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Retina

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For everything Apple, since 1985

MacUser 6 JUly 2012

62

free music apps

TOOLS

63

.

/

MAKEMORE

MUSIWITH

APPSFREE

64

FREE MUSIC APPS

in

Ma musi-making progresses

beyond GarageBand, there are

plenty of pro apps you ould

move up to. But by the time

youve budgeted for a seri-

ous digital audio workstation

(DAW) pakage, a olletion

of software instruments to

suit your style and a rak of

virtual effets to shape your

sound, you might need to onsider

looking for a busking pith.

Fortunately, theres a gentler way

to ease your wallet into pro audio. Freeware

is abundant for OS X, and the days are

gone when it meant non-funtional demos

or aky amateur apps. Nowadays youll nd

serious sequeners and impressive effets

offered by devoted enthusiasts who atu-

ally know what theyre doing.

Many of these studio oders enjoy

programming great software just for the

kudos and to make the tools they want

for themselves, of ourse. Theyll often

have PayPal buttons on their websites, so

if you love their apps you an show your

appreiation, but you an use them as long

as you like without any obligation. Any ash

you do give will help make the developers

hobby viable and enourage them to work

on future releases.

Even major players in the musi soft-

ware industry dont shy away from freebies.

Lots of established manufaturers are

more than happy to give away ut-down

editions of their produts free of harge,

knowing that a proportion of users who

take advantage are likely to upgrade to the

full version or at least buy add-on sound

paks later.

To get your studio started, weve piked

some of the very best online synths, sam-

plers and sounds that you an get for

nothing. If youre already an experiened

tunesmith, youll still nd something new

to try among these.

Many of our reommended downloads

ome in the Audio Unit (AU) le format,

meaning the produt is essentially a small

program that runs inside a sequener

as a plug-in. These are reognisable by

the .omponent le sux, and need

to go in your /Library/ Audio/Plug-ins/

omponents folder in order for your

sequening software to reognise them.

Aommunityof

enthusiastskeeps

theSoundfont

formataliveonline.

Theresahuge

volumeof freebies

&

%

65

Soundfonts

GarageBand, whih omes with every

newMa as part of the iLife suite or an

be bought from the App Store for 10.49,

is a nifty sequener in its own right. The

rst way to extend it into DAW territory

is to supplement Apples default sounds

by hunting for free Soundfonts online. It

an also run most of the AU plug-ins well

be looking at, and an use VSTis (Virtual

Studio Tehnology instruments) if theyre

pakaged using a onverter app.

The Soundfont format has been

around for 20 years, but never really

aught on in the pro audio ommunity.

The information within a Soundfont le

mainly onsists of sample waveforms in

PM format ombined with data relating

to pith, mapping and other performane

parameters. Sadly the le format isnt

quite a universal language, and differ-

ent players will reprodue Soundfont

les with varying degrees of suess. But

pretty muh any player will be able to

extrat the raw audio data and enable you

to play bak the basi samples within your

DAW app. Its well worth doing, beause

theres a huge volume of free Soundfonts

out there to be disovered.

A ommunity of enthusiasts keeps

the Soundfont format alive online. Searh

Google for soundfont or the suf-

xes .sf2 or .sfz and youll disover

thousands of sample

paks in every genre

from hip-hop beats to

multisampled lassi-

al instruments. For

example, we found an

aousti piano pak at

zenvoid.org/audio/

"

.

This .sf2 le needs to be

put in the right plae so

that a Soundfont player

run within a DAW an

loate it. Move it to /

Library/Audio/Sounds/

Banks

2

.

Having put your

Soundfont in the

right folder, open

GarageBand and reate a new soft-

ware instrument trak. This will normally

be Grand Piano by default, but youre

going to hange it anyway. In the right-

hand instrument panel, lik Software

Instrument and then lik the Edit tab

1

.

lik Piano next to the ion depiting

a keyboard, and a list of available instru-

ments will pop up. Selet DLSMusiDevie,

whih is GarageBands own Soundfont player

. The player opens in a new window.

