Free & Low-Cost Social Media Contest and Giveaway Ideas for MusiciansKeeping fans engaged does not have to be complicated or expensive. Here is a list of free and low-cost Social Media contest and giveaway ideas for Musicians.
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Musicians’ Earnings Remain Stagnant Despite Higher Ticket PricesA new survey reveals concerning stats about what is traditionally most musicians' top income source: performing live. Despite higher ticket prices, most Musicians' earnings remain stagnant.
The post Musicians’ Earnings Remain Stagnant Despite Higher Ticket Prices appeared first on Hypebot.

Most Popular Music Instruments to Learn in the USLearn about the most played musical instruments in the U.S., with an emphasis on their cultural significance and historical context making them the top choices in the country.
The post Most Popular Music Instruments to Learn in the US appeared first on Hypebot.

Koma Elektronik announce Chromaplane Kickstarter Koma Elektronik's new synthesizer relies on ten tunable electromagnetic fields, and can be played using a pair of handheld pickups. 

Best headphones for music producers, DJs and musiciansTrusted and reliable monitoring is an essential part of music production at every step of the process. To this end, most will opt for headphones, speakers, or a combination of the two.
Naturally, certain production tasks specifically call for headphones – audio playback while recording a vocal track, for example. They’re often a sensible choice if you’re dealing with noise constraints in a shared apartment, or your music-making space is lacking acoustic treatment.

READ MORE: Best speakers to buy in 2024: 12 best small studio monitors

What’s more, a good set of cans will set you back far less than studio monitors of the same quality, so they’re one of the best investments you can make at the start of your music production journey. Typically, you won’t need any extra hardware to connect your headphones to your setup either.
Make no mistake, monitor speakers hold a valuable position in a music producer’s arsenal. However, headphones offer greater flexibility and portability, and a cheaper barrier to entry – not to mention you won’t upset your neighbours when you’re tweaking mixes at 3am.
There’s no shortage of choice when it comes to headphones, from simpler entry-level models to sophisticated audiophile headsets capable of reproducing microscopic detail. Check out our round-up below for ten of the best headphones across a range of budgets and applications.
Best headphones at a glance:

Our pick: Sennheiser HD 490 Pro
Best budget headphones: RØDE NTH-100
Best DJ headphones: Korg NC-Q1
Best closed-back monitoring: Beyerdynamic DT770 Pro X
Best open-back monitoring: HEDDphone Two
Best wireless studio headphones: AIAIAI TMA-2
Best audiophile headphones: Meze Audio Elite
Best spatial audio/surround headphones: OLLO Audio S5X
Best everyday headphones: Focal Bathys
Best wireless earbuds: Denon PerL Pro

