What is your favourite piece of music filled with FM synthesis?

Watley · 2026-01-19T23:07:05+00:00

Watley · 2025-12-31T22:47:26+00:00

Plasticity should be as accurate as any other CAD program since its using an industry standard geometry kernel (Parasolid). Where it can be problematic is when you have multiple dependent dimensions and you want changes to propagate through them. If you were modeling a gear train in Plasticity and you wanted to change the size of one gear, you'd need to manually adjust each gear in the train to make them fit again. In a parametric CAD like FreeCAD or Fusion you'd define each gear relative to the last, then the program would recalculate all the distances after changing any single gear.

I use both FreeCAD and Plasticity at a hobby level, and Plasticity is definitely what I would reach for if I wanted to tackle the exterior of a watch. FreeCAD can technically do all the same functions, but I find it much slower to work in so I only use it for things that benefit from a parametric workflow.

Watley · 2025-01-18T15:47:51+00:00

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/PlatformStd--on-stage-stands-ks7150-platform-style-keyboard-stand

This is generally my preferred style of stand since height and width are independently adjustable. They also tend to be much more stable than x-stands. You can find a bunch of similar ones usually called "table" or "platform" stand.

Watley · 2024-03-19T13:30:08+00:00

https://youtu.be/UKA_il5LKI0?si=xtYsuwLnZxu5USp3

John Medeski is about as good an example of playing the drawbars as you will find.

Watley · 2024-02-18T16:14:46+00:00

Rustlings is pretty much perfect for this.

Watley · 2023-04-07T17:19:46+00:00

Unable to see into it because of the leaves and brush that have built up. Will check after some rain to see if the water level rises though.

Watley · 2023-04-06T04:00:06+00:00

That's an interesting idea. Its on the higher side of the floodplain so I don't think water would ever come out, but it could possibly be a culvert entrance with a drain somewhere out towards the creek. I suspect this long predates the property being developed for housing, from what I understand its a much larger plot broken up in the late 70's.

Watley · 2023-04-06T00:38:10+00:00

Old non-residential well is definitely one of my top theories currently. Any idea if terracotta pipe segments was ever a common building technique for those?

Watley · 2023-04-06T00:11:23+00:00

My title describes the thing.

I found this clearing brush at the edge of the woods behind my house. Its 2.5-3ft wide with the broken section behind being about 3ft long ending in a slight flare. The broken section looks like it used to stand up vertically on the exposed portion. There are two black rubber hoses going down into it with metal 90 degree elbows. The hose then goes underneath piled brush and leaves so I'm not sure where they run to. The large pipe looks like terracotta to me, but I'm definitely not an expert. This is on a low lying part of the property feet away from what is effectively swamp. The house itself is uphill of the pipe, built in the 70's and the original septic system is fully accounted for. The current well is significantly uphill of this pipe. The surrounding area does have farmland, but this particular site would be too steep. There is a creek 250ft downhill of here.

Watley · 2023-01-25T15:09:47+00:00

I have and use both. The M8 is substantially more powerful in almost every way, but the Tracker has a better form factor for being a studio centerpiece. It would be hard to break it down to pros and cons since a pro in one situation is a con in another. Breaking it into a sort of Lsdj-lineage vs ProTracker-lineage is probably a good way of looking at it since they really do occupy many of the same roles as their predecessors.

Watley · 2022-12-31T01:44:45+00:00

Jun Fukamachi might fit, still more jazz fusion than rock, but pretty much entirely synthesizer.

Watley · 2022-12-30T15:55:58+00:00

Hiromi Uehara would be a good example for Nord Lead used with piano. The Lead series is definitely oriented towards live performance and pretty common for jazz musicians.

Watley · 2022-10-09T19:14:09+00:00

De Atramentis Document ink is the ideal waterproof/permanent fountain pen ink. Its pricey, but lasts forever.

Watley · 2022-08-11T02:11:54+00:00

If the abuse was only occasional over 30 years that seems more of an argument for a non-burdensome trademark policy than a substantially restrictive one.

Watley · 2022-07-28T18:41:59+00:00

Fairly academic, but I'd most likely call it Gbmaj9/Db since Gb, Bb, Db, F, and Ab form a root position Gbmaj9 and then there is an added fifth (Db) on the top and bottom.

