KB - 1 Keyboard Suite v2 - APPS4IDEVICES REBIRTH

KB - 1 Keyboard Suite v2

6/17/2019

Before reading this review, tap on the "Download on the App Store" button and come back here.
Okay, I know, I'm a little radical, but there's only one reason why you shouldn't buy this App.
It's because you already have it!
Is it done?
Okay, so I can start'.
So, KB -1 Keyboard Suite is a Master Keyboard.
Huh? What? What?
You have a Master Keyboard in your studio so you think you don't need to buy this App...
Is that it?
Yes, you do, even if you have the most expensive and largest of all Master Keyboards because yours is not as powerful as mine. Is not as easy to configure as mine and will certainly not allow you to walk around with it anywhere!
Well, I'm continuing my review....
So KB -1 Keyboard Suite is MPE ready....
Hey, what now?
You only work in your studio and are convinced that your $3000 Master Keyboard is more powerful than mine, right?
1 You remind me of all those people who still think that an iPad is a toy and that their Mac or PC can compete with my iPad
2 Now you will listen and no longer disturb me !
And to calm you down, here's the list of everything I can do with my own Master Keyboard

I have an awesome beautiful UI
I have a MPE keyboard!! If you know what is a MPE keyboard you don't need to read the purple text MPE stands for "MIDI Polyphonic Expression" and is a new MIDI standard created by us, ROLI, Apple, Moog, Haken Audio, Bitwig and others for communicating over MIDI between MPE controllers (like LinnStrument, Roli Seaboard, Continuum, SoundPlane or Eigenharp) and MPE sound generators (like these).The principal reason for MPE is to get around a limitation of MIDI: Pitch Bend and Control Change messages must apply to all notes on the channel. This prevents polyphonic pitch bends and polyphonic Y-axis control (which uses Control Change messages) over a single MIDI channel. MPE solves this problem by sending each note's messages on a separate MIDI channel, rotating through a defined block of channels. Here's a brief summary of MPE:
Each note's messages are sent over a unique MIDI channel, rotating through a defined contiguous block of channels called Per-Note channels. The per-note messages are limited to Note On, Note Off, Channel Pressure (for finger pressure), Pitch Bend (for X-axis movement) and CC74 (for Y-axis movement). All other messages (like Program Change, CC7/volume, CC64/Sustain, etc.) apply to all voices and are sent over a separate "Common" channel, either channel 1 or 16. If 1, the per-note channels are 2-16. If 16, the per-note channels are 1-15. Or a split MPE keyboard could, for example, send the left split over Common Channel 1 and per-note channels 2-8, and the right split over Common Channel 16 with per-note channels 9-15. You can choose how many per-note channels are allocated to each split.
Note that most MPE-compatible MPE synths do not implement a Common channel, instead applying all received messages other than the above five per-note messages, regardless of the channel on which they are received, as Common and therefore applying to all notes.
In LinnStrument, MPE is called "Channel Per Note" mode, and the Common channel is called the "Main" channel.
I can save all my keyboard layouts presets on the Cloud, Share them and I'port them when I want
I have 2 wheels that I can setup (depending of the keyboard layout I have chosen)
I can replace my wheel with a XY Pad
Or a Strum Pad
I can place them to the right or the left side of my keyboard
I can set a Scale and its root note as well: Available Scales: Major | Dorian | Phrygian | Lydia | Mixolydian | Aeolian Minor | Locrian | Major Blues | Minor Blues | Major Third | Minor Third | Fifth | Wholetone | Diminished | Major Pentatonic | Minor Pentatonic | Arabic | Spanish
I can use the Chord memory button to play chords. After I played 3 notes, all the keys will play a chord respecting the intervals between the notes I played.
I can enable the Glide | Slide | Velocity and Pressure mode
I can use the repeat feature:: The notes will repeat depending of the Setting I have chosen on the left side of the keyboard (displayed after that I enable the Repeat mode feature)
I can choose from 8 different keyboard layouts: Classic | Uniform | Strings | Scales | Chords | Drum | XY Pad | cc Controller
I can display 5 rows of the layout I have chosen.
I can run as many instances as I like because it's an AUv3 plugin
I can set the spacing between each rows
I can decide the root note of a Chord..(not the same as the Scale root note...)
I can decide the Chord type: Trial | Fifth | Sixth | Seventh
I can also set the Chord mode: Octave or inversion
I can decide to add a Bass note to the Chord (on a different MIDI channel If I want). I can also set its octave.
I can set the mapping of my Drum Keyboard Layout. Save them, share them and import them.
My XY Pads can play notes. It means that I also have a ribbon keyboa

That's all!!!!

To conclude:
AUV3 is great. Lot of you like to be able have several instances of the same synthesizer.No more switch from an App to another too...
I like it too
But, to me to be the AUv3 features need this Keyboard!
Without it's like to have, I don't know, a car without wheels.

It's more than a Killer App.
More than a Must Have!
It should be integrated in our iPad!!!!

