded ARA ecosystem, enhanced ADR and reconform workflows, and a new in-app dashboard.

Pro Tools' new Speech-to-Text engine streamlines dialogue and music editing by enabling users to search any audio file in a session for speech or lyric information via a dedicated transcript window, making it quick and easy to locate specific dialogue or vocal takes.

Avid says Pro Tools 2025.6's MIDI improvements enable "faster, smarter MIDI creation" thanks to the integration of key editing tools in Pro Tools' MIDI Editor, new MIDI note labelling functionality and enhanced input monitoring.

Pro Tools 2025.6 also expands ARA integration to two third-party vocal production tools, Waves Sync Vx and Dreamtonics Synthesizer V, allowing users to process audio directly in the timeline without time-consuming roundtripping.

Pro Tools 2025.6 will be available to all Pro Tools Artist, Studio, and Ultimate subscribers, as well as perpetual license holders on an active support plan.

Find out more on Avid's website.

We all have our favourite tools in our DAW of choice. For some that might be a synth used to craft every sound in a project, or a go-to reverb or compressor that provides the finishing touch for every track in a mix. Personally, I’m borderline obsessed with Ableton’s Auto Filter.

For those unfamiliar with Live, Auto Filter is far from the DAW’s most flashy or feature-packed device. It’s essentially just a simple multi-mode filter, albeit one equipped with an envelope follower and LFO, which provide the ‘auto’ elements of its name.

While it might not be flashy, it is incredibly versatile. I’ve been a Live user for around 20 years, and it’s probably the device I turn to most regularly. Sometimes it’s used to add subtle modulation to avoid loops feeling too static, sometimes I’ll chain multiple instances to create a sort of DIY filter bank, and often I’ll simply add it at the end of a track’s effects chain and automate the cutoff to fade parts in or out of the mix.

Why am I telling you all this? Because Ableton has announced that its latest Live update, v12.2, will be released on June 11 following its public beta, and front and centre is a significant – and if we’re being honest, overdue – update for Auto Filter.

The new Auto Filter brings enhancements to every part of its toolset. Perhaps most significantly, it expands the range of filter types on offer, with additional emphasis on creative filtering.

The existing options – low-pass, high-pass, band-pass, notch, and a Morph filter – are now joined by a comb filter, vowel filter, resampling filter and bi-directional DJ-style filter mode. The Morph filter gains additional slope options, and the notch mode is joined by a notch + LP mode.

There are improvements to the analogue-emulating filter circuits too. Auto Filter now features a clean SVF model, Sallen-Key inspired MS2 and Ladder-style PRD modes, and a new DFM mode that, according to Ableton, “internally feeds back more of its distortion, resulting in a broad range of tones from subtle filter sweeps to warm drive.”

The LFO has been upgraded with a variety of new tools including additional waveshapes and wave morphing, and the sidechain functionality has gained an EQ and mono mode. At the end of the chain, Auto Filter now has an output loudness control to compensate for fluctuations in volume, plus a soft clipping option and global dry/wet. The device also now has a real-time spectrum visualiser built into its UI.

Auto Filter will also be available on Ableton Move following its 1.5 update in May.

What else?

Auto Filter isn’t the only element of Live to gain new features in v12.2. The DAW gains a new keyboard-based workflow for editing automation and modulation, which promises to aid Ableton's commitment to accessibility as well as potentially speed up the workflow of users up on their keyboard shortcuts.

There are new options for bouncing tracks to audio too, which means users can now both bounce a track in place – rendering the existing track to audio – or bounce audio down to a new track without overwriting the existing track.

The browser – which was significantly overhauled for Live 12 – receives a number of refinements too. These include a redesign of the tagging system, with a new layout for the filter view, plus quick tags that can be edited from a sound’s preview tab. Users can now assign custom icons to labels in the library, too.

There are also numerous updates for existing Live devices. Live 12 newcomers Meld and Roar both gain refinements, with the former gaining a new Chord oscillator and Scrambler LFO FX, and the latter additional filter and routing options.

Live’s Resonators and Spectral Resonator can now make use of the Scale Awareness functionality. Finally, Live’s much-loved FM synth Operator now has an increased voice count of up to 32 voices.

Push the boat out

It’s not just Live itself that’s seeing improvements with v12.2 - the standalone version of Ableton’s Push controller gains an OS update as well, which addresses one of the most significant missing features from its workflow – Follow Actions.

Follow Actions are tools used in Live to automate the behaviour of its clip launcher. At their most basic, they can be used to make clips play one after another, but they can also be set up to do more interesting things, such as randomise the playback of clips and scenes or add automated fills and breaks.

While Push is entirely focused on the clip launching workflow, until now users haven’t been able to set up Follow Actions on the device, which is a significant hole in its toolset. As of the latest beta updates – Live 12.2 and Push 2.2b9 – users can now set and edit these from the hardware itself. This has the potential to vastly improve Push’s functionality both as a tool for live performance and for studio creativity.

Push also gains a new 16 Pitches mode, which matches the functionality of Ableton’s compact Move hardware, and offers an easy way to play Simpler and Drum Rack sounds melodically. There’s also a new MPE-ready Expressive Chord Max device designed specifically for playing single-finger chords using Push (or any other controller).

Push can now access more of Live’s native functionality too, including the ability to bounce tracks to audio directly from the device, access the Groove Pool and load tuning systems.

Both Live 12.2 and Push 2.2b9 are currently both in public beta and will be released on June 11 as an automatic free update for Live 12 owners. Find full details of the updates in the official release notes.

Dig out the ‘DAW update day’ bunting, because Apple has just presented us with new versions of Logic Pro for both Mac (v11.2) and iPad (v2.2).

In keeping with Apple’s apparent desire to make the two editions as similar as possible, the big improvements apply to both of them, starting with enhanced audio fidelity and functionality in Stem Splitter, which arrived on the scene last year as part of Logic Pro for Mac 11 and Logic Pro for iPad 2.

