You are the most patient man, that you had to record this twice and are still going through everything so calm and clear! Great video, as always! So glad to be in the DT/DN family now so I can make use of these 😁
Really fun to watch your work flow Learned some tricks. Also really like the tune The Digitone sounded like an instant classic instrument to me and that’s why I bought one You prove that. Thanks for posting the vid
Thank you, Jon! I was a bit worried this unstructured and completely live approach would be too messy. I'm glad you like it! Yeah, the Digitone is a really rewarding box :D
In a week my digitone is coming from Ukraine, where I had to leave all of my gear, but now am able to to take at lest some part of it back. Thanks for your video, gave me some ideas how exactly I want to use it ❤️
Hey man, I'm glad you found it helpful! I wasn't completely happy with the results, but I thought maybe it could be helpful to see what my process looks like when I'm not 100% feeling it =P.
This is so incredible! Will you do another video on how you build sound patches from scratch on the Digitone? Would love to see that! Cheers and keep it up from Germany ✌️
Thank you verey much! I've been thinking about making a tutorial on how I make my lead sounds, how to make velocity sensitive keys/pads, and how to do drums on the Digitone. The next one I'm gonna make is a general how-to-make-a-track type of tutorial, though. Thanks for the request, and thanks for checking out my stuff :)
I am very happy to see your videos. The solo sound is perfect dirty and smooth.. harmonics base on 4/4 9step is very fresh in the track and make good brake in melody.. now i prepare next track with similar sound set..
Thank you, Martin! I'm glad youlike my videos :D. Doing chord changes by only changing the root note is a really fun trick once you're comfortable with it.
@@JakeAlstad Thanks again, man :D. I have a few ideas for Digitone Tutorials. So far I have the bass tutorial, and I could maybe make one on leads, one for pads or velocity sensitive "keys" patches, one for drums (once I'm familiar with it!). I just need to find the time and inspiration to plan and record them.
Ack I know I’m late on this video but I love these types of videos. Production on the elektron machines is cool, especially your style Do you come up with all your own sound design? Or get sound packs?
Thanks for the video. Question: What the purpose of the Paste button? You seem to press it quite often, seemingly when you are not pasting (?) For example, when you are auditioning lead and pad sounds at the beginning.
Thanks for watching! Usually when you press stop, the delay, reverb, and amp release on all the notes will continue playing. Double-pressing the stop button will cut off all the sound. Since I was auditioning sounds with very long release times, I had to double-stop every now and then to cut them off.
Can you elaborate the method of the "RR" arpeggiated drum notes and why you use them? So much other good bits in this but this one skill is interesting to me. You should make a slow paced basic "How to build a track on digitone Ivar style". Good stuff as always!
When I save my drum sounds into the sound pool, I've started saving them with arp enabled at 1/16th note speed. I do this so that I can play for example many hihats in a row using only 1 trig. When The RR versions of these sounds have arp set to 1/32nd note speed, which is sort of a retriggering version of the same sound. So say I want a couple of quick hats somewhere, then I can sound-lock the RR-version of the hihats instead of the normal ones.
Really enjoyed your style and how you make music on Digitone. I'm a songwriter and want to create beats and soundscapes for my songs. I'm 90 percent there in favor of buying Digitone Keys because every time I hear it it just sucks me in but was curious if you think Digitakt would be a better fit. It's kind of been the x-factor that is making my decision hard. I play piano and guitar and have never owned any Elektron products yet, which is why I was leaning towards the keys. To get more of the "instrument" experience.
Thanks a lot, Jesse! I think that if you already have a setup and want to expand, then I think the Digitone may be a better fit than the Digitakt. It sounds really good and you can assign up to 4 parameters to each of mod wheel, velocity and aftertouch. This can make the Digitone really expressive when playing it with a keyboard. It works well as a standalone unit for making full tracks, but I think the Digitakt is less cumbersome and more inspiring to play with because it is less complex/more streamlined, has more tracks to work with at once (they both have 8 voices/audio tracks in total), and all 8 audio tracks and 8 midi tracks are all accessible from one "page". On the Digitone you have to toggle between synth mode and midi mode to mute/unmute or select tracks. If you're multitracking this isn't a problem at all, but since I like to just live record my jams, all these extra steps to do the simplest things really throw me off. That said though, they actually feel very similar to use. 95% of the muscle memory I had from that Digitakt carried over perfectly to the Digitone :P. They both also have the same awesome Elektron sequencer. TL;DR: Digitone is an amazing sounding synth, and the Digitakt is an amazingly inspiring sampler. I usually recommend the Digitakt because it's "faster" and simpler and gives nice results even early on. The Digitone is more complex and takes more effort to get good sounding results, but is really rewarding if you're patient :)
Fantastic tutorial! A question, I hope you don’t mind answering. At 19.33 you ‘steal the voice’ of the trig previous, which is a cool way to cheat more ‘pages’, I think is the main reason for doing it? - anyway, even when I microtime the following trig all the way left, I always get a small moment of silence, so my note isn’t coming in on the 1 of the bar. I’m using a bass sound, which I’ve set to 1 voice. It seems like your lead sound is microtimed all the way ‘left’ so it comes in on the 1 of the bar even though it’s trig 2, unless I’m mistaken? Thanks in advance! Keep up the awesome work! :)
Hey, thank you very much! You're right on both counts; it's a way to lengthen a pattern to 8 bars instead of 4, and there will always be a few milliseconds of silence when microtiming a trig all the way to the left. I very often use that microtiming trick so that the melody follows the same rythm the 2nd time around, but with a new variation in notes only. I like keeping the rythm but changing the notes because it is repitition (which makes melodies easier to remember), but not uninteresting repitition because there's a slight change in the melody.
