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Digital flexibility with just enough analog muscle to put some growling bottom-end into your patches. Beginners will wonder at how easy it is to make a variety of pleasing sounds with this synth, all while learning traditional electronic music principles. Learning the oscillator, LFO, envelope, and modulation matrix is enjoyable on the MicroFreak. The manual downloadable from Arturia's website is nicely written and it's easy to target a specific thing you'd like to learn how to do. Experienced users will appreciate the enormous depth of the feature set and how portable so much sound design power can be. Many long-time synth enthusiasts will be attracted to the form factor and flexibility of the MicroFreak, while still offering at least a small amount of analog wet signal. The MicroFreak is a paraphonic digital synthesizer equipped with an analog filter--what is now being referred to as a 'hybrid' synthesizer. Unlike nearly all instruments in this price range, it is capable of playing up to four voices simultaneously, even though all four voices pass through the same filter. Still, for this price, you can make some enormous walls of sound that you will not believe came out of such a small, light-weight box. You'll keep looking down at it in amazement when you stumble upon a certain preset or home-brew patch that blows you away. All panel settings, including the analog filter, are digitally controlled so that every metric of your patch is stored in the preset library. Once selected, the settings of any patch can be sent to the panel, so that the patch reflects the actual settings of the knobs. If you're not into presets, don't use them. If you absolutely hate presets and digital technology in music, then get ahold of something like a Behringer Crave or pony up for a Moog. Seriously, though, unless you're a raging snob about analog, the Freak will provide enough grit to put a smile on your face. The patch bay is like nothing I've seen before. It's nearly as powerful as the mod-matrix on a Moog Mother 32, but requires no patch cables and is blazing fast to use. Just turn a nob to select something to do the modulating and something to be modulated and--BAM!--a light shows up letting you know that the connection has been made. Each light on the MicroFreak mod-matrix can be interpreted as a patch cable on a traditional plug-in patch bay. Every setting on the panel--with the exception of master volume and the preset/system selection knob--are assignable to the mod-matrix. For a beginner, this means less equipment and a small table footprint. For experienced musicians, this could mean a game-changing portable gig setup. Some frown at the PCB keyboard, but I'm enjoying it immensely. It has passable velocity functionality. It can be set to deliver what Arturia claims is aftertouch, but it's kind of a quasi-aftertouch. By allowing more or less finger surface area to contact a key, any panel function can be modulated, like pitch, filter, resonance, envelope, and so on. Let me repeat that: you can assign any sound design function on the MicroFreak to be modulated by keyboard finger work. Patch the keyboard to filter and resonance to even the basic wave on the Freak to see just what this thing can do. In all seriousness, the keyboard on the MicroFreak is capable of many of the same functions as a ROLI Seaboard. Seriously. There are no on-board effects like reverb and delay, but who cares at this price. A decent combo reverb/delay inline box will set you back as much as the MicroFreak cost you, so it's kind of understandable why these don't appear on the Freak's panel. An absolute killer combination is the Arturia MicroFreak run through a Korg Nu:Tekt NTS-1 synthesizer, even if all you want out of the Korg is the reverb and delay. The NTS-1 is a good synth in it's own right, so it delivers the possibility of an additional oscillator, filter, LFO, and envelope to add to the mix. The NTS-1 usually retails for between $99 and $119, so setting up a complete synth package is possible on the cheap. If you decide to get your dirty little paws on a Freak, there is a seemingly endless collection of YouTube videos offering tutorials, technical advice, free patches, and demonstrations of what it can do. Grab an inexpensive USB audio interface and--BAM!--you've got your own little electronic music studio that sits on your coffee table. Highly recommended. **************************************************** IMPORTANT NOTE: Be mindful of the price gouging afoot at this time for this synthesizer. The prices are all over the place and the potential to be scammed is high. This unit regularly retails for around $349 and there are reputable companies that sell it for that price. I'd go directly to someplace like Vintage King, who has never raised its price on the MicroFreak and seems to stock them reliably. Other good options are Sweetwater and Musician's Friend.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
Huge bang for the buck. Perfect for adding some unusual digital spice to your sound. It's also capable of creating warm, analog type tones. The control panel is easy to use and the OLED display gives valuable feedback when programming. In paraphonic mode, it acts like a four voice polyphonic. Most importantly, it sounds great and is fun to use!
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
My wife has played piano. She watches me play the guitar and bass. I buy her a microfreak and she absolutely loves it . We now jam together and are writing some music . So very expressive and unlimited sounds . Very solid build with a keyboard that is very easy to play . I ran mine through a vox AC 30 guitar amp . Sounds great !
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
All the demo videos looked great, but getting my hands on it makes it a whole other beast. The note input device (def not a keyboard) takes some getting used to, but is very expressive with certain sounds. There is no lack of modulation possibilities. It really excels at pads and basses. I look forward to years of exploring what it can do.
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: Pre-owned
Vast amount of textures and modulation. Excellent filter, lots of hands on control. Great sound, very full and thick. The keyboard is a little strange at first, but you quickly get used to it. Nothing else like it in the price range. Also great sequencer and arp.
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
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