You can expect greater detail when you use Stem Splitter to break apart old recordings and demos, and the feature is now able to isolate guitar and piano parts and put them on separate tracks. There are also presets that enable you to select common stem variations - acapella, instrumental, or instrumental with vocals, for example - so you can more finely tailor the results to your requirements.

The submix feature, meanwhile, enables you to quickly export just the parts of the track you want. You can quickly generate an instrumental version of a song, or choose to export just the drums and bass for a remix, for example.

Next, we have Flashback Capture, which sounds like the name of a sci-fi cop movie but actually enables you to recall MIDI and audio performances that you gave when, for whatever reason, you weren’t recording (previously, only MIDI could be recalled). You can access these using a key command or custom control bar button, and if you’re in Cycle mode, each pass is stored in its own take folder.

There are also the sound pack upgrades. Dancefloor Rush is designed to push your drum ‘n’ bass buttons by way of 400 loops, drum kits and a dedicated Live Loops grid, and comes to both versions of Logic Pro. There are also a couple of previously iPad-only packs that are now on the Mac as well: Magnetic Imperfections focuses on the sound of analogue tape; and Tosin Abasi has his own prog metal pack full of his boutique amps, effects and riffs.

Elsewhere, Logic Pro for Mac’s Learn MIDI feature is now in the iPad version, too, making it quicker and easier to assign hardware controllers. And there are a couple of Mac-exclusive updates, too: Notepad now supports Apple’s AI-powered Writing Tools, and there’s a new search and select feature that’s said to make it easier to find and choose tracks by their name and number.

All of which feels very much like what it is - a point release update that comes a year after a much chunkier ‘full’ Logic Pro revision. There’s no need to question the value of it, though, as it’s free for owners of both the Mac version, which is priced at $200/£200, and subscribers to the iPad version, who pay either $5/£5 a month or $49/£49 a year.

Find out more on the Apple website.

My computer screen is awash with numbers and letters careening upwards like The Matrix in reverse. With every beat, my ears are assaulted by a high-speed flurry of notes, sample chops and effects changes, everything happening much quicker than I ever thought possible.

Graphic bars have been replaced by letters and numbers, parameter values represented by the cryptic hexadecimal system. I've been transported to another dimension of music production and I’m barely in control: I’m programming with a tracker and I’m loving every minute of it.

Most music sequencers use some kind of left-to-right arrangement. Whether that’s the intricate hopscotch of a step sequencer or the endless piano roll of a digital audio workstation, for the most part, sequencers tend to advance horizontally.

Not trackers. They buck the trend by scrolling upwards. They also replace graphic notes on a bar with lines of numbers, like computer code with no GUI veil. It’s unfamiliar, intimidating, and seemingly impenetrable for producers raised on DAWs like Logic and Live.

And yet - working with a tracker can yield surprising and unexpected results, unlocking whole new worlds of creativity for those brave enough to take the red pill. Are you ready to see how deep the tracker hole goes?

What is a tracker?

The first tracker was Ultimate Soundtracker in 1987. Released for the Commodore Amiga by EAS Computer Technik, it gave users access to a then-fairly generous four channels of audio. Crucially, these were 8-bit samples pulled from the Amiga’s Paula audio chip. This focus on sampling in trackers continues to this day.

Four channels of audio expanded to eight with the release of RBF Software’s OctaMED in 1991. More than just granting users access to the internal sound chip, however, OctaMED allowed producers to sequence external gear via MIDI. OctaMED was soon adopted by hardcore and fledgling jungle producers for its ability to create intricate sequences of chopped breaks, either from hardware samplers like the Akai S-950 or via the Amiga itself.

DJ Zinc used OctaMED for Super Sharp Shooter, and Aphrodite famously made his early records with two Amiga 1200s paired together. Modern jungle producer Pete Cannon still uses an Amiga to produce, telling Polyend, maker of the Tracker hardware sampler: “I love trackers for chopping. I still use the Amiga for its sound and the nostalgia it gives me.”

Trackers soon made the jump to PC, upping track counts as they evolved. Impulse Tracker, released in 1995, had 64 channels. Both Deadmau5 and Machinedrum cut their teeth on Impulse Tracker and the latter actually revisited it on his album, 3FOR82. And of course, Aphex Twin made the most of the tracker PlayerPro for Drukqs, as you can see in a video he shared for album highlight Vordhosbn.

Usually confined to computers, trackers have also made the jump to hardware in recent years, with both Tracker from Polyend and Dirtywave’s M8 bringing the tracker/sampler workflow to standalone devices. LSDJ, an unofficial sequencer for the Nintendo Gameboy, transforms the portable gaming device into a tracker and was instrumental in the formation of chiptune as a genre.

Renoise: the tracker DAW

Which brings us to Renoise, and my introduction to trackers, music production’s parallel universe. First released in 2002, Renoise has developed into a fully-fledged DAW complete with plugins (AU and VST), MIDI for controlling external instruments, and even ‘tools’, user-programmable scripts that add functionality to the program, like Max For Live devices in Ableton Live.

The main difference between Renoise and other DAWs is, of course, the tracker sequencer. Where most DAWs have a piano roll, Renoise has the vertical-scrolling tracker window. And, rather than a vertical timeline, you arrange songs by assembling blocks of sequences in a horizontal fashion.

As well, being a tracker at heart, the Renoise workflow is centered on working with samples, with the sampler an integral part of just about everything. Of course, you can create tracks with third-party soft synth plugins, but what look like Renoise factory ‘instruments’ from the outside are actually just samplers at their core.

Lastly, although Renoise supports MIDI controllers like other DAWs, trackers have always been computer programs first and foremost; they work best when your interface is a computer keyboard. Arrow keys, F keys, and a separate number pad: this is how you interact with a tracker, and the fastest way to work with Renoise.

