From the mind and sonic palette of Rick Wade comes a browser-based instrument ideal for generating sounds and new ideas.
Harmonie Keys (a nod to Rick’s legendary Harmonie Park label) is a fascinating project: an instrument that serves as a font of ideas, a tool for making deep, emotional sounds and one that exists in parallel rather than being locked inside of a rigid DAW-based workflow.
Harmonie Keys functions entirely in a web browser (Chrome-based browsers are recommended, but I used Firefox and never hit any problems during a demo). In a lot of ways, you can clarify what Harmonie Keys is by what it isn’t. Harmonie Keys is not a plugin, it’s not a collection of samples or a stock arpeggiator. It uses no AI. Compatibility with a DAW is irrelevant as it never touches Ableton or whatever you use. Instead, you fire up a browser, hit the site, login and with a few selections you can start constructing interesting chord progressions, melodies, harmonies and waves of sound very quickly.
Rick Wade says it was designed from his own musical DNA, for producers “who start with mood, atmosphere and feeling.” As such it’s probably best for people working in deep house, beatmakers, hip hop producers and those working in related fields. There exists an infinite number of plugins and apps that will all but write (and sometimes also write) lo-fi-type tracks and sounds, to the point it doesn’t even feel like a human-generated genre of music anymore but new era elevator or supermarket music. This is not that. Harmonie Keys requires human input. Nothing generates nothing. And the results sound infinitely more elegant, lustrous and sonorous.
Harmonie Keys uses “voices” as the main input. These are divided into four categories: Chord/Melody voices, Grimoire Voices, Instrument Voices and Bass Voices. Most are self-explanatory (Grimoire Voices are defined as “sample-based chromatic pitch-shift”). The main grid in Harmonie Keys features 4 layers allowing for a maximum of 25 Chord/Melody Voices, 4 Grimoire and 4 Instrument Voices, plus 12 Bass Voices. Each voice has unique sonic characteristics and its own effect parameters via rotary knobs and are assigned names that give a feeling of what they’re about (Amber Keys, Velvet Pad, Glass Keys, etc.) Output in Harmonie Keys comes via export to 44.1kHz 16 bit WAV files or standard MIDI files. You can export the full mixdown of all layers or any or all of the four layers individually.
Harmonie Keys is a “production tool” in the broadest sense, but one that is tailored to a type of music and a sound evocative of Rick Wade’s own take on Detroit deep house and downtempo sounds in particular. Harmonie Keys is available for a one time purchase of $89 (no monthly subscriptions here) via harmoniekeys.com.
⚪️ more music making apps and plugins /
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⚙ Emulating the classic Rhodes sound with Magic Tines
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⚙ AudioThing RES-09 emulates the warm strings of the Roland RS-09
5 Mag Issue 225
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elevate: First published in 5 Mag Issue #225 featuring Nico Lahs, Dam Swindle cover mix, 100 releases on Heist, Point Winona Sound Labs and more. Become a member for $2/month and get every issue in your inbox right now…
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