@@IvarTryti Thanks for the reply, Ivar! Cool, that all makes sense! Maybe because it's a lead sound with release and reverb on the notes before I can't hear the slight delay on the note that comes in the second time around, unless you micro-timed the firs note back a little, but I can't spot you doing that. But your points about variation make total sense, anyways thanks again! :)
@@oliverlisher696 My pleasure, man :) I also usually microtime some notes to the right to introduce a biiiit of delay to "humanize" it. The little gap you get by microtiming all the way to the left is just a bonus, if you look at it that way :P
@@IvarTryti Ha! Makes sense! :) If you have the time, this is my first attempt experimenting baed on your tutorials: www.dropbox.com/s/gklue9vc9x8jid4/Digitone%20-%20Sketch%201.mov?dl=0 Thanks again man, you've really inspired me to learn the Digitone and get away from the computer for making music! :)
Beautiful demos. I'm confused about overbridge though.. Is there a need to use the hardware sequencer if you use overbridge and you don't want to perform with it? Isn't it an overkill if you follow this way (just use it as a synth engine with overbridge)? Do I miss something here?
Thanks! If you're not interested in the hardware but are interested in the sound only, then I think you can do everything via the overbridge Digitone plugin. Personally I think a big draw of the Digitone is the hardware; you can get just as beautiful sounds with plugins at 1/10th the cost. I don't use the Digitone plugin, but I do have overbridge installed so I can use the Digitone as an audio interface and record directly onto fl studio.
Thanks, Jakob! I made these patches myself. The melodic ones are made from scratch, but most of the drums are stock presets that I tweaked to taste. I haven't tried any preset packs, so I can't recommend anything!
@@blueberry2a Thank you! I made these patches from scratch except for the drums, which are factory presets that I tweaked to taste. There have been a few comments suggesting I share my patches, but it's something I have to think more about.
Hey! I want to buy Digitone for the hardware extension. I will be use this one especially for dnb neurofunk harsh basslines. It will be decent piece of hardware for me? What u think?
Hey man, I know for a fact that the Digitone can make some NASTY bass sounds. I'm sure there's a way to do it, but I can't think up an obvious way to make that thick neuro "woiowoiow" bass sound. But since it's an FM synth you can get some really harsh and complex high frequencies, and those can be further messed up with a built in overdrive per patch (and a master overdrive right at the end of the signal path). I think that if you only want the sounds but aren't interested in the sequencer or the workflow, it miiight be a bit expensive.
@@IvarTryti I'm interested bout sequencer tho, and elektron workflow. I will be use this device for weird melody lines tho. i Luv the P-lock parameters option, also i want be lil' more dawless and sketch my ideas outside my PC.
@@TheJuggallo Ahh, ok! I think a Digitone could be a really good fit, then :D. The workflow *is* very unique, and I think you'd lose out on a lot if you didn't use it. Since you're interested in the workflow, I think it's worth a shot. It's a slower workflow than using a DAW, but for me it's been really inspiring and fun to work this way.
Thanks! I have to think more about whether or now I should share my patches, but I'm very interested in making tutorials explaining how I go about making them. So far I have a bass tutorial, and have been planning a lead, pads/keys and drum tutorials some time in the future.
you are moving quite quick, but am i getting this right that when you hold trig and push the note button you can easily switch the note of that trig? didn know this was a thing
You're exactly right. Press trig + note, and you enter note mode for that trig. You can put in chords too: each note can be toggled on or off individually. Also really cool trick: you can hold SEVERAL TRIGS to set the same notes to all of them!
I don't have a Digitone Keys, but I do have a Yamaha Reface CP, and when put side-by-side and hook them up with a midi cable, it LOOKS like a Digitone Keys :D
These are actually my own patches! When browsing patches you can select which bank to display, and I save all my patches in bank C, and also browsed bank C (and D, where I save my drums) in this vode.