Taking the red pill

I was sat in front of my computer, staring at Renoise in bewilderment. I had a demo song loaded up and running, a 200BPM breakcore monster called Bears by someone named Daed. The tracker grid launched upwards in a riot of numbers and letters while a flurry of beats and bass jettisoned from my monitors. What had I gotten myself into? I couldn’t make heads nor tails of what was happening, my four decades of music production experience rendered suddenly useless.

It didn’t help either that the vibe was all so ‘personal computer.’ Trackers come from a world of hackers and computer enthusiasts. For me, computers had only ever been a tool to do the things I wanted, like writing and making music. I have also only ever used a Mac, while Renoise looks like a Windows port. And all the numbers! I’m a words guy, right-brained: maths gives me panic attacks. I was, in all honesty, intimidated.

Take a moment, take a breather. I stopped the demo and tried a few others instead; tech house, ambient, dubstep. This was easier to understand, the pace less manic, the workflow less cryptic. I started clicking around at my leisure, figuring out the lay of the land. Here is the sampler screen, here’s the mixer. The effects are arranged at the bottom of the screen like Ableton Live, the mixer like Logic. I can do this, I said to myself.

Rewiring my brain

The big hurdle was, of course, the tracker sequencer itself. There’s always a learning curve when switching DAWs. That’s to be expected. For the most part though, the differences are minor. The basic workflow, the general layout; they’re essentially the same. Roadblocks are small and soon overcome.

But Renoise. A tracker? This was not just learning a few new words, it was like diving into an entirely new language. I speak Japanese, and because of the vastly different grammar, the process of becoming fluent required laying down many new neural pathways in my brain. Renoise was asking the same thing of me. Not left-to-right but bottom-to-top. Not a piano keyboard but a computer keyboard. Even the way that musical events are numbered: not 1-16 but 0-15, so a 4/4 kick pattern gets notes on 0, 4, 8, 12 and not 1, 5, 9, 13.

And then there’s hexadecimal. Renoise (and trackers in general) use the hexadecimal numeral system to express parameter values. Each line in the sequencer has a position for the note (expressed as a letter and octave, such as C-4), the selected instrument number, and then what are called “effects.” These are for volume, pan and delay (what Renoise calls note offset). These amounts are expressed not in regular numerals but hexadecimal notation, for example 3E or FF.

What’s going on here? Hexadecimal is a base-16 number system that uses the numerical digits 0-9 and the letters A, B, C, D, E and F. By combining these two, you can go beyond what would normally be allowed by just two decimal spaces. Where the maximum would only be 99, with hexadecimal you can go all the way up to FF, or 256. It’s actually a clever - and rather elegant - way of squeezing a finer resolution out of a limited space. In theory. In practice, it can be very confusing - as I found out.

Back on track

But, like anything else, practice and repeated use leads to familiarity, and Renoise is no exception. By the third day of struggling with its vertical orientation, hexadecimal notation and other unfamiliar elements, I finally started to get the hang of it. At a certain point I turned off my MIDI keyboard controller and just used the computer keys, and here is when things really started to speed up for me.

Working with arrows and keys is so much faster than a mouse and piano. With this new computer workflow, I was able to slot myself into the tracker mindset. It was like my brain started flowing vertically and thinking in terms of per-note parameter changes. Within a few hours, I had the beginnings of a not-terrible jungle track, something that I had always struggled to make in a traditional DAW to any degree of satisfaction.

By the end of the third day, I found myself grinning like Richard D. James on the Windowlicker album art as I banged out chopped breaks, pitch-bendy bass and gritty pads, all bolstered by Renoise’s superb built-in effects. I even had Arturia’s Augmented Mallets running in the tracker, playing a manic run of notes that I would never have programmed in a regular DAW.

Should you switch to a tracker?

I still have a long way to go in learning Renoise, but after a few weeks, I feel as if I have the basics down, and I can finally think in terms of its ‘language’. Will I be giving up Logic and Live in exchange for the tracker life? Probably not. While Renoise does some things extremely well - it chops breaks like nobody’s business and excels at abrupt structural transitions - it also has some undeniable drawbacks.

Being a tracker, it’s overly focused on working with samples. This is great for sample-based genres like jungle or hip-hop but when it comes to recording audio, you’re stuck using the sampler rather than recording to an audio track. There are ways around this, of course, but at the end of the day, they’re still just workarounds.

Better yet is to use Renoise in conjunction with other DAWs. Make your breaks in Renoise then export them to Live and continue from there, or sample soft synth sounds from Logic or FL Studio then compose within Renoise for the tracker vibe. You could even use Rewire to connect Renoise to your DAW of choice and work that way.

A few alternatives

If you like the idea of a tracker, or are a fan of the nostalgic sounds of ‘90s computer sampling, there are a few different ways to get the vibe of Renoise without committing entirely to a new DAW.

Redux is the sampler from Renoise (complete with tracker-style phrase sequencer) in a plugin format. This way you can utilize the powerful Renoise sampler and its unique approach to sample manipulation without fully committing to the tracker lifestyle.

Another option is Amigo Sampler from PotenzaDSP, an 8-bit sampler that recreates the crunch and funk of the Amiga’s sound chip in plugin form. There’s no tracker though.

Lastly, there are freeware music trackers available if you just want to test the waters. Try Milky Tracker or Schism Tracker, the latter of which is an open source reimplementation of Impulse Tracker, the software that Machinedrum and Deadmau5 learned on. If chiptune is your thing, try Famitracker.

Fender has announced Fender Studio, a new beginner-friendly recording app that you’ll be able to download for free. Available on Mac, PC, iOS, Android and Linux, key features include one-tap recording, Fender amp models and effects and editable Jam Tracks.

An app like this has been on the cards for a while. Fender acquired PreSonus, developer of the Studio One DAW, back in 2021, but in 2022, Fender CEO Andy Mooney expressed his frustration at what he perceived to be music software’s unnecessary complexity.

“Having dabbled in recording myself, I’ve never found a DAW I didn't need an MIT degree to actually use,” he told MusicRadar. “You shouldn't need to spend more time figuring out how to use a DAW than you do creating.

