Steinberg release Groove Agent 4




Steinberg Media Technologies has announced the release of Groove Agent 4, a major new version of the drum workstation that comprises different drum modules each specialized in certain acoustic and electronic drum styles.
Groove Agent 4 features three drum modules, also known as Agents, which trigger a wealth of grooves and samples. Each Agent offers a set of specialized tools essential to the style of drum production in demand, but Agents can also be combined, giving Groove Agent 4 its unique multi-Agent architecture.
The Acoustic Agent consists of three drum kits: Studio Kit, Rock Kit and Vintage Kit. Each kit includes dedicated controls that adjust the mix of room and overhead microphones, bleeding signals as well as further kit tuning. Armed with a dedicated channel strip sporting EQ, compressor, tape saturation and envelope shaper, the acoustic drum mixer comes with up to 20 microphone channels, six group channels and four aux buses. The Style Player provides over 50 contemporary styles to choose from. Once selected, Groove Agent 4 offers a groove with intros, fills and endings and up to 16 variations of the main part that can seamlessly be blended by complexity and intensity.
The Beat Agent gets down to intricate beat production, boasting over 100 kits quickly accessible via the MediaBay and the Sample Browser as well as a broad scope of editing capabilities available through the Sample Editor. The Drum Classifier detects the different kit components in a loop and allows users to extract, replace and rearrange them. The Vintage and Turntable modes add the sound perceived in early 12-bit drum machines.
The Percussion Agent includes percussion instruments the likes of bongos, shakers, tambourine and congas. Its Style Player combines up to 8 substyles and adjusts the complexity and intensity of each instrument. With more than 20 styles the Percussion Agents covers grooves ranging from disco, funk, pop and R&B to classic percussive standards, such as bolero and bossa nova.
The entire library encompasses over 22,000 samples and more than 3,800 grooves. All drum kits have been recorded in 24-bit resolution while the Acoustic and Percussion Agents also offer 16-bit versions on top.
Additional features highlighted in Groove Agent 4 are the Pattern Editor for easy editing of grooves and the Jam mode that creates backing tracks on the fly. The overall kit mixer provides 29 effects and 16 stereo outputs that can be fed directly to any host mixer. In conjunction with Cubase, Groove Agent 4 takes integration to a new level, allowing users to drag and drop samples and MIDI patterns from Cubase onto Groove Agent 4 or drag patterns from Groove Agent 4 back into Cubase. Drum maps from Groove Agent kits are automatically created and pad names are copied to Cubase.
"The fourth iteration of Groove Agent gives us reason to cheer: we've been working hard on delivering a multi-role virtual drummer that is matchless, " said Matthias Quellmann, product marketing manager at Steinberg. "We are confident that Groove Agent will equally become a rich source of inspiration and creativity for musicians all over the globe."
Features at a glance:

• Complete virtual drum workstation including three specialist Agents for drums, beats and percussion — combinable in four slots.
• Huge library including over 22,000 samples and more than 3,800 grooves and patterns for any contemporary music style.
• Acoustic Agent virtual drummer with detailed drum kits.
• Beat Agent drum sampler for electronic music production including advanced slice editing and automatic drum hit recognition.
• Percussion Agent with more than 20 instruments to complete your virtual rhythm section.
• Full pattern editor for groove editing on the fly.
• Style Player plays in the desired complexity and intensity, generates auto fills and much more.
• Jam mode creates immediate backing tracks, including intro, fills and ending.
• Integrated mixing board with high-end audio effects for flexible control over all aspects of your drum sound.
• Advanced Cubase integration with drag and drop, full automation and automatic drum map exchange.