Very nice but way to much work to get to the point of making music...way to much tech not enough making music.But you are a damn master of this very difficult piece of beautiful gear.I have the Digitone Keys just arrived in mail one week ago and im sending it back and grabbing a easy dumb people Dave Smith Rev 2 Cheers
Thanks! Programming in melodies step by step is such a different approach than live recording them. I really like this approach though because it lets me compose melodies *and* tailor the sound to suit the melody, note for note. I can see how it can be a cumbersome way to make music, though :P
You're extremely strong when it comes to your structuring skills which is an extremely difficult skill to acquire, but on the other hand I have to be honest the theme of this piece sounds so depressing and meaningless to me. I know it's not pleasant to hear criticism like that but I feel like if you took a lot more time building a simple but very catchy idea that had uniqueness and finesse in the first place, when the time would come to couple it with your structuring skill, it would greatly improve the chance that your content would be genuinely interesting to listen to.
Thanks for the kind words and detailed feedback! Is your criticism pointed at this track in particular, or my music in general? If it's aimed at this track, then I think I can see where you're coming from. The first melody I wrote sounded too much like a track by Rephazer (who makes awesome music), so I decided to scrap the idea and start over. This threw me off my game a bit. Then there's the consideration of how much time to spend on one idea versus moving on and staying productive. I may have moved on a bit too quickly in this video. If your criticism is aimed at my music in general, do you have time to fill me in on the details? Either way, thanks for checking me out and for the honest feedback :)
@@IvarTryti What I said was directed specifically towards this track, but to me the video was very revealing of your workflow even putting the theme of the song aside. I could literally feel you going through this clear effort of abstraction to try and organize multiple elements in your mind, with the emphasis so obviously placed on constructing something, which is something I'm having the biggest struggle with by the way. In my own process I get hypnotized in the moment and I end up with very catchy ideas I'm having a very hard time expanding upon because of how refined the idea becomes by the time I have to start thinking about expanding on the idea. I have to hear my content over and over from the beginning when I expand ideas to remind myself of the idea I've constructed as a whole because everything has to go through the filter of how it makes me feel for me to find the motivation to move forward with a creative process so it's tedious and very repetitive. The truth is that it takes a LOT more discipline to develop the habits that you've developed, but music in its essence isn't about producing, it's about speaking a language that speaks to the listener, hopefully with the aspiration of doing so in an eloquent way. In order to find balance in your workflow, it can't be just discipline and abstraction, there needs to be a clear comfortable space allocated for spontaneity and feel. You've already worked pretty hard on the discipline side obviously, but all this know how from my perspective will always be meaningless if you're just uninspired. The process of musical creation is very personal, and you may truly be at a point where you would want to make music that expresses sadness, but still, throughout this process, there should always be the intention of conveying something refined, awe inspiring and preferably meaningful.
@@Silent_Stillness Thanks for the clarification, man. Yeah, it's definitely hard to make music when uninspired. It's the reason I almost decided to not upload this video, but I did so anyway. Unlike my other videos this one was unstructured and messy, and I thought maybe it could be interesting to watch how I deal with uncertainty. If I had decided to not upload the video, my plan was to try again with a fresh project and hope that inspiration struck me next time. I agree with you about spontaneity. If you're playing an instrument live, there's a chance you'll play the wrong thing, but that wrong thing might be perfect for the track. Unintentionally improving the song feels awesome =P. I think that spontaneity is important, but it doesn't have to be at that level. When I perform tracks, all I'm doing is muting and tweaking sequences I preprogrammed. There's no spontaneity in these sequences, but there's spontaneity in structuring the track. I've learned a lot of cool tricks because of happy accidents when performing: unmuting the drums too late or the main melody too early, forgetting to reset my tweaks before the next section, and other things like that are examples of spontaneity. It's why I like to practice playing a track only once or twice before recording videos, so that there's room for spontaneity in the song structure. That said though, this track isn't my greatest work. I usually work for 2-5 hours per session, and I finish my tracks in 1 or 2 of these sessions. I've done one other track from scratch where I was very happy with the results, and I hoped I'd be as lucky this time, too =).
