Stagecraft announces MPE Compatibility for Synths

Stagecraft Software has announced Multidimensional Polyphonic Expression (MPE) support for its Addiction subtractive synth and soon-to-be-released sample-based synth, Infinity Synth.

In case you haven't heard, a new standard called Multidimensional Polyphonic Expression, or MPE, is gaining traction with a new generation of hardware controllers. Below is a video of Stagecraft founder Aaron taking Addiction for a spin on Roli's MPE-compatible Seaboard RISE Synth: YouTube.com/watch?v=jZPiP4ihlso

Instructions on setting up Addiction synth to work with Roli's MPE-compatible Seaboard controller can be found here.

And if you haven't seen it yet, here's the official Roli demo of Seaboard doing some pretty amazing things: YouTube.com/watch?v=fGr7VbDiRNw

Under the Hood

Controllers like the Seaboard, often called PMCs (Polyphonic Multidimensional Controllers), are much more expressive because they can send multiple dimensions of finger movement to the synth. For instance, instead of a keyboard that just sends note on/off, pressure, and perhaps pitch wheel data, these controllers can register a finger moving in any direction, finger pressure, and much more. Unfortunately, this breaks the original MIDI standard. While MIDI allows you to send a signal that modulates pitch, or any other attribute, it must do so to every note. In other words, the notes are polyphonic but the modulation is not. To address this, a coalition of audio companies led by the venerable Roger Linn design (Roli, Apple, Moog, Bitwig, and others) created the MPE standard. In MPE, each note is sent in its own separate MIDI channel, allowing for polyphonic expression of every note.

If you're new to Addiction Synth, check out the free 30-day trial here.

Check out products on KVR that are tagged as MPE compatible.

Upload and share MPE sounds on KVR here.