AKAI Professional MPK Mini– 25 Key USB MIDI Keyboard Controller with 8 Backlit Drum Pads, 8 Knobs and Music Production Software Included

Product Information

The MPK Mini Play is portable, fun to play, with some decent sounds and just enough tweaking to make it interesting. The MPK Mini’s ultra portability and multiple user banks make it an ideal companion not just for laptops, but also for standalone workstations like the MPC, Maschine+ and Deluge, which can all host USB controllers. A sturdy metal chassis would not have gone amiss here, particularly since it’s intentionally designed to slip into a backpack and travel with you – but, that said, it feels solid and reliable, with firm knobs and robust drum pads. It’s had a makeover since the last version, wrapping it in red, giving it a slight incline to the front panel, rearranging the knobs and improving both the keys and the speaker. It’s better to think of the MPK Mini’s soundbank as a nicely uncomplicated compositional tool, augmented by a simple set of parameters including reverb, chorus, a two-stage envelope and two-stage EQ.

The ‘ scale mode‘ helps new musicians by allowing them to lock the pads into a specific major or minor scale, which can be controlled with the Major/Minor Pad buttons. The answer will depend largely on your needs as a user, so read on for a direct comparison to help you choose. With its sturdy construction and build, MPK mini Play is ready to travel securely alongside any favorite music production items in backpacks or bags.

A lot of smaller keyboards tend to have issues with the keys feeling awkward or unnatural, but the MPK Mini manages to succinctly and effectively avoid the ‘toy box’ vibe that plagues many other units that I won’t name. These never feel quite as good as the physical thing to us, although one advantage is that you can touch a finger anywhere on a strip and that value will be applied instantly; useful in some cases for applying momentary modulation effects. The row of four knobs along the top gives you the resonance and cutoff of an internal filter and the depth of reverb and chorus you can apply to the sound. The pads on the other hand do send continuous pressure, and you can even select whether you want this to be polyphonic or single channel.

If you have no need for the onboard sounds, definitely go for the regular MPK mini as it has better knobs (infinite vs. The kits sound good and you can play them quite expressively, or you can toggle the Full Level button to play everything at full velocity. tracks with world class audio effects, find any sound with the same synth engines found on our legendary MPCs, record audio and much more. Build quality seems fair, although the ball the modulation joystick is made out of this weird, scratchy foam that honestly looks like it's meant to stay in a prototype. MIDI CC stands for " continuous controller," which will transmit a command (volume, pan, sustain, etc.I mostly work with live instruments, but most projects I do these days include at least some software instruments. Expressive control is handled on the Arturia by a pair of touch strips for pitch bend and modulation, replacing the physical pitch and mod wheels often found on regular synths. Ultimately within any MIDI application, the Mini Play gives you a keyboard, two banks of eight pads and four assignable knobs.