CV – Reason101

84 – Alias8 Multi-Function Fader

I’m obsessed with figuring out solutions to problems. One problem I recently encountered when I was putting together some files for the Alias8 PDF Guide, was trying to get the Alias8 Rack Extension Fader to double for a second control. I wanted to be able to use it to adjust two different parameters (let’s say Amplitude and Pitch of a SubTractor). The idea and thought process behind it is pretty easy. You adjust the Amplitude by moving the Fader, then click a button, and the Fader switches to adjust the Pitch. Click the same button again, and it goes back to controlling the Amplitude.

I’m obsessed with figuring out solutions to problems. One problem I recently encountered when I was putting together some files for the Alias8 PDF Guide, was trying to get the Alias8 Rack Extension Fader to double for a second control. I wanted to be able to use it to adjust two different parameters (let’s say Amplitude and Pitch of a SubTractor). The idea and thought process behind it is pretty easy. You adjust the Amplitude by moving the Fader, then click a button, and the Fader switches to adjust the Pitch. Click the same button again, and it goes back to controlling the Amplitude.

You can download the example files here: Alias8-Multi-Function-Fader. There are two Reason documents (.reason) and two Combinators (.cmb), which are explained below. The files will work in Reason 6.5 and above. To use them, you will also need the Alias8 CV Controller Rack Extension, which is available in the Propellerhead Rack Extension shop. To use, open up the file and go into the Combinator. Press the “Run Pattern Devices” on the Combinator, or press “Play” on the Matrix. The Matrix is used to gate the Subtractor, and is only used as an example so you can hear something when you tweak the Fader. A more comprehensive explanation is provided below.

To start, what I found is that you can’t completely get this type of functionality to work. Not completely. BUT, here are two ideas that get you pretty close.

1 Control with 2 Functions (V.2).reason / F1 2-Function Control (V.2).cmb Files:

I’m starting backwards here, because this was actually the second idea I had (hence, this is Version 2 in the filenames above). This idea uses two toggle buttons, one for Amp and the other for Pitch. Then, with the proper CV routing and an additional Thor to process the CV, you can map both parameters to the Fader. Click the first Toggle, and the Fader will control the amplitude. Click the Second Toggle, and it switches to control the Pitch. When the Amp toggle is off, you adjust the amplitude. Then click the Toggle button on, and the Amp level is held at the current Fader position. Then click the Pitch Toggle off, and the same Fader now controls the Pitch. Click the Pitch toggle on, and the Pitch is held at the current Fader position. The drawback is that you have to have both Toggle Buttons on to start with, and you can’t turn off both of them, since this would screw up the functionality. One of the buttons always has to be “On.” To get it “set” right again, you need to turn on both Toggles, then, turn one of them off and use the Fader. Sounds confusing, I know. But it’s the most efficient way I’ve found to set it up, as it only uses two Toggle Buttons (aside from the Fader).

The Back of the rack for the "Version 2" example that uses 2 Toggles to switch Fader Parameters and simultaneously "Hold" the CV values via the BV512 devices. — The Back of the rack for the “Version 2” example that uses 2 Toggles to switch Fader Parameters and simultaneously “Hold” the CV values via the BV512 devices.

The CV routings from the BV512 into the SubTractor (destination parameters). The Matrix is there simply to "Gate" the SubTractor, so you can hear something and test out the Fader. — The CV routings from the BV512 into the SubTractor (destination parameters). The Matrix is there simply to “Gate” the SubTractor, so you can hear something and test out the Fader.

The settings for the Modulation Bus Routing Section in Thor.

1 Control with 2 Functions (V.1).reason / F1 2-Function Control (V.1).cmb Files:

This next idea uses three additional buttons (aside from the Fader). The two Toggle Buttons act as the Amp / Pitch selection (as above), but a Momentary Button is used to switch between the two Fader states. The benefit of doing it this way is that you can’t screw up the functionality of the Fader in any way. The two Toggle Buttons act to “Hold” or “Freeze” the Level’s position for the selected parameter. The selection of which parameter the Fader controls is determined by the Momentary button. While I think this is a better method in some respects, it suffers from one disadvantage: You can’t tell which parameter is selected via the Momentary Button. There’s no real visual indication to tell you which of the two parameters are selected. This isn’t a big concern when you have only two parameters switched via the Momentary Button, but if you have several parameters you’re cycling through on that Button, things will get confusing quickly (though you could add a visual indicator with the DDL-1 or BV512 Vocoder, but it’s still not perfect – if interested in how this works, see the Kong FX Chain Builder tutorial where I discuss it at the bottom of the page).

The Back of the Rack for the "Version 1" example that uses 1 Momentary Button to switch Fader parameters, and 2 Toggle buttons that "Hold" the CV values of the Fader via the BV512 devices. — The Back of the Rack for the “Version 1” example that uses 1 Momentary Button to switch Fader parameters, and 2 Toggle buttons that “Hold” the CV values of the Fader via the BV512 devices. Note that the CV coming from the BV512 devices are routed into the SubTractor in the same way as the “Version 2” example (Refer to that image further up in this post).

How Does It Work?

The engine of this CV trick is the Thor device. What’s happening is that you are sending the CV value from the Fader into Thor, converting that CV value to Audio, then sending it through the BV512, where it gets converted back to a CV value that is sent out by Band 1 to control the SubTractor parameter (Amp or Pitch). The reason you need to convert it to Audio is because the BV512 Modulation input can be “held” — this allows you to “hold” the Fader value via the Toggle buttons on the Alias8. Note that this is also useful for a lot of other things because it allows you to “Freeze” any CV value in place (for instance, you could freeze the value of an LFO at any time by mapping the “Hold” button to a Combinator button, but that’s going a bit off tangent). There are 2 different BV512 devices because you need to be able to “Hold” each parameter you want to control with the Fader.

Another thing to keep in mind is the CV amount value of 39 in the Modulation Bus Routing Section on the front of Thor. This seems to be the correct value to correctly scale the “CV > Audio” conversion going out from Thor to the BV512 Vocoder. Note that the Rotary is used to Scale this “CV > Audio” conversion, and then the Fader value is going into Thor and modulating the Rotary, which in turn modifies the CV value being sent into the BV512 device. It seemed like the easiest way to set it all up, and the other benefit is that it doesn’t use any routings or mappings in the Combinator device itself.

A Few Additional Notes:

The value sent to the Fader seems to be Scalar, not Linear. Anyone who knows how the CV value can be sent to the Fader in a Linear way, please let me know.
I also would have loved to have one Toggle or one Momentary button switch between the two Fader parameters (keeping everything in one column in the Alias8), but I honestly don’t think this can be done. However, if you figure out a way, please let me know.
Even though this concept creates a multi-function Fader, there’s nothing saying you can’t set it up on a Rotary control instead, to produce a multi-function Rotary.
Why is this an important concept? Because it extends the functionality of a single Control on the Alias8, and the Alias8 device itself. For example, with a little thinking, you could create 8 different controls on 4 of the Alias 8 Faders, and still have 4 Free faders left over for more tweaking. Or have all the Toggle Buttons switch 8 different destination parameter controls on a single Fader, and free up the other 7 Faders for more tweaking.

Update

Eric Kloeckner was kind enough to expand on this idea and improve upon the above design. He managed to put the whole setup on a single Toggle button to switch the operation of the Fader between the two modulations. It solves the need for having two separate toggle buttons to drive the two different parameters.

I then took his design and tweaked it a little to make it as straightforward as possible. The concept uses 2 Thors to control the Toggle switch. This, in turn switches the Fader between the two modulation controls. The only downside is that you have to first “initialize” it by pressing the Toggle button at least once. But this is a huge improvement. And my thanks goes to Eric for finding a solution to one of the problems that was bugging me. Download the Files here: Alias8-Multi-Function-Fader-v2. There are two files in this zip:

Example File Combinator: Press play, and then toggle between adjusting the Pitch and the Level using Fader 1 on the Alias8.
Template File: Use the Output A / Output B spiders to send CV values to target multiple parameters as you wish. “A” parameters are adjusted when the toggle button is “off” and “B” parameters are adjusted when the toggle button is “on.” Use this setup to create a template where all 8 faders can have multiple-functions if you like.

Note: There’s still a slight discrepancy between the CV input & output. In other words, it’s still not 100% Fader value CV : Destination value CV. You’ll still get slightly off results (where moving the fader on a single CV value will bump up the Output CV value by a value of “1,”). However, this is very slight, and shouldn’t be a problem in most cases.

That’s it for now. Don’t forget that the Alias8 PDF Guide I put together contains many other creative ideas for this Rack Extension, so check it out as well. Happy Reasoning!

62 – Song without a Sequencer

After working with the Thor step sequencer, and in honor of Music Making Month at Propellerhead Software, I posted a challenge on TSOR (The Sound of Reason): Create an entire song without the main sequencer in Reason. So here is my attempt at a song without a Sequencer. And I’m here to say, it can definitely be done!

You can’t use the main sequencer. This means you can’t have any note, audio, pattern or automation lanes or clips. Kindly step away from the Main Sequencer!
The song has to be a decent length: about 3-5 minutes.
You can use the L / R and End markers in the sequencer (to indicate the end of the song, or to loop the song over again so we at least know the song’s end location).
It can’t be a “live jam” and it can’t consist of the same one note sound over 4 minutes in length (yes, I get the joke Mr. Marcel Duchamp — Har dee har har). In the spirit of a challenge, this is put out there to challenge you as a musician who loves making songs in Reason. So give it a good shot.

What you end up with is a song that is pretty much controlled via CV and the device sequencers (Thor, Redrum, and the Matrix). After a few days, here’s what I came up with:

Song without a Sequence by Phi Sequence

I thought this was an interesting challenge, given it’s not easy to throw the Main Sequencer aside. For one thing, how do you mute or fade in / out? For another, how do you automate your sends? All very interesting challenges and all will require those that participate to flex their CV muscles. And I strongly encourage you to do so, because the more you learn about CV and the back of the Reason rack, the more you will understand inner connections, and the easier it will be to take what’s in your head and spit it out in Reason.

So enough preaching. Here, I’m going to explore a few tricks to overcome the lack of the Main Sequencer in our song challenge.

You can download the project files here: Song-without-a-Sequencer. This is a zip file that contains a reworked copy of the 128-step forward sequencer Combinator that is used extensively below (works with Reason 4 & 5, and Record 1.5), as well as a finished song file I created without the use of the Main Sequencer or any automation, notes, or pattern lanes / clips (the Song file works with “Record 1.5 + Reason 5”). Note: please respect that the included song file, like everything else on this site, is under the Creative Commons 3.0 licensing, meaning you can mix, remix, share, and play around with the song to your heart’s content, but you will need to provide the source info and a link back to my site here in any productions you do with this file. Share and share alike ok? And you can’t make any money off the file. But if you remix or play with the file, send them back to me privately and I’d be happy to showcase them here in a new posting (send to my email in the top menu), I’d love to see what you come up with. Don’t be shy! 😉

To start tackling this pickle, I first thought about how the song would be sequenced? Since I can’t use any note lanes, the notes would have to be placed inside one of two possible devices: The Thor Step Sequencer or the Matrix. You can also use the RPG-8 to help play your notes and the Redrum could be used as a sample player/sequencer. But I thought I would stick to the Thor and Matrix for most of my song. As I have already explored creating a song entirely using Matrix sequences on my blog, I thought it would be a better challenge to use Thor as my main sequencer. Note: it also helped that I just came off a Thor Step Sequencer bender in the last 2 tutorials I wrote. So it was fresh on my mind.

With that accomplished, I had to set out using Thor as the sequencer for the song. The next step is to figure out the length of your song. If my song is 120 beats per minute, and I use 4/4 time, each bar is 2 seconds long, or 30 bars per minute. If I set up Thor’s step sequencer rate to be 4/4, that means each step is one full bar long (2 seconds). Using this rate/resolution, I can calculate that I will need 8 Thors to sequence a song 4 minutes long (4 minutes = 120 bars or 120 steps in Thor. Thor can produce 16 steps, so 120 / 16 = 7.5 Thors). I promise that will be the only math you’ll need to do in this tutorial. 😉

So the way I started was to create a Combinator with 9 Thors all strung together. See the Generative Ideas tutorial for a complete explanation, or you can download the Project Files at the top of this tutorial. We’re using the forward running Thor 128-step sequencer as a starting point. This is a Combinator that you can modify for use as a forward running sequencer to control various sounds and their levels. You can set all the rates on these Thors to 4/4 and you’ll have yourself a 4-minute sequencer. Now comes the modifications:

Since we can’t use the Main Sequencer at all, we need a way to a) Trigger the Step sequencer via CV, and b) modify the sound source levels via CV. Here’s how you do that:

Triggering the Step Sequencer via CV

The biggest problem you will encounter when doing things this way is how to trigger the step sequencer to start, and ensure it is only triggered once, and never again. The solution I came up with is to use 2 Matrix Curves inside the step sequencer Combinator.

