Developer Peter Postman let us know about RibbonToNotes, a new open-source MIDI plugin that’s designed to give keytar players new superpowers.
What he has to say about it:
“When playing the Keytar, your left hand can’t do much more than some bending and filter sweeping.
With RibbonToNotes, you can also play notes and chords on the ribbon (which many Keytars have). This is convenient for playing key-switches, bass notes and chords on pads, or sending chords to arrangers.
It is not just for Keytars. You can use it for any ribbon. So it is also useful for extending the possibilities of small keyboard controllers.”
RibbonToNotes is open source, created with JUCE for both Windows and Mac. Since it is created with JUCE, it should also be possible to make an IOS version, but currently only Windows and Mac installers are available at the GitHub site.
Ocean Swift has introduced Spectral Oscillator Toolkit, a curated collection of 732 loopable, seamless oscillator sources designed for modular rigs, granular synths, sampler-based instruments, and beyond.
They describe it as “a toolkit for building your own synths – treating WAV loops as raw oscillators to fuel sound design, layering, resynthesis, or cinematic composition.”
“We designed Spectral Toolkit Oscillators to expand the sonic capabilities of your favorite gear,” explains Product Developer Yaron Eshkar. “We love to use them, create them and create with them.”
The sounds are designed to be loaded into samplers, sample-based oscillators, granular engines, or modular systems—allowing you to treat each loop as a foundational oscillator or tonal source within your own synthesis and sound design workflows.
The Spectral Oscillator Toolkit is compatible with, but not limited to, the following samplers, synths, and modular systems that support loading and looping WAV files as oscillators or tonal layers:
Moog Music has released Muse Firmware 1.4, a free update that delivers new features and performance improvements.
Moog Muse Firmware 1.4 updates include:
Global modulation sources have been added, providing six new modulation sources: two global LFOs, two global envelopes, and two global random trigger sources.
23 modulation destinations have been added for use with the new global modulation sources including all parts of the Diffusion Delay, vastly increasing the timbral capabilities and sonic complexities achievable.
New Fade functions available in the Mod Map allow for modulation to fade in or out over the course of a note, giving access to powerful within-note patch transformations.
MIDI integration has been overhauled with full sync functionality, configurable program changes, and more.
Sync to external analog clock has been enhanced with PER-STEP advance mode and new filter LINK MODEs allow for macro control of both filters.
Additional quality-of-life improvements have been added system wide including selectable knob modes, global tuning settings, and patch scrolling via the SELECT encoder.
They say that numerous bug fixes also make Muse firmware 1.4.0 the most reliable and stable firmware yet.
