06Jul 2018 by Brett Pontecorvo
Building a Step Bass

Building a Step Bass

1Sound Design, Blog, Presets and Sounds
For today's post, we are going to use Ableton's built-in "Operator" to create a step bass. I like to think of a step bass as any bass sound that has a repeating pattern on one note. We are going to create our "stepping" sound today by making use of Ableton's arpeggiator. If you don't have Operator, or even if you don't have Ableton, you can still follow along and build this sound in virtually any synthesizer. I highly recommend synth 1 if you are just getting into building sounds and you need a good plugin to start with. https://youtu.be/u_0KUyhz-GA   Building Your Step Bass Step 1: Add an instance of Operator to a default midi channel strip. Operator is great for FM synthesis, but for our purposes today we want Operator to…
Read More
18Jun 2018 by Brett Pontecorvo
Making A Pulsing Pad Sound

Making A Pulsing Pad Sound

1Sound Design, Blog, Featured, Live Playback, Presets and Sounds
How to make the pulsing synth sound you love Pads are better with a pulse. They add a heartbeat, excitement, and depth to your playing. That’s why so many songs being made now, and honestly for the last long time, incorporate this element. Think about the chorus of “I got a feeling”, or [ Insert accurate song title here ]. There is something intoxicating about the constant rise and fall of the volume: We feel its pulse, and it resonates with us. It gives the impression that the music is alive and moving. If you haven’t noticed this before, now that I’ve pointed it out, you will hear it everywhere. So how do we go about making it? Traditionally, this effect is created using something called sidechained compression. What the…
Read More
09Jun 2018 by Brett Pontecorvo
One Mod wheel – Total Control

One Mod wheel – Total Control

1Creating A Keyboard Set Up, Blog, Presets and Sounds
Can we take one knob or fader ( or mod wheel ) and use it to make our whole set run simply? You bet we can. We are going to walk through how we can map our mod wheel to create dynamics and patch changes, all with one knob. Let’s start by thinking of our patch list this time in terms of dynamics: Here is my list top to bottom Piano/Pad  Piano/E Piano/Pad semi-open filter E Piano/Pad open filter/Organ Now, our goal is going to be to make certain markers, using the minimum and maximum values in our mapping window to create zones of sound. When the mod wheel is all the way down you will only hear a very soft pad and a piano. As we move the mod wheel…
Read More
02Jun 2018 by Brett Pontecorvo
Amp Up The Juno Organ Wavetable Preset

Amp Up The Juno Organ Wavetable Preset

1Sound Design, Blog, Presets and Sounds
The Juno Organ is one of my favorite Ableton presets for the Wavetable synth. Its great right out of the box, but we're going to take a look at how we can use macros to take it up to a whole new level. All synthesizers are customizable in nature. They exist to "synthesize" or create a sound. A standing difference between Mainstage/Logic and Ableton is that in Ableton your synthesizers are visible while you are playing. In Mainstage, you can be playing a synth and have literally no control over any of its parameters. This is one of the reasons that patch level controls are so important on Mainstage. You can’t see the actual synthesizers parameters while you are playing. So if you want to be able to change the…
Read More