Sibelius 6, the latest version of the world’s best-selling music notation software, is now available from Avid. Designed for educators, students, composers, arrangers, copyists and musicians of all kinds, Sibelius 6 is as simple and intuitive to use as a pen, yet so powerful that it does most things in the blink of an eye. The new version includes hundreds of improvements, including many innovative new features never before seen in notation software.

The new features in Sibelius 6 include:

• Magnetic Layout takes care of almost every detail of score layout for you, automatically. As you write, it gives everything just the right amount of space and avoids collisions – producing beautiful results. This one feature cuts the time taken to prepare a score by up to half.

• Live Tempo lets you conduct the playback of your score by tapping a key on your computer keyboard, MIDI keyboard or foot pedal. Sibelius follows your beat just like a real orchestra does: you can subdivide your beat to slow down, beat once per bar in fast tempos, and hold as long as you like at pauses, all without marking up the score in advance.

• Versions keeps track of revisions to your score, lets you look back at earlier versions of it, and see what changes were made since. Add sticky note-style comments to your score as reminders for yourself, or for others. Compare two versions of the same score, or even two separate scores, and see the differences color-coded in the score.

• Sibelius Sounds Essentials, the included sample library, is better than ever and now requires no set-up thanks to the integrated technology from AIR. The new Sibelius Player allows Sibelius to play back up to 128 channels simultaneously (depending on computer power) with real-time effects including convolution reverb. Sibelius even loads the samples required for playback in the background, so you can edit your score while the sounds load.

• ReWire support allows you to sync Sibelius playback with Pro Tools, Cubase, Logic, GarageBand, and more.

• Classroom Control enables teachers to instantly send scores to every classroom computer, temporarily lock student computers to attract their attention, and gather in all student files at the end of a class.

• Keyboard and Fretboard windows allow you to input notes by clicking on keys or frets, or play your computer’s QWERTY keyboard like a piano. These beautiful, resize-able windows are also ideal for students learning notation.

• Professional engraving improvements include the most flexible and controllable slurs of any notation program, automatic stemlets, feathered beams, note-attached arpeggio lines, automatic cautionary accidentals, and intelligently positioned jazz articulations.

And more! Learn more at www.sibelius.com/6.

Sibelius 6 on the Mac requires OS X 10.4.9 or Mac OS X 10.5 or later, a DVD-ROM drive, and 3.5GB of hard disk space. 2GB or more RAM recommended.

Discuss Sibelius 6 in our Sibelius forum.

Applied Acoustics Systems announces the release of Strum Electric GS-1, a new guitar track production plug-in for music producers and composers.

Based on the latest AAS physical modeling technology, Strum Electric includes a collection of classic single coil- and humbucker-fitted guitars, a two-channel amplifier with spring reverb, a speaker cabinet, and effects all featured in a ready-made preset library. It also includes an elaborate voicing module which automatically voices chords played on the keyboard as a guitar player would on the fretboard. Techniques such as down- and up-strokes, slides and bends, hammer-ons and pull-offs, palm muting, muffled strings, and arpeggios are triggered by special strumming keys. Strum Electric also ships with an inspiring MIDI loops library which provides rhythmic figures, strumming patterns, and chord progressions in various musical styles.

“Strum’s great strength lies in the fact that it combines the modeling of the complete chain of elements producing an electric guitar sound—the guitar itself, the amp, and effects—with chord voicing and various playing techniques of a guitar player,” said Marc-Pierre Verge, CEO of AAS, “This allows one to get guitar sounds in about any style and create great guitar tracks easily without an elaborate knowledge of guitar playing.”

Pricing and Availability

Strum Electric GS-1 is available now at a retail price of $229. Strum Electric GS-1 runs on both Mac OS X and Windows, as a standalone application as well as in host sequencers supporting the VST, Audio Units, and RTAS plug-in formats.

Strum Electric GS-1 – Electric Guitar

http://www.applied-acoustics.com/strumelectric/overview/

Sample Logic has released Water Harp. WaterHarp is a collection of 300 instruments making it the most comprehensive waterphone library to date. Weighing in at almost 1.8 Gigabytes, WaterHarp not only includes amazing, ready-to-play, acoustically sampled Waterphone ensembles, but also dives heavily into the world of score-ready morphed instruments.

Instrument categories include:

Ambience (68)
Impacts (67)
Tempo-Synced Rhythms (83)
Stingers (35)
Transitions (27)
Untreated Ensembles (14)
Bonus Material (7)

For years, the waterphone has been heard throughout film and television, and is regarded as the “Matrix-Effect” by many.  Not only does this library contain traditional samples of the waterphone instrument, but goes way beyond by morphing the signature Waterphone sound, creating new organic instruments.