Best overall pick: Sennheiser HD 490 Pro
Sennheiser HD 490 Pro Image: Sennheiser.
HD 490 Pro: £349
Plus version: £419
Coming in as our top overall pick is Sennheiser’s flagship HD 490 Pro headphones. Marking the upper end of the HD range the manufacturer is so well known for, the 490 Pros tick all the boxes.
Their open-backed design and frequency response from 5 Hz to 36.1 kHz means you’re getting an accurate reproduction of your mix at all times, without the hyped low or high frequencies found in some headphones. The Plus model also comes with a licence for the dearVR Mix SE plugin, which virtualises different listening environments so you can see how things might translate to another space.
The HD 490 Pros don’t just sound stellar – they feel great too. They weigh just 260 grams without the cable, and come with interchangeable ear pads in velvet and fabric, so you’ll remain comfortable during longer sessions.
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Read our full Sennheiser HD 490 Pro review.
Best budget headphones: RØDE NTH-100
RØDE NTH-100
NTH-100: £119
Offering pro-level audio at a fraction of the price, RØDE’s NTH-100 headphones fit the bill – whether you’re looking for your first set of studio cans or just a cheaper headset without sacrificing on quality.
Due to the smaller transducers in headphones, it’s often tricky to accurately reproduce bass frequencies, and many budget models compensate with an overhyped low end. That’s not the case with the NTH-100s, which also perform well in the mids and highs.
And despite the lower price tag, RØDE has imbued these headphones with a premium feel thanks to an attractive contoured design, CoolTech gel to stop your ears overheating, and soft Alcantara for the pads – a suede-like material often used in luxury cars.
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Read our full RØDE NTH-100 review.
Best DJ headphones: Korg NC-Q1
Korg NC-Q1
Korg NC-Q1: £279
Although Korg isn’t a name typically associated with audio monitoring, the manufacturer set a new standard in the realm of DJ headphones with its NC-Q1 model.
Tailored for high-noise environments, the NC-Q1’s construction naturally reduces outside noise, while the advanced Active Noise Cancelling (ANC) technology is capable of handling sound levels over 120 dB, ensuring you’re getting clear monitoring even in the loudest clubs.
On the ergonomic side, the NC-Q1s boast swivelling headphone cups, allowing for one-ear monitoring with ease. There’s deep and punchy bass response here too, so you can be certain the low end isn’t clashing when you’re mixing tracks.
Read our full Korg NC-Q1 review.
Best closed-back monitoring: Beyerdynamic DT 770 Pro X
Beyerdynamic DT 770 Pro X Limited Edition
DT 770 Pro: £119
DT 770 Pro X: £179
Enter any professional studio in the world and there’s a strong chance you’ll see a pair of Beyerdynamic’s iconic DT 770 Pro headphones. What made them so popular? The perfect balance of comfort, build quality, and sound – all at an affordable price significantly lower than many other pro-grade cans.
Designed for studio use, the DT 770 Pros feature a frequency response of 5 Hz to 40 kHz. As the headphones are closed-back, they’re excellent at blocking external sounds, with 16 dB of ambient noise isolation .
The Pro X Limited Edition model, released to celebrate Beyerdynamic’s 100th birthday, offers a few refinements on the well-worn classic, including a detachable three-metre cable and sleek, all-black design.
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Read our full Beyerdynamic DT 770 Pro X review.
Best open-back monitoring: HEDDphone Two
HEDDphone TWO
HEDDphone Two: £1,749
Open-back versus closed-back is always something to consider when choosing a pair of headphones, with the former typically offering a more natural and spacious soundstage at the cost of less impactful bass and increased leakage.
Berlin-based company HEDD aims to deliver all the benefits of an open-back design with HEDDphone Two, the sequel to its highly lauded original. Smaller and lighter in design, the Twos offer a sophisticated adjustable strap that ensures they’re comfortable for prolonged use.
Of course, there’s a pretty significant price tag to these headphones, but given how they sound, we reckon it’s justified. Powered by HEDD’s handmade Air Motion Transformers, these cans deliver an accurate but pleasing sound signature, with exceptional clarity, detailed transients, and even response across the entire spectrum.
Read our full HEDDphone Two review.
Best wireless studio headphones: AIAIAI TMA-2
AIAIAI TMA-2 Studio Wireless+
AIAIAI TMA-2: £300
