Hi everyone! I recently became a proud owner of the A4 MKII and I’m absolutely loving its sound. However, I’ve encountered an unexpected issue. On my Digitone, there was a keyboard scale feature that allowed me to work confidently in a more “safe” mode. The A4 doesn’t have this feature, and I don’t feel as confident since I’m not very well-versed in music theory. It was really convenient to set one scale across all channels and not worry about hitting the right notes. I’m asking this wonderful community for advice on any “workarounds” to overcome this limitation using the possibilities of Ableton, the A4, and a small MIDI keyboard that I have. Thanks in advance!
The A4 has scales in the note setup menu.
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Thank you for the response! I found the scale options in the note menu, but it seems there are only two available: major and minor. On the Digitone, I had access to a much wider range of scales. Is there any way to access more scale options on the A4, or perhaps a workaround to simulate a broader variety of scales? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Indeed the A4 had only major and minor. Also I’m not sure if the scales are ignored when you record somerhing via keyboard.
I recently got a digitakt, which has all the scales. I thought that was odd for a sampler.
In your case I’d probably use ableton for programming, since it has a midi plugin for that.
Personally, I don’t like using the computer for music, so I usially just look up the notes of a given scale and then write them down on a piece of paper.
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Couldn’t you use the Digitone to play notes into the A4? Never tried it, just a thought…
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Thank you all for your responses! I no longer have the Digitone (I wanted to work specifically with analog sounds), but I do still have the Digitakt. So I’ll try using its keyboard scale feature.
It’s frustrating that the scales update came to the Rytm (35 scales!) which is primarily a drum machine, and not to the A4 which is primarily a “melody machine” 
.
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Yes, although I’m not fully aware of the chronology and logic behind the updates for the A4 and Rytm, what you’re saying does sound quite surprising if the Rytm received Scales, but the A4 did not.
In the end, I’m using the Digitakt as a sort of Scale plugin for my A4.
A4 got it’s last update Feb 1, 2022, the rytm scales came almost two years later in Nov 22, 2023, I think the extra scales were added first to the digis/ST somewhere around Nov 23 with the song mode additions, so that’s almost a year after last A4 update.
if I had to take a guess if A4 gets another update additional scales will be added too.
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+1 for more scales for Analog Four
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