Musical Instruments

The iRig Pre 2 by IK Multimedia is a handy little tool to allow you to use traditional microphones for your content creation needs.

You can always count on Roland to announce products at NAMM that garner a second look. They’ve created quite a little buzz around a couple of new offerings that Best Buy is planning on carrying: The FP-30 Digital Piano and the Roland Boutique Series are going to have people talking for a while.

We are all familiar with the iconic DJ scratching away on vinyl, as the art of turntablism grew these DJ would create more complex routines using just vinyl records, turntables and a mixer. Over time with the move away from vinyl to digital, all these complex mixing routines have now moved onto the computer, to be controlled via DJ controllers. One of the big names in digital DJ controllers is Hercules and this year at NAMM 2016 they had some new hardware to show off, the Hercules P32 DJ controller and the DJUCED 40 3.0 software. 

With this year's holiday gifts you can help the intermediate-level pianist on your list to have the perfect setup for all their musical activities. I'll make some gift suggestions to help encourage the making of a star!

The iLoud Studio Monitor Speaker is a small package that can pack a hefty little punch. It’s meant for listening to music like other wireless speakers, but it also has special features. If you’re a musician looking for a small keyboard amp or software-driven guitar amp, or if you need to check mixes on the go to make sure they’ll translate well to other systems, the iLoud has you covered.

On the faceplate for the BOSS GT-001 it reads, “Guitar Effects Processor”, but that is really selling itself short. The GT-001 is so much more than “just” a guitar processor. While it does contain the legendary BOSS guitar effects that will give you the sound to play vitually any style of music from metal to blues to indie, it also includes effects for acoustic guitar and voice as well as being a desktop audio interface that allows you to connect to your computer for practising or recording. And there’s more!

As with any NAMM, there are artist endorsements and demonstrations galore. Just look for a crowd around a booth and there’s probably somebody you know sitting there talking or playing an instrument. Saturday (today) is usually when they come out in force, but yesterday proved to be fruitful.

It's fair to say that there aren't a lot of truly innovative and fresh new products for musicians and creative types. Zoom's ARQ Aero Rhythm Trak changes that with its incredibly unique offering to musicians, DJs, and others with this all-in-one performance and production tool.

Taking time to work on guitar gear maintenance will help make your next show or session even better. Amplifiers, effects pedals and cables needs TLC too.

Gibson showed us some truly beautiful guitars in the Melody Maker and SG lines. They are celebrating their 120th anniversary this year and have added some really tasteful extras to their lines to celebrate.   What I really found exciting was the Min-ETune feature hardware that Gibson demonstrated to us. Will this be the end of manual tuning?