Hold your Shift key down and create a Matrix under the set of sequenced Thors (we’ll call this “Trigger 1”). Switch to “Curve” mode, and on pattern A1, set it to 32 steps with a resolution of 1/2 (though I don’t think the step length or amount of steps really matters, as long the step length is above 2 steps, but as these settings worked for me, I’m not going to deviate from them). On step 1, set the curve to it’s full height (MIDI 127).
Select this Matrix, right-click and select “Duplicate Devices and Tracks” to create a copy of the first Matrix (we’ll call this “Trigger 2”).
The 2 Matrix Triggers (Trigger 1 and Trigger 2) with the exact same Curve settings.
Now flip to the back of the rack and send the Curve CV from Matrix 1 into CV input 1 on the Combinator. Send the Curve CV from Matrix 2 (Trigger 2) into CV input 2 on the Combinator. Set the Trim knobs on both CV inputs to full 127, and switch to “Unipolar”

Note: If you have Reason 4, you can still do this trick, just send the Curve CVs from both Matrixes into Rotary 1 and Rotary 2 CV inputs, set their trim knobs to full, and on the front of the Combinator, turn Rotary 1 and 2 down to 0 (zero; fully left).

The two Matrix Triggers' Curve CV cables being sent to CV 1 & CV 2 inputs on the Combinator, respectively.
Flip to the front of the rack and in the Combinator’s Programmer, select the first Thor device in your sequence. Enter the following into the Modulation Routing:
CV in 1 > Button 1 : 0 / 1 (For those using Reason 4, change “CV in 1” to “Rotary 1”)

The first Thor Step Sequencer Triggered to start by the Curve of the Trigger 1 Matrix.
Select the Matrix 1 (Trigger 1) device and enter the following into the Modulation Routing:
CV in 2 > Pattern Select : -1 / 0 (For those using Reason 4, change “CV in 2” to “Rotary 2”)

The Trigger 1 Matrix's Pattern switched by the Trigger 2 Matrix.

Now what happens is as soon as you hit the Play button on the Transport, the second matrix triggers the pattern of the first Matrix, which kicks off the first Thor step sequencer (provided Button 1 on this Thor is set to trigger the start of the Sequencer — turning it on, which should already be set up if you downloaded the 128-step sequencer). The great thing about this setup is that it’s a “one-time” trigger setup. Every time the Matrixes come around to trigger again, Matrix 1 will be one step ahead of Matrix 2, and so the first Thor will never be triggered twice. If it were triggered twice, you’d end up with all kinds of problems with multiple CV values output and summed together. Trust me, it’s not what you want to hear coming out of your sequencer.

Ask me why the steps of both Matrixes go out of sync or lag 1 step behind each other and I couldn’t tell you. I’m just happy that they do in this instance. I’m sure somewhere down the road I’ll be doing something totally different with the Matrix and need them in sync, and get all upset because they aren’t. But not here. Here I’m happy happy happy.

Modify your Sound Source Levels via CV

Now that we have the sequencer setup properly, it’s time to add in our sounds. If you look at the song I uploaded, you’ll see that I am using Curve 1 and Curve 2 of all the “Level” Combinators to output 2 level values from each “Level” Combinator. The final output of both curves are sent to the CV input on the Mix channels of the sound devices. This way, you can use the Thor Step Sequencer as a “Level” sequencer for each sound device.

The 2 Curve Outputs: The final Merged Output is sent to the splitter side of the Spider, and then one of the splits is sent to control the level of the sound device.

The 2 Curve inputs: The CV controls the level of the sound device. Input is on the Mix Channel, and the Trim Pot is set to 100.

If you need more level controls, just duplicate the 128-step sequencer Combinator and send the Merged Curve outputs to the devices you wish. Just make sure to keep all the Step Sequencer rates the same in all Thors so that you don’t go out of sync. Not that you can’t change the rates, but things will be much easier if all the Thors in each of the Combinators move at the same time through their steps.

Using this method, you can now fade in your song and fade out your song by adjusting the steps’ curve values in the first Thor sequencer (fading in) and adjusting the steps’ curve values in the last Thor (fading out). You can also control what is heard at any point in time along the song. For instance, I added a Trance Lead “Fill” in the middle of the song by adjusting the steps of the curve that controls the Fill’s Mix Channel Level CV. If you open up this Combinator, you’ll see that all the curve CV values of all the Thor steps are 0 (zero), except for Thor 4, 5 and 6. The curves in these Thors are raised up to around 64 gradually (fading in), and then lowered back down to 0 (zero) gradually (fading out). This has the effect of bringing the fill into the soundscape in the middle of the song. At the same time, most of the other devices except the Basses are lowered during the fill. If you wanted to mute any part along the way, just make sure that the curve value is set to zero. To have it sound, bring it upward to the level you desire (any non-zero level).

Alternately, if you want to mute the sound for a given device, you can just turn off the step where you want to mute the sound (the small red square beneath the steps). However, if you mute this way, it will mute both curves, so if you are controlling 2 devices with the 2 different curves of the same Thors, you’ll end up muting both devices. To get around this, have only one curve from Thor controlling one device (put another way, use only one 128-step sequencer Combinator to control one sound device).

So that shows you how to Trigger your song, change the sound device levels over time, and mute the sounds in your song.

Adding Send Effects

Another thing I wanted to try and accomplish is adding a send effect into the Record Main Mixer and control when and where this effect gets added. If you look at my song, you’ll see a Delay device connected to “Send 2” of the Master Section. This is a nice send effect to use because it already comes equipped with a “Dry/Wet” control on Rotary 4. The crux of the biscuit is this: You need to set up a similar Dry/Wet control for any send that you want to control during the duration of your song. This way, you can use another Curve from a 128-step sequencer Combinator into the Rotary 4 CV input on the back of the Combinator, and turn the CV Trim Knob all the way up to 127. Then flip the rack around and reduce Rotary 4 to 0 (zero; all the way left).

Rotary four (dry/wet knob) is reduced to 0 (zero) shown on the left, and a "128-step sequencer curve" is sent into the Rotary 4 input on the back (with the trim knob set to 127), shown at right.

Next, you need to turn on the Send effect for the devices that will use it (you’ll see in my song that the drum and Rex Loops take advantage of this delay send effect). Now, in much the same way as the sound devices are being controlled by the other step sequencer Combinators, the level of the “wet signal” of the delay is being controlled by yet another merged Curve value from another Sequencer Combinator. It’s as easy as saying “right-click Duplicate Device and Tracks” — of course you’ll have to go into each Curve and tweak the levels of the Curve’s step values in all the Thors, but I think by now you get the gist of it.

The Send settings for my song. The delay is set to Send number 2.

Now just for the fun of it go into the Main sequencer, and delete all the tracks (Don’t delete the devices, just the tracks). Set the End marker to somewhere after 4 minutes and press Play on the Transport. Your song will play through from start to finish. You’ve now created an entire track without the Main Sequencer. I knew you could do it!

Bye Bye Main Sequencer. Asta la vista. Adios. Arivaderce!

Where do you go from here?

This tutorial touches on a few ways you can control your song via CV. It’s by no means the only way it can be done. Not by a long shot.

Another way you could control devices without the main sequencer is to send them through a 14:2 Mixer. If you place the mixer inside a Combinator, you can check the box in the Combinator programmer, to have the Mixer receive notes. Then you can send CV into the Combinator’s Gate/CV input and play the appropriate keys to Mute or Solo your tracks connected to the Mixer. You could also send the Curves from the 128-step sequencer into the Mixer’s Level CV input, much as I have done in my song. This would control your fade-ins and fade-outs.

You could also use a Matrix device inside a Combinator and string together patterns going from A1 – D8. Then map the “Pattern Select” to a Rotary and use a very long slow LFO to move the Rotary over time. The matrix can then control any number of other devices with the Note/Gate CV source, and then you can use the Curve CV to adjust levels of the device, in much the same way I have done here. The only downside to the Matrix is that you don’t have any read-out of the CV levels, as you do in Thor, and so this can be a little daunting.

I hope this creative exercise inspires you to try it out yourself. Or at least shows you a few new hints and tricks when working with the Thor Step Sequencer and CV. Now back to making more music. It is music making month after all. 😉

61 – Generative Ideas (pt. 2)

Continuing our story about creating some random generative musical ideas in Reason, I’m going to take the Random Sequencers we built previously and find some usefulness for them. So hold on to your hat. It’s going to be a bumpy ride.

You can download the project files here: Generative-Ideas-Part2. The files highlight the ideas I’m covering here. Note that some of the files work for Reason 4 and some work for Reason 5. C’est la vie.

Random Glitch Box

The Front panel settings on the "Glitch Box" Combinator

The first and probably best use I can find for these random generators is as a glitch box. Surprise surprise. This one really is a no-brainer. Just fire up the 128-step sequencer, duplicate the devices, and with a little reworking we have two separate randomizations: one for the notes and the other for the gate. Then load up a sample that spans the length of the keyboard, and this will be our “Grain Sample” which will be played via the sequencer Combinator. You can put the sample player inside the Combinator and just rewire the sound source CV / Gate inputs into your device of choice. Here, I’m going to use an NN19 for the sample.

The front of the Sampler glitch Box. It's almost like a Grain sampler, when you use the sequencer this way.

The back of the Sampler. You could also randomize the "Sample Start Time" if you wanted to go further with this idea.

Random FX

Remember that gargantuan “Key Flux FX Processor” I built oh so long ago? Well how about we fire up that bad boy and take it for the ride of its life. Using the same sequencer as above, we’ll plug it into the FX processor, and let it process any of your sounds. Just sit back and watch it cycle through all the various effects randomly. I think I could sit here for hours just listening to it doing its thing.

Crafting Some Useful Leads

Though this might not make any earth-shatteringly great lead tracks, you can make your sequencer more musical by implementing the following idea. First, take the 64-step sequencer, and change the notes around so that each of the four “Thor Sequencers” are 2-steps long. Then put the first two notes of your key (here we’ll use the key of C Major to keep it simple) into the first sequencer, the next two in the second sequencer, and so on. You will end up with this configuration:

Thor Sequencer 1: Step 1 = C3; Step 2 = D3

Thor Sequencer 2: Step 1 = E3; Step 2 = F3

Thor Sequencer 3: Step 1 = G3; Step 2 = A3

Thor Sequencer 4: Step 1 = B3; Step 2 = C4

Next, we’ll map the other steps so that we can add more of specific notes from the same key. In my patch I put more C, E, and G notes in the empty steps on the first Thor sequencer, and more of the D, F, A, B notes in the empty steps of the second Thor sequencer. I then added some sharps and flats into the third Thor sequencer, and additional suspended notes (and Octave shifts — i.e.: C4 notes) into the fourth Thor sequencer.

The steps in the first "Thor Step Sequencer" showing a C3-E3-G3-C4 pattern.

Finally, in the Combinator Modulation Routing section, I mapped the Sequencer > Step Length parameter of all four thors to Rotary 3 & 4, and Button 3 & 4 respectively. The min / max values on all were 2 / 16. This way, we can use the Rotaries and Buttons to add in further steps to increase the “weight” of them into the Random sequencer. For instance, if you turn up Rotary 1, you will introduce more C, E, and G notes. This has the effect of weighting those notes more than other notes in the key. In other words, the sequencer will “pick up” and “play” those notes more than the others.

The front of the Combinator, showing the Rotaries / Buttons. Note the Step Count is mapped to Rotary 3 to add more weight to C-E-G notes.

Of course if the Combinator had more Rotary assignments, you could weight each key separately using 8 rotaries. But that’s just not the case. But if you look at my Kongtrol articles from a few weeks back, you could very easily build it using Kong (wink wink, nudge nudge).

The patch I built only uses 1 octave range, but there’s nothing stopping you from building this across multiple octaves, up to 128 steps, using my random sequencer here. Or you can use the Transpose feature to raise it to two octaves. Or you could use the RPG-8 to force octave switches, but then you’re going to be inputting values into the “Main Sequencer” in Reason, and I’m trying to stay away from doing that.

