I haven’t written a blog for a while… since August! It’s time to get back on track! Earlier I wrote a blog entitled “Mixcraft is Amazing!” and yes, it is a fantastic little program. As I’ve been teaching, however, there are some issues I’ve come across that I would love to see improved. For instance, Mixcraft does not allow for video integration. Garageband does that! Additionally, it is very difficult to mix down in Mixcraft. You can’t automate effects (record changes in real time), you can’t really zoom into an audio clip as much as is really needed for some of the cuts, and the normalize function is pretty aweful. I have to take any project that needs a lot of gain boost into Sonar to really be able to mix it down. Also, you can’t send certain tracks to an effect bus. ie: there’s no way to add eq to the entire mix of drums. It would also be nice to have a master send so that I could add an effect to the entire mix of the song – ie, reverb. Otherwise you have to add that particular setting to each track individually which is not efficient. edit: See comment below – you can add master effects to Mixcraft.

We’ve had a hard time playing the keyboard into mixcraft. Our lab has Soundblaster Live! 24 bit external sound cards. This is not ideal, but it’s what we’re stuck with. For some reason, when we send the output of the MIDI track (Virtual Instrument) to the soft synth that comes with the sound card (Creative USB Sound Font Synth), we can no longer hear the keyboard. We have to get around it by using Acoustica instruments and setting the latency to it’s lower setting. Even with the lowest setting, there is still some delay, and the sound quality has a lot of pops, clicks, and sometimes doesn’t even work. Students who are adept at piano have to record into the computer using Sonar or Sibelius.

HOWEVER, I will note that for its price, Mixcraft is still amazing! I think Mixcraft is great for beginners who want to mix loops and grooves together to make their own songs and beats. For my class, however, we need something with a little more power.  Maybe Acoustica could make a higher level version for a little more money. The interface is so much easier to use than Sonar, I would be willing to pay a little extra money for the features listed above!

This piece was written after a rough week. It is dedicated to my wonderful husband, Tim Gunn, who has inspired me with his unending love.

Click L’Amor to listen to it as an mp3.

Print out music by clicking the link below:
http://www.sibeliusmusic.com/cgi-bin/show_score.pl?scoreid=138957

audio-fx  – This song was made for a project that needed 3 fx in the song to make the song sound real.

BDIddLey <—click here

This was a project that we had to do using at least three audio effects.  I used classic reverb, acoustica compressor, acoustica delay. HOLLA!

Freaky Naughty <—click here

Time to Say Goodbye

I wrote this in May 2008 after falling out of a serious relationship. I also decided to do this for the Audio FX assignment. I’ve been told by quite a few that it’s the best ballad I’ve ever written. Enjoy.

lee-orchestra1

My strings piece have a first violin, second violin,  viola, cello, and bass section.

ramirez-strings1 Got strings vibes and piano to make this Beat.

this song is inspired by abortion.  it is the view of the unborn baby. 

Confusion and Pain

For my piece, I had to be inspired by something, it took me a while to get that.  One day i was feeling kind of happy, then the next day I’d be pissed, so it kind of changed with my mood.  But eventually it ended up sounding kind of good, so I stoped, and this is what I ended up with.

inspired