”So my belief was that we can take the talent and the brand equity of PreSonus and create the equivalent of Fender Play [Fender’s guitar tuition platform] for recording - ie, a product that’s globally accessible and very intuitive to use.”

Fender Studio is that product, and sates Mooney’s desire to have an app that you can record into with a single action. In fact, there’s literally a big red button there as soon as you open it: click/tap this and, providing your device’s mic is enabled or your guitar is hooked up via a compatible audio interface, your playing will immediately be recorded.

“I’ve always said to the team, anyone should be able to just hit a single button on their phone and be able to start recording,” says Mooney now. “We’ve built exactly that. We believe Fender Studio will enable more music creation than ever before by serving the needs of today’s creators and that will drive sustained growth for our company and our industry. I’m proud of what the team has created and can’t wait to hear what gets recorded in Fender Studio.”

While Fender is keen to highlight the ‘one-tap recording’ feature as a big point of difference in comparison to other recording software (tellingly, the press release makes no mention of it being a DAW) it has to be said that a lot of what else you’ll find in Fender Studio looks very familiar. The company is happy to admit that it “shares DNA” with Studio One - there’s one-way project compatibility, in fact - and the timeline and audio editing features don’t appear to break the mould.

It would be unfair to dismiss this as simply a cutdown version of Studio One, though (Studio Half?): having the Fender ‘65 Twin Reverb guitar amp and Rumble 800 v3 bass amp immediately gives Fender Studio a USP, and there five FX pedals and an integrated tuner. Once you’ve registered the app for free using your Fender Connect account details you get six additional amps and effects, too.

And then there are those Jam Tracks for you to play along with. These 20 multitrack audio sessions come in a range of styles, and each part can be transposed, muted, soloed, sped-up or slowed-down.

There are limitations, though. The maximum number of tracks you can record is 16 (you get eight when you download and eight more when you register), and there’s no mention of MIDI or plugin support. As such, the only effects you have are the built-in Compressor, EQ, Reverb, Delay, De-Tuner, Transformer, Ring Modulator and Vocoder devices.

This is a version 1 release, though, so if there’s a demand for more advanced DAW-like features, they could come in time. Refreshingly, there’s no suggestion that this is a ‘freemium’ product, either - in-app purchases aren’t mentioned in the press release - and the extensive cross-platform compatibility is impressive.

The music software market is a competitive place, though, and it remains to be seen if Fender can challenge the dominance of Apple’s GarageBand in the entry-level recording sector.

Find out more on the Fender website.

If you're somebody that regularly works in a DAW, a significant portion of your time will be taken up by repeating the same handful of actions.

Anything that can make those tasks quicker, saving a few seconds each time, can ultimately save you hundreds of hours of time. By making the production process more streamlined and efficient, this can help you stay in the creative flow, too.

SoundFlow is an app designed to do just that. A workflow automation platform for DAWs and music software, SoundFlow is already available for programs such as Pro Tools, Logic Pro and Sibelius, and has just launched a public beta version of its Ableton Live integration.

SoundFlow works by transforming frequently executed tasks into multi-step macros that can be actioned at the touch of a button. These can be triggered using a Stream Deck, tablet, smartphone or MIDI controller, and you can even create custom keyboard shortcuts if you don't own compatible hardware.

SoundFlow's Ableton Live integration arrives with over 850 commands and 40 pre-made decks tailored for different workflows: the software can trigger clips and scenes, assign track colours, edit and transform MIDI, or even add plugins and devices to your rack without opening the browser. Designing custom macros, scripts and decks is a simple process, thanks to the software's straightforward drag-and-drop editor.

"This integration goes far beyond simple shortcuts," says SoundFlow's Chad Wahlbrink. "We're giving Ableton users a powerful toolkit to automate entire workflows — creating, colouring and routing tracks, swapping MIDI Instruments and adding multiple audio effects at once, generating and transforming MIDI — with the push of a button. It's a new era of creative efficiency."

If you're a Live user that wants to speed up your workflow and save time in the studio, SoundFlow could certainly be worth a look.

To test out the Public Beta, you'll need to subscribe to SoundFlow Cloud Pro at $9.99/month, but a free 30-day trial is available. Find out more on SoundFlow's website.

Superbooth 25: Ableton Move arrived last year and was quite a surprising release from the Berlin software brand.

Although, on the surface, it looks like just another pad-based Live controller, Move is actually a self-contained instrument that functions like a cross between Ableton’s flagship Push hardware and its Note iOS app.

In short, Move allows users to play and sequence four tracks’ worth of instruments, based on devices derived from counterparts in Live. These include sampled beats and instruments, making use of Live’s Drum Racks and Drum Sampler, as well as synths powered by the likes of Drift and Operator.

Move also allows users to sample directly into the device, manipulate sounds using a small selection of Live effects, as well as act as a Live controller when hooked up to a computer running that DAW.

Now Ableton has launched a new firmware update for Move, which looks to be its most significant update yet.

When Move launched, one of the most common complaints from potential users was its lack of automatic sample slicing. Although Move allows users to sample using its audio input, onboard mic or internal routing – and lets users manually spread a recording across different pads – at launch it lacked the ability to automatically slice a loop to be triggered across different Drum Rack pads, in the way Live allows.

With the 1.5 update, Move now offers that option to slice a sample into equal regions, with the amount of slices set by the user. Users can then adjust the individual slice points in order to fine tune the process.

Move 1.5 also significantly enhances the device’s MIDI capabilities. Move can now simultaneously send and receive MIDI across its four tracks, which can each be configured with its own MIDI in and out settings. Move can also now receive MIDI clock settings from external devices.

It’s worth noting that Move uses its USB port for MIDI I/O, and doesn’t have conventional MIDI input and output ports.

Live’s newly overhauled Auto-Filter device also comes to Move 1.5, along with a range of presets. The update also adds some refinements to how Move functions when controlling Live, along with a variety of bug fixes.