Wireless monitoring has long remained out of the conversation when it comes to producing music, namely due to the latency and compression inherent to Bluetooth. However, AIAIAI is looking to rewrite the script with its TMA-2 headphones, letting producers unplug without the usual drop in audio quality.
These cans are paired with a W+ Link transmitter capable of transmitting 16-bit, 44.1 kHz audio over a dedicated radio frequency band with a latency of just 16ms. Ample battery power and a comfortable design keeps the TMA-2s in action for longer sessions, while the Bluetooth mode can be used for everyday listening for up to 80 hours.
Designed in collaboration with Richie Hawtin, the TMA-2s and AIAIAI’s other headphones are really quite unique, owing to their modular nature. You can upgrade or replace specific components of your headphones – the headband, speaker units, or earpads for example – and even mix and match parts to create your own configurations.
[products ids=”4XkalKxGqMaPL8P3J8GPcn”]
Read our full AIAIAI TMA-2 review.
Best spatial audio/surround headphones: OLLO Audio S5X
OLLO S5X headphones
OLLO Audio S5X: £379
Mixing surround on headphones is always going to present challenges – that’s simply down to physical constraints. OLLO Audio aims to deliver a proper portrayal of surround sound in binaural form with its S5X cans.
The S5Xs aren’t truly surround sound. Instead, they’re designed to downmix to stereo in the most accurate way possible. Part of this is the calibration process using OLLO’s plugin. By providing your serial number, the plugin accounts for the unique characteristics of your specific set of headphones, ensuring what the manufacturer describes as ‘accurate object positioning in virtualised 3D audio’ through subtle processing on the master channel.
What’s more, the S5X headphones are beautifully designed with robust metal components and sleek wood accentuations.
[products ids=”6C24q3OrHAqizXf2hcAKBw”]
Read our full OLLO Audio S5X review.
Best audiophile headphones: Meze Audio Elite
Meze Audio Elite
Meze Audio Elite: £3,749
If money’s no object, you might want to consider a pair of audiophile headphones like the Meze Audio Elite for your home listening. Undoubtedly, the price tag is significant – but five minutes with these headphones and that initial sticker shock will begin to fade into the background, replaced with an exquisite auditory experience that lets you discover new layers of nuance and detail in your favourite recordings.
Plenty of science has gone into the engineering of the Elites, with each diaphragm driven by a hybrid array of neodymium magnets that provides better frequency targeting within different parts of the ear, and an incredible frequency response of 3 Hz to 112 kHz. Thanks to materials like tungsten and Alcantara, these headphones boast a premium build quality worthy of their eye-watering cost.
[products ids=”1kAyRZfMA1shDAQ858BFTA”]
Read our full Meze Audio Elite review.
Best everyday headphones: Focal Bathys
Focal Bathys. Image: Sylvie Bessou
Focal Bathys: £699
Looking for a high-quality daily driver that can do a bit of everything? Focal has created an excellent all-rounder with Bathys, a pair of headphones supporting wired analogue connection, Bluetooth wireless, and onboard USB-C DAC that touts 24-bit, 192 kHz resolution.
While the 15 Hz to 22 kHz frequency response may not be quite as wide as some other headphones on our list, it’s still more than enough for most applications, offering accurate and neutral sound reproduction.
Alongside, Bathys offers three levels of ANC, eight built-in microphones for making calls, a transparency mode, and six-band EQ which can be adjusted via an app. Really, the only reason we’d think twice about the Focal Bathys is its appearance, with a somewhat Y2K-looking design that’s sure to trigger those with trypophobia.
[products ids=”3YkGhI9pDlDxTtOSi4yH7e”]
Read our full Focal Bathys review.
Best wireless earbuds: Denon PerL Pro
Denon PerL Pro
Denon PerL Pro: £300
Rising from the ashes of the NuraTrue Pro wireless earphones after Denon acquired Nura in 2023, the PerL Pros are identical in all but name.
While the price may seem a little steep, what you’re getting with these earbuds is a truly personalised audio experience. Using something called Masimo Adaptive Acoustic Technology – the original tech that put Nura on the map – the PerL Pros can be accurately calibrated to your own ears.
Like most competitor buds, the PerL Pros also benefit from ANC, spatial audio, and up to 24 hours of battery with the case. But it’s the acoustic personalisation that’s the showstopper here, and it’s certainly worth hearing for yourself if you’re in the market for a new set of earphones.
[products ids=”5zq87rNGVciLN9P9rGnCQx”]
Read our full Denon PerL Pro review.
The post Best headphones for music producers, DJs and musicians appeared first on MusicTech.

