All merchandise advisable by Engadget are chosen by our editorial staff, unbiased of our dad or mum firm. A few of our tales embody affiliate hyperlinks. For those who purchase one thing by means of certainly one of these hyperlinks, we might earn an affiliate fee. All costs are appropriate on the time of publishing.
Standalone sequencers are one thing of a luxurious within the fashionable music-making panorama. Today, even the most affordable synths and samplers have not less than rudimentary sequencing capabilities. And whereas many MIDI controllers have on-board sequencers, they’re normally meant to again up dwell efficiency relatively than change it. In fact, there are a number of exceptions to this rule (Arturia’s BeatStep Professional stays extremely standard even eight years after it was launched), however it’s important to begin wanting into the advanced and infrequently intimidating world of Eurorack and modular synths to commonly come throughout gadgets whose sole goal is taking part in again strings of notes for you.
Eventide, greatest recognized for its high-end results items just like the H90 and TimeFactor, just isn’t an apparent candidate to delve into the world of Eurorack. However that’s precisely what it determined to do with Misha, its first sequencer. Now, no person would have blamed the corporate for enjoying it secure with its first foray into the house. As a substitute, it determined to chuck the standard conventions out the window and make one thing distinctive that’s equal elements enjoyable and confounding, particularly should you’re deeply entrenched in conventional music idea and keyboard-based composition.
I’m not an adept pianist. Nor do I’ve a very deep information of Western music idea. And even nonetheless I initially struggled to wrap my head round Misha. That’s as a result of the buttons on its face don’t play particular notes. As a substitute they play intervals associated to the final word performed inside a scale.
The best solution to clarify that is by means of an instance. Let’s say we’ve set the Misha to play a C Main scale. Beneath the display screen, which exhibits you the important thing and scale, are 9 coloured buttons labeled -4 by means of +4. For those who press 0, you get a C proper off the bat, as a result of that’s the root word and it’s zero intervals away from the beginning of the size. For those who press the +1, as a substitute of getting a C#, you’ll get a D, the subsequent word within the scale.
Thus far, so good, proper? However should you press the +1 once more, you received’t get a second D, and as a substitute you’ll get an E, one interval larger within the scale. To get a second D word, you’d should press 0. And should you wished to return to C, you’d should press -1. It’s not difficult essentially, but it surely breaks a fundamental expectation that any musician would understandably have – that should you do the identical factor, you need to get the identical word. If I play the fifth fret on the low E of a guitar, I anticipate to get an A each time. If the notes continued to climb by 5 steps, with out transferring my fingers, I might have a a lot more durable time taking part in something.
However that is the core idea of the Misha. It’s not constructed round absolute pitch and as a substitute forces you to compose primarily based purely on the relationships between notes in a scale. If that concept sends you working for the hills, then this most likely isn’t the sequencer for you. If, nonetheless, you’re like me and intrigued by Misha’s distinctive strategy, dangle round and let’s dig a bit of deeper.
{Hardware}
Earlier than we go too far down the rabbit gap of scales, modes and sequencing, let’s take a step again and take a look at the {hardware}. Whereas my unit got here with a devoted pod for housing the Misha, it’s ostensibly designed to dwell in a Eurorack setup. At 28hp extensive, it’s a comparatively giant module, but it surely’s fairly shallow at simply 19mm deep, which means it ought to slot in even essentially the most transportable skiffs. That width is type of obligatory, although. The 17 buttons, two knobs, microUSB port, microSD slot and and 16 ¼” jacks for MIDI, audio and management voltage would really feel impossibly cramped on something smaller.
The format feels simply spacious sufficient to be viable as a efficiency instrument, with out fully dominating a smaller Eurorack setup. The 9 interval buttons are well-spaced, the display screen is giant sufficient to ship all the mandatory info and the knobs are sturdy. My solely concern hardware-wise is that the shift buttons have a hole spring to them that feels a bit low cost they usually make an audible popping sound.
The 12 CV (management voltage) jacks are break up throughout three tracks, with three pairs of gate and CV outputs in addition to two inputs every. This provides you a good quantity of choices for controlling a number of synth voices or modulating the Misha’s sequencer. There’s additionally MIDI out and in jacks, in addition to stereo out and a clock in. The microUSB port will also be linked to a pc keyboard to be used with customized keymappings. You’re not gonna be wanting for connectivity choices right here.
The display screen within the useless middle provides you all the data you want about navigating Misha’s interface, although it may possibly take a bit to determine the way it all works. I extremely advocate studying the handbook. It’s not lengthy and may prevent plenty of time and frustration. When you come to grips with how the Misha works, it’s virtually deceptively easy. In truth, I often felt like I needed to be lacking one thing. That, for positive, this module, with all its buttons and knobs and 1-inch display screen, was hiding options from me.
Undoubtedly take time to customise these 4 person buttons, although. Whereas the default capabilities of up and down one octave (button one and two), and up and down one chromatic step (three and 4) are helpful sufficient, they’ll provide a variety of efficiency energy when mapped to satisfy your particular wants. Personally I like swapping in “transfer pitch” for the chromatic steps, and setting it to a fifth. That provides a bit extra spice than a easy octave, however usually nonetheless works properly musically with no matter else is happening.