These new updates join several other enhancements to the Move workflow that have been added since launch. These include the ability to sample using the device’s USB port, as well as improvements to the arpeggitor and quantize modes.

The 1.5 firmware is currently in public beta, head to the Ableton beta program site to find out how to join.

Move itself is available now, priced at £399/€449/$449. For more info visit the main Ableton site. Revisit our original review below.

PRODUCER WEEK 2025: You may already have some knowledge of what a DAW is, how MIDI works and how to wire up your interface and record vocals effectively. But really, it's making tracks and songs you actually want to get better at, right? In this feature, we'll tell you all you need to create a great tune from scratch, whether you are have a particular idea in mind or are searching for that inspiring beat, loop or melody…

Creating a great tune with today's computers is relatively straightforward and way less complicated than it was a few decades ago. All you need is a computer and a simple DAW and you can get started straight away. And if you have a tune in mind then all the better.

DAWs are fantastic applications to help turn inspiration into tunes fast, or can be just used as sound boards (literally!) to inspire you into new ways of song creation. Here we'll show you how to use a DAW to produce a tune with either scenario: if you have an idea of the song you want to create or are just starting from scratch with a blank screen.

DAW templates: what are they?

DAW templates: What are they?

You can - if you have a melody or beat idea in mind - go straight into a DAW and start making music.

You simply need a single track, maybe triggering a piano sound or drum kit, and you can start recording, perhaps using your mouse to draw the notes using the DAW's on-screen piano keyboard editor, or by recording the notes in using an external keyboard. That's the usual way every producer starts a track.

However, a more logical approach that will help you make music going forward is to set up your DAW to make it more welcoming, so that whenever inspiration strikes, you can get in and make music straight away.

In a DAW template you basically customise your DAW, make it personal to you and ready for action so you don't waste time and lose ideas, focus and inspiration.

Then each time you start up your DAW it'll pull up a template full of the tools you use, all ready to go and customised to your music creation style and workflow.

If you make band-based music, for example, you can set your DAW up to have, say, six tracks of instruments ready to play straight away, with a guitar on one track, piano/keyboard on another, drum kit ready to play on another one or two, and say a bass guitar or synth on another.

Meanwhile dance music producers might want an electronic drum kit set up on one track, or even several audio tracks set up with samples loaded in with common beats, say the four-four kick pattern so often used in many forms of house music.

If you have leanings towards a classical piece of music or a soundtrack, you might have your DAW's more orchestral instruments set up on tracks.

Taking this one step further you might want to record instruments in from the outside world, so you set up an input channel in your DAW template, perhaps with some common effects on it for recording like an EQ and compressor.

Basically a template is created around you, the music you want to make and your ideas. You simply add instrument tracks according to your music taste or genre in which you'd like to produce and save it out as a template.

Then, when inspiration strikes, there's no messing around. All you've got to do is play (or draw) the notes on the tracks!

Templates can be as simple or as complicated as you like; some producers spend ages on a template to save time down the line, perhaps adding common effects on each channel, colouring in different instrument tracks to make them easier to visualise, and so on.

Think of it like an engineer having the band's instruments in a recording studio plugged in and ready to go for when they (and their producer) arrive.

While starting a tune with a blank canvas each time is possible, creating an environment tailored to your workflow will save time and can be an inspiring place to make music. Creating music is all about an easy workflow that'll turn ideas into tracks, fast!

What do I need to know?

What do I need to know about making tracks from scratch?

There are essentially three stages to creating music in a DAW: composing, arranging and mixing/mastering.

At the composing stage you will choose your instrument sounds, play and record melodies and beats, very often using a DAWs ability to cycle around a few bars to try out different instruments sounds and beats together to see and hear how they sit.

If you have a template set up then your commonly used instrument tracks will be set up but if not, simply create a new DAW project with, say, four instrument/MIDI tracks and four audio tracks.

The first will allow you to use your DAW's virtual instruments (again see our DAW feature for more on these) while the audio tracks will allow you to load in sounds and samples – perhaps beats or vocals – or record instruments from the outside world. Between them, your MIDI instrument and audio tracks should cover all the sounds you need, but it's easy to create more of either type of track in any DAW.

Next up you'll want to play in and record your ideas or simply try out a few instrument and beat combinations to see if these work. The former approach usually involves the DAW's piano style editor and, if you have one, and external MIDI controller keyboard to play your melodies of trigger beats.

Setting your DAW up to cycle around four or eight bars is a good idea here, as is slowing your tempo down if you are not a great player - recording ideas slowly to get them right and then speeding them up on playback is one feature your DAW excels at!

Play in and record ideas track by track, and add beats, bass lines, leads and pads according to your genre.

Most producers choose instruments that fill the frequency spectrum - that is you'll have a bass sound and drums for the low frequencies, vocals and guitars filling the mid-range, and perhaps strings, higher notes and percussion at the top end.

It's not an essential practice, but having instruments spread across the frequency range like this makes mixing them easier, as it does hearing each individual component.

Now it's time to arrange your loops into songs and here's another area where many DAWs excel in as they have arrangement sections that you can create and move around on screen as chunks of music.

You might, then, create an intro part, verse, chorus and outro and your DAW then allows you to edit and move each part in one go.

Alternatively you can simply repeat your first sets of looped ideas across, say, four minutes and create your own arrangement, by adding to and deleting certain parts. Again, DAWs make this very easy to do

Mixing and mastering basics

A light introduction to mixing and mastering

The final stage of your song composition is mixing which is an essential practice to ensure that you can hear every instrument and vocal in a song, and that nothing is too prominent (loud) or causing your levels to hit the red on any mixer channel – easy to hear and see!

You can simply add or reduce volumes using each mixer track fader, and add or subtract EQ to raise or lower the frequency of each sound. This helps sounds stand out in certain frequency bands - you might want to add a bit of low frequency to a bass guitar so it sounds more solid, for example.