Jacob Collier: “Another thing I recommend to people is to try and make the worst song in the world”Stuck in a creative rut? British multi-instrumentalist and producer Jacob Collier has a piece of advice for you: try to make the worst song in the world. This unusual approach, he suggests, can lead to surprising results in your music.

READ MORE: Four Tet’s production hack for creating “a world” within his tracks so people connect to them “without even understanding why”

Speaking in a recent Guitar feature, the six-time Grammy winner says that the fear of getting stuck creatively is something every artist – himself included – experiences.
“I don’t know any musicians or creative people who don’t know that feeling, because it’s just part of it,” Collier admits. “I will say I’ve come to understand myself better in it, and I realise what I need in those kinds of situations.”
“Sometimes you need space, sometimes you need food, sometimes you need to go for a walk, sometimes you need to cry, sometimes you need to talk to your friends, sometimes you need to persist, sometimes you need to change tack, or sometimes you need to go and play a show.”
As Collier explains, it’s important to keep an open mind when making music so you don’t get bogged down by expectations.
“I find myself locked when I’m covered by expectation,” he says. “And if something isn’t a certain way then I’m failing. But some of the process, for me, is trying not to hold onto expectations too closely and let something be whatever it needs to be.”
“Another thing I’ve tended to enjoy over the years that I recommend to people is to try and make the worst song in the world,” Collier adds.
By aiming for something intentionally bad, musicians can break free from the pressure of perfection and allow their imagination to run wild.
”I’m perpetually surprised by how interesting my ideas become without the fear of them having to be good,” he says. “In fact, they can actively be bad. It’s a guaranteed way of making something interesting.”
Earlier this year, Jacob Collier aimed criticism at veteran producer Rick Rubin, after he shared his philosophy that the audience should come last when it comes to songwriting.
“I would critique Rick in a sense that I don’t think his audience is creative people,” Collier said. “I think his audience is people who aren’t creative, for whom creativity is novel. And they’re thinking ‘Gosh, wow! I never even thought that you could make something for yourself!’ But I feel that anybody who’s inherently creative in some way knows that there’s no one way to do anything.”
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Forcount crypto scheme promoters plead guilty to wire fraud conspiracyOn July 22, two of the five individuals who allegedly stole $8.4 million from investors between 2017 and 2021 by promoting Forcount pleaded guilty.

BIG BAND NIGHT AT THE HOLLYWOOD BOWLThe distinction between the general term “big band music” and the fabulous Swing era oftenassociated with the term comes clear at the end of the first paragraph in the Wikipedia entryabout the beloved style. Technically, we learn, “a big band or jazz orchestra is a type of musicalensemble of jazz that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections.” And then:“The term “big band” is also used to describe a genre of music, although this was not the onlystyle of music played by big bands.”The Hollywood Bowl described their Big Band Night as one where “some of the biggest bigbands in the land take the stage for a night of swinging good times.” Those who attended thevenue’s Big Band Night thinking they would be swing dancing to timeless Glen Miller or BennyGoodman tunes may have left disappointed, but the three large ensembles that performed –Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, Count Basie Orchestra ft. guest vocalist Nnenna Freelon andMaria Schneider Orchestra – offered an eclectic blend of dynamically arranged jazz marked byexciting swells of brass, buoyant rhythms and (most significantly), a seemingly endless blaze ofcolorful, richly improvisational horn solos.Closing in on its 40 th anniversary, the L.A. large ensemble treasure known as the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra opened in robust, high-energy form, with the great Rickey Woodard’spowerhouse sax solo standing out over the whimsical swing of “Georgia” and a cool rompthrough Horace Silver’s “The Jody Grind” featuring fiery, percussive brass flourishes andanother hot, smoky sax solo. In a set unfortunately limited to four tunes, a grand unexpectedhighlight was their choice of Billy Joel’s gorgeous yet somber and meditative “And So It Goes.”After a reflective, easy swaying intro section, the heart of the melancholy melody was expressedvia the beautiful solo bowing of leader/bassist John Clayton on the upright.Led since 2013 by trumpeter Scotty Barnhart, the Count Basie Orchestra has been a magnificent,ever evolving constant in large ensemble jazz for nearly 90 years. Easily providing the mostconsistently exciting performances of the night, the group got off to a speedy, whimsy filled startwith the dizzying piano of Glen Pearson, who traded fours with the intensely percussive,swelling horns before an explosive onslaught of competing, fiery sax solos. The openinginstrumental portion of their set included Basie staples like “Easin’ It” and “Doodle Oodle,” butthe most memorable, enduring highlight was their lush, soulful and ultimately vibrant spin onStevie Wonder’s “My Cherie Amour,” which began with a graceful piano solo by Glen Pearsonbefore the band strutted its intimate romantic, slow danceable stuff.Bringing an even more deeply immersive emotional feeling to the show, guest vocalist NnennaFreelon gave everyone a lift with her heartfelt, dramatic take on “I Like The Sunrise,” which shefollowed with a stylist sultry twist on “They Can’t Take That Away From Me” (which shecuriously introduced with a wordless operatic chant), a slow burn through “Black Iris” and aspirited, devil may care version of “Too Close For Comfort” that called to mind Dianne Reeves’sublime version in the film Good Night and Good Luck.

