Software Sequencers

At the Apple World Wide Developer’s Convention, Steve Jobs highlighted Moo Cow Music’s Band for the iPhone as part of his keynote speech.
Band lets you record tunes on your iPhone or iPod Touch. It’s one of the many iPhone music software apps we’ve featured previously. Expect to see iPhone virtual instruments, iPhone virtual studios, iPhone [...]

Intua has introduced BeatMaker, a new iPhone virtual studio spired by hardware beat boxes, loop samplers and software sequencers
Features list:

16 triggerable pads with polyphonic control
Automatic sample slicing on multiple pads
Edit pads individually
Duration and tonal controls
Reverse
Gain
Output selection (Dry, FX Bus1, FX Bus 2)
Graphical sample bounds editor
Instant muting
Muting individual pads makes your song breathing
Sample [...]

Sugar Bytes released Effectrix, a new effects plug-in it describes as an “Effect Instrument”.
It’s designed to let you break your beats, create pulsing atmospheres, psychedelic sound mutations, and crush, stretch, loop and reorganize any kind of audio material in real-time.
Effectrix is available for Mac OS X and Windows, in VST and AU plug-in formats. It [...]

GlitchDS is a free cellular automaton music sequencer for the Nintendo DS that could be great for creating IDM and Glitch style loops. 
Features include:

Customizable Cellular Automaton sequencer
Create your own “trigger points”
Load in your own sounds
Save and load your work
BPM settings, or “strum mode” for controlling tempo
Up to 6 sounds can be loaded at once
Each sound [...]

Propellerheads has announced a Percussa AudioCubes giveaway for Reason users.
To enter the contest, you need to be a Reason 4 owner.
Here’s how to enter:

Record a video where you tell (in not so many words) us why you upgraded to Reason version 4 and how you feel about it.
Send the video to Propellerheads as a video [...]

November 16, 2007 lecture by Ge Wang for the Stanford University Human-Computer Interaction Seminar (CS 547).
In the first part of this talk, Ge presents the design, philosophy, and development of ChucK, a computer music programming language intending to provide a different approach, expressiveness, and thinking with respect to time and parallelism in audio programming - [...]

This video, from Ableton, is an intro to the new Orchestral Instrument Collection for Live.
It’s a little cheesy - but it’s also cool to see it working within Live.

Apple has released an update for Logic Pro. The 8.0.2 update fixes over 100 issues with the application ranging from MIDI to automation.
Here’s what’s been fixed in the update:

Joining an rapidly growing number of iPhone music apps is the IR-909, a software version of the classic Roland TR-909 drum machine:
IR-909 is a drum machine for the iPhone inspired by the Roland TR-909. IR-909 features a 16-step sequencer, 4 patterns and 8 different drum sounds. To change the value of any property in IR-909, [...]

This video, via AcePinter, explains creating glitch drums with Reason. Included: RV7000 Gating, Automation, Matrix offsetting, Filtering by gate, and Distortion.

Ableton has released of Live 7 LE, a cheaper “lite” version of Ableton Live 7. Live LE is limited to two simultaneous stereo audio inputs and outputs, twelve built-in audio effects, eight built-in instruments, two AU/VST effects and two AU/VST instruments per project.
Live 7 LE Features:

Studio-quality recording up to 32-bit/192 kHz
Sixty-four audio tracks and unlimited [...]

Nanoloop on a Gameboy (whose audio is coming in on track 2) is synchronized to the drums playing in Ableton Live (track 1).
Says littlescale - “This is to test out a new interface I have been working on that syncs Nanoloop to a MIDI clock.”

The long awaited version 7.5 of Orion is now available.
Key changes include:

New audio engine with support for multicore processors
Improved Workflow
Updated VST implementation to version 2.4
New limiter effect, modelled after the famous 1176LN
Auto-tracking EQs for easier mixing
xtended arpeggiator with new options
Creating presets for container multieffects is now possible
Direct Export to MP3 and OGG formats
Improved compatibility with [...]

CNet Asia reports that the Korg DS-10, the software synth for the Nintendo DS, should be available in Japan in July:
The original MS-10 (price 53,500 yen in 1978; US$300 then) was a monophonic, single oscillator job. DS-10 simulator works as two synthesizers (each of them, dual-oscillator affair), since Nintendo DS has dual-screen, upper and lower.
Adding [...]

Nice intro video for the Hobnox Audiotool that offers an introduction to creating beats.
AudioTool is like Reason for your Web browser.