Steinberg / Yamaha Cubase AI Upgrade Rebates

Big rebates when buying upgrades with Yamaha Hardware!

When you purchase the Cubase AI to Cubase 5 Upgrade at the same time as a qualifying piece of hardware that comes bundled with Cubase AI (like the Audiogram 3 or Audiogram 6), you will receive a $150 rebate! Purchases made separately are eligible for a rebate of $100! If you purchase the Cubase AI to Cubase Studio 5 upgrade at the same time as qualifying hardware you will receive a $75 rebate. Purchases made separately are eligible for a rebate of $50.

Rebate claims must be made by March 1, 2010 for purchases made between September 2009 and January 2010.
NOTE: Upgrades from Cubase AI will require a Steinberg Key (sold separately) if you don't already have one to store the new license.

Please contact us with any questions!

The importance of YOUR Music Website

There is no shortage of musician websites. Myspace, iLike, Reverbnation, iSound, and even facebook fan pages. They all can bring traffic to your music and serve their purpose. But the most important website is your own. A website with your own domain name (like www.your-name-or-band.com) as a central place for content, news and sales is the most important website to invest in for your music.

The biggest reason for this is consistency. If you are building a career, all the fad websites of the day will come and go. Sure, maybe your myspace.com/jasonpauljohnston address last year was the biggest thing, but don't put it as the only site on your CD cover or press release. You need real ownership. What happens if Myspace starts charging you or it gets sold to an evil force up to no good? You are just renting space for free from all these other sites and anything could happen overnight. In 10 years time you should still be selling your CD, but myspace may not even exist then.

After you obtain your own domain name (I use 10dollar.ca for .ca's and musicincanada.com for dot.com's) there are three basic approaches to doing your own website. Build/program yourself, hire a programmer, use an existing online service.

For the true DIY musician, a program yourself website might be the ticket as long as the website stays relatively simple. You can learn HTML fairly easily with all the online resources available and that is the kind of website you would use for posting some information, music and pictures. Paypal buttons can be used for sales but that is about the extent of it. If you want to have a dynamic website using any kind of database or interactivity you will need to learn PHP or another type of language. I would suggest you stick to doing music!

Some musician websites are based off of pre-made blog type websites. The advantage is you can update your news very easily and don't have to learn programming. They are harder to tweak in terms of design and difficult with some functionality like selling music downloads. For free blogging websites check out www.blogger.com or the slicker www.wordpress.org. For a paid blogging site typepad.com seems to be the site of choice, but I don't think it's worth the money in comparison. There are tons of free and paid templates and plug-ins for these blog sites that can make them look and act a little more rock n' roll.

If you hire a programmer to do your website make sure they have good design sense. Check out some other sites they have done and see if it matches your image and look. Expect to pay over $1000 for even a simple website with a few features. Many professional musician websites cost tens of thousands more plus maintenance fees. If you pay a programmer/designer I would suggest you make it a design you can update yourself so you can add reviews, concert dates and new songs as you desire. You don't want your website just full of old news. People might come back a second time, but probably not a third time.

Although I can do some programming myself, I decided to go with the online service called Bandzoogle for my website for a number of reasons. The main one is I didn't have the time to program my own site. I literally set up my basic site in minutes. I wanted to keep my focus on the music. Bandzoogle also had just enough design flexibility. It included a number of hard to find features like "pay what you can pricing" on downloads and Google maps showing where people live who are surfing your site. (Not the exact addresses of course!) It was also very dynamic and allowed me to update my site from any computer with an internet connection. You can check out my site here: www.jasonpauljohnston.com and see what you think. Click here or the banner ad below to try Bandzoogle for yourself.

In the end, check out some sites, make a list of the features and look you need, figure out what time and resources you have available and make your decision. But I encourage you to make your own website the central place for purchasing your music and finding out the latest news. Anything is better than nothing, just don't get lost in the web on your way to making and recording your songs!

What Les Paul Gave Recording

by Jason Johnston

Certainly the first thought that comes to mind when you hear the name "Les Paul" is his greatest invention in the history of Rock n' Roll: the solid body electric guitar. But with his recent death, we should remember his equally amazing contribution to the world of audio recording and engineering. A part of his history many people don't know.

We must not forget on the outset, that Les Paul (born Lester William Polsfuss) was a talented musician who sold millions of records. They say necessity is the mother of invention, and his inventions were an outcome of his creativity matched with a need. He first invented the technique of overdubbing and used it extensively on these early recordings. The first was his 1947 recording of, "Lover (When You're Near Me)," where he used a method of mixing a new sound with the previous recorded sound on acetate disks (phonograph records). He would then use the new recording to mix with his new playing and record. The final song was made from eight separate guitar parts, each overdubbed on top of the other: the first in history. His extensive experiments also resulted in the first electronically produced reverb, delay and echo.

This technique of overdubbing grew into what became "multi-track recording" when he invested his own money and commissioned Ampex in 1954 to build the first eight track multi-track tape recorder. In the multi-track a recording head could record a new track and play back previously recorded tracks simultaneously. This idea of being able to record new sounds over top of the old may have come from his childhood when he would modify the player piano rolls by punching out new notes (surely much to the alarm of his parents). This may be the most influential invention in the history of recording. Les Paul was the Gutenberg of audio. After the first 8 Track Ampex multi-tracker was created and installed into Les Paul's home studio (Pictured here as the silver stack on the right) The invention was later known as the Ampex Sel-Sync (Selective Synchronization). This was the foundation of all modern multi-track techniques, even to today's most cutting edge multi-track software like Pro Tools, Cubase or Sonor utilizing computers and hard drives.

Les Paul said his greatest God-given gifts were perfect pitch, a love for music with the ability to learn it quickly, and the curiosity and persistence of an inventor who wants to know "how things tick." These gifts lead to many more gifts he left behind for the world of music and recording.

Sources:
http://www.reevesaudio.com/visitlesandmary.html
Les Paul, Recording-tech pioneer dies at 94, http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10309101-1.html
The Early Years of the Les Paul Legacy: 1915-1963, pg. 4-,Robb Lawrence, Hal Leonard Corporation, 2008 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Paul
http://www.biographybase.com/biography/Paul_Les.html