What are my options for samplers that allow recording via a built in mic and then playing back and recording/sequencing the pitched sample? OP-1 is too expensive for my 5 year old…
This has been announced but no ship date yet.
I was impressed with their After Dark synth, which I purchased for my grandson and held onto for a few weeks to play with myself.
3 Likes
Behringer crave. Cheap as chips and still a real synth. Bonus to add something like a zoom pedal. Double bonus for the oxi glow cable set or similar.
More cash? Microfreak with vocoder.
Even more? Nord stage 4 or komplete s88 with everything. Or push 3. Or black corp deckards dream + expansion. But at this point, you could hostile purchase a meeblip or dato duo.
Certainly, the fact that the Models look like a Fisher Price device “my first 6 track groove box with parameter locks” helps:
3 Likes
I see that the long anticipated Dato Drum is live on Kickstarter.
Features
Sample based drum machine
- 4 drum pads – with retrigger functionality
- 8 step circular sequencer per voice
- Pitch slider per voice
- Selectable and user replaceable samples
- Tempo and swing
Effects
- 2 sequencer effects: random and step repeat
- 2 audio effects: filter and bitcrusher
Connections
- Audio: 3.5mm (1/8") headphone/line output
- Sync: 3.5mm (1/8") sync in and out
- MIDI input and output
- Internal speaker
- USB-C for power. Can also be powered from a power bank
A very short preview video :
Can you imagine this in a game ? Like you get to make a move on the Drum, when something else happens in the game.
3 Likes
Get the new Microkorg 2. It has built in badge games.
1 Like
My children love garageband
Never explained it to them
Now they sometimes help me
(10 y old son )
3 Likes
The DUO was such a let down for me that I’m a bit wary about this one. Looks very cool. Bur build quality has to be better than the DUO. And it looks quite complex for a kid to grasp.
Got my eyes on Playtime Engineering’s MyTracks MPC-like next release, tho.
My kids have been liking my Super Gemini actually. I think they may naturally go for sliders 
i would go for the cheap behringer models. they are playfull and the kids can explore sounds and rhythms. TD-6, RD-3, Edge, Crave.
they can start with one system and can expand it if they stick to the music.
3 Likes
and if they wanna learn electronic music on a pc or mac, show them sonic pi, its free and has a great tutorial. chatgpt can help with the code
I finally got an iPad recently and the amount of super fun intuitive apps out there for making music is insane. A lot of them also run on iphone too and probably a lot would run on old iphones!
Add a midi controller for that hardware feel if you really need to.
1 Like
Yeah the iPad is great for this, although my lad tends prefer jumping in to Sneaky Sasquatch
A lot depends on age and interests, for a small kid I think this Casio is great and cheap, drum pads as well as nice small keys
2 Likes
Kids are not stupid… Digitakt 1
5 Likes
All 3 of my kids have really gravitated towards the OP-1. It’s extremly inviting. But it’s a very expensive device to buy a kid, so that is kind of out of the question. My youngest really digs the Octatrack as well, he loves playing with the fader (I don’t blame him)
What I have noticed with all my kids is that something with proper keys is very inviting to play. So my best bet would actually be a Reface CS.
With the CS you have a great and fairly simple knob per function synth, which really invites you to play.
3 Likes
This makes perfect sense but I’m shuddering at the thought of getting the money together for an OP-1 only for it immediately to get lost or flushed down the toilet or something. But it would be ideal.
Was also thinking of the Reface Rhodes as my fella’s next step, and possibly if he shows enough interest in a few years something like an Astrolab in the home piano type space.
2 Likes
Last night I was pulling some stuff out of my ‘need to get rid of’ box when my youngest son (low teens) found my little Nanobox Razzmatazz and wanted to play around with it. (he’s already in band and loves music and is constantly humming whatever songs they’re working on)
So I popped it over to him along with an old Novation controller with some pads and showed him how to hook them up and start finger-drumming.
Fast forward to today after he’d watched a few videos on the subject of controllers and midi and the razzmatazz, and he’s just chuckling away, getting me to listen to his latest ‘song’ he’s working on. He got going far quicker than I did when I first started not too much older than he is, and he’s hooked.
He mentioned a friend of his who wants a drum machine so I threw that kid a model:cycles I’m not using much, and probably won’t be since I pre-ordered DNII like an idiot, but hey… now they’re getting together tomorrow after school so he can pass on his knowledge to his friend, and who knows what will happen.
But the glimmer in his eyes was worth far more than selling it, and I get to downsize a bit (my goal for 2025, seriously it is…).
I know neither of these is necessarily a ‘synth’ per se, but the nanobox does have more FM capabilities than I was exploring with it, and the Cycles is nice and straightforward.
Having sequencers and kick drums seems to have helped, and he’s already asking about what filters do, so there you go.
Kids pick stuff up quickly. Simple or complex, with a little guidance they just start jamming and figure things out themselves.
It’s also a nice way to get a view on his mood/thoughts/world-view. New teens stop sharing, or many of them do, and you can tell a lot by what comes out of these boxes, in my opinion. I think I’ll find it enlightening.
12 Likes
I’ve been testing anything and everything with my kids and nephews. Deluge is the one hit. Pioneer CD-J with the hamster dance is the other.
You can hold a Deluge in front of an infant and they can make sounds and see pretty lights. Hit play and switch between drum, bass, and lead and they will literally bang out a loop.
Load it with samples from Minecraft and other videogames and kids are captivated. They will actually argue about who gets to use it in my house. I’m at the point where I’m about to buy a second one but I still want to try giving them a Roland JDXI to see if keyboards have a chance.
3 Likes