Reason 5 Adds Live Sampling

This video, the latest in Propellerhead’s series of previews of the upcoming Reason 5 and Record 1.5, takes a look at Live Sampling with Reason 5.

Does Live Sampling get you excited for Reason 5?

Reason 5 Live Sampling

All sample players in Reason are now samplers. Just hook up a sound source to the rack’s sampling input and you are ready to start sampling. Use a mic, a turntable, an instrument or the entire Reason mix.

Sampling in Reason is simple and straightforward. Hit the sample button and Reason starts sampling. Reason will detect the sample start automatically. You can sample when Reason is running too  – no need to stop the music.

If needed, bring up the built-in sample editor to set start and end points, loop points and more. This is possible for all loaded samples  – not only the ones you have sampled.

All samples are stored in the song file and accessible in the new samples pane in the tool window. Here you can easily see what samples are loaded into what machine and delete and export samples as you wish.

Live sampling together with pitch detection of root key and automatic zone mapping makes it dead easy to sample an instrument and map the samples across the keyboard. This way you can create your own multi-sampled instruments for NN-XT and NN-19.

via PropellerheadSW:

Remember the time when samples were something you sampled and not loaded from your hard drive? When a sampler was a machine that could record samples, not just play them back.

As samplers became software instead of machines, they came to rely on external sample editing software for recording and editing the samples and the art of spur-of-the-moment creative sampling was pretty much lost. Now we are bringing it back to Reason 5 with its live sampling input.

14 thoughts on “Reason 5 Adds Live Sampling

  1. This will make things easier. But I still haven't heard anything terribly interesting about the new Reason. I think I'll be fine with version 4 for a while. I just hope they fix up Record.

  2. Definitely agreed. Id hope along with this sampling support they'd add rewire input. It can already act as rewire host to rebirth, so why not allow other things. Personally Id like to have a rewire input so that anything done in ableton for example with vsts could be rewired in as an input. Then you get your vst support, synchronized transport, and more.

  3. The built in sample editor looks like a bigger feature than the sampling. It's cool but not in a groundbreaking way… It's like finally reason can do almost half of what reaper does for free…. Kind of disappointing when I look at it that way…

    With record being a separate app and requiring the dongle, it looks like propeller heads have started getting stingy. What power users really wanted was a more modern way to chop and instruments that sound as good as the competition. That means updating and incorporating recycle into reason. Having to open two separate applications just to chop out a sample is absurd nowadays.

    Also, serious musicians want better sounds. The tech behind the current instruments is old. It was cool when it came out, but now it's dated… Korg wouldn't expect to sell a bunch of rereleased trinities just because they added an improved sequencer… It was eclipsed by the triton and motif es.

  4. "Having to open two separate applications just to chop out a sample is absurd nowadays"
    "The built in sample editor looks like a bigger feature than the sampling."

    "modern way to chop and instruments that sound as good as the competition. "
    The upgraded Dr. Octo Rex loop player loads eight REX loops into one player and lets you switch between them on the fly. This makes arranging a breeze – load the drum loops into one player, the guitars into another and use the sequencer to select what loop to play in a pattern-like fashion.

    With eight loops to switch between, the new rex also comes ready for the experimental minded. Set the player to retrig the loops on the beat, on the bar or on the 16th note. Or program the loops manually like in the original rex player.

    For each of the eight loops, the new rex player also comes with an expanded set of per-slice settings. Set pan, pitch, filter frequency and level, reverse slices, use multiple outputs, create alternating groups of slices and much more.

    "With record being a separate app and requiring the dongle"
    Copy Protection Done Right
    The Propellerhead Ignition Key is to Record what your car keys are to your summer road trip on Ruta Del Che. Just stick it in and go. With one important difference – should you loose the key, your vacation won't be ruined.

    "Also, serious musicians want better sounds. The tech behind the current instruments is old. It was cool when it came out, but now it's dated."
    Dr. Octo Rex
    Neptune is the voice synth.
    Sampler function
    Kong Drum Device

    If you want outdated, look at FL Studio.. locked into a life of 32 bit, delphi programming language with 4 megs of ram limitation, and no possibility of native 64 bit plugins EVER. outdated?