After all the amiability of Clayton-Hamilton and Basie and their many familiar tunes, theuniquely conceptual original offerings by the Maria Schneider Orchestra gave the audience a bitmore of a challenge. She and her much-hailed Grammy winning crew complemented fairlymainstream, tuneful pieces like the opening number “Bluebird” (which featured a charmingaccordion solo) and “Green Piece” with more unusual exploratory compositions that tapped intothe avant-garde side of her eclectic artistry, including the trippy, atonal space odyssey “Sputnik”(headlined by saxophonist Scott Robinson’s eerie notes) and the intentional cacophony of“American Crow,” an off-kilter, multi-mood swinging musical reminder of our country’s currentstate of sociopolitical disarray. Trumpeter Michael Rodriguez’s extended lyrical solo offered amuch-needed oasis between the more chaotic segments.

The post BIG BAND NIGHT AT THE HOLLYWOOD BOWL first appeared on Music Connection Magazine.

Bluetooth Printer works with AppleTalkFor retrocomputing enthusiasts, getting old computers to work with newer peripherals can be an exciting challenge or horrible headache. If you need to print out receipts from an old Mac, you might just be in luck now that [Hamin Mousavi] has gotten AppleTalk to work with cat printers.
[Mousavi] uses a Raspberry Pi 4 here in his version of the hack, but any Bluetooth capable computer running Linux should work. His command line screenshots are from a Debian-based system, but you should be able to translate to other systems as needed.
Thanks to previous work on these thermal printers, drivers are available for them on many other systems, so the tricky part comes down to getting the web connection to the printer working through the Linux box and then getting the Mac (in this case an iMac G3) to recognize the printer as something to install.
We’ve seen people do some really interesting things with thermal printers like making them D&D tools, breaking their paper DRM, and even black and white “Polaroids.”

Horizons Stage at WOMEX Manchester Music City and Horizons have announced the nine artists selected to play the Horizons Stage at this year’s WOMEX (Worldwide Music Expo).

A Throne for LEGO Baron HarkonnenIf you’re both a LEGO and a Dune fan, unless you’ve been living in a cave on Mars with your eyes shut and fingers in your ears, you’re probably aware that LEGO released a set for the royal Atreides ornithopter. The blades flap and everything. Anyway, it comes with several minifigures, including one that doesn’t quite fit with the others — a full-length Baron Harkonnen.
Given that, [gorkyver] decided to create a throne for the Baron that he could rise from, just like in the movie, while delivering the iconic line. With no reference materials available other than pausing the movie, [gorkyver] created a throne from scratch in BrickLink Studio, which made it easy to generate both a parts list and step-by-step instructions.
At the heart of this build is an Arduino Nano, which takes input from the momentary push button and starts the show. The Baron slowly rises on a rack and spur gear connected to a stepper motor, and a DF Player Mini runs the audio through a 75 mm speaker.
Rather than just buying a big box store display case off of eBay, [gorkyver] recreated the skeleton in Fusion 360 and used a hairdryer to bend a sheet of PET-G around to enclose it. A couple of sweet adhesive graphics later, and it totally looks like a real set on display. Don’t miss the demo/build video after the break.
Did you hear? The European Space Agency printed some bricks out of meteorite dust, and there might be one on display near you.

