Urs Heckmann is a prodigy of plug-in development, so when he sends something new, we pay attention. And in a world of a look-alike synths, Zebra2 does seem to qualify as “new”: a next-generation “wireless modular synth.” Didn’t quite get that? Think four joystick control, multiple sound-making techniques, massive, graphical sound sculpting and more:

Looking for gifts for others, or yourself? Or a way to drop hints about what you want? CDM is here to help. Next up for digital musicians ready to give and receive: music with a conscience, and books worth reading, many suitable as stocking stuffers.

Musician and author Mark Nelson tries out the highly anticipated M-Audio MicroTrack recorder for O’Reilly Digital media. Mark takes the test seriously, actually heading out into the field (Maui) and recording with it. (See Hawaii, above. Now why don’t I get to do a review like this?) The verdict? The recorder isn’t perfect: no real […]

Welcome, Computer Music readers — feel free to drop me a line. Here’s a roundup of Max/MSP resources, as a companion to the feature story on Max I wrote for Computer Music Magazine. Max is a deep, deep program, but to get you started, I’ve lined up: Unusual controllers for performance (tablets to game controllers) […]

Little late on this, but Matrixsynth last week points to a DIYer who built a Minimoog clone. Doesn’t look entirely completed, but it’s certainly an interesting idea . . . except that if you’ve got this much time, why not build something new? The Packrat cartoon by David Lovelace has something to say on the […]

Going to The Yale School of Music? Here’s some good news: the Associated Press reports that, thanks to an anonymous $100 million donation, advanced music studies will be tuition-free. (via) The 200-student school was already an elite institution; now you can expect it to be more so. Yale isn’t the only institution to have free […]

While we’re on the subject of free, here’s a massive collection of free VST plugins for Mac and Windows: Rocketloop It’s really great to see everything in one place; makes it much easier to navigate to what you need. Unlike some other sites, Rocketloop is perfect for window browsing. You’ll stumble across imaginative synths like […]

Kevin of The Nettles has this quandary about music-synchronized Christmas lights: There’s this Xmas lights video (make sure that you have your sound on): Wizards of Winter [new, better link] Lots of other video links to crazy Christmas light displays [Ed: Updated those links; thanks Afro! -PK] Do you happen to know the origins of […]

If I ran a giant blogging empire like Weblogsinc or Gawker, I’d have to pimp my other sites right now, like “Here’s the hottest news from the Facial Tissues Blog” or something. I’m glad I don’t have such an empire, because instead we can waste productivity looking at this great stuff: Tiny Tot Synth Lovers: […]