Hyundai has appointed Ray Kurzweil as Chief Strategy Officer of Kurzweil Music Systems. Hyundai, one of the world’s largest corporations, plans to work with Ray Kurzweil to “build Kurzweil Music Systems into one of the largest music instruments brands in the world,” Kurzweil stated.

At the last NAMM, Ray Kurzweil was given a Life Achievement Award by Young Chang North America, with fellow recipients Stevie Wonder and Billy Joel. Congratulations to all.

Kurzweil Music Systems has the technology and the know-how to be revolutionary, just as V.A.S.T (Variable Architecture Synthesis Technology) was. They were the first synthesizer manufacturer to have a web presence, and to provide such power in their synthesizers. Music-making friends are still amazed when I explain how I can build a synthesizer within my Kurzweil.

I have been a long-time contributor to online Kurzweil mailing lists (that’s about 13 years counting from my initial contact to now), advocating and explaining the use of the Kurzweil K2 series synthesizers. They are extremely powerful, but with power also comes complexity for some users.

I wrote three very well received tutorials about Advanced Programming on the Kurzweil K2 series. Fellow users were extremely happy that I not only knew the synthesis architecture so well, but also that I was sharing the knowledge with them, showing them advanced ways to put their synths to great use:

0. Advanced Programming on the Kurzweil K2 series synthesizers – An overview.
1. Interactive Phrase Sequencing
2. Vector Synthesis & WaveSequencing Emulation
3. Faking effects

I won a contest for programming the synthesizer and I also wrote software to remote control the Kurzweil synths’, both at the panel level and at the internal synthesis architecture level, and transfer sounds to and from them in SysEx format.

One of these software, KurView (which you can also see in the header for this blog), enables me to get high-quality images of the contents of the LCD screen, which I have integrated into these new blog versions of my old tutorials.

Kurzweil Music Systems has a very advanced new DSP chip called Mara which should be the heart of forthcoming products.

There are some obstacles and some past occurrences that should be avoided for future success not just technologically but for the community as a whole. As a composer, repeat Kurzweil user (I have owned a K2000 and I now have a Kurzweil K2500XS with KDFX), long-time recognized contributor on the mailing lists, sound synthesis expert and software developer for the machines, I have a few ideas that I would like to tell Ray about.

Kurzweil synths are used by Mike Garson (David Bowie), Alicia Keys, New Order, Jean-Michel Jarre, Dream Theater (Jordan Rudess), Pink Floyd (Jon Carin) and many others.

In the meantime, that’s the best thing that could happen to Kurzweil Music Systems.

Welcome back, Ray.

It’s everywhere. Anytime you read a news piece about music manufacturers, somebody is buying somebody else. The latest example is Digidesign buying the German Wizoo. The announcement came on the 22nd of August.

Wizoo is known for its books, and recent virtual instrument and effects products: Latigo, Darbuka and the W2 Reverb.

The company features famous film composer Hans Zimmer as one of its shareholders. Wizoo has collaborated extensively with Steinberg:

In 1999 Wizoo began a successful alliance with Steinberg Media Technologies, starting with the LM-4 software drum machine and producing pioneering and best-selling software instruments such as The Grand, Virtual Guitarist, Xphraze, Hypersonic and Virtual Bassist.

Digidesign, on the other hand, is the maker of the acclaimed professional DSP-based platform for music production, Pro Tools, which is used in studios around the world.

Prior to buying Wizoo, Digidesign’s parent company, Avid, also bought out hardware manufacturer M-Audio. This explains the radical entry of Digidesign into the small and mid-market segment with Pro Tools M-Powered.

Watch out for the latest release of Pro Tools 7, this October 7, together with a new M-Powered version.

It is to be noted that Kawai has announced a partnership with Wizoo.


Cakewalk, the American manufacturer of the Windows-only Sonar sequencer as well as the all-in-one software studio Project 5 v2, has itself reecently acquired virtual soft-synth maker RGC Audio. The latter is known for its excellent free and commercial VST instruments, namely Triangle II, sfz, and Z3Ta+.

This acquisition enables Cakewalk to integrate RGC Audio’s know-how about excellent-sounding soft synths into Project 5 v2. The new Dimension synth as well as PSYN II are the results.

A year ago, Roland and Cakewalk announced that they would collaborate. This explains the integration of an Edirol GM synth and more recently the Roland GrooveSynth module into Cakewalk’s products.