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Dave Smith Instruments Tempest

	Dave Smith Instruments Tempest
	$2099.00 RRP $2199.00 Seen a better price?

Tempest is a professional drum machine that generates its sounds using six powerful analog synthesis voices, and uses an innovative, performance-oriented operating system that permits an extraordinary level of control to create, edit, arrange, and manipulate beats in real time without ever stopping.

Tempest - Beat Exercise from Richard Devine on Vimeo.

The performance-oriented operating system, ninety panel controls, and bright 256 x 64 dot OLED display work together to provide a tightly integrated, non-stop workflow.

• Record a drumbeat in real-time
• Switch to another drumbeat and use the lit pads to record it using step programming
• Switch to another drumbeat and record tuned keyboard parts
• Use the two touch controllers to to record real-time note sound animations or perform beat-wide sound changes
• Use the generous sound controls to edit any of the drum sounds
• Tweak the analog effects or drum mix
• Arrange beats in real time and record the live arrangement into a song
• And all of the above without ever stopping play

Each of the six analog voices has two analog oscillators plus two digital oscillators (with a large bank of included samples), the classic Curtis analog lowpass filter with audio-rate modulation, an additional highpass filter, analog VCA with feedback, five envelopes, two LFOs, an extraordinary variety of analog modulation routings, and stunning sonic quality, warmth, and punch. Although optimized for drum sounds, it excels at tuned sounds as well, and even doubles as a six-voice analog keyboard synth.1

Sixteen pressure- and velocity-sensitive lit pads are arranged in a 2 x 8 configuration, providing intuitive access to all your fingers and the ideal compromise between the popular 4 x 4 pad arrangement (popular for real-time programming ) and 1 x 16 arrangement (popular for step programming) because Tempest does both. The pads can be used to play thirty-two drum sounds2 (two banks), mute/unmute the thirty-two sounds on playback, play and arrange sixteen beats in real time, play one sound at sixteen tunings (in a variety of scales) or sixteen velocities, or as sixteen time steps for step programming. The ROLL button permits creating drum rolls or repeated groove patterns by varying pad pressure as the beat records, and doubles as a momentary "stutter" effect when the pads are assigned to play beats.

In addition to the six stereo direct voice outputs, there are stereo mix outputs and phones outputs, plus two inputs for foot switches or expression pedals, MIDI in/out and USB.

Two pressure- and position-sensitive Note FX slide controllers permit real-time recording of note or beat-wide sound parameter changes into the drumbeat as you play. For example, record simultaneous filter frequency, tuning, envelope decay, and pan changes for each note. The Playback key permits using the slider to override these parameters on playback, which can be recorded back into the beat. Plus, the sliders can be used in performance to alter beat-wide sound parameters like low-pass frequency or resonance, high-pass frequency, envelope attack or decay, and more.

A variety of unique effects are provided while maintaining a pure analog signal path:

• Stereo analog compressor and distortion circuits affect the stereo output mix
• Beat-synced delay is achieved by generating additional delayed note events within the sequencer
• A beat-synced "stutter" effect is created entirely within the sequencer by looping short portions of the drumbeat on demand

The degree of swing timing can be adjusted in real time during playback. Roger used his entire bag of tricks to make the swing sound very human and natural.

In short, Tempest is a well-considered professional design that could only come from Roger and Dave, with a sonic quality and natural human rhythmic feel that are second to none, all in a compact, portable unit that measures a mere 15.4" wide by 9" deep by 2.5" high.

1 Not implemented in the current OS, but coming in an update. See "A Message from Dave and Roger" for more details.
2 Sixteen sounds in the current OS version; thirty-two coming in an update.



A Message From Dave and Roger

As many of you know, this product has been a long time in the making. It is easily the most complex musical instrument we have ever built, a monumental task for a very tiny company. At this point we have a number of units in the field used by a variety of top artists, and the early reaction has been amazing and highly encouraging!

When we originally announced Tempest, perhaps we were a bit optimistic in giving details about all of our planned features for the product. As a result, even though Tempest is now an immensely capable tool, we've decided to ship with some of those features not yet implemented. We are finding that already this instrument is so powerful and musicians are having so much fun that it's time to go for it. Check the video links below and see if you agree!

The hardware is solid and rest assured Tempest is stable and will not eat your beats. Going forward we'll be releasing periodic free software updates that can be downloaded and installed over MIDI, and we'll be maintaining a list of what is remaining to implement. If you wish to wait until all features are done, we understand. If you wish to try it out first then decide to wait, that's OK, too-we will maintain a liberal, no-questions-asked return policy while we're finishing up the remaining features.

Be assured that we stand behind the product and we are fully committed to insuring that everyone has a great experience with it. We are really looking forward to seeing/hearing Tempest in action!

Dave and Roger