May 3, 2008
The Producers Conference, San Francisco, USA
The San Francisco Producers Conference was a big success, with a capacity crowd of about 120 in attendance.
The San Francisco crew; Tommy Coster Jr, James Bernard, Gerry Basserman, DJ Khalil, Kurt Kurasaki
Gerry kicked off the conference before a receptive audience with a quick overview of the new features in Reason version 4 and then moved on to an in-depth demo of using the new vector automation for track based waveform modulation (creating repeating controller waves - triangles, saws, squares - to drive parameters), and then editing them in order to animate sounds in very custom ways that are unique to a song. He then demoed the Combinator's new ability to filter out controls per device, the NN-XT's new AutoMapping feature, importing samples and group mono samples. Rumour has it that he'd actually prepared a fun performance patch for the RPG but his hour was up too soon, so he didn't get to it.
Gerry Basserman's production demonstration
Kurt went deep into Thor and demonstrated how he created some of the patches for the Line 6 expand your Reason Rack promotion. There were many intelligent questions from the crowd and everyone in attendance seemed to really enjoy getting such an in-depth look at Thor. He also provided everyone in attendance with a printed Thor Tutorial which was much appreciated.
Kurt's Thor demonstration
Kurt was challenged by an audience member at one point to create a particular bass sound using Thor, and he went through this step by step, and created the patch in a matter of minutes with suggestions from the audience.
Kurt Kurasaki demonstrates quick ways of customizing Thor sounds
James focused his presentation on ReGroove and discussed - and demonstrated - how ReGroove can completely change the feel of tracks recorded or sequenced with a very tight or non-human feel, how to create and save your own ReGroove patch from a clip, how to extract the Groove of a Rex file and apply that groove to other tracks, and many other uses for ReGroove like using the slide function as a midi delay to create note flams/trills and give certain tracks a “rushed” or “lagged” feel.
James Bernard's demonstration of the Regroove Mixer
Tommy Coster Jr. talked about his background in the music industry, how he got started and how he managed to become involved with Dr. Dre and Eminem.
Tommy Coster Jr. demonstrates using Reason and Rewire
He then showed some music he did for the Miami Vice movie, using Reason rewired to Digital Performer (DP), going into great detail on how he works with film cues and how he comes up with the feel for the scene.
He also demonstrated an RnB track he's currently working on with a great singer using Reason as his rack of synths rewired to DP, praising Reason's efficient use of resources.
To conclude his presentation, Tommy had a very frank discussion with attendees on the state of the Music Industry, Record Labels, Music Downloads and how one can still manage to make a living doing music. His insights were VERY much appreciated by the attendees.
A bonus was that Tommy’s father (Mr.Tom Coster... keyboardist for Santana!) and mother came to see his presentation. Tom sr. has been given a copy of Reason and will be pestering Tom Jr. for lessons!
The Coster Family: Tom Sr., Donna & Tom Jr. Tommy Coster Sr. speaking with Kurt, Tommy Jr speaks with James
DJ Khalil delivered an interesting presentation, describing in detail how he works with musicians to create his own sample source material which he then runs through Recycle to get his unique sound. Khalil was a big draw at the event and was practically mobbed when he first arrived at the venue, eventually being escorted to the “Green Room” so he could take a moment to collect his thoughts and prepare for his presentation.
DJ Khalil demonstrates his Reason productions used on Jay-Z's "Kingdom Come" album
All in attendance were very happy with the event and kept asking if we could do them more frequently.
James and Press in the Pyramind Control Room
The Pyramind Control Room featured a live video feed where the press could observe and listen in comfort
