Markus Krause
Would you ever go back to freelance coding projects, or are you exclusively working with Tone2 projects now?
MK “I am still able to do projects for the industry occassionally. One project was developing algorithms for digital radio transmission, and I also wrote algorithms for a company which builds particle accelerators. But I’m not allowed to talk about details.” From a total of 12 Tone2 products, seven are synths! Why the focus on synthesisers rather than effects? MK “Synths are more complicated to build than effects. As a result, there is less competition on the market. Furthermore, I’m not only a programmer, but also a passionate sound designer. Building patches is fun.”
Your synths have that big, brash, aggressive ‘Tone2 sound’! What do you think is behind it? And how did it happen?
MK “Because of my academic background (I’m a phonetician and engineer), my approach to designing synths is a scientific one – there’s a lot of complicated math behind it. I always design every module from the aspect of the highest possible sound quality. The sum of all these modules results in the ‘Tone2 sound’. Many people say my stuff has a very modern sound; others say it sounds extreme, like polished plastic!”
“My approach to designing synths is a scientific one”
Which is your personal favourite Tone2 synth? MK “Electra2 and Icarus. I like Icarus because of the resynthesis function. Here you can pick a WAV file and create a new patch from it. There are lots of possibilities for waveform editing. The stereo hypersaws sound very wide, and you can build very fat sounds.
“I use Electra2 for loading samples. It can automatically tune them, which is a major time saver. In v2.5, drag and drop modulation has been added, which speeds up sound design a lot. Since it can play up to four layers and four arpgeggiators at the same time, you can build big ensembles which are great for live performances.” What’s next for Tone2? MK “This year we want to focus on enhancing existing products. There will be several large and free updates. Furthermore, a couple of expansions and soundsets will be released.”