At the moment the DLSMusiDevie

is playing default sounds, and you need to

hange that. lik inside the Soundbank:

window, where it most likely says

QuikTimeMusi Synthesizer. Another

drop-downmenu will appear showing the

Soundfonts available. hoose Yamaha

Grand Piano

, or the name of whatever

Soundfont you downloaded and installed

in step 2. If you dont see it here, hek that

you moved the le to the orret loation.

Within this window there are also

options to stream the sounds from dis

(useful if you have a very large Soundfont

or low RAM, though generally best

avoided) and to hange their tuning and

volume. One you lose the window, you

should be able to play the sounds youve

installed just like any of the existing

GarageBand software instruments

+

.

DAWapps

Whatever sounds youre using, youll

need aDAW(digital audioworkstation)

to sequene them together and apply

effets. Full-pried software like Apples

139.99 Logi Pro or Avids Pro Tools

(from around 500) isworth onsider-

ing, but there are other options for the

anny produerwhoswilling to support

lesser-knowndevelopers and save a

paket. Several dediated teams pride

themselves on releasing prodution-

quality sequeners at a fration of the

ost of their big-name ounterparts.

Reaper

The most fully funtional sequener here is

one of the best. It omes as an unrestrited

30-day trial; if you like it, you an buy a

single-user liene for $60 (about 38.50)

to support development and frequent

updates. If you miss the deadline or ant

deide, however, the software will keep

working and wont fore you to pay up.

Reapers memory footprint is tiny,

even though its paked with features and

effets, so its ideal if youre working with

a mobile setup and even if yourMaBook

isnt the most apable. Another benet

,

66

FREE MUSIC APPS

is that Reaper has a very

ative forum for help and advie.

okos, whih makes Reaper, was

founded by Justin Frankel, who earlier sold

Winamp, anMP3 player app, to AOL for

$100million. If you think the name sounds

a bit dodgy, it derives from an even dodgier

line in the lm Oe Spae. Best not ask.

Just download Reaper from reaper.fm.

MuLab Free

This is the light version ofMuLab 4, but

its a apable if not espeially elegant DAW.

The main limitation is that you an only use

four traks; if you exeed that, a little noise

will ut in to remind you that you should be

using the full version. There are a ouple

of onboard effets eho and reverb

and the app an also host up to eight VST

instruments. FindMuLab at mutools.om.

Ardour 2

This ollaborative DAW is funded by dona-

tions. A third version will be released soon;

in the meantime, version 2 supports almost

all audio le formats as well as AU plug-ins.

It even has open ++ soure ode available

for those who really like to tinker under the

hood. Download it from ardour.org.

Effets

Nomix is ompletewithout a touh of fx

(or a buketload, if you prefer).

MeldaProdution

No less than 21 different effets make up

this pakage of outstanding sound

manglers. They download and install easily

as one pakage frommeldaprodution.om,

and if you want more options in the future

its easy to upgrade to the full-prie version.

NI Guitar Rig 5 Player

The free version of Native Instruments

guitar amp/abinet rig, available from

nativeinstruments.om, has more than

enough guitar effets to get you started.

Youll need route the audio signal from

your eletri guitar into yourMa through

a suitable analogue interfae: basi USB

adaptors are available from audio deal-

ers for under 20, or you ould go for

something more exible (seeMaUser, 16

September 2011, p42, bit.ly/mu2719). Then

apply the Guitar Rig effets plug-in to the

appropriate input and strum away.

TAL effets

The high-quality effets here inlude a dirty

Bitrusher, a ouple of reverb emulations

and a silky tube saturation plug-in. The

standout star is the Vooder AU, whih

an make even the most tone-deaf singer

sound tuneful with its 1980s-style envelope

modelling. Find it all at kunz.orrupt.h.

Synths

When youwant to reate sounds from

srath, you need a software synth.

These are some of our free favourites.

GreenOak rystal

Not only do Green Oak produe one of the

nest free synths on the market, they also

roll out free updates at regular intervals.

Its not the prettiest synth, nor the most

modern, but for pure power and exibility

its a great all-rounder. You an breed two

pathes together to reate a mutated hild.

Find it at greenoak.om.

