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Creating music on computer proves a head-scratcher for many.
The creative flow is easily dammed by the complex interfaces of high-end Midi and audio sequencers, such as Cubase and Logic, hence there’s a ready market for entry-level songwriting software.
Apple has been more than busy catering for it with the Mac-only Garageband, part of the £55 iLife ‘06 suite. It’s a supremely simple composition suite that supports pre-formatted audio and Midi-based Apple Loops to speed production.
However, not to be outdone, Steinberg has waded in with Sequel, a product for both OS X and Windows and featuring a similar slap-it-together attitude towards workflow.
Sequel ships with more than 5,000 loops and more than 600 software instruments, any of which can be plonked into the single-window interface and automatically beat-mapped to keep performances in sync. There’s also the facility to record up to eight tracks of audio and import your own samples, so it’s not merely a case of pasting Steinberg’s own offerings into a composition - there is an amount of creative control on offer.
At 6GB, Sequel is a big installation, but that’s mainly down to the supplied audio content which should be hived off to a media drive at the earliest. The audio and Midi content provided is of generally high quality and covers many modern musical genres including dance, metal, electronic and World. However, if your tastes run to the more esoteric, you’ll have to record it yourself via Sequel’s multitrack recording functions.
The software’s layout is refreshingly clean. At top left there's the Pilot Zone, which hosts the main editing, automation and project-management tools. Getting a song going is merely a case of clicking the Add New Track icon and selecting loops from the library via the Multi Zone at base, then shifting them about in the Arrange Zone.
There’s an amount of sample-editing to be had in the Multi Zone, should loops need fine-tuning, and a collection of such popular effects as reverb, delay and chorus, as well as dynamics and EQ processors, can be applied per track or globally. It’s also possible to automate certain functions via draggable handles on timelines that run alongside the audio content.
Come playback, Sequel presents a variety of options. By default, it’ll play what you’ve set up in the Arrange Zone, but there are other replay modes suited to performance. In Live Mode, sections of the song can be assigned to pads which can be triggered as the mood takes you - great for spontaneous songwriting.
Alternatively, there’s Chain Play mode by which song sections assigned to the pads can be triggered in whatever order you fancy, with sections looping when you click the Cycle button. DJs and musicians should find both features highly entertaining.
Once the mix is finalised, you’ve the option of exporting the piece straight to iTunes as an AAC file ready for transfer to an iPod. Alternatively, there’s the means to export uncompressed Wav or Aiff files at up to 44.1kHz, 24-bit stereo.
So, how does Sequel fare against Garageband? The latter handles video, which Sequel does not, and can access Audio Units-based instruments and effects that may be resident on the system. Sequel doesn’t do third-party plug-ins, so you’re limited to what’s bundled. Garageband also has a wealth of Apple Loops libraries, although we’re likely to see Sequel-optimised collections before long.
Where Sequel does score is that it’s available for Windows PC, filling a gap in the market for an entry-level audio/Midi sequencer. For those bamboozled by Acid, Cubase Studio, Logic Express, Sonar, et al, Steinberg’s latest could provide the key to unlocking musical genius. Users will likely move on to more sophisticated products as confidence grows, but Sequel will still fulfil a useful purpose as a live-performance tool.
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All Audio Recording, Editing & MixingTags: Music Software
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