This WaterHarp library delivers Mind-bending ambiences, Suspenseful tension building stingers, Tempo-synced percussive rhythms, and Explosive score-ready impact textures. This library is a must have addition for all film, TV, and game composers.   WaterHarp is designed to streamline your workflow with its well-organized genre specific instruments and performance-ready interface.  With WaterHarp, you will spend less time searching and more time creating. WaterHarp costs 49.95 and is available for direct download.

Requirements:
The WaterHarp is a Kontakt formatted sample library for Mac/PC.  You must own the latest version of Kontakt 2, or 3 (not to be confused with Kontakt player).

Euphonix has announced MC Transport, the latest addition to its line of Artist Series media controllers. MC Transport brings the unparalleled speed, resolution and software integration of Euphonix’ high-end controllers to the personal studio.

MC Transport ships with a comprehensive set of preprogrammed soft keys for all major audio and video applications that instantly come up whenever each application is in focus. All soft keys, transport controls and numeric keys are also fully customizable, and can be easily programmed for a variety of functions to suit your workflow.

MC Transport features EuCon™, a high-speed control protocol developed by Euphonix that enables simultaneous control of multiple applications and even workstations over an Ethernet cable at 250 times the speed and eight times the resolution of MIDI. EuCon automatically detects whatever application is in the foreground and instantly sets MC Transport’s controls, high-resolution display and programmable soft keys to match.

Euphonix has worked closely with the world’s leading software developers like Apple, Steinberg, MOTU and others to deeply integrate native EuCon support into their audio and video applications to provide high-resolution, high-speed control over almost all software functions for an unmatched editing and mixing experience. MC Transport also supports the HUI and Mackie Control protocols for even greater flexibility, at a faster speed and higher resolution than any other controllers. MC Transport is expected to be available in June 2009 at an estimated street price of $399.99.

D’Addario and Planet Waves, have released Chordmaster, a chord library/playback application for iPhone and iPod touch. Our friends at Audiofile Engineering have developed the application.

The Chordmaster boasts a library of almost 8,000 gig-tested chords for every style of music. True to the iPhone and iPod touch, the application can be strummed with gestures. The notes are sampled from D’Addario endorsing artist and Mac OS X Audio.com owner, Marc Schonbrun.

Chordmaster has the following features:

• Support for right and left handed guitarists
• View as notes, or intervals
• View chords in multiple inversions/positions across the neck
• Strum full chords or individual notes

Chordmaster is available for $1.99 from the iTunes store

Read more about it here in the new iPhone and iPod touch forum.

Here’s something cool: Soundlab has released G-Player, a standalone and plug-in Giga player for OS X. Mac users have been longing for a proper solution to playing back Giga samples and Soundlab has delivered.

G-Player is the first native Giga player for OS X. G-Player was designed to play large orchestral sound libraries and supports disk streaming, dimensions, keyswitches and layered instruments. It’s the first player to do this all without the need to import samples.

G-Player supports VST and AudioUnit plug-ins formats. It’s available for $129 through their online store.

You can discuss G-Player here in our forums.

Thanks to Rand for submitting this through our Submit News feature. You’re the first member to do this at our new site! Keep it coming.

The iPhone and the iPod touch are marvels of technology. I’m constantly amazed at what they can do. I was recently talking to Jordan Rudess (of Dream Theater) about the iPhone and its potential for music. He mentioned a new iPhone app called Bebot that he’s been working with. Check out this YouTube video for a great demonstration of Bebot.

What’s amazing is that some of the technology in Bebot was first seen in the Continuum, a very high-end MIDI controller. While Bebot isn’t exactly the same, the fact that it’s $1.99 is staggering.

The iPhone is clearly maturing. With people like Jordan helping developers understand what musicians need, the platform will continue to grow in new and unique ways. As it does, you can count on Max OS X Audio devoting more time to new musical instruments—iPhone and iPod touch.

Blue Cat Audio has announced a massive update of all its commercial EQ plugins. The new versions are now available for Mac in VST and Audio Unit formats. The Liny EQ series have been completely redesigned for this new release.

The Blue Cat Audio EQ plugins include the Liny EQ series (linear phase graphic equalizers), Parametr’EQ series (digital and analog parametric EQs) and the Triple EQ plugins (semi-parametric visual EQs). They all come in three flavors, offering a wide variety of capabilities. In particular, the Widening versions propose mid/side processing for frequency selective stereo narrowing or widening.

New for all plugins:
- Mac Audio Unit support.
- Mac VST Support.
- New documentation.

New for the Liny EQ series:
- New user interface design.
- The plugin now offers two types of EQ curves.
- EQ range is now customizable.
- Undo/Redo support.
- Preset import/export in a host independent format.
- Window opacity control for plugin transparency.