@@IvarTryti I just finished going through pretty much your entire body of work on soundcloud and it made me smile when I saw your orchestral creations because the first thing i thought when i listened to your youtube video was that you seemed like someone who would have the mind of a classical music composer which is a complete anachronism considering the kind of equipment you're using . Anyhow, it showcased your melodic know-how and it's pretty obvious that on top of being very strong structurally you're very strong melodically, and clearly you've put in a lot of work where it counts. Circling back to your video, the first thought that came to mind was that it's almost like instead of you playing the digitone to bend it to your will, the digitone was somewhat playing you. What I mean by that is that it felt like the use of this particular machine caused a regression in the finesse of the content you very easily could have laid down had you had less restrictive tools, knowing the kind of music you've already demonstrated you were able to make literally years ago. I think the Digitakt is an amazing groove machine, and the digitone is its capable sidekick, but clearly these machines are not meant to facilitate large scale melodic constructions. I think that if you're going to try and force it, your best shot is by hooking up a keystep style keyboard to it and by relying on your digitakt for percussions. 64 steps and pray you have enough brainpower to somehow manage to internalize large structures without visual guides throughout pattern chaining without going nuts. Also, nothing stops you from spending a week or two actually making and saving sounds on the machines so that next time you want to just pump out something on the spot you don't need to get sucked into the elektron's pseudo depressive synth sounds lol! It's super cool sharing your stuff, but as you might probably know by now releasing low quality stuff over time decreases the listeners willingness to consider clicking on your content over time especially if you release a lot of content. More importantly, releasing music for the "likes" as if it was some sort of drug is the best way to find yourself stuck being uninspired and frustrated... food for thought!
@@Silent_Stillness Wow, thanks for listening to so much of my music. I really appreciate it! I've been making music for a long time, and 99% of my pre-Digitakt/Digitone stuff was made with a mouse and a piano roll in FL Studio. I'm not good at expressive live playing, but I'm comfortable "drawing" expressiveness with a mouse :P. You're not completely wrong about the machines playing me and not the other way around. 10 years ago I started becoming less and less inspired, and eventually got all burnt out. I still made music now and then, but it was more because "I haven't made music in a long time" than anything. Then earlier this year I wanted to try something new and completely different from my usual workflow, so I bought the Digitakt. Compared to a laptop and a DAW, the Digitakt is very limited, but I haven't been this inspired to make music in years. The thing about these limitations is that instead of being frustrated at what it CAN'T do, it's iiiinnnncredibly satisfying to push the box to its limits and actually achieve what I want it to do. Also, having little to no visual aid when structuring my tracks is a limitation, but the satisfaction of imagining a melody and chord progression, putting it in the step sequencer, and getting it right on the first try can't be beat. For now, the overall slower workflow is absolutely worth it, considering how inspired I am by it. One day I plan on combining my orchestral stuff with the Digitakt/Digitone and get the best of both worlds, but I'm not in a hurry. I sit in front of a computer all day at work, and it's nice to just take out one or both of these boxes to the living room and make music without needing a screen. When I run out of ideas (but before I get burnt out again!), I'll start looking into it :) Thanks for the thoughtful comments, man!
I don't own digitone, but watched vid with pleasure.
Hehe, thank you very much, Rafal. I'm glad it was interesting even if you don't have one :D
Master class in the digitone :-)
Thanks, SJ!
You are the most patient man, that you had to record this twice and are still going through everything so calm and clear! Great video, as always! So glad to be in the DT/DN family now so I can make use of these 😁
Haha, thanks a lot! Glad you find this video useful, even if it's more rambly than my tutorials :D
@@IvarTryti Yeah I think just watching someone else's process is always useful for thinking of new ideas!
wow great trick with shifting the pitch of hat so it doesnt steal the voice! another amazing video
Thank you! Yeah, I was surprised it worked when I tried it :P
Those whistle arpeggios are my favorite :D
Really fun to watch your work flow Learned some tricks. Also really like the tune The Digitone sounded like an instant classic instrument to me and that’s why I bought one You prove that. Thanks for posting the vid
Thank you, Jon! I was a bit worried this unstructured and completely live approach would be too messy. I'm glad you like it! Yeah, the Digitone is a really rewarding box :D
That was great dude! The drums sound nice and I love that dusty melody! Dreamy.
Thank you, Crolodon! I'm glad you like it :)
In a week my digitone is coming from Ukraine, where I had to leave all of my gear, but now am able to to take at lest some part of it back. Thanks for your video, gave me some ideas how exactly I want to use it ❤️
This is a marvelous introduction to your ideas when constructing melody on the digitone! Super helpful thanks!
Hey man, I'm glad you found it helpful! I wasn't completely happy with the results, but I thought maybe it could be helpful to see what my process looks like when I'm not 100% feeling it =P.
This is so incredible! Will you do another video on how you build sound patches from scratch on the Digitone? Would love to see that! Cheers and keep it up from Germany ✌️
Thank you verey much! I've been thinking about making a tutorial on how I make my lead sounds, how to make velocity sensitive keys/pads, and how to do drums on the Digitone. The next one I'm gonna make is a general how-to-make-a-track type of tutorial, though. Thanks for the request, and thanks for checking out my stuff :)
@@IvarTryti Great to hear, looking forward to that. :)
I am very happy to see your videos. The solo sound is perfect dirty and smooth.. harmonics base on 4/4 9step is very fresh in the track and make good brake in melody.. now i prepare next track with similar sound set..
