Q. How did you get to be making virtual synths? Were you in bands while in school?
My synthesizer career started around 1979 with the Korg MS-20 and SQ-10.
Electronic music was rising in the 70's and as a 17 year old guy I was a guest musician in the Dutch synthesizer band called PERU (formed by PEter and RUud). The first album was released in 1981 and we even formed a 2nd band called Nova which had an instrumental #1 hit in Netherlands in 1982. So I skipped the band in the school, because I was not interested in Rock... but electronic music :D
With our band we created many albums (in the 80's) and this was all ahead of the House and Trance music scene.
Synthesizers became mainstream early 80's', changed the whole music industry.
Our music was not popular anymore (traditional electronic music) so I used my skills in a different way and now many years later I am mainly an software instrument developer.
Q. Do you get any time to write music these days?
Sure but time is limited. With our old band we released again an album in 2018 and recently I also composed some piano pieces, since this is such a beautiful instrument.
Last October I was on stage again in an event for electronic music and it was great. Currently I am working on a new album and hope to have it ready early 2021. Creating music is part of my life and this will continue of course.
Some of my tracks you can find on my music Youtube channel.
Q. Any particular recordings where your products are featured?
Sure! For example, the reverb inside the piano pieces are RP-VERB 2! And of course in our last band CD, we also used allot RP products, next to other plugins. Some tracks of the latest PERU album you can listen to here on YouTube.
Q. How have you and your company been doing during COVID19?
We are still going strong but we don’t know how it is going to effect us on the long term. Music is essential to get through these bad times.
Q. How does Rob Papen differentiate itself from other virtual plugin manufacturers?
What somebody did mention me years ago about my brand, was the term ‘Boutique software’ and that does cover it I guess.
Q. What are some of the challenges and benefits working in this industry from the Netherlands?
From origin The Netherlands are trade people, so Dutch people you will find on almost every spot on this planet. There are more benefits than downsides in the Netherlands. So I am happy to be based in this small country.
Q. How long have you been selling software digitally?
Essentially from the start. It was 2003/2004 if I am not wrong, but at that time boxed software was still big.
But electronic delivery took over very fast because the resellers could avoid having stock software or outdated software on their shelves. Also the consumer would have instant access to the software they bought.
Q. What brought you to XCHANGE?
The distribution network I used for USA/Canada stopped, so using XCHANGE was a logical move, since many use this already for many years.
Q. How has XCHANGE impacted your business?
Well, I just started using it for USA/Canada and so far it is looking good :D
Q. What are some of the challenges in using XCHANGE?
The XCHANGE account we had already for a long period, but we didn’t use it.
Now that we started using it, I am happy that the newer version of XCHANGE improved alot.
It is much easier to work with and it has some neat features like the ‘Promotion’ tools.
There are still some minor flaws in the user interface, which makes things take more time than it should be.
But I guess, over time these things will improve as well.
Q. What can you tell us about new products you are working on?
Currently we are working hard on the Blade-2 project. The original Blade was released in 2012 and it was our first product with the XY pad which became a trade mark in many of our products. It is going to be an interesting synthesis concept, great for synth geeks... but also for musicians that enjoy the quality sounds we produce.
Q. What is your outlook on the future for software business?
Well, it looks bright! If somebody would have shown me in 1979 (when I had my first Korg MS-20) what would be possible in 2020... I most likely would be in shock and called Dr.Who for time travel!