Expressive Osmose

[The Elf]

It's here. Ordered in March 2019, arrived yesterday morning:


Not sure what I make of it yet. More when I've formed an opinion...

[RichardT]

It's here. Ordered in March 2019, arrived yesterday morning:


Not sure what I make of it yet. More when I've formed an opinion...

Watching with interest! I’d very much like to know what it can do for real-time playing of sampled violins, for example.

[Martin Walker]

I hope we don't have to hold our breath as long as you did waiting for it to be delivered

[BJG145]

I live for days like those.

[OneWorld]

It's here. Ordered in March 2019, arrived yesterday morning:


Not sure what I make of it yet. More when I've formed an opinion...

"Ordered in March 2019, arrived yesterday morning:"

Reminds me of that joke Russians made in times of Soviet Russia, when a comrade needed a plumber to call and fix a leak and the plumber said "Yes comrade, we'll come around and see you on Wednesday, 20th March 2025"

The comrade asked "will that be morning or afternoon? I have an appointment at the hospital in the afternoon"

[BJG145]

Reminds me of that joke Russians made in times of Soviet Russia, when a comrade needed a plumber to call and fix a leak and the plumber said "Yes comrade, we'll come around and see you on Wednesday, 20th March 2025"

The comrade asked "will that be morning or afternoon? I have an appointment at the hospital in the afternoon"

Pity it now also works for the NHS.

[Arpangel]

It's here. Ordered in March 2019, arrived yesterday morning:


Not sure what I make of it yet. More when I've formed an opinion...

Watching with interest! I’d very much like to know what it can do for real-time playing of sampled violins, for example.

Please, no sampled violins trying to be violins, let’s just connect it up to a load of stuff and hear what happens.

[The Elf]

Orchestral parts are very much in my sights, amongst other uses. I haven't the money to hire an orchestra and our listeners like the orchestral parts I create.
Anyway...

As ever, I miss that fifth octave. For lead parts a four-octave keyboard is ok, but as soon as I place my left hand I'm very aware of lacking that low end. It is what it is.

I bought the Osmose as a controller keyboard, rather than a synth. To this end I very much like the feel of the keyboard. I like the weight (or lack of it!), the matt finish, the travel, the wide squared-off key tops, the resistance to aftertouch... It really is quality. What I'm not so enamoured of is that to get enough finger grip to generate sideways movement I also get a spot of aftertouch; not a huge problem in reality, but has to be acknowledged. Worse is that in generating aftertouch it can be tough to avoid sideways movement. I have a feeling that familiarity will mitigate these points - already is, in fact. I can always filter out a control feature if it's a problem for a specific part.

The factory patches? Hit and miss. Mostly 'miss' for me. TBH I didn't buy the Osmose for the internal sounds (didn't even realise it had any at first), so anything useful is a bonus in my ears. There are a handful of nice wind patches, which are right up my street. Unfortunately there are also many patches with jarring repeating elements, which I abhore in most instruments. A few patches are nice enough, but quite pedestrian, and done better by other instruments; the last thing I need from the Osmose is an 'analogue' bass patch.

I tried pairing the Osmose with Equator 2, an instrument closely associated with the Roli Seaboard, and well versed in MPE. A little control re-mapping was necessary, but it worked OK. That said my Seaboards already do the job here, so I doubt this will be a use I'll return to very often.

I then paired the Osmose with my humble Audiothingies MicroMonsta 2. This is a match made in heaven! Those psuedo GR-500 guitar synth patches that I enjoy were instantly under my finger tips, and much easier to play than with my Rolis. Applying filter sweeps, vibrato, pitch bends... all gorgeously interactive and natural. I could almost wish the MM2's synth engine was on-board the Osmose, rather than the Haken.

While we're on the subject, I doubt this is a synth that I'm going to be editing any time soon. The software looks about as friendly as a jack russel guarding its bone, and I just don't feel motivated to install it. I'll probably have a moment of weakness some time and give it a try, but for now I'm leaving well alone.