Availability and pricing
The full retail version of Groove Agent 4 will be available from Steinberg resellers and through the Steinberg Online Shop from August 20. The suggested retail price is 179 €, including German VAT.
The Groove Agent 4 update from version 3 is now available as download through the Steinberg Online Shop for 99.99 €, including German VAT.
Groove Agent 4 is available for 32- and 64-bit Windows and Mac OS X in VST2, VST3 and AU instrument plug-in formats.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4MdmNfAWhs
 

This is interesting - as I started out with Cubase about a hundred years ago, I purchased Groove Agent Version 1 - that's the version that really didn't work at all - then even after I had become so disenchanted with Cubase but more seriously Stinkberg, who are dreadful (don't know if they've improved at all of late) I still kept Groove Agent as I liked using it, even with all its flaws.
So I dutifully upgraded to Version 2 and then Version 3 in the hope it might work properly one day - if never did!!
So is this a PROPER bug free working version I wonder - a bit like another Company (shall not mention the name) but also about 10 years in the making! I wonder if this will also have bugs on release, that's a release after the 10 years in the making of course............
Now do I upgrade...emm there's a question - bitten three times, do I risk a fourth!!!!! E99 does seem very very expensive so shall probably have to give this a miss - ah the nostalgia of random crashes, outputs not matching what you hear during play, and just all round weird behavior will have to wait for another day.
Nigel
 

I really enjoyed and got used to Groove Agent 2 with Sonar 5PE, so I am going to have to read the reviews and check into this. I have been watching EZ Drummer 2, here and giving it some time ...myself some time? to consider it.
 
Late summer implies I'd better buy my Epi Wildkat and "Gretsch" pickups for it, because I imagine lots of stuff is going up a version! Oh well, it's only money....
 
Michael

I see the upgrade from 3 to 4 is $99 but not how much it is from 2 to 4. ???Anyone know?
 
Michael

Michael
Did you actually ever get Version 2 to work properly; such as output of midi grooves was one thing that was impossible I remember and confirmed so by Stinkberg - there was a work round but cannot remember what that was.
In concept I loved it, that's why I kept upgrading, but implementation was so poor
Nigel
 

Properly?????? Well.......Sort of ......LOL
I had a couple of workarounds and back then I had clients (studio wise) who wanted to hear drums but not pay for them! LOL So I had a couple clumsy ways to play and then do lots of edits to get a good drum track. I still have it on my old P4 xp PC (with Sonar 5.2PE and Sound Forge 8)and have thought about buying another small usb I/O to create tracks with it, but....... my upgrade to AD2 was only $50 with Fairfax, so I figure I might spring for GA4 or EZ2.
 
Michael
 
 
 
 
 
 

Yes, much as I remember it - various work arounds to cater for  blatantly poor implementation! But it was such a shame as in theory it was one of the best, certainly great to jam with etc and come up with unusual grooves etc- the reason was,  it was never a Stinkberg product  - it was produced by Wizoo - but something happened to Wizoo (Stinkberg purchased them perhaps?) then Stinkberg just dropped all the Wizoo products and stopped supporting them - I had about 3 or 4 which I had purchased directly from Stinkberg and all stopped working very shortly afterwards because of OS upgrades etc - and Stinkberg just didn't want to know!!
When i complained they very nicely just deleted my account!!!!!

Whoa! That seems harsh! I went looking for my Groove Agent authorizations etc and can't seem to find anything, but it should be an option for me to upgrade from version 2 to 4. I'm sure I'll watch-wait-read as much as I can for a bit to see how it's going/working, especially with Sonar X3e PE/VST3.
Maybe Steinberg's over their "new cruelty" period(I think that's from LA Story with Steve Martin?) and it'll be what it always had to potential to be.
Michael

I love the original Groove Agent concept and workflow.  It just made it easy to get started with ideas and being able to control complexity and fills on the fly was very nice.  The MIDI out function was also very useful, I had produced a couple of tutorials on how to get it to work but was invaluable for using your own drum sounds.
 
Groove Agent 4 looks as if you can drag and drop MIDI patterns to and from the project which will be interesting.  Also the new dynamics and complexity matrix looks a lot like Logic Pro's new Drummer.

Simeon!   You are the one who told me the workarounds for GA in Sonar, that I used! Thanks so much for that! That was like 10-12 years ago. Hope things are going great for you!
I am always wishing the "next cool drum program" would be a completely tweaked Groove Agent type thing! So maybe GA4 will be the real thing. Maybe it's EZ2 or AD2 or BFD3 (I have 2) or maybe the bakers are taking Session Drummer up!
Michael