Finally the mastering stage is about adding gentle EQ to the overall mix and perhaps some (again gentle) compression to give it more volume and level consistency.

It's important to break down creating a track into these processes as a DAW lends itself so well to each one, but you don't necessarily have to do them as isolated steps - you can be mixing while composing for example, no problem!

The bottom line when starting a track is to make sure your DAW's workflow doesn't impede your creativity - make it your customised, happy place to make music.

Learn some of its key commands - short cuts to common DAW processes - and you will be creating great tracks in no time!

10 key track starting points

10 key track starting points

1. Templates aren't essential, but once you've created several audio and MIDI tracks with different sounds and instruments, you might as well save this out as a template for future use as it will save you time next time inspiration strikes!

2. DAWs usually come bundled with virtual instruments for any genre of music creation but they might not cover your specific needs. Here you might need to invest in third-party instruments or sample collections. Check out our recommended drums, synths and software guitar collections.

3. We touched on key commands/short cuts above. Again they are not essential to use, but make opening your DAW's mixer or editors much easier, for example - simply press a button and you are editing your tune! Similarly you can use key commands to quantise notes (get them in time), open effects, and instruments, and open and close other commonly used DAW windows and features.

4. Don't be frightened of using external samples in your tunes. At first it might feel like cheating when you load in a fully-formed drum loop for your backing track, but it's all about being creative with these loops, mixing and matching them with other loops or using different effects. And you can always recreate a drum loop with your own beats down the line if that guilt persists! You can download lots of free samples from SampleRadar here.

5. Similarly you can also load in MIDI files that have melody and beat ideas for your tunes. Again, while someone else has done some of the heavy lifting for your beats and melodies, MIDI files can trigger any sound - which is entirely your call - plus you can add your own effects or even go in and change the notes and beats to make them yours.

6. Further still there are plenty of AI tools and compositional elements that are designed to make songwriting and tune production even easier. Don't be scared to embrace these tools as they are designed to either help you to speedily turn your ideas into tunes or inspire you to create - they just smooth the process for you.

7. DAWs often come with several tools to aid composition which are well worth using as sources of inspiration. The most recent release of Ableton's Live (version 12), for example, has a suite of generative MIDI tools that help you create beats and melodies in a certain key. Many DAWs feature tools like this.

8. Need inspiration? If you are trying to make music in a particular style, don't be scared to load in a track you like into your DAW as a reference. Load it in on an audio track and use it to reference a typical arrangement – where verses and choruses begin and end, for example, how the beats evolve, and also its volume levels (for mastering).

9. Get song ideas all the time? If you are one of those (lucky) people who gets ideas for tunes constantly, even a well-templated DAW might not be speedy enough for you to translate them into tunes. In which case, keep a note book or dictaphone with you and record ideas wherever you are. Either that or explore the DAWs available on your phone - not usually as fully featured as your computer-based application but great for capturing scratchpad ideas anywhere and fast.

10. Finally, keep all of your ideas! Just because you might fall at the first hurdle with a song idea, perhaps only getting it to four or eight bars, there's no reason you can't come back to it in the future where you might have extra ideas, samples, or instruments to add to flesh it out. That is the beauty of DAW music production! We'll also be covering how to turn those loops into fully-fledged songs in future features, so stay tuned and keep creating tunes!

Further reading

MusicRadar further reading

If you want some direct inspiration on where to begin when writing a new track, then our 50 ways to start a track feature will give you plentiful starting points

If you're struggling developing those brief musical ideas or loops into bigger tracks, then here our expert Sara Simms details some way of building out.

Similarly, if you've got an idea but don't know how to make it into a 'proper' song or track, then here's ten ways to do just that!

Maybe you've got a collection of cool samples, but how do you make them form part of something greater? Maybe expand outwards from a foundational sample - find out how in this feature.

Overall arrangement is covered here, and thinking about the listener of the track, and its emotional impact, is key.

Moving between sections (verse/chorus/verse) can be quite jarring if not carefully considered, here's a great feature that details some sure-fire transition tips.

Essential for any successful track is a central hook (or series of hooks) so don't overlook the importance of focusing on this. Here's an easy way to start

It's all about that bass, a wise person once said, and while creating a track incorporates many musical elements, the low-end is a particularly pivotal consideration. Here's how to get get a vibrant bass part cooking quickly.

How do you get these tracks locked-down and finished? While we'll cover this topic in more detail in an upcoming feature, this article highlights how some of the big names get things done.

And, if you're still struggling putting the track to bed and moving on to the next one, we'll tell you how here.

What is it?

It’s been a long time now since Studio One came into the world of music production. Studio One offered a simpler, more to-the-point DAW that worked solidly with audio and MIDI, and wasn’t bloated by a history of adding features. PreSonus and Studio One have spearheaded a few industry initiatives like the ARA format, the .multisample and .DAWproject formats, which encourage DAW developers to integrate their products more.

We’ve been Studio One users since version 2, watching the DAW add new features, some of which are still unseen in most other competitors (the Channel Editor, gain reduction metering in the mixer, Console Shapers). In recent years, the DAW has tended to feel more like it’s playing catch-up or peering over other DAWs’ shoulders, rather than pioneering its own solutions and new ways of working, and version 7 is something of a mixture of both.

Studio One was originally forged by PreSonus and some renegades who were previously involved with Steinberg’s Cubase and Nuendo. Why should you care? Because in 2021, PreSonus was acquired by Fender, adding another DAW to the ranks of those involved with every musician’s favourite type of business: private equity firms. The narrative of the Studio One story now reaches a fork in the road: will its corporate ownership put its ex-Steinberg employees right back to where they once were, or will things be different this time? Whatever the outcome, it’s a compelling story.

The headline features for version 7, then? Native Splice integration, Ableton Live-style clip launching, stem separation, tempo mapping, a CV instrument and more. And all that for a markedly lower price than previous versions. Nice!

What's new in Studio One Pro 7?

