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Organelle M and Orac 2: Review and tutorial
🕑 Added 2019-07-28 15:13:59 +0000 UTCHi!
The Organelle is "just a shell": based on an open source operating system and patching language (Pure Data, as well as C and Supercollider) it can be practically anything. Most electronic music instruments have linux variant brains, so it's quite interesting to see how the Organelle has evolved to be anything but a typical electronic music instrument.
Fixed grid 16-step based sequencers are nowhere to be found (at least not for the first few years), as are feature rich heavy, multi parameter synths and samplers.
Rather, Critter and Guitari have given it a playful "soul" with real time open ended sequencers and synths/samplers with just four parameters. Best of all, they've open sourced everything, and indeed, a community of musicians developed dozens of unique and charming patches over the years, many of which kept the fun and playful soul of the Organelle.
All this playfulness comes at a price: it's hard to create arrangement style performances on Organelle - there's no song mode - it's all about real-time performance rather than an organized timeline...
One of the most impressive things to come out of the Organelle's developer community is Orac by Mark Harris - a "rack" based system that lets you chain patches, modulate parameters and more.
I've already reviewed the Organelle 1 and Orac 1.0 in the past - this video focuses on the differences between Organelle M and the original Organelle, as well as what's new in Orac 2.
I'll be taking a look at ZOIA next so it's going to be interesting to compare the two!
All my best,
Ziv (...messing around with quirky open source patches on YouTube as "Loopop"...)
Comments
What you're hearing in my videos is the direct output of the instrument without any processing. I didn't notice any audio quality issues with either one. BTW thanks for your support :)
Have read a few reviews that suggest the sound quality is below par on these units. Wondered what your impressions are/were of the sound of both organelle incarnations... And was there an improvement on the M release. Thanks for all that you do...
Thanks! I think I posted some in my original Organelle review, but no, I don't have a list per se. Of the factory ones I really like Analog Style for its simplicity, Stereo Rhythmicon for its charm, 1008 for its power (it's a mini Orac...) DJ Patch Record for it's live processing (don't let the silly name deter you) and Loop Jam Rec. Of the third party ones LoFi Piano, PicoStudio and Re-Tape Echo are really good. These are just the current ones...
wavi-savi
Thanks for posting this! Do you have any favorite patches, or have you posted a list of those anywhere? I don't see it in the e-book.
