ROLI Piano (4 octave full size keys Lumi)

[NothanUmber]

@thetechnobear

my suspicion is that this is where Roli interests are, even if its mid-term.
add the X/Y axis support to the Piano via finger tracking rather than (expensive) hardware keyboard support.
(being able to use with other keyboards they’ve already stated is a ‘bonus’, not their main market / focus )

Would make sense, both for a combo product and for adding extra dimensions to any electronic keyboard and even a complete tracking system to acoustic pianos - the latter could be a big(ger) market (Particularly that air voice mode described above could be extremely cool in combination with a real acoustic piano, when any hand could switch between piano and electronic continuous voices with a single gesture. Like keys+voice or keys+e-guitar work well together!)

[thetechnobear]

yeah, the thing is… much of this has been possible for quite a while now, with various systems… but it doesn’t gain much traction.

Imogen Heap has pushed this for over a decade now, and has demonstrated really well how it can be integrated acoustically. (pre glove days she had a ‘piano bar’ on back of acoustic piano keybed ?)
the best use-case Ive seen, is where she uses gestures to maintain the sustain of the piano via effects - granular, reverb and echos mostly. it feels quite natural, albeit other worldly (rather than electronic)
it reminds me of the ambient guitarists that use ebow and lots of pedals fx.

but yeah, ambient musicians already have a ton of tools/toys to play with

[greaterthanzero]

Taetro rigs up a small emulation of some of Imogen Heap’s mi-mu setup here, with mixed results.

- YouTube

(he notes that when his hands are closed for the “grasp” gesture, the “tilt” gesture becomes unreliable. which makes sense – with Leap Motion, a closed hand has always meant missing fingers.)

Anyway, I think that’s a fine use case which absolutely requires a different mount. A singer won’t have a table in front of them on stage, but they will have a mic stand.

Side note:
The website’s “tech specs” section still says it sends class compliant MIDI over USB. This is repeated in the user manual. So presumably, we’ll be able to host it on SSP or Organelle, or a custom Raspberry Pi build despite none of that being officially supported.

(What I can’t find is anything like a MIDI implementation chart.)

Also of interest…

• there are two USB C slots up front for passing a Roli controller through.

• one of those slots is reserved for single controllers, like the new Piano. the other slot is for merged BLOCK setups. I guess the first port can’t detect those?

• the user manual strongly suggests that your third party controllers should not plug into either of those ports.

• in addition to the pedal jack, there’s a TRS headphone jack I haven’t seen anyone mention.

• that last bit’s key to understanding the point of this next one: In addition to the class compliant MIDI over USB, it’s also a class compliant audio interface.

• (I guess it can take audio from your iPad and route that to a headphone jack, which is nice because your iPad probably can’t.)