The 120th AES Pro Audio Expo & Convention in Paris will open its doors this Saturday morning. The Opening Ceremony at 12 noon traditionally features a prominent keynote speaker with an outsider's perspective on the pro-audio scene. This year, the AES is lucky enough to feature two prominent speakers: Emilie Simon, composer of the Oscar winning French film "March of the Penguins", and her sound engineer Cyrille Brissot. Emilie Simon, who rose to fame through her extraordinary sonic creations, will demonstrate the importance of recording technology to her music and present some samples of her work. Additionally, Ms. Simon will showcase an exciting new application of audio technology, kicking off the 120th AES Pro Audio Expo & Convention with a bang.

Teragon releases KickMaker, a synthesizer designed specifically to create good kick drum sounds. It uses four independent oscillators and a wide range of effects, allowing one to create perfectly customized beats. KickMaker is the perfect solution for producers who are tired of using factory samples or ordinary drum machines, and want an easy way to create a wide range kicks for their tracks.

KickMaker is available as Audio Units and VST versions.

After months working on their new UVI-Engine (used in MachFive and other hot software), Ultimate Sound Bank is proud to present their new virtual instrument "Plugsound PRO". Basically, Plugsound PRO is THE ultimate sound workstation dedicated to both studio or live performances. Users can easily manage instruments and grooves in a single ergonomic interface. Plugsound PRO includes a massive 8 Gb core library that can be extended indefinitely through specific extension cards just like we use to do in dedicated synths like the Roland JV series.

Renoise is now available as 1.5.2 Universal Binary version. It has been updated to support both PowerPC and Intel Macintosh computers. If you have an Intel Macintosh, you can expect Renoise to run faster. Renoise is the next generation of music tracker software, combining studio quality sound and virtually infinite expandability with a clear and concise interface putting every parameter and option literally at your fingertips!

FXpansion announces the release of BFD Converter. This little utility application allows users of BFD to import sounds from Toontrack's Drumkit From Hell Superior and Custom & Vintage. The BFD Converter application creates new BFD-format sounds from the Toontrack data installed on your hard disk.

BFD Converter is available for Mac OS X and costs $45 or 35 euros. Please note that you must own BFD and the Toontrack libraries in order to use BFD Converter.