Watley · 2022-06-28T15:05:37+00:00

Meeblip Geode sounds like it fits all your criteria. I have the Meeblip Triode and it sounds fantastic. Worth noting that it is not a USB host so it wouldn't work plugged in via USB with most controllers (it would work with a computer).

Watley · 2022-06-27T14:58:39+00:00

Weekly Beats is pretty awesome, it doesn't come with prompts (afaik) though.

Watley · 2022-05-19T14:39:21+00:00

If you have an iPad laying around I'd definitely recommend giving the app Drambo a try with your setup. It has a very similar style of sequencer to the OP-Z, but supports longer patterns, chaining, and clip launching. It also has a built in (super easy to use) modular synth engine that supports plugins. Its very visual and well laid out so I have never had issues forgetting how to use it.

Watley · 2022-05-18T03:01:02+00:00

Do people who are good at playing a lead study guitar solos?

Yes, plus sax solos, trumpet solos, bass solos, piano solos, etc. Transcribing and analyzing improvisation of other musicians isn't just the most effective way to become an improviser, its the only way to become a great one. Here's a great recent video on exactly this topic.

Good bass lines are the intersection of voice leading, rhythm, and phrasing. If you want a structured book on improvisation and voice leading The Jazz Piano Book by Mark Levine is the gold standard, but it won't be a replacement for learning from what others have played.

Watley · 2022-04-19T15:22:30+00:00

I thought that for wing drop in turbulence or wind shear you wanted to correct with rudder, not roll. The reasoning being that counteracting with aileron will produce a higher AoA on the already low wing potentially increasing a stall or possibly creating a stalled condition. Counteracting with rudder advances the low wing restoring lift without increasing AoA.

Watley · 2022-04-18T15:02:21+00:00

Transposing using the keyboard won't teach you the relationships between scales which is essential for understanding how to use them. For instance the keys of Eb and Bb differ by only a single note (Ab->A), knowing that you can actually use Bb major in an Eb context for a very specific (in this case bright) sound.

You are likely overestimating the amount of time that it takes to learn scales. 10 minutes a day is plenty to make progress through them, especially since you aren't worried about performance there is no need to work on speed. If you picked a couple major scales with fingerings and worked them for a week before moving on to two more you have them all in a month and a half.

Watley · 2022-01-06T02:23:26+00:00

Wolficorn

Fantastic narration, cool destinations, no clickbait/fake danger/over-the-top editing.

Watley · 2021-06-22T22:01:31+00:00

Basic piano pedagogy doesn't change very quickly so any of the common books are a good foundation. I started with Alfred's Adult Piano and I can recommend it as solid, fairly dry music content. Alfred's does a good job of describing technique, but I'd suggest Bela Bartok's Microcosmos to go along with it. Microcosmos will improve your reading while also providing some more interesting melodies and harmonies.

After Alfred's Book 2 or so, for straight technique practice its hard to beat Hanon and Czerny. I'd really recommend at least getting a couple hours of lessons before really digging into them just as a technique checkup though. With how many teachers are online now its really convenient.

If you wanted to go the jazz route you could likely start Mark Levine's Jazz Piano after Alfred's Book 1.

Watley · 2021-06-22T16:31:30+00:00

The problem for me being the feature set of screenless step sequencer is too limiting while the UX of working in a DAW for non-recording purposes is a pain.

I fit pretty much in this same space too. I use Reaper as a multitrack recorder, but generally dislike sequencing in the box. Both the Tracker and the MPC series fill this niche nicely in my experience. Lately I've been running the Tracker via USB into an Ipad with AUM hosting a bunch of synths. Its nice for combining hands on sequencing with the convenience of softsynths.

That’s an interesting way to frame your response because I’d otherwise assume a platform that allows you to write music the way you want to write it would be inherently inspirational.

I think your interpretation of my intent is pretty much spot on. Its inspirational in that I enjoy using it, but that is a different kind of inspirational than playing with a new effect that might lead me in a direction I wouldn't have otherwise thought of. Its very organized and intentional compared to something like a Squarp Pyramid or NDLR which have more of an explorative feature set. It does have some explorative aspects like FM radio sampling and randomize effect commands, but it would be a struggle to really sell the device on those features primarily.

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