How much does a MIDI keyboard help?

[meow meow]

I've been tempted to purchase a MIDI keyboard for a while now, because I was under the impression it eases beat making and placements of basslines as it's much easier to play them out. Is this really the case? :<

I have been having troubles with mapping out my wobbles.

[Eridu]

yes, its a whole lot easier with a midi keyboard.

[jrisreal]

It's really just different...I like the fact that it involves playing a real instrument rather than buttons, though

[meow meow]

It's really just different...I like the fact that it involves playing a real instrument rather than buttons, though

While I can't actually play the keyboard, I agree.

[mikeyp]

It helps tons.

Much easier to play out a melody than on a computer keyboard, and if you get one with assignable knobs it really makes it easy to explore different sounds at once rather than clicking around with a mouse one at a time.

[secret door]

You don't need to know how to play the keyboard to run with a MIDI keyboard. In fact, you'll probably learn a lot about playing scales yourself just through pattern and repetition.

[victor w]

Yes it makes a big difference imo. If you can't afford a full blown midi controller just find a keyboard with midi for the time being...IDK how many times I've been messing around playing with random chords and it's turned into a song...and it's easier while browsing patches to test a melody or w/e

[Genevieve]

Depends on your workflow. I'm saving up for a guitar MIDI pick-up to control all my instruments because MIDI keyboards just don't do the trick for me. However, I'm probably a minority.

[hutyluty]

its loads easier to mess about on a keyboard until you hit a decent melody than it is messing about drawing in dots on the piano roll

[s3f]

depends on how you're using it, i'd say... don't limit your choice of product to only keyboards. knobs faders, pads etc. can give you a LOT of possibilities to experiment, too. but that doesn't mean that you'll automatically get better at producing imho. for me it's just a lot of fun so i have one

[bRRRz]

It just helped me personally sooo much!

[RandoRando]

i make much more complex sounds now, loading different parameters in massive to my faders on my mpk, then just fucking with them while the song is playing and recording what sounds good, you can mess with different paramters at once with a mouse.

[steeze]

I find it a big help myself, especially for auditioning sounds and such. However I still find I come up with most of my musical ideas on my guitar, having a play on the keyboard every now and then is a good way to get different ideas down that I wouldn't normally come up with on the guitar

[wizeguy]

yea it helped me a lot, i cant play keyboard or piano at all. check out the akai lpk25 the size of its jokes but the built quality is sick

[bRRRz]

yea it helped me a lot, i cant play keyboard or piano at all. check out the akai lpk25 the size of its jokes but the built quality is sick

agreed. I have the LPK25 as well and it's awesome.

[meow meow]

I find it a big help myself, especially for auditioning sounds and such. However I still find I come up with most of my musical ideas on my guitar, having a play on the keyboard every now and then is a good way to get different ideas down that I wouldn't normally come up with on the guitar

Oooooooooh shit. That's the one I wanted, and the pad, haha (:

As long as it helps me lay out basslines and experiment, then I'm sold.