Modulation, Modulation, Modulation

Another interesting use of the random sequencer is when you start to get into modulation. With a random setup, you can use the CV output to modulate parameters on any of the Reason devices, even ones that don’t have a CV input (using the Combinator Rotaries as the CV pass-through). Included in the file is a “Mods” patch which show you how to create a random EQ generator and also use the same random sequence to affect some parameters to the Thor sound source directly (via CV1). The Thor’s CV1 is then mapped to the “Amp Pan” and “Osc 3 Position” parameters. Note that in order to get the EQ Frequency modulated, you need to send the random sequence CV to a Combinator rotary first. Then in the Combinator’s Modulation Routing section, you can map the rotary to affect the EQ Frequency. In the patch I’m providing, I set the Min / Max values to 600 / 100, which provided some nice movement to the sound.

The front of the Combinator showing the Thor sound source and EQ, Both of which are modulated with the Thor Random Step Sequencer.

The back panel showing the Note CV sent to the Spider and then sent to Rotary 1 and the Thor sound source CV 1 input.

The front panel of the Combinator with the Programmer displayed. Note that the EQ Parameter 1 Frequency is mapped to Rotary 1. This way a parameter without a CV input can be controlled via CV using the Rotary as a pass-through.

In a nutshell, if you open this patch, you can press play on the transport, which starts the sound. No modulation is affecting the EQ, Pan, or Osc 3 Position parameters yet. In order to turn on these modulations, press button 1 (Run / Reset). You will then hear the modulations taking effect. To select the amount of modulation applied, use Rotary 1. To affect the Synced Rate of the modulations, use Rotary 2.

Note: in this kind of setup, I only used the “Note CV” value from the random sequencer. The gate CV value was not needed or used. I also removed the CV visualization DDL-1 devices, so that the patch would be accessible for both Reason 4 and Reason 5 users. Note also that the CV values are inverted through the Spider so that Rotary 1 will gain more modulation when turned to the right. If the signal wasn’t inverted, turning the Rotary to the right would produce less modulation, which is counter-intuitive in my book.

Where do you go from here?

These are just a few ideas I had when I was playing around with the Random Sequencer I created. As I went from having the first initial “problem,” I ended up with several interesting sequencer patches and ideas. This just proves that if you have a single thought or problem, and you can solve it, you can end up going in a lot of different directions which lead to even more ideas and creative projects. So I guess my point is this. Find as many “problems” as you can, and then work toward solving them. Because that just might be the creative spark you need to start an imaginative wildfire.

One other place you could take this is to build an entire “generative” song, in which all parts of it are randomized. In this case, if you used the Thor sequencer here, you would end up with a song that is never the same way twice, and one which bypasses the Main Reason sequencer entirely. As a creative project, that would be quite an undertaking. But if you want creative ideas, there they are.

Another creative “generative” idea is to blend multiple LFOs together, so that you end up with a lot of variety. You could then take a third LFO and use that to apply to one of the two LFO’s rate or amount parameter. There’s all kinds of ways you can layer LFOs to come up with some pretty intricate modulation sources. But I think I’ll save that one for another article at a later date. For now, I’m pretty much done looking at Thor’s sequencer for a while. And it’s Music Making Month, so it’s time to actually make some music right?

PS: If you come across any other ideas related to this idea of “Generative” or “Random” music, please share them. I’d love to hear and take a look at what you’re working on. All my best for now.

58 – Taking Komplete Kongtrol

This tutorial should prove a little enlightening for those that only think of Kong as a basic drum module. Here we’re going to twist it into the ultimate controller for everything under the sun. For starters, I’ll show how Kong can control 8 filters at once, and then I’ll move on to use Kong to control the FM Pair Oscillator in Thor. Using some of these methods, you’ll be able to control pretty much anything in Reason or Record with Kong; moving traditional device control from a basic keyboard to a Pad controller.

Sound exciting? I thought so.

You can download the project files here: Taking-Komplete-Kongtrol. This file contains 2 .rns and 2 .cmb files that are outlined below. Both require Reason 5 or Record 1.5 due to the fact that it uses the new Kong device and new CV inputs on the back of the Combinator. There is also a “Volume Control” example .rns file for you to get your feet wet.

Note also that I’ll be unplugged until next Thursday April 15th, so don’t take it personally if I don’t respond to questions until that time. Some times you just have to unplug from things for a bit. But feel free to leave me a little love. I promise to get to all your comments or questions when I jump back online. Have a great week! 🙂

A Little Background

When I was working on my mammoth “Key Flux FX Processor” patch I got a post on the Propellerhead User Forum from someone who jokingly said “what’s next? A Kong controlling Thor? A Thong?” After I stopped laughing and rolling around on the floor, I thought about it for a minute and said “well why not?” And that was the start to this tutorial here. I decided I wanted to try to control Thor with Kong. Whether or not this is practical is for you all to decide. For my part, I can see this being a new fun way to play around with the devices inside Reason.

Understanding the Kong Control Concepts

There are two main concepts that I’d like to outline here. The first is the idea of using the Pads in Kong as an up / down selector switch to transpose MIDI values up or down. The other is the idea of visualizing these changes in Reason, since visualization in Reason (and Kong especially) is somewhat limited.

The first concept was opened up to me by Ed Bauman of EditEd4TV fame. In the midst of his working on recovers for his 80’s band, I asked him to help me figure out how to transpose from one octave to the next using the Kong pads. This helped me set up the Kong Piano Roll Keyboard (again, that was explored in another article). So credit where credit is due. Without his help on that project, I couldn’t have figured out some of these tangential concepts to control other parameters with the Kong pads.

The concept works like this: Using one pad in Kong for the upward movement and one pad for the downward movement, you use the Thor Step Sequencer “Note Transpose” function to manipulate a device parameter that goes from 0 – 127 MIDI value. Each time the up or down pad is pressed, it transposes the value by an increment of “1.” For example, you can go from 64 to 65 to 66 to 67 and so on, using the “Up” pad. Since Reason allows you to interchange CV values (using Note CV for Gate or Gate CV for Note), this isn’t difficult to accomplish.

Here’s the basic setup to control the Volume of a Channel in the Mixer (just as an example):

Open up Reason with a Main Mixer. Then create a Combinator with a 14:2 Mixer. Underneath that, create a sound generating device (for simplicity’s sake, create a Subtractor and load up your favorite Sub patch). But note that this can be any device you like. Underneath that, create a Matrix and add a pattern in, so that it is playing the Subtractor.
Now holding the Shift key, create a Kong device. Still holding Shift, create a Thor device and call it “Vol Up.” Completely initialize the Thor device by pulling down all the parameters, removing the Oscillator and Filter, and turning everything to 0 (zero). Also while we’re at it, pull down the level of the Channel on the Mixer where the Subtractor is connected to 0 (zero).
Open up the Thor programmer, and in the Step Sequencer set the Run Mode to “Step,” Step Count to “1,” and set the first step’s note to “D3.” In the Modulation Bus Routing System (MBRS), set up the following 2 lines in the first 2 slots:
Seq. Note : 100 > S. Transp (Step Sequencer Note : 100 > Step Sequencer Transpose)

Seq. Note : 100 > CV Out1
Duplicate the “Vol Up” Thor device and rename it “Vol Down.” Then go into this Thor’s Step Sequencer and change the note value of step 1 to “A#2.”
The MBRS / Step Sequencer settings for the "Vol Up" Thor device.
Next, holding the Shift key down, create a Spider CV Merger/Splitter at the bottom of the Combinator rack and name it “Vol Merge.” Now it’s time to route everything up.
Flip the rack around to the back, and on the Combinator’s 14:2 Mixer, turn the Subtractor channel’s level trim knob up to 127. Then connect the Merged output from the “Vol Merge” Spider to the Level CV input on the Mixer channel.
Connect the Kong’s pad 1 “Gate Out” CV to the “Gate In (Trig)” CV input on the “Vol Down” Thor. Also connect Kong’s pad 5 “Gate Out” CV to the “Gate In (Trig)” CV input on the “Vol Up” Thor.
Connect the CV 1 Modulation Output from the “Vol Up” Thor to the “Vol Merge” Spider’s Merge Input 1. Also connect the CV 1 Modulation Output from the “Vol Down” Thor to the “Vol Merge” Spider’s Merge Input 2. Set both trim knobs to a value of “84.” That’s the magic CV number that makes things happen correctly.
The CV routing for the Up / Down Volume Control using the Kong Pads
Flip the rack to the front again, and label Pad 1 in Kong “Vol Down” and Pad 5 “Vol Up.” Now play your device by pressing “Play” on the Transport and you’ll hear the volume at level 64. Press Pad 5 about 10-15 times and you’ll start hearing the volume rising. Press Pad 1 and the volume drops. You’ve now set up Kong to act as your up / down fader for the volume of your Subtractor device.

Visualizing the Kong Volume Control

Since there’s no visualization in Kong, it’s hard for us to track where the volume is located for the Subtractor. Here’s one way to do it using the DDL-1 device. Note that this trick is curtosy of Sterioevo, and I can’t thank him enough for showing it to me. See the comments to my previous “Kong FX Chain Builder” tutorial for more information on the ins and outs of this visualizing method.

Building on our previous volume level control, hold Shift down and create a DDL-1 device underneath your Kong device. Label it “Volume Viz” or something like that. Also change the Unit to “MS” for Milliseconds.
Open up the Combinator programmer, select the “Volume Viz” device, and in the Modulation Routing area, set up the following line:
CV In 1 > Delay Time (MS) : 1 / 127
This sets up the CV 1 input on the combinator to change the display of the DDL-1 to show values between 1 and 127.
Now we just need to send the same CV merged signal to also send a value to the CV 1 input on the Combinator, so flip the rack around to the back, and move the CV merged output to one of the A split outputs. Then connect the Merged output to the Split A input on the same “Vol Merge” Spider.
Finally, send another A split output to the Combinator’s new CV 1 input and turn its trim knob all the way to 127.

The DDL-1 used as a visualizer for the Volume setting

You’re all set. Now when you flip to the front of the rack and start pressing the volume pads, you’ll see the value update in the DDL-1 device. I know, it’s pretty sweet. You now have visualization of your volume setting.

A Look at the “Thong 8-Type Filter FX Processor” Combinator

So to answer the question about controlling Thor with the Kong device, I set up 2 patches. The first one is the “Thong 8-Type Filter FX Processor” which can be used as an insert effect on any sound you like. This patch allows you to switch between 8 different filter types and control them all via the Kong pad interface. Here’s a rundown of the pad assignments. Note: You do not want to use any of the Combinator parameters, since all the CV for the Rotaries, as well as the Mod Wheel was used to create the pad assignments and visualization. So simply create a track for the Kong device in the Combinator, and use that track as your control.

Note: I made all the up / down switches bipolar so that everything starts out with a value of 64. This is because each pad press only moves up one midi value, and if you started out at 0 (zero), you’d have a long way to go to get higher up on the register. Starting out at the middle makes working with the up / down pads a lot easier IMHO.

Pads 5 & 1: Controls the Frequency of all filter at once. Pad 5 moves the filter frequency up and Pad 1 moves the filter frequency down. These two pads together act as the frequency rotary control. Visualization for the Frequency setting can be seen on the “Freq Viz” DDL-1 device located just below the Kong device.
Pads 6 & 2: Controls the Resonance of all filters at once. Pad 6 moves the resonance up, and Pad 2 moves the resonance down. These two pads together act as the resonance rotary control. Visualization for the Resonance setting can be seen on the “Res Viz” DDL-1 device located just below the Kong device.
Pads 7 & 3: Controls the Drive of all filters at once. Pad 7 moves the drive up, and Pad 3 moves the drive down. These two pads together act as the drive slider control. Visualization for the Drive setting can be seen on the “Drive Viz” DDL-1 device located just below the Kong device.
Pads 8 & 4: Controls the LPHP parameter of the “Notch” and “Peak” filters, as well as the Gender parameter of the “Formant” filter. Pad 8 moves the LPHP and Gender parameters up, while Pad 4 moves the LPHP and Gender parameters down. These two pads together act as the LPHP and Gender rotary controls. Note that the filter must be set to “Notch,” “Peak,” or “Formant” for you to hear the effects of these two pads. Visualization for the LPHP/Gdr setting can be seen on the “LPHP/Gdr Viz” DDL-1 device located just below the Kong device.
Pads 13 & 9: Controls the Envelope Amount of all filters at once. Pad 13 moves the envelope amount up, while Pad 9 moves the envelope amount down. Together, these two pads act as the envelope amount rotary. Note: To turn off the envelope entirely, reduce the envelope amount to 0 (zero) using the “Env Down” Pad (Pad 9). If you wish to insert your own pattern sequence to control the envelopes, change the pattern sequence in the Thor Filter device’s Step Sequencer. Each Thor Filter device Step sequencer controls the corresponding filter envelope, except for the “Peak” Thor Filter, which controls both the “Peak” Thor and “AM” Malstrom filters. Visualization for the Envelope Amount setting can be seen on the “Env Amt Viz” DDL-1 device located just below the Kong device.
Pad 14: Controls whether the Filter Envelope is turned on or off for all filters. Visualization for this pad can be seen on the fourth band of the “Filter Type Viz” BV512 Vocoder device.
Pad 12: Controls whether the “Comb” filter is set to plus (+) or minus (-). Visualization for this pad can be seen on the third band of the “Filter Type Viz” BV512 Vocoder device. Note that this is a very specific setting, and the filter type must be set to “Comb” in order for you to hear anything.
Pad 15: Controls which filter is heard. Visualization for the Filter Type setting can be seen on the first band of the “Filter Type Viz” BV512 Vocoder device. Selections can be one of the following 8 different filter types:

LP (Thor Low Pass Ladder Filter)
HP (Thor State Variable Filter – High Pass mode)
Comb (Thor Comb Filter)
Formant (Thor Formant Filter)
BP (Thor State Variable Filter – Band Pass mode)
Notch (Thor State Variable Filter – Notch mode)
Peak (Thor State Variable Filter – Peak mode)
AM (Malstrom AM Filters – both Filter A and B are set exactly the same way when controlling this filter).

