New Ostraka Track: Tunguska Dub

Posted on January 28, 2013 by John C.S. Keston

I produced this track soon after I got my DSI Tempest about five months ago. As a keyboard player one of the first things I did was hook up a MIDI controller to it. Although the Tempest is a legitimate, six-voice, polyphonic, analog synth it does not yet record chords into the internal sequencer. To get around this I simply synched the Tempest with Ableton Live and recorded the MIDI there. Obviously not an all-at-once-live-playing endeavor, but many of this machines limitations have pretty simple and effective work-arounds.

After five months of sitting on the track I finally decided to clean up the mix a little, give it the title Tunguska Dub, and preview it on SoundCloud. All of the drums, the main melody, the dub organ, and the wub bass are done on the Tempest. The SCI Pro-One is handling the main bass part, and the Super Jupiter is making the arpeggiated counter-melody.

Fragile Gloss Featuring DSI Tempest

Posted on September 13, 2012 by John C.S. Keston

It has been a couple of months since I have shared an Ostraka track (Wayland’s Smithy back in July), so I thought I would let you have an advance listen to a very recent mix featuring the DSI Tempest. This particular track also includes sounds programmed on the Roland MKS-80, SCI Pro-One, and Korg Monotribe. Thanks for listening, and let me know what you think.

In Habit: Living Patterns Complete Collection on SoundCloud

Posted on September 5, 2012 by John C.S. Keston

I have made the entire collection of pieces that I composed for “In Habit: Living Patterns,” performed at Northern Spark in June, 2012, available as a set of sixteen tracks on SoundCloud. This set will be downloadable for a unspecified time window, so get it while you can.

Duet from In Habit: Living Patterns

Posted on August 30, 2012 by John C.S. Keston

This is the fifteenth of sixteen pieces that I composed and performed during each vignette of the dance production “In Habit: Living Patterns,” performed at Northern Spark in June, 2012. This is also the last of two of the pieces in the series that I used a patch that I programmed to simulate a Japanese reed instrument called a shō.

Revision from In Habit: Living Patterns

Posted on August 28, 2012 by John C.S. Keston

This is the fourteenth of sixteen pieces that I composed and performed during each vignette of the dance production “In Habit: Living Patterns,” performed at Northern Spark in June, 2012. This one was based on the Eight Minute Drone that I shared last year.