Access Virus Snow with Live, Numerology and Nodal

After some consideration and watching many videos I decided to get the Access Virus Snow. (Awave in South Yarra sold the unit. I can recommend the store and they are keen to get you trying the many synths on display.) While the most expensive of the synths I considered, the Virus just looked the most comprehensive and came with software integration. For what I can use it for and afford the Snow was the best option in the Access range.

I really like the sound and the variety. The setup documentation is a bit scattered in various guides, song files, and manuals but once I grasped the 4 channels to 1 instance of the Snow it worked. I use the MOTU Ultralite for my soundcard rather than the Virus because there are more routing options. The documentation also came with a guide by Harold Scarr on “Programming Analogue Synths” which is good starting point for Virus programming. I just wish they had updated it for the latest Virus iterations.

Ableton Live is my preferred standard DAW because all the connections are obvious. There are is a MIDI track for each of the 4 parts which send their MIDI to different MIDI channels (though they could be the same) in a track which contains the plugin.

Five12’s Numerology can run the Virus plug in. What you need to do is have four note generators each on a different channel and one AU plug-in for the Virus. You need to manually connect a wire from the MIDI out of the generators to the MIDI in of the plug in.

Nodal can send the notes over a IAC connection to the Virus with its instruments to the four channels but I find it easier to use Live as a central router for MIDI and as a host for the Virus AU. Speaking of Nodal I am playing around with drum patterns like the Amen Brother break to see how Nodal can work at creating standard patterns and then being a starting point for variations. It works in a stardard file but I failed to get MIDI triggering of instruments in separate Nodal files which is said to be possible.