Ive been wanting to dabble with digital music production. All software ive tried has so many menus and buttons and switches I get overwhelmed.
While looking up instruments on amazon I came across these pocket synthesizers called stylophones and similar like theremin that entry for about 40-50$.
These seem like cool little gadgets to toy around with and maybe get a foot in the door to learn how to do digital music production. Does anyone have experience with these things? Are they worth messing with?
I have an old mixer for my condenser microphone that plugs into laptop I think I can plug aux line in from these mini synths to the mixer.
I would suggest the Korg Volca line over something like these if you want some hands on hardware for an introduction, they will be a lot more versatile. That said, it doesn’t matter what you use to make music as long as you’re expressing yourself and having fun, toy or not. The stylophone was used on lots of commercial recordings most notably by David Bowie.
Stylophones are novelty toys. Sure you can use them for a specific lofi sound but if you’re looking to produce more “serious” music spend your money elsewhere.
Agreed. There’s nothing digital about them, either.
The stylophone is probably not a very good choice if you actually want to make a musical track, it’s quite a bit limited.
Also, please don’t assume that hardware is simpler than plugins. A lot of hardware has plenty of menu diving or arcane shortcuts due to the limited hardware controls, tiny (or absent) screens etc. You should be looking at “one knob per function” devices.
If you just want to explore a bit and make tracks, get a groovebox l. If you are looking to dive into synthesis and a bit of sound design, look at the Arturia Microfreak.
I would get a small midi keyboard with drum pad, it would be much more versatile
Came here to say this, get a MIDI keyboard OP. It’s basically your gamepad for digital music production. You mostly have at least 2 octaves of piano keys and a drum pad, also some knobs and sliders you can map. They are very well supported by modern audio production software.
A very cheap one would be the Akai MPK Mini MK3 for example.
Not OP but I’ve been wondering how do do this myself, so thank you for that recommendation.
My recommendation is the Novation LaunchKey Mini. Very similar to the Akai they recommended but I personally bought one 5 years ago when I started, so I prefer it for that reason.
Although this could be true with the Akai, I do know the LaunchKey comes with a 90 day trial of Ableton as well, which is the DAW I use to this day. Just my $.02
I do music production (mostly lo fi rock, no midi) and got curious about those a while back and picked one up. Installed Vital. I’ve never put anything out with it but it’s a ton of fun to play with. You could totally use one to create some great music if you wanted.
I guess it also depends on what type of musician you are. If you come from traditional instruments and want to record some nice drum patterns or so it’s a really nice tool. Otherwise you have to artificially add some random off timing (like ms) to recreate that natural feeling. I could imagine many people can also be more creative playing on an instrument (which a midi keyboard basically is), getting that haptic feedback instead if just clicking things together.
Oh! I think maybe I wasn’t clear because I was still drunk. I was co-signing the keyboard. There’s one next to my desk.
Oh my bad, it sounded like you never used it!
Yup, you’re going to want at least a tiny keyboard at some point soon.
If too many controls is intimidating in your plugins, either try one but into the DAW like ReaSynth in Reaper which will be basic but still fairly powerful, or something like Decent Sampler which has knobs that do a bit of tweaking but are still most just preset sounds. Many will have ADSR and some basic effects and that’s it.
You might want to get a Groovebox like the Novation Circuit Tracks. That’s a standalone device which gives you everything you need to make full Songs in one pretty compact package.
A groovebox like the Circuit Tracks is a good recommendation.
A stylophone is more of a toy than an instrument, really
If you want a small synth that you’ll actually be able to use to make music and learn, I’d say look into the Korg Volca series. They’re only around twice the price of the stylophone, and are much more powerful in terms of what they’re capable of.
There’s about 10 of them now and are very affordable for what they are, which is a combination sequencer and synth. They can also be connected together to sync up, so you could have one doing drums and another doing a bassline or something.
Look into YouTube videos about them and decide which you think would best help you make the kind of music you’re looking to make.
I agree, but I’d also like to mention that it’s absolutely possible to get great mileage out of a “toy” synth, provided you already know what you’re doing.
how about using software instead
I got both the regular stylophone and the beat version for my kids a while back. The beat version you can do loops with. My musically inclined brother-in-law could not let it go for about two hours last time he visited. I have only learned the intro to Jerk it out on the regular version though. They are really cheap and you can buy solder it yourself kits for about 10 euro making them even cheaper so I say go for it.
Get something that has attack, decay, sustain and release and a few different waveforms. Practice with that. Might be more for synth design, so maybe get a sequencer. Have fun!
Get a cheap/pirated DAW with some basic synth plugins. I’d recommend starting with the most basic subtractive synth you can find, plus a sampler, and some basic effects (delay, reverb, distortion, chorus). Limit yourself to that until you understand everything they’re doing.
Pick a tracker like OpenMPT and watch tutorial videos on YouTube.
Anything that is fun for you that makes musical noise is a good option for you! Presumably you are not attempting to be a world class music producer right away, and are more interested in having a bit of musical fun. Go for it.
Basically no.
Pocket synthesizers are good for music writing, but everything that has to do with the production itself an instrument will not help you with.
Certainly if you think you will have fun playing it you can sample it and use it in your songs, but that has almost nothing to do with digital music production.
