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Sequencers, synthesisers and samplers

  • 03-02-2004 11:34pm
    #1
    John
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,135 ✭✭✭✭


    I'm a complete newbie to these pieces of equipment. I was interested in picking up some stuff and I was wondering had anyone any recommendations. I plan to use them for weird sounds and backing for my current guitar and bass set up (think autechre backing up the melvins). I suppose I'd be better to ask in the dance section about this sort of equipment but dance scares me


Comments

  • #2
    musician.ie
    Closed Accounts Posts: 230 ✭✭musician.ie


    Do you need them for live performances or playing at home on your own? Do you have a computer? There's a lot of free and cheap music software which will do what you want. If that's not an option, then a modern keyboard workstation will have a built in sequencer and more weird sounds than you can shake a stick at. If you want to sample your own weirdness, you'll need a sampler and a sequencer or keyboard to drive it.

    Tell us more about what you want to do, to get a better answer.


  • #3
    John
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,135 ✭✭✭✭John


    Thanks for the reply.

    I'd like to be able to use the equipment live. I have a desktop but it's not great (I've tried to run software like CoolEdit and whatnot on it and it didn't work very well). I'd like to sample real noises as opposed to using built in weird sounds, I'd like to use noises from daily life.

    So I guess the sampler and sequencer/keyboard option is the one I'm looking at. I don't know where to start when it comes to this sort of equipment as the most high tech thing I've bought before was a flanger pedal.


  • #4
    musician.ie
    Closed Accounts Posts: 230 ✭✭musician.ie


    It's an interesting time to be buying a hardware sampler. Most of the leading names in sampling ( AKAI, Yamaha, EMU ) seemed to have distanced themselves from the field. Computers have come on so much, that they can do everything a hardware sampler can do, only better, and the software typically costs £200-£400 with a huge sample library thrown in.

    Also many of the high end keyboard workstations ( £2000 and up ) now have comprehensive sampling capabilities. It just doesn't seem to be profitable for hardware guys to make a box that only does sampling.

    On the other hand, this means you can pick up used samplers for a low price. There's an AKAI MPC 2000 going for £300 right now on ebay uk
    http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3701085873&category=38070
    which might suit you. Look up it's capabilities on the net and see.....

    Hope this helps.


  • #5
    robbie1876
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,766 ✭✭✭robbie1876


    musician.ie is spot on, a cheap sampler/midi keyboard setup sounds like it will sort you out. All you need then is a bit of patience to set up your sounds. You should be able to get up and running for €500 or so in total.

    The bottom keyboard in my sig is a Yamaha Motif 7, which I've expanded to 64mb RAM and use it's sampling facilities all the time live. It is an extremely powerful and totally reliable setup for dealing with samples, and sound quality is stunning.

    Here are some helpful links to look at:

    http://musicmall.com/cmp/tutindex.htm
    http://www.hitsquad.com/smm/tutorials.html
    http://www.audiomidi.com/aboutus/classroom.cfm


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