Pad 16: Filter / Bypass. This provides you with a quick way to switch between the Filtered sound and the non-filtered sound. Think of this as a Wet / Dry switch.

A Look at the “Oscillator Kongtrol – FM Pair” Combinator

The second patch is a Kong controlling an Oscillator inside Thor. To start things off easy, I decided to control the FM Pair Oscillator. Again, I made all the up / down switches bipolar so that everything starts out with a value of 64. This is because each pad press only moves up one midi value, and if you started out at 0 (zero), you’d have a long way to go to get higher up on the register. Starting out at the middle makes working with the up / down pads a lot easier IMHO.

The FM Pair Oscillator control has at least one interesting twist. Since controlling the Carrier / Modulator pair is unlike controlling a MIDI value of 0 – 127, we need to figure out the proper settings to control a MIDI value of 1 – 32. This is done by going into the Up / Down Thor devices and changing the note values of the first step to the following:

“Up” Thor device: G#3

“Down” Thor device: E2

Once this is updated, you can control parameters that have 32 options. This does not only mean the FM Pair Carrier and Modulator, but also the Matrix pattern devices, or Thor’s Wavetable Oscillator “Table” selection. Anything with 32 MIDI values can now be controlled and stepped through one at a time in Kong.

Here’s a rundown of the pad assignments. Note: You do not want to use any of the Combinator parameters, since all the CV for the Rotaries, as well as the Mod Wheel was used to create the pad assignments and visualization. So simply create a track for the Kong device in the Combinator, and use that track as your control.

Pads 5 & 1: Controls the Pitch of the Oscillator. Pad 5 moves the pitch up and Pad 1 moves the pitch down. Visualization for the Pitch setting can be seen on the “Pitch Viz” DDL-1 device located just below the Kong device.
Pads 6 & 2: Controls the FM Parameter of the Oscillator. Pad 6 moves the fm up and Pad 2 moves the fm down. Visualization for the fm setting can be seen on the “FM Viz” DDL-1 device located just below the Kong device.
Pads 7 & 3: Controls the Carrier setting of the Oscillator. Pad 6 moves the carrier setting up and Pad 2 moves the carrier setting down. Visualization for the carrier setting can be seen on the “Carrier Viz” DDL-1 device located just below the Kong device.
Pads 8 & 4: Controls the Modulation setting of the Oscillator. Pad 6 moves the Modulation setting up and Pad 2 moves the modulation setting down. Visualization for the mod setting can be seen on the “Mod Viz” DDL-1 device located just below the Kong device.
Pads 13 & 9: Controls the Amp Envelope’s “Attack.” Pad 13 moves the Attack setting up (slower attack) and Pad 9 moves the attack down (faster attack). Visualization for the envelope’s attack can be seen on the first and second band of the “Amp Vizualize” BV512 Vocoder device, located just below the 4 DDL-1 devices. The first band shows the upward setting, and the second band shows the downward setting (much easier to see when you are actually using the Kong controller – so download the patch and try it out).
Pads 14 & 10: Controls the Amp Envelope’s “Decay.” Pad 14 moves the Decay setting up (longer decay) and Pad 10 moves the decay down (shorter decay). Visualization for the envelope’s decay can be seen on the third and fourth bands of the “Amp Vizualize” BV512 Vocoder device, located just below the 4 DDL-1 devices. The third band shows the upward setting, and the fourth band shows the downward setting.
Pads 15 & 11: Controls the Amp Envelope’s “Release.” Pad 15 moves the Release setting up (longer release) and Pad 11 moves the release down (shorter release). Visualization for the envelope’s release can be seen on the fifth and sixth bands of the “Amp Vizualize” BV512 Vocoder device, located just below the 4 DDL-1 devices. The fifth band shows the upward setting, and the sixth band shows the downward setting.
Pads 16 & 12: Controls the Panning of the sound. Pad 16 moves the panning left, while Pad 12 moves the panning right. Visualization for the panning can be seen on the seventh and eighth bands of the “Amp Vizualize” BV512 Vocoder device, located just below the 4 DDL-1 devices. The seventh band shows the leftward setting, and the eighth band shows the rightward setting.

Where can you go from Here?

Sometimes it’s the smallest concepts that can lead to the biggest revelations; opening doors to new ideas and solutions. This is definitely one of those cases. Using these simple ideas, you can now control virtually every possible parameter in Reason via the Kong Pads. These are just two types of control devices I built here. But there’s nothing stopping you from building a Reverb Kong controller (ReKong 7001?), or a DDL-1 controlled by Kong (DDKong-2?). And there’s nothing stopping you from building a controller that allows you to combine Oscillators or Filters or any number of things together that can be triggered by Kong pads. Just use your imagination and come up with some cool ways to take your pad controlling to new heights. This is just the tip of the iceberg. Where you go from here is all up to your patience and ambition.

Any thoughts?

57 – Kong FX Chain Builder

In this tutorial I’m going to show you how to create a flexible FX chain that has 8 stops along the chain, and at each of these stops, allows you to select from 1 of 6 different FX devices. This means you have a total of 48 different FX devices to select from in the chain, and the possible permutations of all these FX are 8×7 possible FX combinations, which amounts to 40,320 possible FX chain permutations. Don’t believe me? Go here: http://www.vpgenius.com/tools/combin.aspx. That’s a hell of a lot of possibilities. Now change the order of your FX chains, and you end up with double, triple and even more possibilities. So let’s see how it’s all done.

You can download the project files here: Kong-FX-Chain-Builders. The file contains 3 different FX chain combinators that are outlined below. The effects in each chain are the same. The only difference is that they each present the chain in a different order. You can take this idea and build any number of effects chains in any order you wish to combine both “Serial” and “Parallel” processing of your audio signal through various FX that you create in Reason. It’s all only limited by your own imagination.

Introducing the “Kong FX Chain Builder” Patch

The beauty of this type of system lies also in the fact that you can combine a “Serial” and “Parallel” audio system together. So when I was working on my “Key Flux FX Processor” in project number 56 here on my site, I introduced the notion of a Parallel system, whereby the same audio was sent through many different FX chains and then sent out to the soundcard. In this tutorial, I’m going to introduce the idea of a Serial FX system, and merge it with a Parallel FX system so that you get much more flexible audio routing and audio possibilities.

The main controls for the Kong FX Chain Builder (and Combinator Controls)

The idea is pretty simple. First you have a set of FX in a chain, as follows:

Filter > Delay > Distortion > Chorus > Phaser > Delay 2 > Filter 2 > Reverb

Now, each of these “stops” along the chain also has 7 different selectable FX sound possibilities, as follows:

Filter> (Pad 1)	Delay> (Pad 2)	Distortion> (Pad 3)	Chorus> (Pad 4)	Phaser> (Pad 5)	Delay2> (Pad 6)	Filter2> (Pad 7)	Reverb> (Pad 8 )
FX 1	FX 1	FX 1	FX 1	FX 1	FX 1	FX 1	FX 1
FX 2	FX 2	FX 2	FX 2	FX 2	FX 2	FX 2	FX 2
FX 3	FX 3	FX 3	FX 3	FX 3	FX 3	FX 3	FX 3
FX 4	FX 4	FX 4	FX 4	FX 4	FX 4	FX 4	FX 4
FX 5	FX 5	FX 5	FX 5	FX 5	FX 5	FX 5	FX 5
FX 6	FX 6	FX 6	FX 6	FX 6	FX 6	FX 6	FX 6
Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio

The Dry audio is there so that you have a selection that sets things back to being the original audio, like a pass-through. Using this table you can come up with an amazingly large array of different sounds by mixing and matching the different FX together. You can, for instance, create the following:

Filter > (Pad 1)	Delay > (Pad 2)	Distortion > (Pad 3)	Chorus > (Pad 4)	Phaser > (Pad 5)	Delay 2 > (Pad 6)	Filter 2 > (Pad 7)	Reverb > (Pad 8 )
FX 1	FX 1	FX 1	FX 1	FX 1	FX 1	FX 1	FX 1
FX 2	FX 2	FX 2	FX 2	FX 2	FX 2	FX 2	FX 2
FX 3	FX 3	FX 3	FX 3	FX 3	FX 3	FX 3	FX 3
FX 4	FX 4	FX 4	FX 4	FX 4	FX 4	FX 4	FX 4
FX 5	FX 5	FX 5	FX 5	FX 5	FX 5	FX 5	FX 5
FX 6	FX 6	FX 6	FX 6	FX 6	FX 6	FX 6	FX 6
Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio	Dry Audio

And that is just one example.

Switching the Order of Effects in the Chain

The Kong FX Chain builder from the back of the rack

Now I know some of you are going to say, “well why can’t I switch the order of the FX chain?” So instead of having the Filter come before the Delay, how about switching it so that the Filter comes after the delay. And to that I’ll say that Reason is not the easiest software to work with when it comes to making routing decisions such as these and building it into a single setup is very difficult. But thankfully it’s pretty easy to build multiple instances of the Combinator to come up with any FX chain order you like. The trick is to flip to the back of the rack and change the following:

The order of the “Gate Out” CVs from the first 8 Kong Pads
The order of the 14:2 Submixers and their associated splitters. The signal flow goes from the “To Devices” of the Combinator into the first Effect’s splitter. Then the 14:2 Submix main output of the first effect goes into the second effect’s splitter. And so on down the chain, until the final output goes into the Pan splitter device. The Pan also has a bank of different “Global” LFO Panning selections. This can be selected on Pad 15.

So anyway, this just shows you that with a little thought, you can create a variety of FX of your own and route them in a serial way. Then use the “Parallel” processing idea to create multiple effects at each stop in the chain. Simple enough right?

Here are the other 2 effect chains I came up with. Feel free to create your own based on variations that work for you. You can either change the routing scheme as I outlined above, or you can change the actual effects at each stop. As you can see, you don’t even need to have all the FX in play within the chain. You can keep any part of the chain set to “Dry Audio” so that it will not be affecting the chain at all. This means you can make your chain simple with only 1 effect in play, all 8 in play, or any amount in between. Here are the other two effect chains I put together:

Delay > Filter > Phaser > Delay 2 > Chorus > Filter 2 > Reverb > Distortion

Phaser > Chorus > Filter > Reverb > Distortion > Delay > Delay 2 > Filter 2

Working with the “Kong FX Chain Builder”

There are 2 components to working with the Kong FX Chain Builder: 1. The Combinator and 2. The Kong device. Both work together to create your FX chain. You can also use them “Live” and play the different effects out on the pads in real-time, or else build them up in the studio until you find a combination of effects that works for your sound, and then just leave this setting as it is (or save it for future recall).

