They have announced at NAMM that they are parterning with several companies, the first of which is Presonus to allow for direct uploading to the service from audio applications. Audio File Engineering is another partner and it is reported that Ableton Live will soon include the feature as well.

This is exciting news for the site and for the music web business. We have seen this sort of integration with other social networking services before, but not in the music world. How the feature is exactly going to be implemented is unclear at this point. Soundcloud has grown in large part due to its ability to easily distribute audio files and remix packs online. The ability to upload individual tracks within an audio project would be a useful one indeed.

Quote Alexander Ljung, SoundCloud CEO:

“We’re very excited to be launching the first of our music softwareintegrations with PreSonus and Audiofile Engineering. With these upcoming partnerships it’s possible to imagine a production workflow in which you produce a track, upload it to SoundCloud, and send it direct to Abbey Road for mastering without any files hitting your desktop. We’re imagining a future where music professionals can seamlessly use the web together with their desktop tools in a fully integrated and extremely powerful combination. The SoundCloud platform and our open API, in combination with progressive companies like PreSonus and Audiofile Engineering, are making it possible for this future to arrive in 2010.”

via Harmony-Central.com

Novation and Ableton have announced a new dedicated controller for Ableton Live called the Launchpad. Taking obvious design ques from the popular DIY Monome kits, the launch pad a 64 button interface designed to control Live’s session view.

Details from Ableton.com

Big grid
Launchpad features a multi-color, 64-button grid for launching clips plus eight dedicated scene-launch buttons. The buttons are lit by LEDs displaying clip status so you can see at a glance what’s loaded (orange), what’s playing (green), and what’s being recorded (red).

Compact, portable
Despite the big grid, Launchpad is compact and portable: it’ll fit in your bag for gigs and won’t hog your desk space in the studio. It’s slim, sturdy, weighs less than a hardback book and it’s USB powered, so there’s no power adapter to drag around.

4 modes for flexibility
It’s not just about launching clips: as well as the Session Mode, Launchpad offers Mixer Mode—a unique way to control Ableton Live’s mixer—and two fully-customizable User Modes.

Innovative mixer control
In Mixer Mode, the rows and columns of the grid become virtual faders, sliders and knobs controlling track volume, pan, sends, mute, solo, Clip Stop Buttons and record arm, depending on the function selected. Use the scene launch/mixer function buttons to select the function you want to control.

Customizable
The two fully-customizable User Modes transform the grid into a drum pad controller, DJ effect controller or anything else you can think of. The default state for User Mode 1 provides drum pad control for Live’s Drum Racks—great for sketching out beats. Using Live’s simple MIDI mapping, it’s easy to create custom control environments, whatever devices you’re using and however your Live Sets are configured.

Made for Max for Live
The User Modes make Launchpad the ideal hardware counterpart for Max for Live. Launchpad is flexible enough to deal with even the most detailed Max for Live devices and can handle generic parameters and controls with ease. Eleven LED states provide visual feedback that’s precise enough for complex devices. Launchpad users will soon be able to download a Max for Live step sequencer patch from Novation and more Max for Live patches are planned for the future.

Communication goes both ways
Live and Launchpad are in a constant, two-way, hardware-software dialog. The back-lit grid buttons show what’s happening in Live and Live, in turn, shows which section of the Session View is currently under Launchpad control: a red border around the current clip group let’s you see where you are with a just a cursory glance at your screen.

Navigating the Session View
Obviously, you’re not limited to controlling only 64 clips. The arrow buttons move the grid up, down, left and right one track or scene at a time. Hold down the ‘Session’ button in Session Mode, and you can use the arrow keys to jump eight tracks or rows at a time—very useful for navigating around large, complex Live Sets.

More buttons? More Launchpads
Want more buttons? Launchpads are designed to work together, with up to six units at once. That’s more than 400 assignable buttons! Launchpads running on the same system can run in different modes, so you can control the Session View, mixer and custom setups all at once, with one Launchpad for each.

It will be avaliable November 1st and priced at ~$200.

http://www.novationmusic.com/launchpad

http://www.ableton.com/nl398-launchpad

via LivePA.org