I wondsr how you would develop track further..
Thank you, Martin! I'm glad youlike my videos :D. Doing chord changes by only changing the root note is a really fun trick once you're comfortable with it.
awesome, as always. thanks for the tips!
Thank you, Jake! I'm glad it was helpful :)
@@IvarTryti i'd love to see more digitone-specific videos/tutorials/whatever you want to do! You're one of the best with this instrument
@@JakeAlstad Thanks again, man :D. I have a few ideas for Digitone Tutorials. So far I have the bass tutorial, and I could maybe make one on leads, one for pads or velocity sensitive "keys" patches, one for drums (once I'm familiar with it!). I just need to find the time and inspiration to plan and record them.
It´s a good machine with good skills!
It's a great synth yeah, and thank you!
The mad Digtone scientist...strike again...Muhaaa aaaaa...
Haha thanks, man :D
Excellent walkthrough
Thanks a lot, man =)
Ack
I know I’m late on this video but I love these types of videos. Production on the elektron machines is cool, especially your style
Do you come up with all your own sound design? Or get sound packs?
Thanks for the video. Question: What the purpose of the Paste button? You seem to press it quite often, seemingly when you are not pasting (?) For example, when you are auditioning lead and pad sounds at the beginning.
Thanks for watching! Usually when you press stop, the delay, reverb, and amp release on all the notes will continue playing. Double-pressing the stop button will cut off all the sound. Since I was auditioning sounds with very long release times, I had to double-stop every now and then to cut them off.
Beautiful!!
Thanks!
would love to see more of your 'process' videos
Can you elaborate the method of the "RR" arpeggiated drum notes and why you use them? So much other good bits in this but this one skill is interesting to me. You should make a slow paced basic "How to build a track on digitone Ivar style". Good stuff as always!
When I save my drum sounds into the sound pool, I've started saving them with arp enabled at 1/16th note speed. I do this so that I can play for example many hihats in a row using only 1 trig. When The RR versions of these sounds have arp set to 1/32nd note speed, which is sort of a retriggering version of the same sound. So say I want a couple of quick hats somewhere, then I can sound-lock the RR-version of the hihats instead of the normal ones.
Sounds so good at 24:50 🌊
THank you, Luke&Line :D
Heck yea Ivar, mad vibes!
Thank you, Orital! :D
Really enjoyed your style and how you make music on Digitone. I'm a songwriter and want to create beats and soundscapes for my songs. I'm 90 percent there in favor of buying Digitone Keys because every time I hear it it just sucks me in but was curious if you think Digitakt would be a better fit. It's kind of been the x-factor that is making my decision hard. I play piano and guitar and have never owned any Elektron products yet, which is why I was leaning towards the keys. To get more of the "instrument" experience.
Thanks a lot, Jesse! I think that if you already have a setup and want to expand, then I think the Digitone may be a better fit than the Digitakt. It sounds really good and you can assign up to 4 parameters to each of mod wheel, velocity and aftertouch. This can make the Digitone really expressive when playing it with a keyboard. It works well as a standalone unit for making full tracks, but I think the Digitakt is less cumbersome and more inspiring to play with because it is less complex/more streamlined, has more tracks to work with at once (they both have 8 voices/audio tracks in total), and all 8 audio tracks and 8 midi tracks are all accessible from one "page". On the Digitone you have to toggle between synth mode and midi mode to mute/unmute or select tracks. If you're multitracking this isn't a problem at all, but since I like to just live record my jams, all these extra steps to do the simplest things really throw me off.
That said though, they actually feel very similar to use. 95% of the muscle memory I had from that Digitakt carried over perfectly to the Digitone :P. They both also have the same awesome Elektron sequencer.
TL;DR: Digitone is an amazing sounding synth, and the Digitakt is an amazingly inspiring sampler. I usually recommend the Digitakt because it's "faster" and simpler and gives nice results even early on. The Digitone is more complex and takes more effort to get good sounding results, but is really rewarding if you're patient :)
Fantastic tutorial!
A question, I hope you don’t mind answering.
At 19.33 you ‘steal the voice’ of the trig previous, which is a cool way to cheat more ‘pages’, I think is the main reason for doing it? - anyway, even when I microtime the following trig all the way left, I always get a small moment of silence, so my note isn’t coming in on the 1 of the bar. I’m using a bass sound, which I’ve set to 1 voice.
It seems like your lead sound is microtimed all the way ‘left’ so it comes in on the 1 of the bar even though it’s trig 2, unless I’m mistaken?
