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SOFTWARE REVIEWED: Cakewalk Pro Audio
RELEASED BY: Et Cetera Publishing
PRICE: Cakewalk Pro Audio v8.0 is UK £279. Cakewalk Pro Audio Deluxe v 8.0 is UK £339. Cakewalk Professional v7.0 is UK £199
REVIEWED BY: G-String
REVIEW: -
Midi files are all over the Internet, and up until recently, they were the main source of passing music across the web. With the introduction of MP3 Player and the Real Audio Player, they are becoming more obsolete. As most of you will know, Midi files use computerised sounds, many of them similar to your eighties keyboard sounds. But with the new MP3 Players and Real Audio Players, the sound is of CD quality. You can have vocals, whereas you can't with midi files. You can have a melody line instead. However, this does not mean that MIDI files are crap. No sir! They are still an invaluable way of creating music on your PC. There are many programs available to make such midi files. Cakewalk is one of them. There is also Roland GS Karaoke Player. That too, is good. """"You can expect a feature on these products coming up soon.""""
Cakewalk Pro Audio v5.0 is the very first music editor I got. Given to me by a good friend Colin Carson, the program helped me to make great midi files of bands like REM, Bush, Nirvana, Manic Street Preachers and so on. Since I don't have a midi keyboard, to create a whole song would probably take about six hours, depending on how musical you are. A music book of REM's "Man On The Moon" was brilliant for me. I could have the exact instruments playing what is played note for note on the single. This took about two hours of my time because many of it is just loops, copy and paste. """"The screen shots page will not hold any screen shots, here you will be able to download some of my friends midi files, and of course, some of mine.""""
This version of Cakewalk was made back in 1996 and since then there have been a lot more versions. Currently, Et Cetera Publishing are at version 8.0. There was also another series launched after the Pro Audio series. Cakewalk Express (currently at version 6), Cakewalk Professional (currently at version 7), and Cakewalk Pro Audio Deluxe (currently at version 8). The different series have different properties and will appeal to different people who use it for different purposes. So basically they are different. You have a screen where you can make music. You can do this in a staff, that's all the lines and notations, or you can do it on a piano roll, that's where you have at the left hand side the piano running from bottom to top, and lines which represent that note. Alternatively you could plug a keyboard into your PC and play into it. It can work in those three different ways.
The program is your own little recording studio. You have all the controllers at your fingertips. You are the composer (if it's your own song), the player and the producer. All those little twiddly knobs are on the screen or in a toolbar. You can be the guy listening to the playback fiddling around with something, smoking a cigar, and suddenly shouting, "THIS IS CRAP. CALL YOURSELVES ARTISTS??" and then sitting down, wiping the sweat from your brow and sighing, "Lets take it from the top then, shall we?" Well maybe that's my little dream. . . . . . . .. . . .
With the software you can change the tempo, the instrument, the note, the length of the note and a lot more. There are endless possibilities to what you can do. It's coming up to 3 years since I got this and I've not worked out all the stuff. I learn something new each time I try it. Of course, that could be because I've not read the manual or the tutorial. I can't be bothered with them. It's much more fun this way. It just depends on how you like to operate.
My sister is a great one for making music on the computer. She did a midi file of Pictures of Matchstick men in about three days. It is brilliant, but if I had a keyboard it would be a lot better. One of the great things about the program is that it will open up any midi file on the Internet and tell you all the stuff that you want to know about it. What chord is playing, what key it's in. Everything. There is even space to type in the lyrics that appear as they would in a music book. Between the two sets of lines, or staffs as they are called.
Overall, I can't give it a really high rating, mainly because to create a whole song takes hours and hours. If I had a keyboard, it might be a bit higher. To the possible buyer: make sure you know what you're doing before you buy it.
SCORE:
86%
MINIMUM HARDWARE REQUIRED:
CPU: 486 DX2
RAM: 16MB
Windows 98\95\NT
Sound Card
LINKS: www.cakewalk.com