Steinberg Cubasis 3.7 & Iconica Sketch

Cubasis 3.7 lets you add both tempo and time signature changes into your projects.

Fancy composing a symphony on your commute? Steinberg have got you...

Mobile music technology has come a long way over the last 15 years or so. While the mobile platform has encouraged some brilliant indie developers to get involved, a number of the established ‘desktop’ players also saw the potential and have invested considerable R&D resources. Steinberg are one of the most obvious examples on that front and, since its first launch in 2013, Cubasis has provided an ever more sophisticated DAW experience as mobile hardware has itself become more advanced.

Steinberg have now released Cubasis 3.7 and, as I’ll get to in a minute, it continues the trend of features familiar on the desktop gradually transitioning to the mobile environment. Alongside the Cubasis update, Steinberg have also introduced a new virtual instrument. Well, new to the mobile platform at least... On the desktop, Iconica Sketch is Steinberg’s streamlined version of their full Iconica orchestral library. The Sketch version provides a full suite of orchestral instruments and a core set of performance articulations, while its compact size makes it ideal for use on a laptop, for example, letting you do just what its name suggests — create full orchestral sketches.

Full orchestral libraries are few and far between on iOS/Android devices so the mobile version of Iconica Sketch is something that will have broad appeal, especially as it is able to run as a standalone app, or as an AU instrument within any suitable DAW host. That said, Cubasis users who purchase Iconica Sketch do benefit from free access to an additional version of the instrument that offers enhanced integration into their favourite mobile DAW. So, what’s new in Cubasis 3.7, and just how do you squeeze a full orchestra into something as small as an iPad, iPhone or Android device?

Time To Go Fast, Faster, Slow

Every iteration of Cubasis has seen the arrival of new features ported over from the desktop world. The latest release continues that trend on three distinct fronts. First, courtesy of Steinberg’s parent company Yamaha celebrating their 50th anniversary of synth development, if you own the FM Classics IAP, you now get a free update for that with nearly 400 additional patches from the classic DX7.

Second, and perhaps technically more impressive, is that Cubasis now includes support for a tempo and time signature track, allowing you to add both time signature and tempo changes within a project. If your needs go beyond 4/4 and a fixed tempo, this is going to be quite a big deal.

This has been implemented by adding a Global Track to a project. This then provides lanes for both tempo and time signature data respectively, both of which can be activated/deactivated individually. With the Draw (pencil) tool selected, you can simply tap on the Signature lane to add a new time signature event and a pop‑up dialogue lets you configure the values. Things can get as sophisticated are you like here so, if 3/4 followed by 9/8 is your thing, then feel free to knock yourself out.

Whatever changes you make, the bar structure will adjust itself accordingly. Equally, when you undertake editing tasks — for example, editing MIDI notes — the grid reflects the time divisions for the current time signature. I had no problems adding multiple time signature changes to a project and existing MIDI followed the changes.

Tempo adjustments follow a similar process. You can tap with the Draw tool to add a single tempo point, while if you draw freehand, a series of tempo points will be added at grid‑point resolutions (as specified far‑right on the Toolbar). You can also choose to add the tempo changes as jumps or as ramps between two points so you can easily create smooth tempo changes for accelerando or rallentando sections if required. Existing points can, of course, be edited and you can also select multiple tempo points for editing.

In testing this functionality out on an existing Cubasis project, MIDI data on virtual instrument tracks followed tempo changes automatically, as you would expect. What I was pleasantly surprised about was how well existing audio events also followed suit providing their Time Stretch mode was set to Auto. This is something we take for granted within a desktop DAW (although perhaps we shouldn’t?) but it was still impressive to see (hear) on an iPad.

One caveat is worth noting, though. While it’s now perhaps less common than it ought to be, recording an ensemble performance in the absence of a click does let the musicians ‘play’ with the tempo to add a further dynamic to the music. Unless I missed something, at present, the Cubasis tempo functionality doesn’t include the ability to easily generate a tempo map from such an existing recording (and which then allows you to edit or add MIDI elements to the musical grid). At least for now, that remains a task for the desktop.

