You run up against a limitation in Ableton Live, or you’ve got a creative idea. What if you could make it happen using code? That’s the Ableton Extension SDK, out in public beta now (JavaScript, TypeScript, Node.js). And just like that, we’ve got Live with handy new workflows, opening up scores, connecting to the Web, and playing games. Here’s what it means, and what it can and can’t do (so far).

Behind the headlines, there is the reality of living through war. Our friend in Kyiv, Kaximia, (part of Tembra Modular, “Let’s explore modular synthesis”) is back to talk about how music can be an outlet. The past days and hours have been horrifying, from Tyre to Odesa, so I’m grateful to Kaximia for her reflections […]

Epic layoffs in March cut deep into the audio and music teams. But there’s hope that their work will live on in Unreal Engine and MetaSounds, via what is arguably the most innovative sound work built into any game engine. Unreal Engine 5.8, now in preview, features a bunch of powerful tools for working with sound, one of the biggest sound releases yet. Here’s a look at what’s in that roadmap.

Forget any associations you may have with additive synthesis. Monomono’s Niseko takes that harmonic content and makes it accessible and expressive, via the UI or an input (including Push and MPE).

Kids today, with their 31 equal divisions of the octave. Yes, it’s the music of Nicolà Vicentino, a Renaissance theorist and composer who built his own microtonal harpsichord to accommodate his experimental tunings. But it’s not just a theoretical experiment: there is some connection to musical practice (even if Vicentino was basically making this up). Food for thought as we mess with digital tuning systems and microonality.”

Kelli Cain and Brian Crabtree are celebrating the 20th anniversary of their monome company and project this week. For anyone moved by their creations over the years, there will be no escape from the feels in this gallery — and, of course, I couldn’t resist adding some extra memories from that era.

It’s an oscillator, a step sequencer, a modulation and envelope source, a quantizer (with custom tunings) — even a scope, thanks to its interactive, animated visual interface. Thorn Audio’s new Eurorack module can make anything from elegant, precise curves. It’s more than just another do-everything module. Now you’re playing with Splines.

Piaman, aka half of RYOKO2000, formerly Pianoid (bio: “doesn’t play piano at all”) is turning himself into a human Vocaloid, with joysticks and fast reflexes. And this is what you need right now. Linkhole trail begins now:

It’s Memorial Day in the USA, Whit Monday in Germany and other parts of the West, and since what’s truly sacred is shopping, that means some deals running through the end of the day.

There’s something magical about playing sounds with polyphonic expression. It means translating sound ideas directly to your hands and improvising live, rather than having to go back and edit those ideas in later or take your hands off the keyboard to turn a knob. Here’s a look at playing the presets I made for Elastic OSC using Expressive E’s excellent Osmose keyboard.