A4 Feature Requests

Yes! Modulatable individual track lengths would be great! Also Trigger in for Notes as a mod Destination would be awesome for self generating Patches. I know there are Trig Conditions but still you must Set them. I would e.g. use White noise AS a random source for generating Notes…

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When reading the manual for the digitone i found out it ll be able to choose different scalings: Phrygian, Lydian, etc.

I was wondering if anyone else agrees it would be great to have that future on the analog four, or is that already the case with the mkii version? (couldnt find it in the manual though).

All of the scales in the Digitone can actually be used currently in the A4, but the UI is only set up to show maj/min and key…

These other scales are the modal scales where each of them in one key will always be the equivalent of the other ones in other certain keys. This is part of general music theory…
Basically for example the Prygian scale in a certain key will be the exact same notes as major in another certain key…

Here’s a chart to figure this out:

It would be nice if the UI was updated to be able to stay in one key and select which scale…
In the meantime it’s no different to select the relative major scale and key…

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yea sure, but would be nice addon if that could be added on the a4 anyway, i like it when using my stillson hammer and just dial up any scale and it blocks out notes. Not to mention my tubbutec module for microscaling.

I agree that’s I wrote this:

My intentions are to show how the A4 can do this while not subtracting in anyway from a feature request for a more user friendly way…

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Hi,

Am I only one who would like to save TEMPO at least with Songs and possibly with patterns also?

Of course, best thing would be that you could choose tempo save as “off” which means that pattern/song will follow current (global) tempo. But then you could also save some BPM value with patterns or songs. Well, I can live without pattern tempo but at least this feature would be great with songs.

What do you think?

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This would also be doable if the arp settings were p-lockable (fast arp functioning like a retrig)

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After reading A4 manual’s MIDI appendix I believe I can’t do what I was looking for. (So if this is true) this is my new feature request for A4:

Chance to control Song mode via MIDI.

I would happily welcome a change to have a special MIDI command which would take me to some song row. With A4 itself you need arrow keys and “yes” button to happen. This MIDI control would really give new flexibility to song structure which is now little limited with A4/AR.

P.S. In Mac world If you are looking for a nice MIDI/audio sequencer to send MIDI time sync, program changes, audio / MIDI note / CC sequences etc.etc. I advice you to check Numerology 4 from Five12.

Does anyone actually believe that elektron will update a discontinued product is is this just a hope?

I mean, whats in it for them? its not like the MK2 shares the same hardware like the Octa MK 1 and 2

Or are we automatically talking about MK2 A4 now and MK1 Keys?

The A4 , out of all the Elektron products has been hung out to dry. It really would be amazing to see things change for the legacy version but I think they now have bigger fish to fry …

What I would like to see for the first time in their history is for Elektron to take the A4 MK1 and release some of the schematics so that the DIY community could make these tweaks themselves as I do believe most of what people are asking for is possible

I actually dont mind Elektron crippling things in order to sell other boxes or even the drip feed of features, its just smart business. Its not always about the consumer / user. More sales = more R+D of new products and future investment.

But when they make a product obsolete they should open it up for modders and the like. The A4 MK 1 second hand price took a massive nosedive mostly down to the lack in sound compared to the MK 2 IMO.

I dont think it would take much to find duplicate midi information inside the machine that runs the 4 voice tracks as the synth uses internal midi…

Would love to hear Elektron chime in on this

Have anyone thought of installing a cv to midi converter INSIDE the A4?

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I personally let behind my times of diy hardware, but i can see someone selling a cv to midi converter specially designed to be installed inside the A4

It’d be a hassle because there’s not really a good way to ‘tap into’ an existing MIDI port - proper MIDI merging needs software unless you want to sacrifice an existing port to the mod.

Also, since the CV channels are variable (v/oct, hz/v, gate, trig, linear), there isn’t a one-size-fits-all code to convert that to usable MIDI messages. It would require a specific/static configuration in the A4 settings.

They may have “bigger fish to fry,” but they don’t forget about “legacy” products.
I anticipate any feature-requests that appear in the MK2 version will be included in the MK1 version, excluding any sound-engine-related improvements. (Heck, those might be included, too; the main changes were in the filter and overdrive, anyway.)
Look at OT1 and OT2; AR MK1 will get the purported, new drum-model (dual-vco synth), too.

Oh, and remember that this feature-request list began in 2013, before MK2 units were even a glimmer in her mother’s eye.

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What about a PIC16F88 based midi merger ?
That’s the was I used to merge midi, and you only need a PIC programmer and the PIC16F88 to write and read the software.
Regarding the CV variables, It could maybe be restricted to A and B on V/oct and C and D on gate/trig .
This way you can use your cv outputs as you want , or configure the machine to V/oct and Gate, turn on the midi merger and have your A4 sending midi through midi output (and also V/oct on A and B and Gate on C and D)

I didn’t find a feature request topic specific to the A4mkII so I post it here.
It would be great if the CV inputs could be used as a gate and V/oct inputs to sequence the A4 tracks with a CV sequencer.
I would love to sequence my A4 with the Metropolis.

Ability to store a sound directly in soundpool just by holding a trig and turning Level knob.
Validate to replace or choose a slot.

When doing a kit reload in a live situation by pressing NO + KIT. It would be nice to have the ability for these changes to be in a ‘slide’ mode instead of the instant ‘hard cut’ reload.

My example is, I have a buildup I’m doing in a ‘techno’ track, and perf knobs are set to open filters and increase reverbs and other things, where the track reaches it’s peak volume wise and everything is bright as hell. Then on the “drop” I want to return to normal, but I don’t want it to sound like it’s ‘hard cut’, would be nice to have a 0.3 second slide to the original values instead of the hard cut… Maybe have an option for it in kit settings so you can turn it on/off and choose a time value for the slide…

I think since elektron marketed the No+kit feature as something that’s very helpful in live situations, this feature would make it even nicer. I think this could be useful for everyone as well, not just my scenario. I don’t know if it’s doable though.

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Regarding A4 MKII

  1. While in live input recording mode, it would be great to be able to live record trigs for more than 64 steps (1 pattern) without the need to change patterns manually.
    E.g. Live record a sequence, and at the moment that one pattern slot is full, A4 would automatically jump to next pattern slot forward and start recording following trigs into that new pattern.
    This would allow for smoothly building organic melody lines for whole songs.
    It could be featured as an “tickbox” option in advanced pattern scale settings.

  2. I am not sure if this is something feasible to convey due to hardware architecture, however would it be possible to be able to pan each OSC individually, so that e.g. OSC1 shoots out only from L track output of TRACK1 and OSC2 is hearable only from R output of TRACK1.

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I’m pretty sure on the A4 Mk1, if you chain patterns together and start live rec. mode then you can freely record trigs through as many patterns as you have chained. You can chain patterns by entering pattern select and holding down several trig keys for the patterns that you want to chain.
Maybe this hasn’t been implemented on the MK2 or maybe I misunderstand what you are trying to do?

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That´s beautiful, it works!

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