What’s The Score?

Tempo variations are, of course, an integral part of many orchestral compositions so the addition of a tempo track in Cubasis is obviously going to appeal to the same users who might be interested in Iconica Sketch. While I suspect the underlying sample base (approximately 2GB in size) has been optimised to minimise storage requirements, the mobile version offers the same 34 orchestral instruments and 140 total articulations found in the desktop edition of Iconica Sketch. What that means is that you get access to individual sub‑sections within each of the major orchestra sections. So, for example, within the string section, you get instruments for the basses, celli, violas, first violins and second violins. Alongside string, brass and woodwind instruments, the collection includes both percussion and chromatic percussion instrument options. As with Sketch on the desktop, what you don’t get is ensemble patches (that is, a full string section ensemble in a single instrument), but anyone wanting to mock‑up a proper orchestral score would almost certainly want to break down their lines into the individual sub‑sections anyway.

Whether used as a standalone app, or as an AU instrument within a suitable host, Iconica Sketch gives you a full orchestral sound palette to work with.

The selection of articulations is also sensible. For example, for the string instruments, you get staccato, pizzicato, spiccato, sustain, legato, tremolo and sustain with vibrato, while the various brass instruments offer four or five articulations including staccato, marcato, sustain and legato (and some add sustain with vibrato). Yes, you would get more articulations in a top‑end desktop‑based orchestral library, but it’s plenty to work with and the articulation keyswitching is easy to use. Performance dynamics behaves as on the desktop so, for the sustained articulations, the mod wheel controls how hard/loud the instruments are played, while for the shorter articulations, MIDI velocity does the same job.

In testing, Iconica Sketch happily ran as an AU instrument in both Audiobus and AUM. Even if you are not a Cubasis user, therefore, the instrument could still be a great choice whatever your DAW host‑of‑choice happens to be. However, as a Cubase and Cubasis user, I have to say the Iconica Sketch workflow within Cubasis is particularly slick. It’s also worth stating that the sound itself is impressive; Steinberg have managed to pack a lot of orchestral punch into a very compact format.

I can imagine students of orchestration finding this a pretty compelling combination, especially when used with a compact‑format MIDI keyboard. If the latter features velocity sensitivity and a hardware mod wheel, you really do have a powerful orchestral compositional toolkit that you could take almost anywhere with you. I’m less sure I’d want to get into detailed MIDI editing on a phone‑sized screen, but on the standard or Pro iPad, it’s a pretty comfortable experience. And, of course, projects started on an iPad Cubasis/Iconica Sketch combination can easily be exported to a desktop Cubase/Iconica Sketch combination if you want to take things further or move over to your top‑tier orchestral libraries. With Dorico also available on an iPad — and including support for AU instrument playback — sketching orchestral scores is now a mobile activity.

Mobile music making is now well beyond novelty status and the combination of Cubasis 3.7 and Iconica Sketch are prime demonstrations of just how capable it has now become.

Pinch Yourself Now

When you spend a lot of time immersed in the world of modern music technology, it’s very easy to get blasé about just what is possible so, forgive me if I encourage you to pinch yourself for a moment; a compact but well‑featured orchestral sound set, sat within an equally compact but well‑featured DAW, all running on an iPad (heck, even an iPhone or Android device) that you can take literally anywhere. I don’t recall seeing that on the Starship Enterprise in Star Trek TOS, but it’s the kind of thing that, not so many years ago, would have made perfect sci‑fi film/TV gadgetry.

Except now it’s not. Cubasis 3.7 and Iconica Sketch make it a reality and, in terms of the software costs at least, it would be within almost anyone’s reach. Mobile music making is now well beyond novelty status and the combination of Cubasis 3.7 and Iconica Sketch are a prime demonstration of just how capable it has now become.