And then it was off to Kontakt and a few orchestral patches. Yes, it kinda works, but... I don't feel it the way I do with my Seaboards.

I like that this is a 'keyboard', rather than a set of squidgy targets to 'aim' for like the Roli Seaboard. That said I haven't experienced the same 'duck to water' feeling with Osmose as I did with the Seaboard. I'm lucky in now having the choice. For solo parts I think I favour Osmose, at least when some speed is required - for chordal parts (especially orchestral) my heart is still with Seaboard, which feel more natural to me, and I feel more in control.

Sorry it's a bit of a mixed bag above. The most fun I've had have been the on-board wind patches and pairing Osmose with MicroMonsta 2. Given that these two uses represent important vertebrae in the backbone of my work I'm content.

[Martin Walker]

Sorry it's a bit of a mixed bag above. The most fun I've had have been the on-board wind patches and pairing Osmose with MicroMonsta 2. Given that these two uses represent important vertebrae in the backbone of my work I'm content.

No worries Paul - your detailed analysis tells us a lot about its strengths and weaknesses

[ajay_m]

As I found when I developed my reaper plugin for the kmi qunexus and kboard devices (to turn them into what I thought I had paid for) the imagined experience of having polyphonic pressure and tilt (or sideways motion, which I was able to map as a third control axis) turns out to be quite different from what you need when you actually *play* these devices.
As a consequence I had to implement pressure envelopes and a bunch of other features to map my imagination to reality, and I imagine it's the same with the Osmose, with the underlying hardware giving you the control dimensions but requiring some quite sophisticated post processing to actually respond naturally.

[Ben Asaro]

Wow, that's quite the wait time! Long enough to have thrown away the rose tinted glasses by the tenor of your review.

The Osmose is way too much instrument for me; to hear you lamenting over the 5th octave made me chuckle as I am a terrible keyboard player!

I hope it really comes alive for you when you load/make your own patches for it!

[RobinC]

Mine finally arrived today after a last minute hold up in Paris that prevented delivery before the weekend. Initial thoughts are similar. I like the keyboard, the onboard presets though did little to wow me.

I've also got a Rise 49 (version 1) which whilst I've always liked it I've always found it fatiguing to play , so have played it much less that I should have. My keyboard skills are on the wrong side of mediocre and I've never found my sausage fingers to be particularly adept at playing chords on the Roli. In part the purchase of the Osmose was about finding something with some of the expressivity of the Roli but easier to play. I suspect I'll end up keeping both though

[The Elf]

In part the purchase of the Osmose was about finding something with some of the expressivity of the Roli but easier to play. I suspect I'll end up keeping both though

Those thoughts are familiar to me, and I've reached the same conclusion. Neither the Osmose, nor the Roli are all things to me, but between them I have the options I've been wanting.

I'm getting some expressive lead performances out of the Osmose. It's going to see a lot of use on the next album!

[The Elf]

One quick mention...

Local Off is stored between power ups. That's how a pro synth should work.
(You reading this, Novation?...)

[MarkOne]

One quick mention...

Local Off is stored between power ups. That's how a pro synth should work.
(You reading this, Novation?...)

And Nord!

Actually from what I’ve read, you can’t do local off with a Midi cc command either, so you can’t set up your live rig Cantible/MainStage etc to sort that out at the start of a set.

[Forum Admin]

Great feedback Elf... and my chance to remind folks that there is an Osmose keyboard up for grabs in one of the latest SOS Competitions.

Entry form here: https://www.soundonsound.com/competitio ... -mpe-synth

[jackvr]

I tried pairing the Osmose with Equator 2, an instrument closely associated with the Roli Seaboard, and well versed in MPE. A little control re-mapping was necessary, but it worked OK.

Could you further detail what remapping you did to connected E2 and Osmose? Through a DAW. I use Digital Performer. Thanks

[The Elf]

The main thing was to re-map the two types of aftertouch of the Osmose to something Equator can make use of. I don't recall the details at the moment, since I still use my Roli with Equator and haven't been back to the Osmose for that particular use.