One final thing value noting is that Misha has a built-in oscillator that you may activate within the settings. However, past offering a easy sound supply for auditioning melodies and usually getting a really feel for the sequencer, it’s virtually ineffective. In truth, it’s not even talked about within the handbook.
Composing
Misha ships with 100 preloaded scales starting from fundamental (Melodic Minor), to unique (Enigmatic), to microtonal madness (48 word equal-tempered). And, if by some means that’s not sufficient for you, there are 100 person slots for loading your individual scala recordsdata. Between the varied scales, modes and keys, the musical choices baked into Misha are seemingly countless.
Probably the most rapid solution to begin exploring them is to pick out a scale after which begin urgent the interval buttons. That is really a reasonably satisfying manner of taking part in an instrument, too. I don’t have an enormous rig to stay this in, however I paired it with Cre8Audio’s East Beast and West Pest, in addition to the Moog Subharmonicon and Elektron Digitone all to fantastic impact.
This isn’t the type of course of you go to whenever you wish to translate a melody you hear in your head to the actual world. Maybe somebody might prepare themselves to assume in intervals to make use of Misha that manner, however it could take a variety of work. As a substitute this will create comfortable accidents. You simply should pay particularly shut consideration to what you play to be sure to can recreate something that catches your ear.
Now, sure, there are methods to lock a controller to a particular scale, just like the Misha – mainly making it not possible to play out of tune. However there’s one thing about taking part in intervals as a substitute of notes that feels each intuitive and stunning, in a manner a keyboard by no means might. Crafting melodies turns into a rewarding exploration the place I’m mainly pressured to cede management, relatively than a irritating try to make use of my restricted idea information to show concepts into actuality.
One of many few issues I’ve to determine beforehand is what number of octaves I wish to mess around in. Setting the word vary to 2 octaves, as an example, means, as soon as I climb past that cap, the intervals will swing again round to 2 octaves under my root word. It’s most likely greatest to try to keep away from going all the best way round, although. Leaping down two octaves can sound a tad harsh.
The octave limits additionally apply when utilizing Misha as a sequencer, so you may play a melody line unfold out over 4 octaves value of a scale earlier than beginning over. The sequencer, although, is the place issues get a bit of dicey. It’s constructed across the concept of a “tone row,” a tool utilized in serial composition the place all twelve notes within the chromatic scale are performed, with out repetition, to create a motif. The innovation right here is that this idea of a tone row will be utilized to any scale, not only a twelve-note, Western chromatic one.
This technique of composition positively falls on the experimental finish of the spectrum and with sure scales it may possibly come off a bit of awkward. This additionally implies that the variety of steps in a sequence depends on which scale you’re utilizing. A single octave sequence in a minor pentatonic scale will solely have 5 steps, whereas two octaves of the quarter tone scale could have 48 steps. Whereas I respect the novel strategy, a part of me actually needs that the tone row was a mode you may activate and off. I’d like to see Eventide add a extra conventional sequencer by means of a firmware replace the place notes will be repeated.
There may be additionally a chord mode that means that you can ship three-notes out over MIDI or divided between the three CV outs. When you have a Eurorack setup with a number of synth voices, it is a nice solution to create some complexity and variation, particularly when you have different utilities that may additional modulate what the Misha places out. For instance, you may ship the foundation word by means of a easy arpeggiator for the bass whereas utilizing the opposite notes to play leads or pads. Sadly, there isn’t a onboard solution to sequence chord voicings. You possibly can manually change it whereas performing, but it surely’s type of a ache. Alternatively, you may use one other sequencer to ship MIDI CCs to Misha and alter chord voicings, which looks as if overkill.
Simply one of the simplest ways to make use of the Misha is as a efficiency instrument paired with an exterior MIDI controller. Right here, the white keys offer you a fair broader vary of interval jumps (9 in both direct) in addition to fast entry to the foundation word, whereas the black keys can repeat a word, play a random scale word or transfer chromatically up and down one step at a time. And, after all, you may nonetheless hit the 4 person programmable buttons on the entrance of the module and even map different notes on the keyboard to place extra variables at your fingertips.
Wrap-up
At $599, Misha just isn’t low cost. And that jumps to $699 should you want a Eurorack pod and energy adapter. Nevertheless it’s additionally actually distinctive. If the attract of interval primarily based efficiency or tone row sequencing is what you’re after, properly, that is the one recreation on the town (not less than that I’m conscious of). I’m positive that there are methods of getting an analogous impact utilizing software program, however in the case of {hardware}, that is it.
I do want that Eventide made a number of extra concessions to conventional composition, although. I need to have the ability to repeat notes or program passages which are an arbitrary size, relatively than be restricted to the variety of notes in a scale. Possibly these might be added in a future firmware replace, at which level it could be more durable to provide you with causes not to purchase one. For now, Misha is a dear, area of interest instrument that’s additionally undeniably playful and artistic.