I’ll start off with the Kong device. Note that if you want to fully utilize the device, you should create a track for it in Reason or Record’s Main Sequencer. This way, you can not only play the Kong device, but also record your Kong pad changes over time. And you can also lock your pad control surface to the Kong device and another controller to the Combinator; essentially controlling them both via 2 different controllers at the same time. So here are all the Kong pad settings:

Pads 1 to 8: These are the 8 stops in the FX chain going from Pad 1 > 2 > 3 > 4 > 5 > 6 > 7 > 8. In the original file I created (Kong FX Chain Builder A), this goes from Filter > Delay > Distortion > Chorus > Phaser > Delay 2 > Filter 2 > Reverb. The Pads act as a cycle, starting with a dry signal, then going through 6 different possible FX. The pad cycles through these 7 positions. So each time the pad is pressed, you’ll hear a new effect inserted into the chain.
Pads 9 and 10: Decay Down / Decay Up – These pads will shift the decay of all the Reverb effects upward or downward. So you need to have the Reverb effect turned on (in other words, you need to have one of the 6 Reverbs enabled; not the dry signal).
Note that there is an upper and lower limit, which, when reached, will not go any further. However, the pad can continue to go upward or downward for a few more times. This means that if you push the decay all the way to zero, and still hit the “Decay Down” pad, it will continue to move downward. So it may take a few more Pad pushes on the “Decay Up” pad to get it back to a “zero” postion (until you start hearing the decay again). This is true of all the Up/Down pads.
Pads 11 and 12: Envelope Pattern Down / Envelope Pattern Up – These pads will shift the matrix pattern banks upward or downward. These curve patterns are used to “play” the envelope amount on all the filters in the system. Therefore, you need to have at least one filter turned on to hear anything. You also need to have the “Env Pattern On” button (button 2 on the Combinator) enabled. There are 25 patterns on each Matrix (from A1 to D1), for a total of 50 patterns from which to select (you need to use Button 4 on the Combinator to switch between Matrix A and Matrix B).
Note that there is an upper and lower limit, which, when reached, will not go any further. However, the pad can continue to go upward or downward for a few more times. This means that if you push the patterns all the way down to A1 on the Matrix, and still hit the “Env Pat Down” pad, it will continue to move downward. So it may take a few more Pad pushes on the “Env Pat Up” pad to get it back to the “A1” postion (and get the patterns to start moving forward again). This is true of all the Up/Down pads.
Pads 13 and 14: Volume Down / Volume Up – These pads will shift the global volume upward or downward. Note that there is an upper and lower limit, which, when reached, will not go any further. However, the pad can continue to go upward or downward for a few more times. This means that if you push the volume all the way down to zero, and still hit the “Volume Down” pad, it will continue to move downward. So it may take a few more Pad pushes on the “Volume Up” pad to get it back to a “zero” postion (until you start hearing the volume again). This is true of all the Up/Down pads.
Pad 15: Panning. You can select from 6 different Auto-panning effects, which are global and affect the signal after it has gone through all 8 effect stops in the chain. There is also a seventh “dry” position, which is on by default. The Pad cycles through all 7 positions (6 “auto-panners” and 1 “dry” position).
Pad 16: FX / Bypass – this allows you to switch between hearing the effects chain or hearing the original “dry” signal.

The Combinator controls are outlined below:

Pitch Bend: Not assigned.
Mod Wheel: Controls the envelope amount on all the filters. This is used in conjunction with the Envelope patterns in both Matrixes that also control the envelope amount. In other words, you can use the Mod Wheel to scale the envelope amount, and therefore, how much the envelope is affected by the patterns or not. If you wish to control the envelope amount without having any patterns control the envelope, disable button 3 on the Combinator, and then use the Mod Wheel, which will now be the only parameter affecting the amount of envelope applied to the filter(s).
Note also that both the Mod Wheel and the Patterns affect all filter envelopes globally; both “Filter 1” and “Filter 2.” And of course, at least one filter needs to be added into the FX chain for you to hear the effect of the Mod Wheel or Patterns applied to the Filter Envelope amount.
Rotary 1: Filter 1 Frequency. Adjusts the Frequency of the first filter in the chain. All the filter selections for “Filter 1” are affected using this rotary, so that as long as you have one of the six filters enabled in the Filter 1 slot, the Frequency can be adjusted.
Rotary 2: Filter 1 Resonance. Adjusts the Resonance of the first filter in the chain. All the filter selections for “Filter 1” are affected using this rotary, so that as long as you have one of the six filters enabled in the Filter 1 slot, the Resonance can be adjusted.
Rotary 3: Filter 2 Frequency. Adjusts the Frequency of the second filter in the chain. All the filter selections for “Filter 2” are affected using this rotary, so that as long as you have one of the six filters enabled in the Filter 2 slot, the Frequency can be adjusted.
Rotary 4: Filter 2 Resonance. Adjusts the Resonance of the second filter in the chain. All the filter selections for “Filter 2” are affected using this rotary, so that as long as you have one of the six filters enabled in the Filter 2 slot, the Resonance can be adjusted.
Button 1: Not Assigned.
Button 2: Invert Envelope. This is a simple envelope invert button, and affects all filters in both the “Filter 1” and “Filter 2” slots in the FX chain.
Button 3: Envelope Pattern On. This turns on the envelope pattern Matrixes so that the curve pattern that is selected in Matrix A or B will affect the envelope amount of all Filters in both “Filter 1” and “Filter 2” slots in the FX chain. There are 2 parameters that both affect the Filter Envelope Amount: The pattern here, and the Mod Wheel. The higher you raise the Mod Wheel, the higher the Envelope amount. You can use a combination of the pattern and Mod Wheel to effectively “play” with the Filter Envelope Amount parameter. The reason I set it up this way is that you have ultimate control over the envelope amount. For example, you can turn off the pattern by keeping this button (button 3) disabled. Then use the Mod Wheel to scale the amount upward or leave it fully off (when the Mod Wheel is fully down). Or you can turn on the pattern and leave the mod wheel fully down to have the amount controlled solely by the pattern. Or use both in combination to play around with the envelope amount.
Button 4: Envelope Bank A / B. Selects between the two pattern banks (2 Matrixes) that affect the Envelope Amount parameter on all filters (read above for more information). There are 25 patterns on each Matrix (from A1 to D1), for a total of 50 patterns from which to select. Button four switches between the first 25 patterns on Matrix A (when the button is disabled) to the second set of 25 patterns on Matrix B (when the button is enabled).

Visualizing the active FX Chain

Sterioevo over at Mute.Hate.Loud.Love was kind enough to provide two methods for visualizing the active effect chain (see the comments below this post for more info about this CV method). He used the Gate Length of the Thor Trigger devices to change the Modulation Level Bands of the BV512 Vocoder and the delay steps in the DDL delay devices to show visually which effect was enabled at each stop in the FX chain. So I updated the patches (just download the Project files again if you haven’t already) using his “Vocoder Visualization” method. You’ll now see a Vocoder under the main Kong device. This uses an 8-band setting to display the position of each effect on Pads 1-8 in the Kong device. This way you can visualize what’s going on as you play the pads. Very cool and handy little tool! Thanks Steve!

So what do you think of this combination of “Parallel” and “Serial” effects processing using Kong? Any other ideas come to mind on how these ideas can be used? I can envision setting both this and the “Key Flux FX Processor” ideas on the alternate devices. For example, you could set up the “Key Flux FX Processor” on Kong and you can probably set up the “FX Chain Builder” on a Combinator. The device is somewhat irrelevant. What matters is the concepts and what you want to accomplish. And as you can see, Reason can usually provide an avenue to make your systems come to life.

Until next time, hope you can make this work for you and use it in your own productions. If you do, drop me a line and let me see what you come up with. I’m always interested to see how others’ use my patches. Cheers for now.

53 – Key Trig Patterns (Part 1)

I’m sure most of us have used the Matrix or Thor Step Sequencer to some extent. But how often have we thought about using our keyboard to trigger those patterns? I know I’ve never given it much serious thought, since I usually sequence all the parts into the main sequencer. But this time I’m going to explore the possibility of triggering patterns from our Keyboard. This has a lot of “live play” applications.

By now, most of us know how to use Pattern sequencers to play parts in their tracks. I’m sure most of us have used the Matrix or Thor Step Sequencer to some extent or degree. But how often have we thought about using our keyboard to trigger those patterns? I know I’ve never given it much serious thought, and it’s probably due to the fact that I don’t play “live.” I usually sequence all the parts into the main sequencer. So this time, we’re going to explore the possibility of triggering patterns from our Keyboard.

The project files can be downloaded here: key-trig-pattern-methods. This file contains some combinators and an .rns file with all the combinators inside. These Combinators outline some of the methods presented in the tutorial below. Try them out and see what you can do with these ideas.

Furthermore, we’ll see just how far we can take this idea. The whole thing will be contained inside a Combinator (or a Kong device, if you wish), and the notes on the keyboard will trigger different patterns playing different instruments. It’s like having full control of the band at your fingertips on your piano or controller keyboard.

Sound interesting to you? Yeah, it was interesting to me too.

Before I jump into the various methods of Key Triggering, I want to give a huge shout out to Peff for providing help on figuring out the “Latching” method below. Without his help, I would have spent several more hours tearing out my hair. So thanks Kurt! I really appreciate all the help you provide, not just to me, but to the whole community.

Triggering Matrix Patterns

Let me start off by saying this is a huge PITA where the Matrix is concerned. The main problem lies in the delay of Pattern triggering from the moment when you press the trigger key to the moment the pattern starts (variable, depending on when the key was hit during playback). Yes I know, you can plop your patterns down on the Matrix pattern lanes, but that’s defeating the whole purpose of this tutorial, which is all about triggering patterns via different keys on your keyboard. But for the sake of argument (and to be complete), I’ll show you first how to set it up this way using a Matrix, but I’m not going to spend a lot of time on this one. Maybe this is beneficial on some planet where delay is a “cool” and “hip” concept. Here’s a video where I outline 2 methods to key trigger a Matrix Pattern. The first method is not described in detail here because it introduces the dreaded delay. But the second method (outlined in detail below) can be useful in a somewhat chaotic and free-running way.

Note: Ed Bauman highlights a method you can use to Trigger Matrix Patterns “almost” instantaneously here: “When Reason’s Time Signature is set to 4/4, patterns will switch on every measure, a full 16 x 16th notes, but if you set the Time Signature to 1/16, patterns will switch on every 16th note, so it’s basically immediate. Of course, if you’re playing back a sequence, doing this completely screws up the measures in a song and makes the whole song gigantic as far as measure count goes, but it definitely works for the Matrix and ReDrum. It used to apply to Dr. Rex as well but with Dr. Octo Rex we now have the Trig Next Loop region which essentially does the same thing if you’re switching around rex files within one Dr. Octo Rex.”

First, Create a Combinator. Then create a 14:2 Mixer, and a sound source (in this case a Subtractor). Load up a Subtractor patch or else create your own synth sound in the Subtractor. Then create a Matrix underneath. It should automatically connect the Note / Gate CV for you. Enter a pattern into the Matrix (or press Ctrl+R to quickly enter a random pattern).
In between the Subtractor and the Matrix, we’re going to create a Thor and completely initialize the patch (this means removing any Oscillators and Filters, and dropping all the values down to zero.
The Thor is simply used as the gate trigger. So flip around to the back of the rack and connect the Note / Gate CV from the Matrix into the Thor CV1 & 2 inputs. Also connect the CV 1 & 2 outputs from Thor back into the Note / Gate CV inputs on the Subtractor.

The back of the rack showing the CV passing from the Matrix through the Thor and into the Subtractor.

Flip around to the front again, and in the Thor Modulation Bus Routing Section (MBRS), enter the following:

CV In2 : 100 > CV Out2 : 100 > Midi Gate (under Midi Key > Gate)

Open up the Programmer Modulation Routing on the Combinator and for the Subtractor device uncheck the “Receive Notes” checkbox. Then select the Thor device and enter the following for the Key Range: Lo: C-2 / Hi: C-2. This way, when you press C-2 on your keyboard controller, it will open the gate and play the pattern on the Matrix.

Now press Run so the Matrix pattern is running. You won’t hear anything yet. In order to hear the pattern (turning it on or off) you need to press the C-2 key. This allows you to hear the pattern. The crappy part is that there’s no telling when the pattern will be picked up when you press the key. Put another way, the pattern is continually running, but only sounds when you press and hold the key down. Not the most elegant solution.

To add multiple instruments or parts, select the Subtractor, Thor, and the Matrix (holding down your “Shift” key to multiple-select the devices), right-click and select “duplicate devices and tracks.” Enter your new pattern in the Matrix. Then flip to the back of the rack and route the audio out of the Subtractor to a new channel. Finally, go into the Combinator programmer, and adjust the Thor device so that only one key on your keyboard controller is used to trigger the Thor (C#-2, for example).

Repeat the above process for as many sounds as you need (up to the total amount of keys that your keyboard will allow: 88 for a full size piano or synth controller keyboard, or 128 for the full midi range which a Reason or Record Combinator allows — from C-2 to G8). This is more than enough of a range to create a complete set of instruments and sounds for most any standard songs or performances.

Using Thor’s Step Sequencer for Precise Pattern Key Triggering

Now that you have an understanding of how the Matrix is key triggered, I’ll move on to a more robust way of accessing patterns via the keyboard. This method replaces the Matrix in favor of the Thor Step Sequencer. Since the Thor Step Sequencer can be programmed to start and stop precisely where you want it, using it is the best option when you want precise control over your sounds. It’s just too bad that it’s more of a pain to enter and edit notes into it. The Matrix, to my eyes, provide a simple visual way to add patterns. The Thor Step Sequencer is more tedious by changing rotary knobs all the time.