Thanks in advance! Keep up the awesome work! :)
Hey, thank you very much! You're right on both counts; it's a way to lengthen a pattern to 8 bars instead of 4, and there will always be a few milliseconds of silence when microtiming a trig all the way to the left.
I very often use that microtiming trick so that the melody follows the same rythm the 2nd time around, but with a new variation in notes only. I like keeping the rythm but changing the notes because it is repitition (which makes melodies easier to remember), but not uninteresting repitition because there's a slight change in the melody.
@@IvarTryti Thanks for the reply, Ivar!
Cool, that all makes sense! Maybe because it's a lead sound with release and reverb on the notes before I can't hear the slight delay on the note that comes in the second time around, unless you micro-timed the firs note back a little, but I can't spot you doing that.
But your points about variation make total sense, anyways thanks again! :)
@@oliverlisher696 My pleasure, man :) I also usually microtime some notes to the right to introduce a biiiit of delay to "humanize" it. The little gap you get by microtiming all the way to the left is just a bonus, if you look at it that way :P
@@IvarTryti Ha! Makes sense! :)
If you have the time, this is my first attempt experimenting baed on your tutorials: www.dropbox.com/s/gklue9vc9x8jid4/Digitone%20-%20Sketch%201.mov?dl=0
Thanks again man, you've really inspired me to learn the Digitone and get away from the computer for making music! :)
So many tutorials... I'm struggling to keep up with watching. Thanks for your efforts!
Haha, thanks a lot for watching, Johannes :D
@@IvarTryti Well I'm trying. But I promise to watch all your videos when the kids are grown up and/or I'm retiring. In 35 years or so.
@@humankapital2000 Haha damn, I'm looking forward to your thoughts on my stuff in 35 years! :D
@@IvarTryti Sure, I added a reminder to my calendar for the year 2054. See you then!
I am planning on buying a digitone, can you program a whole track to play by itself?
Damn. That Soft Detune Patch is beautiful. Where can I find it? This whole video is great!
Nice track dude! Reminds me of Boards of Canada.
Thank you very much, Matt!
Matt Schaller I was going to say the same thing!
Beautiful demos. I'm confused about overbridge though.. Is there a need to use the hardware sequencer if you use overbridge and you don't want to perform with it? Isn't it an overkill if you follow this way (just use it as a synth engine with overbridge)? Do I miss something here?
Thanks! If you're not interested in the hardware but are interested in the sound only, then I think you can do everything via the overbridge Digitone plugin. Personally I think a big draw of the Digitone is the hardware; you can get just as beautiful sounds with plugins at 1/10th the cost. I don't use the Digitone plugin, but I do have overbridge installed so I can use the Digitone as an audio interface and record directly onto fl studio.
👏
Thanks!
Great tune. I‘m curious if the pressest are packs from Elektron or home made. If packs, which one would you recommend?
Thanks, Jakob! I made these patches myself. The melodic ones are made from scratch, but most of the drums are stock presets that I tweaked to taste. I haven't tried any preset packs, so I can't recommend anything!
Ivar Tryti thank you. These presets are wonderful, keep up the great work.
@@IvarTryti hello very interesting with your patches where can i get them ?
@@blueberry2a Thank you! I made these patches from scratch except for the drums, which are factory presets that I tweaked to taste. There have been a few comments suggesting I share my patches, but it's something I have to think more about.
Ivar Tryti I was wondering if you’d consider selling these presets. I went looking for them in my Digitone and then realized they were yours!
Hey! I want to buy Digitone for the hardware extension. I will be use this one especially for dnb neurofunk harsh basslines. It will be decent piece of hardware for me? What u think?
Hey man, I know for a fact that the Digitone can make some NASTY bass sounds. I'm sure there's a way to do it, but I can't think up an obvious way to make that thick neuro "woiowoiow" bass sound. But since it's an FM synth you can get some really harsh and complex high frequencies, and those can be further messed up with a built in overdrive per patch (and a master overdrive right at the end of the signal path).
I think that if you only want the sounds but aren't interested in the sequencer or the workflow, it miiight be a bit expensive.
@@IvarTryti I'm interested bout sequencer tho, and elektron workflow. I will be use this device for weird melody lines tho. i Luv the P-lock parameters option, also i want be lil' more dawless and sketch my ideas outside my PC.
@@TheJuggallo Ahh, ok! I think a Digitone could be a really good fit, then :D. The workflow *is* very unique, and I think you'd lose out on a lot if you didn't use it. Since you're interested in the workflow, I think it's worth a shot. It's a slower workflow than using a DAW, but for me it's been really inspiring and fun to work this way.
Hi Ivar I was wondering how you record the digitone. Having only one main out doesn’t help with mixing and mastering
Ivar, how many patches are on your Patreon ?
very interesting with your patches is there any solution to get them ?