TAL synths

The people at TAL supply four free synths,

and the best of them is the most reent,

NoiseMaker. Its simple interfae belies

its massive sound. Their other offerings

inlude a analogue bassline synth and a

plug-in emulating the sound of the Roland

Juno-60, as used by Duran Duran and the

Eurythmis. Go to kunz.orrupt.h.

Symptohm:Melohman PE

If osillators, envelopes and LFOs leave

you old but you still want some standout

sounds, this synth is for you. The avour

DAW APPS

Reaper A neat, eient

sequener that

osts nothing to download

Ardour 2 Development is

voluntary, as is payment

MuLab Free Four traks

of a full DAW, for nothing

67

is distintly analogue, with keyswithes for

various modulation parameters. You an

even load your own samples and morph

them together. Find it at ohmfore.om.

Drums

Roll your own. Or kik, or rimshot

Mini Spillage

This three-hannel drum synth from

audiospillage.om looks simple enough but

has plenty of power hidden beneath its

smart interfae. With options for envelope

editing, warping and frequeny modula-

tion its possible to oax some fat eletro

sounds from this little wonder.

Drumore Free

For real aousti sampled drum sounds,

this massive library weighing in at over

1GB of hits and loops just ant be, um,

beaten. Both rok and hip-hop styles are

overed, and the main draw here is that you

an onstrut loops and lls in the plug-

in and then drag these diretly into your

DAW. Get it from sonomawireworks.om.

Kikmaker

If its just hard and fast kik drums you

need, look no further than this plug-in from

teragonaudio.om. You an hoose from

over 60 presets and then rene the sound.

The four osillators route to an ADSR

envelope lter and effets panel where you

an drive the ompression and frequeny

expansion to ontrol the sound.

NI Guitar Rig

Your Ma

is the amp

Kikmaker

For beats you

an tweak

Green Oak rystal

Powerful vibes

Kikmaker

For beats you

an tweak

Kikmaker

For beats youFor beats you

an tweak

MeldaProdution 21 effets

give you the

key to a great sound

Drumore Free

Real perussion on tap

TAL synths

With knobs on

68

FREE MUSIC APPS

okos Reaper

(see p65) and youll be presented with the

basi arrangement window. As with most

DAWs, traks an be staked vertially in

the uppermost window and themixing

ontrols run horizontally aross the

bottom half of the sreen

!

. Hover the

mouse pointer over any ontrol or button

for a desription of its uses.

Head to the Reaper Stash, an online

forum for users who donate sounds and

samples. For a basi beat, download the

.wav le from bit.ly/MXLLXw and drag

it into the grey arrange window. Reaper

detets the tempo of the beat automati-

ally and suggests hanging the sample

tempo tomath the projet tempo, so

lik Yes

,

. Press Spae to play or stop.

Experiment with Reapers speed fun-

tions. Either lik in the tempo window

or hoose Projet Settings from the File

menu and hange the tempo to 100. Now

grab the right-hand edge of the sample

and, while holding Option, streth it to t

the new tempo

+

. Loop the sample four

times by releasing Option and dragging in

the samemanner. Use + and - to zoom.

Now for effets.With Reaper you an

stak up effets on top of any type of trak,

be itMIDI or, as in our example, an existing

audio trak. Go to View > FX Browser or

lik the FX button in the trak parameters

pane. Pik a okos effet from themenu.

Weve hosen VST: Reaverbate and the

Dark orridor preset

.

Next, add a seond trak using Reapers

onboard synth, played in from yourMa

keyboard. Go to Insert > Virtual instru-

ment on new trak and hoose okos

VSTi: ReaSynth. Then lik where it says

Input 1 in the trak parameters pane. This

is hanged to InputMIDI/Virtual MIDI

keyboard/hannel 1

. Bring up the vir-

tual keyboard display using View > Virtual

MIDI Keyboard or Option+B.

When you lik within the virtual key-

board, you should be able to play the

synth by pressing the orresponding

keys

(

. Press the reord button on the

transport panel or use md+R to begin

reording.

When youre ready to go further, you

an nd video guides to all aspets of

Reaper at tutorialsforreaper.om and a

detailed manual at bit.ly/JN2HjV.