Why Electra One Feels Like the Future of MIDI Control (Without the Hype)

Hi,

I really enjoyed making this one! I bought my first MIDI controller decades ago, and it was a boring big thing with keys, knobs and faders, and was a nightmare to program. Since then, MIDI controllers have been getting more smarts, increasingly larger screens which mostly led to a more user friendly interface, but not much more.

I love the new arps and sequencers in controllers like the Keystep MK2, but let's face it, with a small screen and need to appeal to a broad user base, they can only go so far in terms of the creative tools they give us access to.

Then a while back, Electra One announced an API and Lua scripting environment which would let users do pretty much anything with their lovely color screen, if they only bothered to learn Lua and read through the amazingly capable, but unbelievably long API. I had a look and found it quite daunting (a nice way of saying nightmare), but then I asked Claude, and it happily had a go at writing a script for me. Did it succeed? Not at first (and not at second or third), but eventually, after a bit of coaxing, it worked!

All the details and results in this video... which might be a glimpse into the future of being creative with music tech.

Yours,

Ziv (exploring how nightmares might turn into MIDI wishes come true, on a youtube channel called "Loopop"...)

PS I'm publishing the Tombola patch for free on the Electra One user forum, but I'll be sharing the insights of making it in future book updates!

Why Electra One Feels Like the Future of MIDI Control (Without the Hype) // Mini vs MK2 Review (YouTube)