B4 organ manual

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Real Guitar 2. EVE Soundset vol. Native Instruments Massive. The upper and lower manuals and pedalboard are accessible via their own MIDI channels as on the previous version, and keyboard splits can be set up, providing 'zoning' of the sounds of both manuals and the pedalboard from one MIDI channel if desired.

Keysplits can be assigned directly from the Manual view by holding down the right mouse button the Control key on a Mac and clicking on an upper manual key, and then making your choice from the resultant drop-down menu.

Keysplits and transposition settings are global to B4 II — in other words, they're not storable on a per-preset basis. The Organ view above is where many of B4 II 's new features are to be found, and is divided into four sections. The lower section duplicates the drawbars and performance controls of the Manual view, but displays them larger, for which my aging eyes are truly thankful. The Organ section provides control over Key Click amount, fully variable response to keyboard velocity and Leakage amount.

Leakage is a characteristic of older Hammonds, where the crosstalk 'whine' between the tonewheel outputs can be heard, varying in timbre according to which drawbars are in use, and which notes are playing. When applied carefully, this can add a great deal of realism. When in String mode, notes decay to silence like a string bass when pedals are released.

When in Organ mode, increasing the Sustain parameter acts like a 'hold' feature — the notes are held at full level according to the Sustain time amount — which is very useful for keeping the bass notes flowing if you're not too nimble on the pedals. A couple of problems came up with B4 II during the review period. Under certain conditions, B4 II 's CPU usage ran exceptionally high when using it alongside other plug-ins in Cakewalk's Sonar 5 my sequencer of choice.

However, in one particular arrangement, which included two instances of Kontakt 2 and various effects plug-ins, B4 II gobbled up nearly 40 percent of the available CPU, causing it to max out. Replacing it with the original B4 reduced the CPU to normal levels. Finally, in the stand-alone version, I noticed that moving the Drive knob fully anticlockwise sometimes caused audio to cut out completely. NI have completely redesigned the built-in tube amplifier emulation for B4 II , and claim that the new model has been modelled on the original Leslie tube amplifier.

The character of the distortion, especially at high drive levels, is considerably more authentic than in B4 , being far less fizzy and imparting a satisfying growl. This makes for a more solid, focused sound that works just as well with single notes as with chords. At lower drive levels, it doesn't entirely capture the soft, sexy 'purr' of the real thing to my ears, erring a little on the crackly side.

Nevertheless, this can be greatly improved by the choice of virtual speaker cabinet see the 'Cabinet Office' box below. The new Tube Amp also offers extremely effective tone controls that work at just the right frequencies, especially when emphasising the bass end of things — an area in which B4 was rather lacking.

The Expert screen see below is similar to the Organ view, but provides this panel of more detailed controls for the organ percussion, reverb, and Leslie rotors. An additional benefit of the Tube Amp is the way in which it compresses the volume level as you drive it harder, much like a real tube amp. This, in conjunction with the tone controls and various other niceties, goes a long way towards addressing B4 's problem of the drop in volume in the lower key ranges. Now it's a doddle to recreate aggressive, spitting bass tones think 'History Repeating' by the Propellerheads that were frustratingly elusive on the original B4.

Speaking of volume consistency, B4 II now features loudness robbing, another Hammond 'feature' whereby the sound's volume is 'compressed' whenever the same tonewheel is being played simultaneously by multiple keys. All this leads to a much better sound balance overall. As well as the various speaker cabinet simulations that can be chosen in Organ view, four of the virtual microphones' parameters are located here. Firstly, the relative levels of the dry tonewheels and Rotator output can be balanced.

As hinted earlier, turning this fully anticlockwise is how you would completely bypass the Rotator as opposed to hitting the Brake , and the option to balance the two is there for those wanting to recreate the effect of playing both through a Leslie and a Hammond's own stationary speaker. The treble and bass rotors' levels can be balanced, as well as the treble and bass microphones' relative pan positions.

The Air parameter is the most interesting here, increasing the level of early reflections in the sound. This creates a convincing sense of distance from the speaker cabinet without adding any significantly measurable reverb. B4 II offers 13 different speaker cabinet simulations.

The first four of these are variations on Leslie and cabinets, each one being either fully enclosed or with the 'back' removed to reveal the rotating speakers. With the exception of the final simulation, Direct a model of a DI box , the remainder are modelled after classic guitar speaker cabinets. Although NI have avoided using brand names, the illustrative icons make the intended references clear.

The most interesting one here is, unusually, 'Bass VT' — undoubtedly Ampeg's famous bass guitar cabinet. This has a particularly beefy sound with a lot of high frequencies, and is excellent for emphasising the rotary effect's swirling of the upper drawbars. These cabinet simulations are the real key to modelling specific Hammond sounds that are associated with certain genres of music.

Each cabinet confers signature frequency characteristics to the sound, in some cases dramatically so. For example, there is a clear distinction between the Open Rotary model, which delivers a bright, aggressive rock tone, and the Closed Rotary model, which produces a mellower, jazzy timbre but with a shiny-sounding top end. Such subtleties of tone could be quite difficult to convey with the original B4. For example, I have tried to duplicate the classic Al Cooper 'Like A Rolling Stone' sound — a full, flutey sound but with silvery, swirling upper harmonics.

I never quite managed to nail it on B4 , but the registration through B4 II 's Rotary Closed cabinet with the 'Air' parameter at 50 percent and drawbar Leakage set to around 30 percent hit it dead on. Interestingly, using a guitar cabinet in conjunction with the rotary speaker balance at percent is an interesting concept. For this to work in real life, you would have to send the rotary speakers' microphone outputs to a matched pair of amps feeding two identical, acoustically isolated speakers and mike these up all over again!

However, the inclusion of guitar cabinets is not as daft as it sounds — Jon Lord's signature overdriven Hammond sound in Deep Purple evolved through such experimentation, namely driving Marshall stacks directly from the output of his C3 — often without the Leslie.

When using the additional Vox Continental or Farfisa tonewheel sets, the guitar cabinets come into their own, as this is representative of how they might originally have been amplified. The combination of DI Box and rotary effect, on the other hand, is a rather more intriguing fantasy concept! The provision of these cabinet simulations in B4 II is well judged, and broadens the sound palette to a remarkable degree.

The Expert view shown on the previous page delves deeper into the finer sound-editing details. Percussion volume, decay and harmonics can be fine-tuned here; similarly the Vibrato mix and depth can be adjusted.