The Momentary Key Method

The first method is the easiest and allows you to create a “momentary” trigger via your midi keys. This means that when you press a key, the Step Sequencer plays the pattern. When you release the key, the pattern stops.

To set this up, first create a Combinator, and then in order a 6:2 Mixer, a sound device (here, a Subtractor), and holding the “Shift” key, a Thor device. While you’re at the front of the rack, add a sound into the Subtractor that you’d like to hear. Any sound will do.
Completely Initialize the Thor device. This means removing the Oscillators, Filters, bringing all values to zero as well.
In the Thor MBRS, enter the following:
Directly to the rght of Button 1 on the Thor, use the upward spin control arrow to set this to C-2. This means that the Thor Step Sequencer is triggered when the C-2 key is pressed. In the Step Sequencer, set the Run Mode to “Repeat” and enter a pattern into the Step Sequencer (note that to gain access to the full note range, you’ll need to switch the Octave setting to “Full”).

Note that an alternate way to trigger the Step Sequencer is outlined in the Video. Though this is a more labor intensive way to trigger things. If you want to use this method, switch the “Button 1” source in the MBRS to “MIDI Gate (found under MIDI Key > Gate)” and then open the Combinator Programmer and adjust the Key Range of the Thor device to Lo: C-2 / Hi: C-2 (so one key is selected). This achieves the same outcome.

Flip the rack around and in the “Step Sequencer CV Output,” send the Note and Gate/Velocity CV outputs into the Gate / CV inputs on the Subtractor.

The back of the rack showing the Thor routing from the Step Sequencer into the Subtractor.

Lastly, go into the Combinator Programmer, and deselect the “Receive Notes” checkbox for the Subtractor (so that the Subtractor only receives notes from the Thor Step Sequencer).

Now, when you play the C-2 key, the Thor Step Sequencer will start and play for as long as the key is held down. Cool right? If you want to create more instruments along other keys, create the new sound device (or even another Combinator), duplicate the Thor, connect the new Thor CV outputs to the new device, and move the button spin control to the new key setting. Done.

The Latched Key Method

No, this is not the latched key kid hanging outside his parents’ house with the key around his neck. This is the second method to trigger patterns via MIDI keys. It is is a little more complex because you need two Thors to produce it. This method is a “latch” or “hold” style of triggering. Another way to look at it is a toggled pattern on / pattern off method. In this procedure, you press a key and the pattern starts. The pattern then plays through even when you release the key. You then press the same key again, and the pattern stops. In this way, the pattern is “latched” by the key.

Building on the first method, we need to change a few things. First, reset the Combinator by removing the key assignment (using the spin control to the right of the button — which should be set to “-“). We also need to remove the “Button 1” line in the MBRS (not necessary, but for cleanliness’ sake). Label this Thor “Pattern.”
Create a new Thor and completely initialize it as we did previously. Label it “Trigger.” In the Step Sequencer, set the Run Mode to “Step,” change the Edit knob to “Curve 1” and create a 2-step pattern, with Step 1 set to zero (0) and Step 2 set to 100. Then enter the following line in the MBRS:
Flip the rack around and send the “Curve 1” CV output from the “Trigger” Thor into the “Gate In (Trig)” CV input on the “Pattern” Thor.

The back of the Reason rack with the CV routings for the latched setup. One Thor triggers the other Thor's Step Sequencer to start

Flip the rack back to the front and in the Combinator Programmer, ensure both the Subtractor and “Pattern” Thor is not receiving notes (uncheck the “Receive Notes” checkbox), and ensure the “Trigger” Thor is receiving notes (the “Receive Notes” checkbox has a check in it). Also set the Key Range value for the “Trigger” Thor to Lo: C-2 / Hi: C-2.

The Combinator Programmer Modulation Routing

Now press the C-2 key on your keyboard. The Step Sequencer starts and plays through even when you release the key. Press the key again, and the Step Sequencer stops. If you wish to add more devices to different keys that are “latch” triggered, create the new sound device (or even another Combinator), duplicate the 2 Thors, connect the new Thor CV outputs from the “Pattern” Thor to the new device, and adjust the Key Range to a new key for the “Trigger” Thor within the Combinator Programmer. Then you can set up your pattern in the “Pattern” Thor Step Sequencer, and you’re all set. Simple right?

Where do you go from here?

Here’s a few suggestions, which we will explore in the next part in our “Key Triggering Patterns” tutorial series:

Now that we have the hang of the way in which we can trigger the Thor Step Sequencer via your keyboard controller, you can duplicate the same sound source as many times as you like to create new patterns for the same sound source. Yes, you can merge the CV to control the same sound source (instead of duplicating the sound source), but it’s often quicker just to copy the whole thing and change your pattern.
You can create many different sound source instruments (any synths, samplers, Rex or Drum modules) that are controlled by different Thor Step Sequencers and map them to your keyboard to create complex multi-instrument Combinators. Using this method, you could even create an entire song within a single Combinator, and play the parts of the song by playing notes on your keyboard. In this way, you can bring the sounds in and out based on how you play the keyboard, or program the notes directly into the main Reason sequencer.
Instead of setting this all up in a Combinator, try setting it up on a Kong device, and using the Pads to trigger the patterns instead of the Combinator.
Feeling ambitious? Try combining the two methods: “Momentary” and “Latched,” then designating a key on your keyboard, a button on the Combinator, or a Pad on Kong to switch between the two methods.

These ideas are great for setting up “Live Play” templates in Reason Combinators. It takes a lot of preparation to set up a complete song in this manner, but once it’s set up, it will make you look like a magician as you play complete part sequences with the press of a key.

What do you think of these ideas? Have any others that you’d like to share here? Post a comment and let me know what you’re thinking. As always, thanks for watching, listening, and reading.

52 – Dr.VocoRex: Going Loopy

It’s time for something new and fresh to come out of Reason 5. So I give to you the Dr. VocoRex Loop Manipulator. It’s a bit of a glitch, and it’s a bit of a fun creative way to merge some Rex Loops and a Vocoder together, and provide a few parameters that you can play with and manipulate. So let me know what you think. I’ll show you how to build it below, and then I’ll provide a few Combinator variations. You’re the loop doctor. So let’s start dissecting our patient.

The project files can be found here: Dr-VocoRex-Loop-Manipulators. This is a zip file that contains 3 Combinators that we’ll be building below. I used Reason 5 to build them, and since they use features from the new Dr.OctoRex, you’ll need Reason 5 to work with them. However, try to work on something similar in Reason 4. You won’t have access to multiple loops in a single device, nor some of the CV inputs, but you can still go a long way to recreating something similar. I also included an .rns file so that you could quickly open them both and try them out. For the .rns file, I believe you will need Reason 5.

To start off, you can do a lot of neat things with the Dr. OctoRex via CV, and that’s really at the heart of this tutorial. When you start creating 2 Dr. OctoRex devices with different loops and using a Vocoder to bring them together, things can quickly get very wild and interesting, especially where the CV routing is concerned. So it’s time to put on our CV hats and dive in.

The Basic Setup

Here’s the video to showcase the kinds of setups we will be working to build:

First, create a Combinator and 6:2 mixer underneath. Now create a Dr. OctoRex, Vocoder, and Spider Audio Merger/Splitter. Then holding the Shift key down, create another Dr. OctoRex loop player.
Flip the rack around and send the Left and Right audio output from the second Dr. OctoRex player into 2 left (mono) channels on the Merger side of the Spider. Then send the left output to the Modulation input on the Vocoder.
Flip the rack around to the front once again. Expand the Rex loop players and Add two different loops into the first slots of each device. For the moment, let’s ensure they are both the same speed. So now you have a loop in slot 1 for both devices. The top Dr. OctoRex is what will be played (the Carrier). The bottom Dr. OctoRex is what will be used to modulate the top Rex loop (the Modulator).

For this exercise, I chose the Drb18_Optical_165_eLAB.rx2 for the first Dr. OctoRex and the Drb09_Shadow_165_eLAB.rx2 for the second Dr. OctoRex loop player (both files can be found under the Dr Rex Drum Loops > Drum N Bass folder).

On the Vocoder, set the number of bands to 32. I prefer this band level because it gives a better definition of the sound.
Now let’s get into the CV and play with a few bands in our Vocoder. Flip the rack around and create the following CV connections:

Vocoder (Band 12 CV Out) > Dr. OctoRex (Carrier) Osc Pitch CV In (trim knob set to 127).

Dr. OctoRex (Carrier) Voice 1 Filter Env. > Vocoder (Band 7 CV In).

Dr. OctoRex (Modulator) Voice 1 Filter Env. > Vocoder (Band 11 CV In).

Immediately playing this will yield some interesting results. Now try adjusting the Filter Envelope on both Dr. OctoRex devices. You’ll notice you can get a variety of freaky sounds out of this setup.

The back of the rack showing the two Dr. OctoRex devices used as a Vocoder Carrier and Modulator

All that’s left is to open up the Combinator’s programmer and setup the Rotaries and buttons to gain access to a few crucial elements of these devices. Here’s how I set things up:

Rotary 1 > Vocoder Dry / Wet : 0 / 127

Rotary 2 > Vocoder Shift : -64 / +63

Rotary 3 > Dr. OctoRex (Carrier) Osc. Env. Amount : -64 / +63

Rotary 4 > Dr. OctoRex (Modulator) Osc. Env. Amount : -64 / +63

Button 1 > Vocoder Hold: 0 / 1

Button 2 > Unassigned.

Button 3 > Unassigned.

Button 4 > Unassigned.

Going a Few Steps Beyond the Ordinary

So the next logical step is to add more loops and then set up 2 Combinator Rotaries to adjust the loop slot position of each. This opens you up to 8 different Loops in each Dr. OctoRex device which can be mixed and matched to your liking (it’s like having 8 carriers and 8 modulators; all of which are adjustable.

If you add more loops and then adjust the loops so that they can be tied to a Rotary knob and switched at will between them, ensure the “Trig Next Loop” on the Dr. OctoRex devices are set to 1/16. This way, the jump from one loop to the next will happen fairly instantaneously and without a long delay.

And Now for Something Completely Different. . .

Alternately, you could send all the output bands of the Vocoder into a series of Thors (4 CV bands for each Thor), then use these Thors to convert the CV to Audio and send all the audio outputs to a Mixer (you’ll need 2 14:2 Mixers to carry all 16 audio inputs). Then set up another bank of Thors to control the Level CV of each Channel on the Mixers. Once this is done, send the main audio output through a Spider Audio Merger/Splitter to make the signal Mono, and convert the audio back to CV in yet another “master” Thor. From there, it’s a matter of sending the CV into the Osc. Pitch of the Dr. OctoRex Carrier device. Now you can open the Combinator Programmer Modulation and set up a Rotary to control the “Step Count” (from 1 to 16) of all the Thor Audio devices (set in the “Reverse” direction). This allows the Rotary to cycle through the Vocoder’s “CV out bands.”

Of course, if you use this method, you’re going to need to give up a Rotary. So I would do this as an alternative to adding multiple loops. Instead, use only one loop for the Carrier and another loop for the Modulator. Then you free up 2 Rotaries (Rotary 3 and 4, which were previously used to control the loop slot position of both Dr. OctoRex devices). Apply the Step Count parameter to Rotary 3, and you’ll still have another Rotary (4) to spare, for controlling any other parameter(s) you like.

Then you can set up a series of Thors to control where the CV gets sent back “into” the Vocoder. To do this, you need to again convert the CV into Audio using a Thor, and then send this audio into a bank of new Thor devices, which are set up to determine where the CV source is sent (into 1 of 16 Input bands on the Vocoder). Then do the same thing we did previously on the Combinator’s third Rotary, except this time you’re using the Combinator’s fourth Rotary to control the “Step Count” of these new Thor devices. And there you have it. Rotary 3 controls the Vocoder’s “CV Out” bands, and Rotary 4 controls the Vocoder’s “CV In” bands. Pretty nifty. And it has all sorts of other applications, not just controlling parameters on a Dr. OctoRex. See: This tutorial provides you with more than just another loopy way to play with your loops. 😉

Ok this is a little crazy, but you can control the CV ins and outs on the Vocoder via 2 Rotaries on the Combinator. Here's the back of the rack.

If all of this is making your head spin, just check out the Project files. The third Combinator in the set (Dr. VocoRex 004) is the one that houses this little configuration. So look it over and you’ll see how it’s all set up.