Thanks! I have to think more about whether or now I should share my patches, but I'm very interested in making tutorials explaining how I go about making them. So far I have a bass tutorial, and have been planning a lead, pads/keys and drum tutorials some time in the future.
🙏🙏🙏
You forgot to record a 40 minute take?!!??! Oh man that hurts.
Haha phew no, I only lost the first 5 minutes or so, but enough to have started working on a loop.
Hi, Ivar. Are the sounds in your Bank C your own?
Yeah, I save my melodic patches to bank C and drums to bank D. My drums are mostly made up of factory presets that I've tweaked to taste, though.
@@IvarTryti thought i had erased a bank of great sounds there. Cheers
you are moving quite quick, but am i getting this right that when you hold trig and push the note button you can easily switch the note of that trig? didn know this was a thing
You're exactly right. Press trig + note, and you enter note mode for that trig. You can put in chords too: each note can be toggled on or off individually. Also really cool trick: you can hold SEVERAL TRIGS to set the same notes to all of them!
@@IvarTryti thats dope!
I just saw a vid for Digitone keys..that thing is nuts.. in a good way... do you own one?
I don't have a Digitone Keys, but I do have a Yamaha Reface CP, and when put side-by-side and hook them up with a midi cable, it LOOKS like a Digitone Keys :D
@@IvarTryti Cool.
hey Ivar, are these all your own patches? if so you should def get a pack together to share/sell.. they sound great :)
They look to be the stock presets, all the stock sounds are great on the DN!
Thank you! The melodic patches are made from scratch, but the drums are mostly reworked presets. Drums on FM Synthesis is still a mystery to me :D
These are actually my own patches! When browsing patches you can select which bank to display, and I save all my patches in bank C, and also browsed bank C (and D, where I save my drums) in this vode.
@@IvarTryti great work, they sounds lovely.
@@IvarTryti thought so, nicely done!
What soundpack is that?
I made these patches myself. The melodic ones are made from scratch, but most of the drums are just heavily tweaked stock presets.
Speed tracking that’s the way uh huh I like it yeah that’s the way uh huh I like it :)
I was a bit worried the video was too unstructured and all over the place. I'm glad you like it, man!
Very nice but way to much work to get to the point of making music...way to much tech not enough making music.But you are a damn master of this very difficult piece of beautiful gear.I have the Digitone Keys just arrived in mail one week ago and im sending it back and grabbing a easy dumb people Dave Smith Rev 2 Cheers
Thanks! Programming in melodies step by step is such a different approach than live recording them. I really like this approach though because it lets me compose melodies *and* tailor the sound to suit the melody, note for note. I can see how it can be a cumbersome way to make music, though :P
Boards of.. Digitone.
Haha, thanks a lot :D
coolC:!
Thank you, Wlkn!
You're extremely strong when it comes to your structuring skills which is an extremely difficult skill to acquire, but on the other hand I have to be honest the theme of this piece sounds so depressing and meaningless to me. I know it's not pleasant to hear criticism like that but I feel like if you took a lot more time building a simple but very catchy idea that had uniqueness and finesse in the first place, when the time would come to couple it with your structuring skill, it would greatly improve the chance that your content would be genuinely interesting to listen to.
Thanks for the kind words and detailed feedback! Is your criticism pointed at this track in particular, or my music in general? If it's aimed at this track, then I think I can see where you're coming from. The first melody I wrote sounded too much like a track by Rephazer (who makes awesome music), so I decided to scrap the idea and start over. This threw me off my game a bit. Then there's the consideration of how much time to spend on one idea versus moving on and staying productive. I may have moved on a bit too quickly in this video.
If your criticism is aimed at my music in general, do you have time to fill me in on the details? Either way, thanks for checking me out and for the honest feedback :)
@@IvarTryti What I said was directed specifically towards this track, but to me the video was very revealing of your workflow even putting the theme of the song aside. I could literally feel you going through this clear effort of abstraction to try and organize multiple elements in your mind, with the emphasis so obviously placed on constructing something, which is something I'm having the biggest struggle with by the way. In my own process I get hypnotized in the moment and I end up with very catchy ideas I'm having a very hard time expanding upon because of how refined the idea becomes by the time I have to start thinking about expanding on the idea. I have to hear my content over and over from the beginning when I expand ideas to remind myself of the idea I've constructed as a whole because everything has to go through the filter of how it makes me feel for me to find the motivation to move forward with a creative process so it's tedious and very repetitive. The truth is that it takes a LOT more discipline to develop the habits that you've developed, but music in its essence isn't about producing, it's about speaking a language that speaks to the listener, hopefully with the aspiration of doing so in an eloquent way. In order to find balance in your workflow, it can't be just discipline and abstraction, there needs to be a clear comfortable space allocated for spontaneity and feel. You've already worked pretty hard on the discipline side obviously, but all this know how from my perspective will always be meaningless if you're just uninspired. The process of musical creation is very personal, and you may truly be at a point where you would want to make music that expresses sadness, but still, throughout this process, there should always be the intention of conveying something refined, awe inspiring and preferably meaningful.