Version 7 comes with a few immediately obvious graphical changes. There’s nothing earth-shattering, but regular users will notice more rounded edges and brighter highlights for selected items. Choices like these make it slightly more reminiscent of Logic, but they’re not going to change anything too fundamental. Once you’re used to the new look and return to the old one, it does seem a bit more brittle.

Elsewhere, Studio One 7 gets Ableton-style clip launching, which integrates quite nicely to run (optionally) alongside its timeline, Splice integration within the Studio One browser, a new CV instrument, stem separation, and sundry other features including Global Transpose, clip looping, tempo mapping and more.

Pricing

• Studio One Pro 7 (perpetual licence): $200/£170/€200
• Studio One Pro 7 (yearly subscription): $180/£160/€180
• Studio One Pro 7 (monthly subscription): $20/£17/€20

There are a few things to get out of the way first about how Studio One is now made available. For version 7, PreSonus has changed pricing structure, the tier structure, and the way things are paid for. We’re going to get into the weeds about that here, so if pricing models don’t concern you, scroll on through to the What’s new in Studio One Pro 7? header below.

Key to the changes is that, for version 7, PreSonus has dropped the DAW’s Prime and Artist tiers, leaving only one version of the DAW with all features in tow. Now, Studio One Pro 7 is the DAW synonymous with ‘Studio One’.

Studio One Pro 7 is available for a one-time charge under a perpetual licence, which costs $200 (£170/€200). Paying for this option means you’ll get every update of Studio One Pro 7, just as you’d expect with previous versions. One fact that has irked some existing Pro-tier users is the upgrade charge of £135, which is the same charge paid by Studio One Artist licence holders.

Another way to buy Studio One is on an annual or monthly subscription. At $180/£160/€180 per year or $20/£17/€20 per month, these subscriptions are packaged as the ‘plus plan’, expanding Studio One Pro subscriptions with a package of extras, including “cloud-based collaboration, loop and sample libraries, add-ons, partner offers and cloud storage”. A package of extras is a slightly confusing thing to offer subscribers at the same time as ‘simplifying’ three tiers down to one, but there it is.

Studio One Pro Annual+ subscribers also get a perpetual licence to Studio One Pro, but only get the updates made during the time they’re subscribed. If their subscription ends while the DAW is at, say, version 7.2, then that’s the version they’ll keep after. Monthly+ subscribers get access only while their subscription is active. Whether a subscription is the right choice for you will depend on how much worth you’ll get out of those added ‘plus’ features.

Confused still? Your options are $200/£170/€200 for a perpetual licence and all updates to Studio One Pro 7, $180/£160/€180 for a perpetual licence with a year of updates to the latest version of Studio One Pro (renewing), or $20/£17/€20 for a single month of Studio One Pro 7.

Performance

While we appreciate not having to install gigabytes and gigabytes onto our machine at once, it’s worth noting that the Studio One package can be very complicated to install, depending on where you try to initiate it from.

While there are Minimal and Recommended installation types to choose from, you may find yourself heading back to PreSonus online, where you’ll find (after some mental work) the place to download and install individual components that you’re missing – possibly including some mentioned in this review like the new instruments, stem separation and Splice integration. The experience could do with a review, especially given the DAW’s Start Page and Plugin Manager that offer help managing files and systems from within the DAW.

There's now Ableton-style clip launching

Studio One 7 introduces a clip launcher, the non-linear ‘Session View’ style of making music using loops and scenes as pioneered originally by Ableton Live, then seen in Bitwig, and implemented in one way or another in Logic Pro, GarageBand for iOS, FL Studio, and even Cubase.

Click a button in the top bar, and a clip launching panel will appear side-by-side with the timeline like a Scratch Pad. It can be set as the only view to concentrate on that. Scenes run left-to-right, different to the classic Session View axis, but since the horizontal rows line up with your timeline and tracks, having things this way around feels quite logical.

In use, clip launching in Studio One is… fine. It works, everything is quantised well and simple to change, and it’s intuitive to use. There’s not much to it, mind. Each sample gets a play/stop button to activate it, as does each entire Scene. There are no frills like Ableton’s Follow Actions, for example, but the most important and creative features about clip launching are right here.

In fact, clip launching is good in Studio One precisely when the clip launcher and timeline are used at the same time. Each track (row) has an arrow that can ‘hand off’ responsibility for that track to the timeline or the launcher, meaning that you can throw a couple of elements onto the clip launcher to experiment while the rest of of your timeline goes on (or loops) like normal, ready to take events (‘clips’) back after you’ve experimented with your options in the launcher. There’s a playlist function to chain scenes together to fire off in order. It’s clever.

Looping options for audio and MIDI

Seemingly to match the clip launching options, you can now more easily pull out an audio region to loop its current contents across the timeline. This can be done both forwards and backwards in time, the advantage being that you can make a change to the original event (‘clip’) and its looped content will change automatically.

Event looping is a decent quality-of-life feature, although it’s slightly buried as an option you have to select in a right-click menu.

Studio One 7's instruments

If you look at it in the right way, Studio One Pro 7 introduces multiple new instruments and strengthens the experience for others. The DAW’s onboard sound generators were fine in the days of version 2 or 3, but today, products like Mai Tai and Presence are starting to grate. These instruments are fine as preset players, especially given the number of sounds bundled with Studio One, but they’re less credible as instruments in their own right. Most people wouldn’t buy these if they were third-party plugins.

Deep Flight One expands Presence XT with sounds that are rich, complex and grand, made from a mixture of analogue gear and tasteful processing. It’s a great sound expansion for Presence XT, adding capabilities beyond the bread-and-butter scope of the instrument, and there’s a lot of complexity happening behind the scenes. The problem is, perceptually, Deep Flight One never comes across as a whole new instrument, feeling far more like an expansion or new ‘pack’ for Presence XT.

Alongside this, Presence XT Editor is now part of the bargain for all customers, so complex multisampled patches can be created by all. Deep Flight One might be something of an advertisement for the editor, and its sounds are very impressive, but a whole new instrument it is not.