Where do You go from Here?

Well, there’s many different directions you can go. If you’ve set up all the Vocoder CV bands as I did in the last part, it’s a cinch to plug the CV destination (from the Out bands) or CV source (from the In bands) to any CV in/out you wish on the Dr.OctoRex (or any other device you wish to introduce. So try playing around with these CV source/destinations.

You could also introduce another set of Dr. OctoRex / Vocoder devices and have two going simultaneously. Just a thought. And with the new editability of slices in the Dr. OctoRex, you can adjust each of the slices individually.

Or try perhaps to have a single Loop both be the Carrier and Modulator. With the separate outputs, you could have one set of slices modulating another set of slices; all within the same loop. Lots of possibilities.

So these are just a few ideas you can use with 2 Dr. OctoRex loopers and a Vocoder. There’s probably a million ways to combine them together for some awesome results. Why not share a few with me here. I’d love to hear all your ideas. Until next time, happy Reasoning and happy Recording. Go out and make some masterpieces!

51 – Matrix Track Building (Part 4)

Just when you thought it was over. . . You were wrong! I’ve decided to extend this series of tutorials to explore a few things that I didn’t get to within the track I built. I could probably go on for 10 more parts to go over all the possible things you could do with the Matrix. But I wanted to focus on a few areas and explore them in a little more depth. So here’s a few things beyond the track, which you can do with the Matrix Step Sequencer.

Download the new project files here: Matrix-Track-Building2(NoCheat). This zip file contains a new version of the main song .rns file, as well as the two new Combinators for the Bass and Pad tracks. They both contain new Matrix devices that can be used in place of the Mod Wheel Automation clips found in the song. Read on to see what was done to update them. Note: please respect that these project files, like everything else on this site, is under the Creative Commons 3.0 licensing, meaning you can mix, remix, share, and play around with the song to your heart’s content, but you will need to provide the source info and a link back to my site here in any productions you do with this file. Share and share alike ok? And you can’t make any money off the file. It’s not going to win any awards anyway. But if you remix or play with the file, send them back to me privately and I’d be happy to showcase them here in a new posting (send to my email in the top menu), I’d love to see what you come up with. Don’t be shy! 😉

Chaining Patterns together to create a Pendulum Direction

As I mentioned in Part 1 of this series, you can chain two patterns together to create a Pendulum direction for any pattern. To do this, simply have one pattern going one direction, and another pattern going the opposite direction. Then you can place the patterns back to back endlessly in the main sequencer on the pattern track. The pattern clips would alternate and sound exactly as if you used the Pendulum direction setting on the Thor Step Sequencer. Here’s a short video to show how that’s done.

Automating the Resolution Knob

Spend more than a few minutes with the Matrix, and you’ll realize that you can’t automate the Resolution knob in a Matrix. So how do you keep the pattern the same, but change the resolution of the pattern? I came across this problem when I was first starting out with Reason. And it’s no problem. The solution is to create copies of the pattern (A1, A2, A3, A4, etc.) and then change the resolution for each pattern. If you want a pattern that can travel across all resolutions in the Matrix, you’ll have to create 9 copies of the same pattern, and then change each pattern’s resolution setting from 1/2 to 1/128.

Note: You can even put the Matrix inside a Combinator and assign a Combinator Rotary to switch between the different patterns (A1 to B1). In this way, the Combinator Rotary acts as a Resolution knob, and it IS automatable. Only downside is that your pattern must complete the full pattern cycle before it switches to the next pattern/resolution in this scenario (because the Matrix is “locked” to the main tempo).

Finishing up the song. . . No Cheating this time!

Now let’s delve back into the Track I completed and update those last two automations that were put on the Mod Wheel automation lanes, and change them to be controlled by the Matrix. Once this is done I can clear my conscience and bring this series to a close.

Note: For a full explanation of how this is accomplished, refer back to “Part 2” of this series, where I go into great lengths on the subject of using the Matrix to create a long complex pattern (or rather, a compound pattern). If you’ve been reading this tutorial through chronologically, the hope is that you’ve given this a try yourself and come up with something similar to the solution I came up with here.

If you look at the image below, you’ll see how I changed the automation in the main sequencer for the Bass and Pad track. For both those tracks I turned the automation lanes off (to keep them here to show you the relationship — they are just above the new Matrix Pattern Lanes), and added a new Matrix to control the Mod Wheel of each of those Combinators (labeled “M.Wh.Seq.”). This essentially does the same thing as the automation. If you open the Project files at the top of this posting, you’ll be able to open up the .RNS, solo each track and then play the song at the automation points to listen to how the Matrix is working. You can also open up the rack and see the Matrix cycle through the patterns. If you want to switch back to compare, just turn the Matrix pattern lane off, and turn on the automation lane again.

The main sequencer showing how the Matrix patterns can be used in place of the Mod Wheel Automation clips

And that about does it for the Matrix. I’m sure there are many other ways to use the device, but my hope is that this shows how you can get the Matrix to play most anything the Reason devices can dish out. I hope this also shows you some new creative ways that you might not have known about before. If you have any other uses for the Matrix, please feel free to share them here. It’s been an interesting creative journey for me, and I hope for you as well.

As always, thanks to those who watch, read, and listen in.

50 – Matrix Track Building (Part 3)

In this tutorial, I’m going to finish up our Matrix song, and then explore the differences between the Matrix and the Thor Step Sequencer in a little more detail. It’s important to note the differences between the two and how one is not necessarily better than the other. Although I would argue that Thor’s step sequencer is much more advanced from a programming standpoint. I think the Matrix still has a lot to offer and still provides a lot of possible uses. So don’t shelve it just yet.

Creating a Bell Fill

This time we’ll use the Matrix in a new way, as an Arpeggiator. I know if you have Reason 4 and up, you have the great RPG-8 (which I’ve explored in a different series of tutorials). This time, however, we’ll use the Matrix to arpeggiate your sounds. In this specific case, the Bell Fill track is used to add some arpeggiated notes into the song. Creating an Arpeggio with a Matrix is really easy. Think of it this way: You need one Matrix to play the notes/gate and another Matrix to apply the Arpeggiator. In the second Matrix, the Note CV is sent to the Osc. Pitch CV input (Osc. Pitch is a CV input on all Reason Synths and Samplers).

In this case, a Thor is used to create a Bell sound using 2 FM Pair Oscillators, and then one Matrix is sent to the Note/Gate CV input on the Thor (this plays the Thor in a normal way), and another Matrix Note CV output is sent into the CV1 input. On the Modulation Bus Routing Section (MBRS), the CV1 input is sent to the 2 Oscillator Pitches. Any notes you input on this second Matrix device will adjust the Pitch as the Thor is played; i.e.: it arpeggiates the Notes being played. This gives you a great degree of control over your Bell sound.

Song Cleanup

Finally, we’ll do a little bit of cleanup to the song overall. First, we’ll add a Reverb as a send to all the tracks and “glue” the whole song together. Second, we’ll add a Mastering Suite underneath the Hardware Interface to master the entire track. Note that this is just a starting point. You can tweak all the mastering device parameters to fit the song as you see fit. But it’s a good starting point to try out some of the Mastering Suites that are included with Reason and Record. For that matter, you can bring everything into Record and use the SSL to master your track. So many options.

Probably more important is the fact that if you have Reason 5 (not sure about Reason 4), you can select all the Matrix Sequencer tracks (using Ctrl+Right-clicking on the tracks at the left section of the sequencer) and select “Convert Pattern Automation to Notes.” This is a very handy way to convert all the pattern automation you’ve spent so much time getting “just right” into note clips on note lanes. Once this is done, you’ll have to move all the note clips to their respective Combinator tracks. The Pattern lanes are automatically muted for you though, because the expectation is that you won’t want to have them playing or “doubling” up, after you move the note clips to the Combinator lanes.

This little trick provides you with the ability to then go in and adjust individual notes or entire note clips using the “Sequencer Tools” (F8). You can quantize, Transpose, adjust velocity, randomize notes, Scale Tempo, etc.

So there in a nutshell is how you can use the Matrix to build a track in Reason. Now I think I’ll try building one with nothing but Subtractors. That should be an interesting task. As always, let me know what you think, or if you have any suggestions on ways in which you can use the Matrix within Reason and Record.

If you want to download the final song file, along with all the separate Combinators, you can find them here: Matrix-Track-Building. The file includes a final .rns file as well as the separate Combinators. The reason the Combinators are provided is because I’m running reason version 5. But for this project, I stuck only to devices you would find in both version 4.0 and 5.0. So if you can’t open the .rns file, then you have the Combinators and can reconstruct things yourself if you like. It’s more fun that way anyhow. Note: please respect that these project files, like everything else on this site, is under the Creative Commons 3.0 licensing, meaning you can mix, remix, share, and play around with the song to your heart’s content, but you will need to provide the source info and a link back to my site here in any productions you do with this file. Share and share alike ok? And you can’t make any money off the file. It’s not going to win any awards anyway. But if you remix or play with the file, send them back to me privately and I’d be happy to showcase them here in a new posting (send to my email in the top menu), I’d love to see what you come up with. Don’t be shy! 😉

Where do you go from here?

Well you have the file, so feel free to remix and play with it and send it back my way. I’d love to take a listen. As I put together this posting, I also thought a little more about the comparison between the Matrix step sequencer and the Thor step sequencer, so I’ll leave off with a look at both in a side-by-side comparison. Just to give everyone a little more food for thought about both, and when one would be better suited over the other. In asking some people on “The Sound of Reason” website which was more advantageous than the other, I got some mixed responses. Most found the Matrix to be easier to use live, but they also found the Thor sequencer to be advanced on a number of fronts. I’ll let you decide. For now, the jury seems to say that both are still very much necessary, and they are more like sisters than a parent-child relationship.

So let’s take a rundown of the Pros and Cons of each by providing a side-to-side comparison:

