Techno production in iPad

One of my hobby is production and blend of electronic music, until a few months ago my Mac was my studio with Traktor Pro, Reason 5 and Ableton Live spending whole nights dedicated to this hobby. Now as amazing as it looks to me as my main tool is the iPad, with the great variety of applications that there are for this iPad is an ideal tool. Although you miss Mac's processing power the great advantage of iPad is that it's a device that allows you to create and mix music far more organic and more portable. I always felt that turning and activatingcontrols with the cursor felt quite unnatural, and now with the iPad everything can be done with his hands more amusing. Below I will list the applications I use, and I recommend them widely. I have a lot of applications to try and every month they come up with new ones so they're likely to update this with more applications in the near future. For each person to choose what applications to buy according to his or her degree of production or experience I have decided to classify applications at a scale of 1 to 5 according to his or her degree of complexity as follows:

1. These are the best-to-use applications, anyone can buy the run application and start using it right away.
2. Although these applications aren't complicated require a remote idea of how a mixer or synthesizer works, any geek can have fun with them.
3. To use these applications you will have to read some manual or tutorial as the interface isn't so simple and you will have to be familiar with music production software or mixer.
4. The applications at this level are complex and require some experience and / or patience and time to learn how to master them.
5. Just experienced electronic music professionals or lovers.

All right, let's get back to it.

iMS-20 (Level 5)

I started with this app despite being the most complex of all because it's my favorite. iMS-20 is a replica of Korg's legendary MMS-20 analogue synthesizer. Besides the synthesizer includes a percussion kit, a mixer (for the siter and kit), an effect board (14 types) and a screen where you can manage music patterns and put together songs. That application is certainly the most complete that I have seen for the iPad and allows to create music from scratch or to use templates that come preloaded with many sounds that can be used in the synthesizer. All compositions that are performed in this application can be exported as music files or shared through SoundCloud. I highly recommend this application but you will have to read the manual online as if it's quite complicated because of its functionality and its interface. I normally did not read the software manuals and because of this custom I had to spend several hours exploring the interface to understand it well, when I decided to read the manual everything was easier.

iELECTRIBE (Level 3)

That's an iPad version of the Korg ELECTRIBER-R sequencer. That sequencer comes with dozens of precharged patterns and it's quite easy to use but if you will require to watch the videos that Korg offers on your page to understand its operation more quickly. The implementation has eight challenges.

Electrify (Level 4)

That's an application that allows you to create electronic music using a great library of pressurized samples or uploading our own, has several effects and I found them particularly useful to create patterns and loops that I can use in my mix. The interface works in a very similar way to the Ableton Live interface but those who are unfamiliar with this type of interface will have many problems understanding them, especially as they have no manual or tutorial.

Looptastic HD (Level 1)

That's one of those applications that perish more to play than to produce real music but it's quite fun and I enjoy quite using it. The mechanics are very simple, have several sets of precharged loops and can be copied from other applications, these loops are currently sitting on the screen so that their position determines their volume and sound distribution. Also you can have an effect and get loops together to create a melody and at the end of the session you can record everything we did to reproduce them later or export them to the computer. That's very simple for anyone.

Studi.HD (Level 1)

This application is from the same Looptastic HD developers and works in a similar way with the difference that here the loops are put into a timeline they extend or contract as much as they wish, and they can apply to each individual and can activate the iPad's microphones to record the environmental sound, this is useful if they wish to record vocals or some percussion. All projects can be published and exported.

GrouveMaker (Level 2)

Although this is a very simple application the interface can be a little confusing at first so I recommend that you read the documentation on the developers' page. This application has sets of instruments that can be mixed (8 channels) to create a melody, all instruments are suitable to be mixed without care about BPM, and they are in essence always playing the same song but they can be transformed and combined with the instruments of each channel. There's a free version with a song and another that's activated while registering the product. They can also buy dedicated versions for some musical genera such as Techno, Drum & Bass, Hip-Hop, etc. This application is especially fun to play with friends as it allows anyone to feel as a dj and you can also record different patterns and combine them into a mix that can be exported to the computer.

BassLine (Level 3)

That application is to create low effect that are useful to use as loops. The bounds can be playback at the same time as some song from our iTunes library is being playback but the most fun way to use it is if you have an iPad connected to a mixer to apply the bounds with effect and other songs.

FunkBox Drum Machine (Level 3)

That's a quite fun application that emits several legendary rhythm boxes, with some patterns that can be modified and mixed as well as export. The application is universal so it can also be used on iPhone or iFor Touch.

ReBirth for iPad (Level 4)

That implementation originally appeared in 1997 and was discontinued in 2005. I remember that I met her at '98, when I was 16, and it was with this app that I started creating electronic music at my Macintosh Performance 6500 (as time goes by). That application has come back to the iPad now, it's a quite complete synthesizer / sequencer and that despite the passing of time doesn't feel old. There's a lot to count on this application but I'll just say with one word: amazing. I started this article with my favorite application and now I close with that with that with a more special place in my heart..