Thank you very much – I’m glad that you’re enjoying it. I am fortunate to get to work with such an amazingly talented group of people. In terms of our production process, we usually mix a show every week. I get the episode roughly two weeks before that, so I’m working on two at a time. The cycle starts with a spotting meeting in the editing room, which generally includes Vince Gilligan (creator and executive producer), the writer(s) of the episode, the picture editor, our sound and dialogue team, our post-production supervisor, our music supervisor, our music editor, and me. We painstakingly go through the entire episode, which is usually complete at that point, and talk about the sound and music for every scene. We discuss where music should be, and equally importantly, where it should not. And if there is going to be music, what it should achieve and whether it should be score or source. To me, this meeting is the most important step in the process.  

After that, I spend a few days writing cues in my studio. I deliver them to Vince as QuickTime movies, and he gives me feedback. I spend a day or so polishing things up and then it’s time to repeat the cycle with the next spotting session. While writing for the next episode, I’ll also be mixing each of my cues from the previous one again from the ground up to prepare them for the mix stage. In addition, I always attend the final mix playback for each episode.

We can now announce that Bob Derkach of Scarborough, Canada is the lucky winner of the CrowdChoir competition. We will be shipping the Array Mbira instrument to Bob directly.

Thanks again to everyone that submitted a note, we're currently about halfway through sorting them, and will update you on progress soon.

How did Xtended Piano end up slotting into this whirling sonic cloud?

"Imogen is a gifted sound designer and found the Xtended Piano samples to be rich with possibilities.  Together with samples from Felix and his Machine (http://www.felixsmachines.com/), the Xtended Piano samples actually formed the nucleus of the sound in the beginning of the recording process for Heapsong 2, later called Propeller Seeds."

The competition is now closed.

We're pleased to announce that Stephen Barr of Pennsylvania, USA, is the winner of our Rock Creek Tongue Drums. 

The instrument was available until 30th April, and in that time over 1600 downloads were sold.

Howe is a UK based producer and composer, known for his 90s Sneaker Pimps project, and more recently some great production work for Marina & The Diamonds. 

Liam was happy to share some insights into the processes of writing Obselidia's hypnotic score at his crows-nest studio, up among the roof-tops in London.

Curious about their working methods and instrumentation, we chatted with Barry Burns from the band about what goes into their creative production process, from a sonic point of view.

Can you tell us how a Mogwai track gets underway? Do the band all generate ideas separately then come together to develop them, or do they develop more in the studio?

We caught up with Neil and asked him to share some of his thoughts about using Soniccouture instruments in particular, and production techniques in general.

You're a fan of Novachord  ; what aspects of the instrument do it for you? what uses do you find for it in your productions?

"I'd never heard, let alone seen a Novachord before, I didn't quite know what to expect when I hit purchase, it was a leap into the unknown (although I've never yet been disappointed in a Soniccouture purchase).

The Rocksichord is a big, blue, chunky sounding beast that has been used by a huge number of musicans over the years, including The Beach Boys (on Sunflower), Genesis, Dr. John, John Lennon, Stereolab (on Sound-Dust), Sun Ra, Terry Riley (on A Rainbow in Curved Air), Rick Wakeman (solo and with Yes), and Wilco (on A Ghost is Born).

RMI Rocksichord is currently only available in Kontakt format ( V3 or 4), and is  a FREE download from www.soniccouture.com

Excerpts of the review are on the Glass / Works product page, and the full article can be read here, or you can pick up a copy of the magazine, of course.

You can read the full review on the SOS site here , and there's an excerpt on the Stones product page, along with the usual demos and product info.