MPE-enabled soft synths compared? Pros and cons?

aqaraza · November 11, 2019, 4:00am

As very much a layperson, it’s taking me awhile to really understand what’s needed to fully express the Sensel Morph through a soft synth. (My pesky, zombie post on trying in vain with Arturia’s CS-80, over on Tech Support forum, is evidence.)

The November newsletter, on MPE, has been helping me play catch-up. So, now, I have a question for any of you who are using an MPE-enabled soft synth.

Which do you prefer, and why? Which has the most expressive implementation? What are pros and cons between the ones you’ve tried?

My starting point for a list of such synths is that posted over on Roli’s site at https://roli.com/mpe down at the bottom; but any other such lists or (obviously) synths not listed there are welcomed!

aqaraza · November 11, 2019, 4:21am

A tangent and a side-note: It appears that the Expressivee Lié software allows mapping of MIDI to parameters in basically any soft synth. And, that it also allows non-Touché controllers to utilize those mappings to modulate that synth. (At least, it appears this is possible with ROLI instruments, to play Lié patches, and if ROLI instruments, then likely others like the Morph.)

In a way this isn’t really surprising to me: It’s more surprising that this kind of functionality isn’t more widespread. It was sort of what I figured expressive instrument makers must be doing: creating a mapping utility that allowed the various expressive capabilities of their instrument to be mapped MIDI-learn style to whatever synth one liked. But this seems not to be the case.

So, this hunch has caused the Touché to spring to the top of my wish-list, in part just to get access to Lié as a tool that can do this kind of broad mapping across other MPE instruments (ie, my Morph).

Maybe some things for the next version of the SenselApp to try out in some way?

Ok, now, back to any thoughts on the various MPE-ready synths out there…

Nordym · May 15, 2020, 12:41am

It would just be great for someone to do a Piano Overlay specifically for the Arturia CS-80 / ME80. I’ve gotten close but still struggling with getting enough features in a single Morph setup to do all the things you can do when playing a CS-80. Like having the portamento behave right, or having subtle pitch bend when moving x/y without the pitch going out of the 1/2 step range while hitting one key… stuff like that.