WORLD OF MUSIC ; PORTABLE KEYBOARD - Latest Portable Music Keyboards, Synthesizers and Music News

Today, Ableton released a new podcast series called Doing Music, which explores the techniques and strategies that artists use to generate their musical ideas. In each episode, host Craig Schuftan interviews an artist about the hands-on approaches they use to spark ideas in their work – and try to challenge the myth that creativity is something that some people have and others don’t.The podcast is for anyone with an interest in making music. Listeners will get to hear insights from artists on how they stay active in their creative field, and over the course of the series can build a toolkit of practices that can help them spark new ideas too.

Today, Behringer teased its upcoming 16-voice Sequential Prophet-5 copy, the Pro-16.

The Behringer Pro-16 was originally announced back in 2021, when it was described as essentially a knockoff of the Prophet-5, but with 16-voice polyphony.

Behringer today shared this update:

“Recreating this synthesizer was no small feat.

The engineering work involved is extraordinarily complex, requiring meticulous attention to detail and precision. Our team of engineers had to navigate the intricacies of integrating thousands of components to stay true to the original sound while adding modern capabilities.

One of the most challenging aspects of this project was the development of an 8-layer printed circuit board (PCB). For those unfamiliar, a PCB is essentially the backbone of any electronic device, housing all the components and ensuring they work together seamlessly. An 8-layer board means there are eight layers of circuitry stacked within a single board, allowing us to pack more functionality into a compact space. This complexity is necessary to manage the increased number of voices and new features while maintaining signal integrity and reducing noise.

The result is a synthesizer that not only honors the legacy of the original, but also enhances it with 16 voices, offering unparalleled polyphony and richness.”

The Behringer Pro-16 synthesizer will build on the original Sequential Prophet-5 design by adding:

• 16-voice polyphony
• Multi-mode filters. Providing a wide range of tonal possibilities.
• 8-mode atrophy settings: Allowing for extensive modulation and sound-shaping capabilities.
• Poly aftertouch key bed.

Details on pricing and availability of the Behringer Pro-16 are still to be announced.

FX Collection 5 ups the total to 34 “precision-engineered effects for studio mixing and creative production”

Arturia has updated its renowned collection of effects plugins, bringing two new and two existing titles to FX Collection 5.

The two new effects are Bus Peak and Bus Exciter, two processors designed to be used on your master bus chain. Bus Peak is described as a “pro-grade” limiter that combines tone control, clipping and limiting with loudness and True Peak metering. The plugin is aimed at helping you achieve optimal loudness in your mix while maintaining clarity and detail.

Bus Exciter is an exciter effect that’s capable of enhancing both your low end and high frequencies via separate modules. The Exciter module will boost your high-end content to improve its perceived loudness, enabling you to dial in additional harmonics to bring texture and shimmer to the sound, while the Big Bass module adds body to your low-end.

In addition, FX Collection 5 now features two existing Arturia effects, EFX Refract and EFX Motions. The former is a dual-stage, unison-based multi-effect that multiplies a signal eightfold then runs it through one of five effects, BandPass Filter, Comb Filter, Bitcrusher, Distortion and Harmonizer, each of which which can be added to those eight voices and processed individually before being summed back together.

EFX Motions is another multi-effect plugin aimed at bringing motion to your mixes, combining five effects (Noise, Drive, Filter, Volume and Pan) and a Beat Repeat module with a variety of sophisticated modulation options that includes envelopes, step sequencers, envelope followers and randomizers. The plugin’s capable of producing everything from subtly evolving sonic manipulation to glitchy, IDM-esque carnage.

Alongside these four additions, FX Collection 5 features 30 titles that you’ll find in its previous iteration, covering a broad range of applications and including everything from analogue-modelled chorus and filter plugins to lo-fi tape emulators and savage distortion effects.

Find a full list of the plugins in FX Collection 5 on Arturia website.