Gig Performer 2 ships with a built-in programming language that can be used to develop very sophisticated behavior for live performance. GPScript gives Gig Performer some "open endedness", providing the ability to add features that are not already built in to the product. A full...
Although we're really busy working on Gig Performer 2.x (more on that later), we put out a minor update to Gig Performer 1.x today where it's now possible to distinguish between NoteOn and NoteOff events in our MIDI Filter plugin. Why is this interesting? Well, turns...
By default, Gig Performer saves the values of all widgets using a "last value" algorithm. That means that when you change a widget value and save your gig, then when you reload your gig, that widget will have the same value. This is very convenient but...
The normal way to use Gig Performer™ is to create rackspaces each of which contains a collection of plugins connected together as desired. A rackspace might contain everything needed for a single song or you might use several rackspaces during a single song, switching from...
(Yes, there's a video of the complete process at the end of this article so don't be afraid to keep reading!) If you have been watching YouTube videos of people showing you how to play this great song and they're busy playing 8th note chords something like...
OS X has a nice built-in feature called IAC (Inter-app Communication) that allows you to connect MIDI applications together and communicate with each other. (There's nothing built into Windows but there are third party applications like virtualMIDI that do the same kind of thing.) However, there...
We released version 1.5.2 a few days ago but we continue to move full steam ahead designing and implementing numerous other features that we (and customers) want to see in Gig Performer. One item that was requested a long time ago was a master volume control...
This feature just saved my a-- !!! Seriously! I'm getting ready to go on a tour in Japan with the Security Project. My main laptop is a 5 year old Macbook Pro with a 17" screen. It has 16Gb RAM and SSDs instead of hard drives...
In this short video - we will show you how to use Touch OSC app as a remote display and touch control surface to control your live rig and display the most important information about the current status. You will also see how easy it is...
If you're on a Mac, there's a great app out there called OSCulator that can be used to transform pretty much any input to any output. For example, you can configure it to receive MIDI notes and have it send keystrokes (yes, that's right, as...
When you normally configure OSC settings so that Gig Performer can communicate with your control surface such as Lemur or TouchOSC running on your iPad, you will generally specify the IP address of your iPad in Gig Performer's OSC configuration. Here's an example where 192.168.0.31 represents...
I love Kontakt! It was the key that allowed me to stop having to carry a Korg Kronos with me on tour along with my other controllers (I love the Kronos as well but it's so darn heavy.) If you load a Kontakt instrument, particularly one with...
I hear the term "Latency" a lot when talking about audio processing. What does it really mean? How do you set your gear and Gig Performer to work for you, not against you? What is latency? It's simply the amount of time that passes between the sound...
We are very excited about a new feature introduced in Gig Performer 1.5. It's something we've wanted from the very beginning and it's something that we believe many people will really find incredibly useful. Normally, Gig Performer preloads all rackspaces, which means that all plugins that will...
A lot of people asked about controlling multiple parameters from a single knob or slider and wondered why we didn't have such a facility in our first release. In fact we got quite a bit of criticism for the lack of such a feature. Apart from...
Gig Performer has a sophisticated OSC implementation that can be used for a variety of purposes, one of which is to allow bidirectional control with an iPad running a control surface such as Lemur or TouchOSC (Using Touch OSC with Gig Performer). To help you get...
Gig Performer allows you to create multiple "gigs" at the same time and they are completely independent of each other, each one separately controllable. We had a couple of scenarios in mind for this feature such as allowing vocals to use an independently controllable (and...
Yeah, we know, you've spent months or even years creating your set list, tweaking your plugins, changing them, getting your sound just right. Now you've got hundreds of patches and the notion of having to start all over again seems really painful. But here's a...
When it comes to selecting plugins, there is a myriad of choices and decisions to make. Everyone has their favorites and everyone is trying to find the right combination of plugins to create that great sound on stage. If you are a guitar player or a singer, you will be leaning more towards the effect plugins. If you are a keyboard player then you are likely to pay more attention to instrument plugins.
A great write-up of what a pro player is using these days comes from our own David Jameson. Read his “Go-to plugin list” here /my-go-to-plugin-list
Easily combining, inserting and tweaking those plugins is essential for any serious musician. That’s why a great host application (hint: Gig Performer😀) is a must. Otherwise you might very well try a plugin and a few of its presets but then give up on it before you explore all the cool options it might offer.
When it comes to pricing, usually you get what you pay for. Creating a great sampler plugin for example takes a lot of development and studio time, using great instruments and great players to capture a particular instrument faithfully. Then some serious development time to actually allow players to play those samples back properly. Having said that, there are some hidden gems that are absolutely free! Typically they are used as promotional tools for other commercial plugins made by the same company.
Anyway, you can never have enough plugins – right?
Most of the plugins listed here will have an installer so all you have to do is install them and restart Gig Performer. Some, however, come only as compressed files so you will have to manually drag the files to the appropriate folders. These will usually have instructions within the archive.
As a performing musician touring with several bands including The Security Project and Beyond The Wall, there are certain plugins I can't do without on tour and I thought I'd mention some of them here in case anyone is interested. Note that I have no relationship...