Sony’s $600m Michael Jackson deal isn’t completed yet – but it just took a big step forward in courtSony's deal to acquire a 50% stake in Michael Jackson's publishing and recorded catalogs has cleared a major hurdle
Source

17-year-old Eric Zhu’s startup was built in a high school bathroom — now it’s raised $2.3M and is emerging from stealthEric Zhu started building Aviato, an analytical platform for private market data, in a very typical place for an entrepreneur: the bathroom in his Carmel, Indiana, high school. Now the 17-year-old’s startup is emerging from stealth with $2.3 million in venture funding. Aviato tracks funding rounds and headcount, similar to competitors like Crunchbase and PitchBook, as […]
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Four Tet’s production hack for creating “a world” within his tracks so people connect to them “without even understanding why”Four Tet has a production technique he uses to create atmosphere and the feeling of a unique world which exists within his tracks.
Appearing on the Tape Notes podcast, where he opened up some of his most-loved tracks to explore his approach to production, Four Tet – also known as Kieran Hebden – explained how he works with texture and subtlety to create a connection between the listener and the music.

READ MORE: 7 music production techniques you can learn from Four Tet’s Three

Delving into his track Skater, which is inspired by a time when he watched his daughter ice skating and felt cut off from the noise of the outside world, Hebden shares how he built the song and even used real-life recorded sounds of the skating.
“All the other things that happen are there to guide you through the track,” he says, playing some vocal parts. “They’re very quiet and subliminal. I didn’t make them like a lead part of the song because it’s like I want the melody and the groove of it all to sort of be here, and then the ice skating and the humans and all the people and stuff echoes around in the distance.
“There’s an atmosphere there that puts it in a sort of world. I use a lot of things like that where there’s little quiet echoey bits of vocals and noises and little things happening all the time combined with everything else.”

He adds, “I’ve always done it, but then working on the Burial records for instance, working on stuff with him… He invented so many levels of doing that in ways that people have never thought, like tons of subliminal little sounds and textures all the time.”
He later continues, “I learnt early on that having these little bits of texture mixed in with everything actually put things in a world. Especially when you’re doing electronic music, it really puts things in a zone that is a great device for giving a way for people to connect to it without them really even understanding why they’re connecting to it, you know?”
Check out the podcast below:

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BandLab mobile users can now experiment with beats for free before buyingBandLab has made a significant improvement to the BandLab Beats marketplace, enabling users to try any BandLab Beat in BandLab Studio before choosing to purchase.
This change means within the BandLab mobile app, producers and vocalists can experiment with, add additional tracks and apply effects to a Beat with no up-front financial commitment.

READ MORE: BandLab hits “pivotal moment” as it surpasses 100 million users worldwide

Here’s how it works: on a Beat’s detail page within the BandLab app, the user can tap “Try for free in Studio”, where the Beat instantly loads into a Studio session, and creative touches can be applied and trialled to ensure the Beat aligns with their creative vision.
Once the user decides to commit to the Beat in question, they can purchase the licence with a tap and unlock the ability to save, download, publish and export their song with all of their previously-made personal touches remaining intact.
“This is the latest among many updates that demonstrate BandLab’s commitment to eliminating any barriers to creativity and making music creation accessible,” says BandLab. “This feature encourages users to try Beats in real-time, experiment freely, and immediately put their inspiration to work without upfront costs.”
Recently surpassing a massive 100 million users globally, BandLab continues to innovate and bring consistent quality-of-life improvements to its user base.
Earlier this month, the social music platform rolled out a number of advanced mobile features, including Mobile Automation, an expanded library of vocal effects and improved filters.
Learn more at BandLab.
Editor’s note: BandLab and MusicTech are both owned by the Caldecott Music Group.
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