Download on the App Store

Price $9.99 Author Kai Aras Type Controller Supports Inter-App Audio (IAA), Audio Unit (AU) Version1.2 Released 11/20/2018 Updated 03/28/2019

The video

AUM - Audio Mixer

Ruismaker

auGEN X

F-16 Filter

iSymphonic Orchestra

BASSalicious 2

Pure Synth® Platinum

IAA version

The 2 top bars

Browse Presets manager see Browser Presets Manager section | Write Save Save as | Preset INIT Loaded preset - tap to open the Presets window | See image 1 & 1' for chord mode and scales only. See in the Layout section / Keyboard which layout come with this feature.
Settings see settings | Glide* | Slide* | Velocity* | Pressure | Repeat see image 2 | Up octave up | Down octave down | 1 1 octave display | 2 2 octaves display | Chord Memory = tap to enable then play 3 notes from now each key will play a Chord with this interval | Panic = MIDI panic | Latch = infinite sustain / * the arrows indicates the motion to play this MIDI expression

Image 1

Image 1'

Settings

Layout

Expression

MPE

Controllers

1 Layout

Layout | Keyboard Layout

Note that all these keyboard layout comes with their own settings See next section

Classic with a modulation wheel on the left side for Pitchbend

Uniform comes with a pointer. Note that even if the Scale options are highlighted here, they will not affect this keyboard

Strings: a linear keyboard layout. Here you can set a Scale but take care to not play the unamed notes (Black Keys). This keyboard comes also with a pointer

Thaï is the Scale keyboard. Here you will be able to play all keys (no more black Keys) without risk to play a wrong note. See Scale section further down

Chord Keyboard: each key plays a Chord. Set the root key and the scale in the top bar

Drum layout (see further down to see is strength...)

The XY Pad layout can also play notes to become a real Ribbons keyboard... See further down

The cc Controller layout

Classic keyboard layout settings

Number of Row displayed up to 5 | octave per Rows 1 or 2 | Spacing between Rows (max here for 5 Rows)

Uniform keyboard layout settings

Settings are the same as the Classic layout. Here I set 2 rows only. The spacing settings are still set to the the max

The String Keyboard layout settings

Same settings as the Scale Keyboard below (here 1 octave of 2 available | spacing between Rows set to the minimum) see available scale below

The Scales keyboard layout settings

The Chords keyboard layout settings

In the first section of the Chords settings window, you can see that a setting has been added: Root note. Select the desired one

Section 2 | Chord sSttinhs

Chord type: Trial | Fifth | Sixth | Seventh
Chord Mode: Octave | inversions

Section 3  | Additional Midi Output

Chord Bass Output: On or Off
Chord Bass channel: select the MIDI channel
Chord Bass Octave: Set the Octave from Key to -5

The Drum Keyboard layout

You can set the Pad mapping as you like and save them.

Section 2 | MIDI Output Mode
MIDI Output Mode: Single Channel or Channel per Pad

Section 3 | Note Mapping
New Save as = same as the screenshot above

Pad 0 to 15 on the left: Tap to rename
Use the arrows to set the note.
Use the test button to test your Pad setting.

The XY Pad Keyboard Layout

Section 1 | Layout
Number of XY Pads 2 max

Section 2
Pad A & B type: CC | Note | Wheels

Pad A & B Channel: MIDI Channel
Same as above: 2 control per Pads x 2

The cc Controller Keyboard Layout

Section 1
Items per rows: 1 or 2 = 4 or 8 rotative knobs

Section 2
Same as Drum

MPE

MIDI Mode: Regular or MPE

Expression

Controllers

Controllers Type: None | Wheels | XY see image 1| Strum see image 2
Position: Right or Left

Image 1

Image 2

Browser | Presets manager

The App Store description

KB-1 MIDI Keyboard

KB-1 is a suite of expressive virtual keyboards and controllers designed for a multitude of scenarios.

Play multiple instruments simultaneously, complete with MIDI Polyphonic Expression, scales, chords, strumming and more.

Overview:
- 8 distinct Keyboard Layouts
- Multiple Rows per Keyboard
- Multiple Octaves per Keyboard Row
- 15+ Scales (for layouts that support scales)
- MIDI Polyphonic Expression (MPE)
- Standalone operation with multiple Keyboards and dedicated MIDI outputs per Keyboard
- AUv3 MIDI Plugin

Layouts:
- Classic (Piano Keys + Wheels)
- Uniform (Seboard-style Keys and Layout)
- String (String-style Keys)
- Scale (Uniform layout with scale support)
- Chord (One key per chord for all scale degrees)
- Drum (up to 16 user mappable drum pads)
- XY (up to 2 configurable XY-Pads)
- CC (up to 16 user mappable knobs for CC control)

Expression:
- Glide (horizontal)
- Slide (vertical)
- Velocity (mapped to y-axis)
- Pressure (iPhone only)

App Connectivity:
- Standalone
- AUv3 MIDI Instrument

MIDI Connectivity:
- Inter-App MIDI
- USB MIDI
- BLE MIDI
- Network MIDI Version 1.2 release notes- Added per-keyboard preset mangement including some factory presets - Added mapping browser including some factory drum mappings - Mappings can now be imported/exported - Drum layout can now be set to ouput to individual MIDI channels per pad - Root Note & Scale can now be changed from the main screen - Roll/Note Repeat now brings up a dedicated control for setting the repeat rate - Chord layout can now output the bass note to a 2nd MIDI channel (great for transposing sequences) - Fixed an issue where the chord layout would not respect the MIDI channel setting - AUv3: Fixed an issue where the plugin would crash when changing MPE/MIDI Channels - Drum: fixed an issue where changing octaves per row would have no effect on the drum layout - Fixed an issue where "Slide sends Aftertouch" option would not restore properly when loading a preset or session - Fixed an issue where horizontal slide (glide) would not be completly smooth even at max sensitivity - Fixed an issue where the Maj V7 chord was voiced incorrectly - Fixed an issue where selecting mappings for the xy controller was not possible - Fixed an issue where the MIDI output channel for some layouts was off by one when running the AUv3

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