Review: Korg Minilogue
We have all been wondering before the release of this product whether it is real or not. It looks like it has 2 Oscillators, Mod, Mixer with Noise, a 2 and 4 pole Filter, Amp EG and EG, LFO, and Delay. It also hosts an arpeggiator and a 16 step sequencer. It also sports 4 voices, so quadruple everything I said. Well, inside of the beast is just that in hardware: 4 times the above.
Korg also didn’t stop there. They added a velocity sensitive keyboard, though it is a weird mini keyboard. I got used to the size of the keyboard after a few minutes of play though. A slider that resets to the center upon release that can be used to control a parameter based on the how the patch is programmed.
Last but not least, and this one is more than a novelty, is an OLED oscilloscope, which acts as the screen for programs and parameters.
When you turn on the unit, it goes into “Tuning” mode, and tunes the analog oscillators. Shortly there after, you get a flat line (waiting for signal of the oscilloscope.) You play a key and the oscilloscope begin to animate or draw the waveform being played.
Back to those components, yes, it is a VCO, Analog Mixer, VCF, VCA, as well as an analog LFO. It is amazing how much Korg has put into this keyboard for just $499 USD street price for the Minilogue. It also has Audio In, Sync In/Out (to work with the Volcas as an exmaple), MIDI In/Out, and USB port. Did I also say that the knobs respond to MIDI, and it can send and receive Clock messages. It has 200 memory slots, with 100 populated with factory presets, and 100 available for custom sounds.
This board is fantastic by any means, and we are currently using the version 1.11 of the firmware and seems to be running free of bugs (as far as we can tell.) There were some initial quirkiness and may posts on the Internet about the clicking noise produced at the output. I have been able to recreate that, but I also know to program patches so that it does not. If you create sounds on a modular synth, you would know that in many cases it clicks when you hit two notes in rapid succession, though it depends on the VCA and how the EG is configured and how fast the Attack is.
I can definitely say, that for $499, this is the best analog polyphonic keyboard money can buy at the moment. Of course, there is a minor wish list, and I mean minor.
Wish list:
- Aftertouch
- Proper Pitch Wheel and Mod Wheel (but don’t remove the stick)
- CV In/Out, Gate/Trigger Out
- MIDI Thru
If you want to listen to what an analog poly synth sounds like, you can get a great unit from Korg for well less than a grand. Cheers!