@@Silent_Stillness Thanks for the clarification, man. Yeah, it's definitely hard to make music when uninspired. It's the reason I almost decided to not upload this video, but I did so anyway. Unlike my other videos this one was unstructured and messy, and I thought maybe it could be interesting to watch how I deal with uncertainty. If I had decided to not upload the video, my plan was to try again with a fresh project and hope that inspiration struck me next time.
I agree with you about spontaneity. If you're playing an instrument live, there's a chance you'll play the wrong thing, but that wrong thing might be perfect for the track. Unintentionally improving the song feels awesome =P. I think that spontaneity is important, but it doesn't have to be at that level. When I perform tracks, all I'm doing is muting and tweaking sequences I preprogrammed. There's no spontaneity in these sequences, but there's spontaneity in structuring the track. I've learned a lot of cool tricks because of happy accidents when performing: unmuting the drums too late or the main melody too early, forgetting to reset my tweaks before the next section, and other things like that are examples of spontaneity. It's why I like to practice playing a track only once or twice before recording videos, so that there's room for spontaneity in the song structure.
That said though, this track isn't my greatest work. I usually work for 2-5 hours per session, and I finish my tracks in 1 or 2 of these sessions. I've done one other track from scratch where I was very happy with the results, and I hoped I'd be as lucky this time, too =).
@@IvarTryti I just finished going through pretty much your entire body of work on soundcloud and it made me smile when I saw your orchestral creations because the first thing i thought when i listened to your youtube video was that you seemed like someone who would have the mind of a classical music composer which is a complete anachronism considering the kind of equipment you're using . Anyhow, it showcased your melodic know-how and it's pretty obvious that on top of being very strong structurally you're very strong melodically, and clearly you've put in a lot of work where it counts.
Circling back to your video, the first thought that came to mind was that it's almost like instead of you playing the digitone to bend it to your will, the digitone was somewhat playing you. What I mean by that is that it felt like the use of this particular machine caused a regression in the finesse of the content you very easily could have laid down had you had less restrictive tools, knowing the kind of music you've already demonstrated you were able to make literally years ago. I think the Digitakt is an amazing groove machine, and the digitone is its capable sidekick, but clearly these machines are not meant to facilitate large scale melodic constructions. I think that if you're going to try and force it, your best shot is by hooking up a keystep style keyboard to it and by relying on your digitakt for percussions. 64 steps and pray you have enough brainpower to somehow manage to internalize large structures without visual guides throughout pattern chaining without going nuts. Also, nothing stops you from spending a week or two actually making and saving sounds on the machines so that next time you want to just pump out something on the spot you don't need to get sucked into the elektron's pseudo depressive synth sounds lol!
It's super cool sharing your stuff, but as you might probably know by now releasing low quality stuff over time decreases the listeners willingness to consider clicking on your content over time especially if you release a lot of content. More importantly, releasing music for the "likes" as if it was some sort of drug is the best way to find yourself stuck being uninspired and frustrated... food for thought!
@@Silent_Stillness Wow, thanks for listening to so much of my music. I really appreciate it! I've been making music for a long time, and 99% of my pre-Digitakt/Digitone stuff was made with a mouse and a piano roll in FL Studio. I'm not good at expressive live playing, but I'm comfortable "drawing" expressiveness with a mouse :P.
You're not completely wrong about the machines playing me and not the other way around. 10 years ago I started becoming less and less inspired, and eventually got all burnt out. I still made music now and then, but it was more because "I haven't made music in a long time" than anything. Then earlier this year I wanted to try something new and completely different from my usual workflow, so I bought the Digitakt. Compared to a laptop and a DAW, the Digitakt is very limited, but I haven't been this inspired to make music in years. The thing about these limitations is that instead of being frustrated at what it CAN'T do, it's iiiinnnncredibly satisfying to push the box to its limits and actually achieve what I want it to do. Also, having little to no visual aid when structuring my tracks is a limitation, but the satisfaction of imagining a melody and chord progression, putting it in the step sequencer, and getting it right on the first try can't be beat. For now, the overall slower workflow is absolutely worth it, considering how inspired I am by it.
One day I plan on combining my orchestral stuff with the Digitakt/Digitone and get the best of both worlds, but I'm not in a hurry. I sit in front of a computer all day at work, and it's nice to just take out one or both of these boxes to the living room and make music without needing a screen. When I run out of ideas (but before I get burnt out again!), I'll start looking into it :) Thanks for the thoughtful comments, man!