Mac System requirements:
- Intel or Power PC Mac
- Mac OS X Leopard (10.5)
- An Audio Unit or VST compatible application

The plugins are available in several bundles or separately, with a temporary special offer on bundles. Existing customers can update most plugins for free, except the Liny EQ series for which a special upgrade price is available. Demo versions of the 8 plugins can be downloaded on www.bluecataudio.com.

Links:
http://www.bluecataudio.com/Products/Category_EQAndFilters/
http://www.bluecataudio.com/Products/Bundle_LinyEQPack/
http://www.bluecataudio.com/Products/Bundle_ParametrEQPack/
http://www.bluecataudio.com/Products/Bundle_TripleEQPack/

Pricing:
Blue Cat’s Liny EQ Pack (3 Plugins): 99.96 EUR (instead of 119 EUR) or $133.56 (instead of $159)
Blue Cat’s Parametr’EQ Pack (3 Plugins): 99.96 EUR (instead of 119 EUR) or $133.56 (instead of $159)
Blue Cat’s Triple EQ Pack (2 Plugins): 42.14 EUR (instead of 49 EUR) or $59.34 (instead of $69)

Individual plugins prices available on www.bluecataudio.com

Blue Cat Audio happy to announce the release of their audio analysis plugins for the Mac platform in Audio Unit format.

These audio analysis plugins offering original interaction capabilities are available as a single bundle (Blue Cat’s Analysis Pack) or separately. The bundle consists in a versatile audio level meter, spectrum and stereo field analyzers as well as a multiple tracks oscilloscope. While the “Multi” series propose simultaneous multiple tracks analysis with multiple instances linking support, the “Pro” series let you extract parameters from the incoming audio signal and record them asautomation curves or send them as MIDI CC messages. Typical applications are the creation of unique side chaining effects or external signal based hardware control.

To celebrate the support of this new format, we propose a 15% price reduction on the Blue Cat’s Analysis Pack bundle, and a free upgrade for existing customers. Demo versions and available for download on www.bluecataudio.com and our site offers many tutorials to get you started with these plugins.

Plugins:
Blue Cat’s Digital Peak Meter Pro (peak and RMS meter).
Blue Cat’s FreqAnalyst Pro (spectrum analyzer)
Blue Cat’s FreqAnalyst Multi (multiple instances spectrum analyzer)
Blue Cat’s StereoScope Pro (stereo field analyzer)
Blue Cat’s StereoScope Multi (multiple instances stereo field analyzer)

Mac System requirements:
- Intel or Power PC Mac
- Mac OS X Leopard (10.5)
- An Audio Unit compatible application

Pricing:
Blue Cat’s Analysis Pack: 196.94 EUR (instead of 229 EUR) or $257.14 (instead of $299)
Individual Prices and other bundles: see www.bluecataudio.com

The forums are running the newest phpBB software. You should see far fewer spam posts (if at all) along with some other niceties. The site is now on a modern platform that can evolve easily. The look of the site is also in flux. Kevin will hunt down a cool skin in short order. I’m already really exicted about the new tools avaliable to the moderation team.

In recognition of Glenn’s hard work and amazing ethic today, I’m making him a moderator of the site. He not only brings years of web experience, but an impressive pedigree as an electric musician and Logic expert. I hope you’ll welcome him warmly to our community.

***Note: I was asked to reset my password on first login. Kevin was not. Please let me know if you’re unable to get into the site at all. I don’t forse any major issues.

I’ve opened up two new forums on the site today. The first is one for Sibelius notation program. We’ve had enough notation questions over the years to warrant the forum. It also helps that I’m a long-time Sibelius trainer and can facilitate helping out. Now that Pro Tools has Sibelius capability built-in, this move seems very timely given the number of Pro Tools users we have here at Mac OS X Audio.

I’ve also added a forum for Final Cut Pro. Many of us audio folks need to dabble in video at one time or another. Some of us do more than dabble. It’s always interesting to see just how different an audio person looks at a timeline vs a video person. This forum will be a place for all of us to discuss using Final Cut Pro. As I’ve gained some amazing FCP experience in the last year, I’m going to start as a moderator. Clearly, FCP is a big app and my gut tells me that there are other experts here. If you feel you can help out, please private message me. We’ll start out with the FCP app as the focus, and see how many questions come from the Final Cut Studio before we evaluate any sub forums.

As you can tell, we’re really looking to grow the forums. Got ideas for expansion? We’re all ears! 

Marc Schonbrun

We’re happy to have them back, with 100% of the data intact. We’ll revamp the look and feel soon.

Thanks for your continued patience!