	Matrix	Thor	Notes
Pattern Enable	Yes	Yes	You can use the “Step Seq.” button on the Thor Controller (top panel) to enable or disable the Step Sequencer.
Pattern Reset	No	Yes (non-automatable button).
Number of Patterns	8 Patterns x 4 banks = 32	1	Obviously, the Matrix can produce more pattern variations than Thor. You will need to create a new instance of Thor for each pattern you want to input.
Pattern Randomization	2 Options (via right-click context menu): Randomize Alter Pattern	1 Option (via right-click context menu): Randomize	Dear Props: Please add Alter Pattern to Thor. Pretty please with a cherry on top.
Convert Patterns to Notes	Yes (via right-click context menu).	No	This is the biggest beef users have with Thor. You can’t send the Thor sequencer data to the Main Reason/Record sequencer, either as patterns or as notes. Nuff said.
Number of Steps	1 – 32 (selectable via digital input and up/down arrows). Non-automatable.	1- 16 (selectable via lighted square step buttons) or Step Count knob. Note that the Step Count knob is automatable, while the step buttons are not.	Thor’ step count knob is automatable, which means you can automate the number of steps, but since you can’t automate the step buttons, you can’t automate turning steps on or off.
Pattern Input Type	Note/ Bar visual display (non-automatable)	16 Rotary inputs (non-automatable)
Resolution Input Type	Rotary (labeled dial)	Rotary (digital dial)
Step Directions	1 direction: Forward	5 directions: Forward Reverse Pendulum 1 Pendulum 2 Random
Run Button	Yes (non-automatable)	Yes (non-automatable)	It’s a little unfair to say that the Thor Run button is not automatable. As with most things in Reason/Record, there are workarounds. And you can get it to run using the Modulation Bus Routing Section (MBRS) or CV to trigger the sequencer. As far as I can tell though, there’s no way to automate the Matrix Run button.
Run Modes	No	4 modes: Off Step One-Shot Repeat
Mute Light	Yes	Yes
Sync Capability	Yes	Yes
Synced Rate / Resolution	9 Positions (non-automatable): 1/2 1/4 1/8 1/8T (Triplet) 1/16 1/16T (Triplet) 1/32 1/64 1/128	21 Positions: 16/4 12/4 8/4 7/4 6/4 5/4 4/4 3/4 2/4 3/8 1/2T (Triplet) 1/4 3/16 1/4T (Triplet) 1/8 1/16D (Dotted) 1/8T (Triplet) 1/16 1/16T (Triplet) 1/32 1/64	Synced Rates/Resolutions which are shared between the two are in Bold. While the Matrix has less positions, it has two positions Thor does not: 1/128 and 1/2. Though I would venture that using 8/4 and 2/4 is the same as using 1/2.
Non-Sync Capability	No (always synced)	Yes
Non-Synced Range	N/A	.10 Hz – 250 Hz.
Editability
Notes	Yes (5-Octave Range from C1 to C6)	Yes (Full Range from C-2 to G8)	Note that for Thor, there are 3 global Note modes: “2,” “4,” and “Full” octave ranges. Note also that for Thor, the Octave switch is not automatable
Velocity	Yes (Range is 0 – 127)	Yes (Range is 0 – 127)	Note: in Thor you can see a digital readout of the Velocity value. In the Matrix you do not see the precise value. It’s a bit of a guess to get the Velocity exact. Though workarounds exist to see the numerical CV value (see Part 1 of this series of Matrix tutorials).
Gate Length	3 states: Off (0) Half (50%) Tied (100%)	100 States (Full Range of 0% – 100%)
Step Duration	Static	Varied (17 Positions): 1/4 1/3 3/8 1/2 5/8 2/3 3/4 7/8 1 5/4 4/3 6/4 7/4 8/4 9/4 3 4	This parameter is different than the gate length. Whereas Gate Length determines how long the gate stays open, Step Duration signifies how long the note plays. Put another way, this allows you to create a self-contained tempo inside Thor’s Step Sequencer. Something you can’t do with the Matrix because all steps are a static value. There is no ability to change step duration for each note played. If you use Step Duration in Thor, generally, you’re going to want your entire pattern to equal the same value as the overall tempo. This means if you change One step duration downward, you want to change another one upward to compensate. If you don’t compensate, you’ll end up with a pattern that’s out of sync (which of course may be what you want, but probably not). Try it out to get a feel for how it operates. If you go too far, there’s always the “Reset” button.
Curve 1	Yes. 2 “modes”: Unipolar (Range: 0 – 127) Bipolar (Range: -64 to +64)	Yes. 1 “mode”: Unipolar (Range: 0 – 127)
Curve 2	No	Yes. 1 “mode”: Unipolar (Range: 0 – 127)
Shuffle	Yes (valid for Resolution values 1/8T and above). This is non-automatable, but is set on a per-pattern basis.	No	Though Thor does not have a Shuffle feature, you are usually better off using the ReGroove functionality for Both Thor and the Matrix. In Thor, you can use the Step Duration to shuffle as well.
Editing Input / Edit Knob	Note / Step / Gate / Velocity are drawn in by hand.	Rotaries are available for each step, and are turned for one value at a time (determined by the Edit knob). Note that the edit knob as well as the steps and Rotaries are all non-automatable.	This makes for easier “Live” editing input for the Matrix. Thor can be a little difficult and unwieldy to enter. It takes more time and precision to lay down a pattern.
CV Capability (all of which are non-automatable)
CV Outputs	3 Outputs: Curve CV Note CV Gate CV	6 Outputs: Note Gate / Velocity Curve 1 Curve 2 Start of Seq. Out End of Seq. Out	This is where Thor really shines, because there is an extra Curve CV, and extra CV outputs that can get sent to other locations when the Sequencer starts and/or stops.
CV Inputs	None	5 Inputs: Gate In (Trig) Rate In Pitch In Gate Length In Velocity In	Again, Thor has some nice input capability where CV can be used to send values into the Sequencer to Trigger all kinds of Parameters. For example, you can have the sequencer run (and play a short sequenced thor melody, for example) based on a Kick by sending the CV from the Kick drum into the Gate In (Trig) CV input.

*Note: Unless otherwise specified, all above parameters are automatable in the sequencer.

In leaving, I’ll say this: They both have their respective places. And what you want to do in your tracks is going to determine which step sequencer you use. One question that I can’t seem to shake is why on earth the Props didn’t provide the ability for the Thor step sequencer to create 64 patterns in a single device, and provide the same kind of editing interface that the Matrix has? If these two things were implemented, the Thor step sequencer would go light years beyond the Matrix and would probably negate the need to keep using the Matrix altogether. These two feature implementations would solve the two biggest issues: multiple patterns per device, and an editing environment that is easy to manipulate in a “live” environment. So if the props are listening, take note: This would help the users out immensely!

Your thoughts?

And after writing this, Sterioevo was kind enough to provide this cool little patch which shows how you can chain several Thor sequencers together to create a giant 256-Step-Transposable-Sequencer. No this is not a tutorial on Thor necessarily, but it shows that with some creative CV routing, you can get an amazing thing going on. Very cool stuff!

49 – Matrix Track Building (Part 2)

Now we get to some fun stuff: How to use the Matrix in a few different and interesting practical ways. To that end, I decided to build an entire track using nothing but sound devices that are controlled by Matrixes (Matrices?). This way, we can explore some of the practical uses of the Matrix along the way.

Creatively, it can also be a test of limitations to try creating tracks entirely with certain devices in Reason. It helps to set some boundaries and you might want to try creating an entire track using nothing but Thors, or nothing but one set of 10 samples or something along those lines. It forces your mind to think in new and innovative ways. And that, after all, is the point of this Blog.

Kick Drum and Roll Creation

In this video, I’ll show you how to create a kick drum and roll using a Subtractor. The Matrix is used to gate the drums and 2 patterns are created: One for the main drum part, and the other for the Roll. Once this is done, you can program the patterns in the sequencer and put the roll anywhere you want.

Snare and Hi Hat Creation

In this video, I’m going to do the same thing with the Matrix. Once again, we use some Subtractors for the sound sources, and the Matrixes are used to gate the drums.

Entering a Bass Line and Variations

Next, we’ll use a Malstrom and Matrix to create a simple Bass line. We’ll also use the “Copy/Paste Pattern,” and “Alter Pattern” functions on the Matrix to create some variations of the main bassline. Note that the “Alter Pattern” feature of the Matrix (accessed from the right-click context menu when you hover your mouse over the Matrix device) is unique to the Matrix. Even Thor doesn’t have this feature. The difference between Alter Pattern and Randomize are as follows:

Randomize: Randomizes the Note values anywhere from C1 to C6 in the Matrix. Also Randomizes the Gate & Velocity events (on / half / tied is also randomized), and the Curve. In other words, all three Matrix outputs are randomized.

Alter Pattern: Randomizes the notes, Gate / Velocity, and Curve events along the left and right axis. No new notes are introduced, no new velocity and gate values, and no new Curve values. Put simply, it reorders what already exists on-screen. And is one of the best features of the Matrix in my honest opinion.

Ok, I’ll admit, I cheated a little on this one. I automated the Mod Wheel directly in the sequencer. I could have just as easily created a curve ramped upward in a new Matrix and sent the Curve CV output from the Matrix into the Malstrom’s Mod Wheel CV input. Then drawn the pattern into the sequencer at the position where the Combinator Mod Wheel automation is located. Oops. But this gives you a great opportunity to practice some of the concepts I’ve presented here. Why not try reproducing this automation lane with a new Matrix yourself? Yeah, let’s go with that. 😉

Creating the Lead

In this video, I’ll show how you can create a Lead with Thor. Then we’ll use the Matrix to create a few patterns as we did for the Bassline. One of the things I hope you take away from this video is the idea that you can use the Matrix to adjust parameters that don’t have CV input jacks on the back of them. I know this sounds counter-intuitive, but it’s not a hard setup at all.

For example, here we have the BW parameter on Thor that can’t be adjusted via CV input, and since it can’t be adjusted on the Thor Modulation Bus Routing System (MBRS), you can’t send the curve CV of the matrix into Thor to adjust it that way. The solution is to send the Curve CV from the Matrix into a Combinator Rotary (or CV input in Version 5.0), and then set this parameter in the Combinator’s Modulation Programmer, so that Rotary 1 on the Combinator adjusts the BW in Thor. This way, the Combinator Rotary acts as a CV pass-through between the Matrix CV source and the Target parameter. This means that you can automate almost any parameter in Reason using the Matrix as a source. Such a simple idea with profound and powerful consequences.

In this second Lead-creation video (below), I’m going to introduce the idea of creating Chords using the Matrix. Since the matrix is a monophonic device, you cannot play more than one voice (or note) at a time. So Chords are out. However, once the lead is created, you can duplicate both the sound source and Matrix a few times to gain access to multiple voices. For example, create three instances of the Sound Source/Matrix duo, and then on step 1 for the first Matrix, place a “C” note. On step one of Matrix 2, place an “E” note. Finally, on step 1 of Matrix number 3 place a “G” note. If you have a pattern that is one step long, you will hear a C-major chord when all three are played simultaneously (when all three Matrixes are “run” at the same time).

So this video shows you how to create polyphony, and automate a polyphonic lead line in the sequencer.

Adding Pads

Now comes the part where we add our pad sound. This is a basic Thor device using some Wavetable Ocsillators and a Multi-Oscillator. Two Matrixes are used; one to control the note/gate of the pad, and the other used to adjust the Filter 1 Frequency.

Once again, I cheated on the Matrix in favor of a Mod Wheel automation lane. The poor girl is never going to forgive me.

Looks like another opportunity to try switching automation lanes into pattern lanes using a Matrix. For this one, it will be a little trickier. Since the Matrix pattern can only go 32 steps long, at the highest resolution(1/128) a single pattern can last 1/4 bar, while at the lowest resolution (1/2) a single pattern can last 16 bars. Put another way, if you want the smoothest possible curve, you will need to use 1/128 resolution. If you want the choppiest curve, you can use the lowest resolution (1/2).

Why does resolution matter? Because it’s important to understand that the Matrix is a “Step” sequencer, and not a a smooth curve (like a vector curve, for example). Put another way, think of the steps in the step sequencer as a square wave and a vector curve as a sine wave. As the amount of steps increases and the amount of time to play those steps decreases, the Resolution becomes finer (the Square Wave moves closer to morphing into a Sine wave). As the amount of steps decreases and the time it takes to play those steps increases, the Resolution becomes coarser (the Sine wave moves closer to morphing into a Square Wave). The finer your resolution, the less you will hear the change from one step event to another. The coarser your resolution, the more you will be apt to hear the switch from one step to another. This is a key concept to keep in mind when working with the Matrix. If the resolution is too course, you’re going to hear the switches between steps — which may be what you’re after. For this specific case, we want to create a very smooth curve. That’s going to mean a lot of Patterns and some work to create smooth, even curves. Truth be told, in the Matrix, there’s no such thing as a pure vector wave or sine wave. It’s just that there is a point at which the resolution becomes so fine that the ear does not hear the switch from one step to another (similar to how resolution works with sight. look at a newspaper photograph up close or through a magnifying glass and you see all the dots — course resolution. Look at the newspaper from farther away and your mind can no longer discern the dot pattern — fine resolution).

So how do you recreate the 20-bar ramp upward that I used for the Pad’s Mod Wheel automation?

The solution is to determine the resolution you want, then chain your patterns together using multiple curves. Let’s go somewhere in the middle. Using 1/16th resolution, we will need 10 patterns to create a 20 bar curve (all patterns using 32 steps). So you will need to utilize patterns A1 to B2 to create a continuous ramp upward. Still with me? Good. Now the most difficult part comes. Since the Matrix does not provide a proper way to set each step (you have to do this visually), you’ll have to figure out approximately where the curve starts and stops between patterns. For this, you can use the Visualizing CV trick I showed in the video in Part 1 of this series. Or you can eyeball it using the hash marks along the left edge of the curve input area. You know that the curve ending A5 and starting on A6 will need to be at the 50% mark of the Unipolar Curve height. So work backwards from there ramping downward all the way to zero at the start of pattern A1 (use the Shift key to create an even line of step events in each pattern). Then work upward from the start of A6 to the end of B2 (again holding down shift to create an even line of step events). Once that’s done, create a series of 10 patterns on the sequencer, each 2 bars long, and chain them together from A1 at the start to B2 at the end.

Now repeat this process using another 10 patterns and create a downward ramp 20 bars long (from B3-C4). To create the middle clip that is at level 127 is easy. Create a pattern (on C5, for example) which is one step long. On this first step of C5, raise the curve value up to the top in the Matrix editor. Then place that pattern on the sequencer for the duration of the middle clip (4 bars long in this song).

Phew! Now you see why I cheated. This is no small task. It’s fiddly, and it takes some effort. So why would you do it this way? Well, it shows you the concept of chaining patterns together, which can come in very handy to create curves or note sequences over long passages in your song. Also, it’s a great way to learn how the Matrix operates, which is, after all, the reason for this tutorial series. But more on this whole pattern chaining issue later on.

Thus ends the second part of our track creation using Matrixes. In the next part of this series, I’m going to show you how to use the Matrix as an arpeggiator, finish and clean up the track, convert all the patterns to notes, and more. Until next time, hope you have some fun in Reason and Record, and post a comment to let me know how you’re making out with the software and how I’m doing teaching it to you. Thanks for reading!