Steve Heithecker

I have a deep dark secret. It's a bit embarrassing but I'll let it out in the hope that it will ease my pain (a 12 steps kinda of thing and I don't mean that musically). The truth is I own about 20 hardware keyboards from the classic Moog Rouge to my pimped out Triton rack and the secret is that I haven't tuned them on in about 3 years, well maybe my triton and 2080 get some love but other than that....there they sit. Why is this so? Why I have turned my back on those beautiful old circuits and chips?

Well, it's a little program I like to call Reason. Back in the day (versions 1-2.5) Reason was a great little sketch pad for jotting down ideas but it's sounds were a little thin compared to other soft synths and VERY think compared to say.... my Chroma Polaris. Well thats all changed now especially with the release of v.4. Version 4 sounds great right out of the box. They have put a lot of effort into their audio engine and summing bus. Run it through a HD192 into a pair of Genelecs and presto change-o, instant phatness. So now when the creative bug bites I have both a great sketch pad but also a world class app for all my sequencing needs. If you include 3rd party refils such as the Miroslav Orchestral library or the Nine Volt Guitars or from any of the myriad sample libraries out there and you have almost unlimited resources at your beck and call.

In an analog studio the amount of time its takes to get the synths fired up and the board and speakers and such up and running can be a bit time consuming and to be honest when that special little bit of inspiration hits me at 2 in the morning by the time I get everything up and live I've lost the magic of the moment to the art of switch flipping. 

So to appease my midnight muse I leave a dedicated G5 running at all times (I do sleep it and turn off the monitors to be green) and when the inspiration hits I have almost every imaginable sound at my fingertips.  After I've laid down the foundation of my track and the sunlight approaches, I rewire my Reason session into Pro Tools to track my audio. An added bonus is that you can export you well labeled MIDI data to Pro Tools also and then re-voice it to your hardware. This allows you to get sounds from wherever you want. Mixing and matching sounds from different sound sources is a hallmark of MIDI. A little hardware with a bit of software equals - Best of both worlds!  Now I still feel bad about my older synths but I just hope they remember it's about being creative and just like in comedy....timing matters!