Then there’s Lead Architect, which was first introduced alongside Studio One 6.6. This one actually does feel like a new instrument, merging and blending between three patches of sampled sounds run through some very nice-sounding virtual circuits. Lead Architect is immediately playable and simple, but you can access many of the parameters under its triangular fascia, including filters, LFOs, envelopes, plus all effects, for each of the three sounds per preset. It’s very fun and immediate, if not strictly new in version 7.

Another instrument improvement is with Impact. If the other ‘new’ instruments are hidden in a bad way, then Impact is hidden in a good way: a mini version of the pad-based drum machine can integrate with your piano roll and live right there next to where you actually program it, helping you to tweak sounds and sequence them at the same time. Everything’s within easy reach, and it’s great to see this kind of innovation happening – it gives an advantage to using the ‘stock’ instruments, having them better integrated than a standard-format third-party plugin.

Splice is now integrated natively inside Studio One's browser

In possibly the most talked-about feature of this upgrade, Studio One now hosts sample browsing service Splice right inside the browser. Right there alongside Instruments, Effects and Loops tabs, you get a Splice tab, and logging into your existing account is no fuss, since it’s done through your browser but automatically loads properly in your DAW once ready.

From here, you can browse Splice just as if you’ve got it open in another window, but without leaving the DAW. Or you can use the recently implemented Search with Sounds function to have Splice recommend you sounds based on what’s in your project already. And since ‘your project’ is right there in the same view, you can simply select a few audio regions in Studio One and have Splice go digging for some complementary sounds.

As big Loopcloud users, we’ve been doing things like this for about four or five years, but this level of integration – into the DAW you’re actually using – is an impressive evolution of the concept. The integration into Studio One’s browser is very well executed and quite compelling.

CV Instrument gives pitch and gate translation

Modular and synth fans will be happy with the addition of an external CV instrument in Studio One Pro 7. With the correct compatible audio interface, this instrument converts Studio One’s note data into Pitch and Gate outputs, ready for piping into a CV-led music system, which can be returned back to the DAW through the same plugin or on a new channel, assuming its outputs are connected back to your interface.

We haven’t been able to use the CV Instrument for its intended purpose, so we’ll leave any opinions for other sections.

You can map your grid tempo to a wonky recording

In any DAW that can automate tempo (including Studio One and its Tempo Track), there’s a trick to take a performance recorded without a click and use its timing to manipulate the master tempo so that the project’s grid lines shift to line up with your wonky (sorry, organic) recording. This means you could take a drum kit recording, and by shifting the master tempo under its feet, you could program MIDI in beats and bars as normal, and they’d all conform to the same human timing.

Studio One 7 lets you do this automatically, and makes it very simple. Right-click an audio track and select Audio >> Detect Tempo, and then right-click again and select Extract to Tempo Track. Your project’s timing should now conform to your recording, no matter what the original tempo was.

This is perfect for multiple circumstances, and most obviously, if you have a nice, human-played recording that you want to add MIDI to, or if you want to produce mashups or remixes out of whole tracks or stems, whether they’ve been recorded or produced to a click or not.

The idea behind this one is great, the execution is simple, and the results are highly effective. Everything we threw at this sailed through and worked great with MIDI and even warped loops. A great feature for anyone recording real performances to have. Three thumbs up for this one.

Stems can be separated and instruments broken apart

Stem extraction has moved from being something of a holy grail of the audio world to being something of a plastic cup of the world audio – it’s usually acceptable quality, you’re not quite sure if it’s good for you, and you can find it basically anywhere. Well, that now includes native to Studio One.

Right-click a full stereo track and you can choose to Separate Stems. As mentioned earlier in this review, this is a feature that needs to be installed separately, which is partly due to its 1.6GB size, but it can be a frustrating thing to miss when you want it the most. Stems are separated into vocals, drums, bass and other – standard practice with this sort of thing – and your resultant pieces are nested under a new Stems parent track, which exists alongside the original audio you broke apart (with the event now muted).

In practice, stem separation works fine in Studio One 7. It works about as well as all the other stem separation technologies, which still feel very impressive considering how impossible this was ten years ago. This particular take on the technology feels like it picks up nuances very well in bass, but it suffers from the same confusion of reverb tails, cymbals and sustained sounds as similar technologies.

Don’t expect this technology to blow away its peers, but it’s great to have stem separation in Studio One if you don’t have the technology from anything else.

Global Transpose makes audio and MIDI follow your key

Right in the transport bar, next to the global Key selector, there’s a Transpose selector. Just like each track in studio one has a Follow Chords option in its inspector, it also has a new Follow Global Transpose option too. This leads the track – whether it’s an audio or MIDI track – to follow that master Transpose setting when changed.

If you want to use the global transposition feature, you’ll want to try it with most elements of your track, but likely not drums. It’s great for trying out something in a different key, or temporarily repitching everything to help record something which repitches back with everything else when done.

Verdict

Studio One Pro 7 sees a good number of new features for the DAW, generally themed around creativity, sound design and coming up with new ideas. Users will now find more creative options and capabilities, but the onboard instruments and effects are starting to show their age.

The DAW is still capable of innovation with features like Splice integration and tempo mapping, but spends more time than it should worrying about what other DAWs are doing (or did 15 years ago). This is a development team that has proven its ability to implement great new ideas, and we hope that their own agenda is given more weight than user requests.

For new users, Studio One Pro 7 is a good choice of DAW, and this is helped by its new, lower price point and a fairly simple proposition to the potential buyer. It’s Studio One's editing, mixing and creative features that should help convince users, rather than its set of onboard instruments and effects.

For existing users, Studio One Pro 7 is an upgrade that’s all about creativity. If that sounds like what you look for out of a DAW, you’ll be well served by the upgrade price – whatever your previous tier.

Hands-on demos

PreSonus Audio Electronics

Specifications