  5. Reason has some of the best synths in the game. If you can't create anything you hear on the radio, you're a newbie and should keep believing what you've been told.

  6. Tomorrow's Kong Drum Designer will leave skid marks on some of these haters. There goes a wasted $13 on IL's Dumbmaxx drum synth. Homies!

  7. Not a Reason user (more like an Ableton Live fanboy) but definitely a Reason fan. Some of this stuff got me wondering too; 'is this really an improvement?'. Bear with me; just my 2 cents here and perhaps worth even less.

    Yet what I cannot help wonder about is "from what context". Are you looking at this while having Live (<g>) or another DAW in your mind or do you really try looking at this the 'Reason way' ?

    Sidestep but.. I see it so many times; Live knows Arrangement & Session view. The first being the "regular" setup with horizontal tracks and such, the second is… "different" (look it up). Yet you will still see people trying to treat session like arrangement (good or not is beyond the scope of this article IMO).

    I cannot help wonder; are some of you doing Reason, or treating it as something it isn't ?

    Personally I can see quite some potential here.. The only thing which is keeping me wondering so far are the blocks.

    But one thing is for sure; I'll definitely have a test session if Reason 5 comes out (provided that the P Heads let me :-)).

  8. to large:

    you didn't get my point. I actually liked reason, and have used it on quite a few projects. … the problem is that it did not stay competitive with other virtual instruments… sure I could make the sounds in reason sound great with a bit of work… I'm by no means a beginner and do this stuff for a living. Anyone who says reason has better features than Live/Cubase/Logic/Protools/Reaper is misinformed.

    I'm not saying reason sounds bad or is garbage.. I'm saying it's not AS GOOD as almost everything else out there (native instruments plugins, SPL plugins, IK stuff, BPM, etc).

    You didn't understand my point about the sampling, or you dont know much about chopping with reason. I'll try to explain:

    YOU CAN"T CHOP WITH REASON!!!! you have to use recycle, which is another app. After you load your chopped file into reason, you have no control over start-end time of your chopped samples (like on an mpc or live or maschine, or anything useful). If you want to change that stuff, you would have to close reason, reopen recycle, edit the loop, rechop, and then export. Then you would have to reopen reason and hope you chopped it right… there is no non-destructive chop function inside reason, and having 8 dr. rex's doesn't fix that. Anyone who has moved from an mpc to reason knows about this limitation and how annoying it is. Also, the REX file format is outdated… there are much better algorithms available and much better ways to chop than recycle.

    My point is that I shouldn't have to buy/use 3 different applications to do the things that are pretty much expected of every other single DAW. That is bullshit.

  9. yo.. import the rex into the NN-XT.. Then you have control over the slices! I've been doing that for YEARS. Reason is the best shit I ever used and I came from a long line of hardware in this hip hop shit!

  10. I already know about that workaround. It’s slow and inefficient. Also, the nnxt will not adjust the start or end times of a sample past the actual chop, ie non-destructive edits. This is something that is standard on mpcs, mv8000s, the mc909, live, etc…

    Wait a second… How about this? ReCycle won’t even do it!

    I appreciate your advice, and have been doing the nnxt thing for years… But prop heads needs to get with the times if they want to appeal to hip hop guys.

  11. I already know about that workaround. It’s slow and inefficient. Also, the nnxt will not adjust the start or end times of a sample past the actual chop, ie non-destructive edits. This is something that is standard on mpcs, mv8000s, the mc909, live, etc…

    ReCycle won’t even do it 🙁

    I appreciate your advice, and have been doing the nnxt thing for years… But prop heads needs to get with the times if they want to appeal to hip hop guys

  12. “My point is that I shouldn’t

    have to buy/use 3 different

    applications to do the things

    that are pretty much expected

    of every other single DAW.

    That is bullshit.” – its not a DAW? never has been, so no point comparing.. its all about workflow – reason is one way of working..the updates in reason 5 look fantastic from my perspective, ive been using reason since v1 and suits my way of working perfectly. all comes down to preference

  13. you can actually use reason like an mpc with the new kong drum designer you can load a slice into a pad and it plays the whole duration without holding it

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