Did a first attempt at a song. Crappy little disco number to learn more about the A4. Made some patterns. Some were sampled into the OT. Everything was sequenced by the OT since I don’t know enough about the A4 yet 
https://soundcloud.com/the-snipecatcher/skating-by-elektron-analog-four-mkii
Gotta say, I really love the A4 so far.
Hit my first couple weird brick walls…
One was a stupid mistake and I really don’t know what I did, but I totally lost a couple hours work…bummer, but stuff like that is bound to happen when learning a new machine. Bought the ask.video tutorials as I really can’t find too much by the way of great tutorials online. It’s on the mk1, but practically everything applies the same.
Problem two- when slaving the A4 to my OT and building up a fairly dense pattern, the first bar is a jumbled mess, then by bar two everything sounds great. I kinda like the way it sounds for this jam I’m working on, but I’d like to know how to fix the problem
I’m considering ‘buying’ the AskAudio A4MK1 too. Is it worth it for an A4MK2 owner? Or are there too many differences regarding workflow, functions, etc?
I recall something about having midi in/out set to midi+USB can cause data transfer fluctuations? I think It was when I was loading samples to my AR, or controlling AK transport with the AR.
Well, I’m an MK2 owner and I bought it
There will be a few times where you’ll have to search a different button, but most of the same concepts apply. Watching a tutorial that uses the MK1 makes me glad I got the MK2, just because it’s a bit easier to navigate. I’m not debating which one sounds ‘better’ because I’ve never tried an MK1.
But yeah, I’m finding the ask.video thing to be helpful
Thanks! I’ll check that out!
Thanx Snipecatcher! I’ll start my course tomorrow.
Tried every midi config I could think of on both the A4 and the OT, but the first bar is still wacky…only thing I can think to do is mute the first 4 bars before coming in.
One other strange thing is the first note of a synth line doesn’t come in on the A4 until the first pattern repeat…lots of little mysteries to unravel!
this could be due to the note coming slightly to early so it isn‘t recognized in the first pattern cycle. try to quantize it if it isn‘t on the grid. haopens often to me when live recording
You’re probably right, so I’ll check into that!
Sometimes with a new machine, I’m a bit overwhelmed at the big picture and overlook small, obvious things like that
your wacky first bar is strange. is the OT clocked as well or is it the master?
It’s the master right now
The Kits paradigm is pretty simple to understand, but you have to get it clear in your mind.
On A4, Kits can be linked to different patterns.
Cool thing is that if you want to tweak the sound on a chain of several patterns at once, it’s easy to do.
But another thing is you have to make sure you “save as new” if you don’t want to erase previous work.
So hit Yes+Kit frequently to make sure you save your work.
No+Kit to reload the latest saved state.
And Save as new if you want to create a new Kit.
Oh, and save your project once in a while 
First time is mandatory so that you don’t work on the locked “Presets” project.
And in a few weeks/months, don’t forget to backup your project. And make it regularly to avoid losing your work. Which you will, unfortunately most likely, as you did already…
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Now soundwise I would only underline that you have to set OSC level under 70 if you don’t want oscillators to saturate.
And try to synthesize some good percussions, it’s a very powerful synth for such sounds ! And your OT will love be fed with them…
Today I have discovered @arcrae.io’s sound, and it’s my task for tonight to get such lush evolving pads out of the A4 
Thanks for the tips! Love that ambient jam too!
Excellent advice throughout, thank you!
Fate is a bloody joker.
Last evening I lost a few months work.
I believe I reloaded my project instead of saving. I had a warning but ignored it !
Anyway, while trying to recreate some sounds I had not saved on the Drive (new advice : save good sounds on the Drive for reuse) I did a monster sound on track 2 with Feedback on osc 1 and neighbor on osc 2.
The result was pretty unstable and raw, and when I put some kick on track 1 it ate it and gave me some kind of sidechain fx.
There is so much to discover with this synth, pretty deep.
I love its sound.
Oh my if you’re learning subtractive synthesis, I highly recommend reverse engineering sounds you like. Like someone else said, there will be some good patches loaded onto the A4 already. If you hear a sound you like copy down all its settings and go about replicating it. The filter is exactly here, the env is this much, the attack on the filter env is this much, etc. Then when you actually start to dial in the sounds yourself and get closer, your eyes will be open.
I learned synthesis by reverse engineering Bass Station patches, MS2000 patches…And also just playing around with super straight forward synths like a Juno.
Pretty quickly you’ll get a toolkit of synth tricks that won’t ever leave you, and a time will come when you say “I want this kind of sound” and you just make it.
That would be nice
Couple jams (not completed songs yet) I managed on the A4
Also, a couple weird things I stumbled onto for other beginners. Most of you probably know this stuff, but…
I came up with a couple basic patterns on the A4, then slaved the A4 to my OT. Made a very basic midi sequence (plus LFO’s) to play into the already sequenced A4. Some pretty crazy stuff happens.
This ‘trick’ is super common with the OT, but I’d never tried it. Sequence the A4 (or anything, really) and live sample short chunks of the sequence in various spots with a bunch of different locked trigs. Let it keep recording over and over. It’ll add so much subtle or not so subtle variation to your pattern it’s insane. Old hat to many, but I really only ever tried it after watching a great tutorial by Max Marco. We were all noobs at something new once, right?!