I had the mk 1 and sold it, it wasn’t necessarily the sound just the endless turning of the encoders to change anything, and pushing them in and turning for more immediate reaction was a big turn off. They remedied this on the Digi boxes, not sure what the mk 2’s are like.
I find myself actually making melodies on my AK. I don’t really make melodic music, but the AK really pulls me in that direction somehow. Maybe it’s the lights on the keys? The keyboard connected to a familiar sequencer? Not sure what it is.
Both the mk1 and mk2 has this fixed with encoder acceleration support a long time ago (turn fast => change fast).
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My favourite feature so far is sending gate/cv to DFAM and audio from DFAM through A4s effects. I have replaced Mother 32 with A4 and I find it to be a more versatile combo. I didnt have time to spend more time with the machine,using it mostly for jams as preset synth. Running melodies from ios app Piano motifs over bluetooth midi and syncing the DFAM (providing rhytmic elements) from the bass track’s notes.
I didnt figure out how to set the A4 as 2 voice synth. I would like to have T1 as bass monosynth on midi ch 1 , and T2 - T4 as polysynth for chord melodies on midi ch 2.
Anybody can help with the settings? Thanks
There’s a Poly config shortcut on the panel. Make sure you’re on track two, then ensure that the boxes of track 2-4 are ticked. That should be it
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Hi
I dont see the Poly config anywhere on the panel (mk1). Thx!
Function + kit for poly config on the mk1. You have to scroll down a little bit. Then tick the boxes.
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Tough choice.
Studio : never try an a4 mk1 before ? don’t plan to do live i would say go for ak (it’s more close for the bucks to the a4 mk2 especially a bit more bass and separated outs)
Live : it’s too big for travel (in another country + other part of the setup), it’s ok nearby your location i would go mk1 or mk2 desktop type
Already experienced the a4/ak before, i would say go for the A4 mk2, more precise encoders make the sound design experience way better, the overdrive improvement gives you a more profitable range… The oled screen also is an improvement. yeah yeah there’s a lot of improvements included better overbridge speed and also class compliant can be very cool outside with an iphone/ipad…
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I love it for its versatility and the many roles it can play. I also leaned much enough about it over the years to make it quickly sound the way I want.
It can and does sound great but I can totally see why someone would struggle with the sound in general or to dial it in to her/his liking.
I would lie if I‘d tell I never had thoughts about getting rid of it or got frustrated when I needed something specific quickly and lost my self in jumping around pages forever.
I feel the digitone is much more instant gratification. I recently finished a lot of tracks where I used both though, and I quite often found the most interesting sounds with most character came from the A4.
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I have a long A4 buy and sell history, which ended with the MK2 model. What lets ne keep it, is how surprisingly great it can Sound. Definately a Keeper.
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I had the mk1 for about 3 years and sold it to take the plunge into modular completely.
Time has proven I was wrong and recently got a used mk2 which gets me the pads I was missing and liberate some voices for drums duties.
I couldn’t be happier.
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A4/AK is first polarizing for the same reason many people have negative opinions of Elektron gear: you have to read the manual. It isn’t a knob-per-function, straight up WYSIWYG synth that you can understand just from looking at the front panel. After purchasing it, it might take a couple days before you’re doing things that sound decent, and it might be a few weeks or even months before you have your head really wrapped around most of its features and the Elektron workflow.
The second thing that might be polarizing is the sound. It is pretty distinct and most of my synth friends have commented that it is a very “modern” sounding analog. Maybe that’s because I tend to use the FM features and make weird modulations, but even if you go for simple, traditional analog style sounds you can still hear the digital control in the way the modulation moves. I’ve been able to get pretty much any sound I want out of it, from pads to percussion to soul-shattering bass (anyone who says it can’t do bass doesn’t understand how to use filters), but it can’t be what it ain’t. It’s not a drifty, grimy VCO poly, although you can get pretty freaking close if you’re crafty.
I’ve had my AK for a few years now and it’s still the heart of my setup. With the midi and cv options, and of course the sequencer, it’s made to be your “main brain” and I just couldn’t live without it. But I can understand that people who don’t like reading manuals, multi-button shortcuts, menu pages, or just the Elektron workflow in general might not jive with it.
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I’ve got an Analog Keys, like it a lot, but still have a way to go to use it to its full capacity. I think Panu Savolainen’s demo shows how distinctively beautiful it can sound (beauty being in the eye of the beholder and all that considered).
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It just dawned on me that you could get two extra envelopes and LFOs by routing the CV outputs to CV inputs and setting them up to affect the 5 parameters of you’re choice.
For instance you could have a kick on track 4 that is ducking the rest of the tracks by routing cv out to in and having the cv output be triggered by the kick track. This only applies to MK2 though
Sorry for spamming but I thought that it added one extra dimension to this wonderful synth.
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This is quite a nice trick, never had read it before.
Thank you friend!
When I had my A4mkII, I used that CV-sidechaining trick together with the «CV-kick» trick.
I used a fast audio-rate sinewave LFO1 on the CV-track, modulated its pitch with LFO2 configured as a one-shot envelope, and also modulated the amplitude of LFO1 with ENV2. Then I routed that from CV-A back into one of the external audio inputs. Massive kicks on the CV-track without using any of the 4 synth tracks.
Finally, I used ENV1 sent as value out of CV-C back into CV-in, to add sinechain-ducking to the bassline on track 1.
When muting the CV track, it then muted the kick and also stopped sidechaining the bassline at the same time.
In my view, this is one small example of the many insane things one can do with the A4, if one just digs deep. 
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Nothing much to add but another positive opinion, for those in the future who rummage through this thread to decide. I really love it.
A few months back I wrote a long post about how I think it’s a great synth to learn synthesis (in response to some old post stating the same). Its not knob per function in a traditional sense, but knob per function per soundscaping category; i.e. the filter page, the amp page, the LFO page, etc. Learning synthesis that helped me out a lot, because it kept things from being overwhelming, and helped to see the different parts chained to work together and the total picture they form.
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well, luckily for me i dont plan on getting more elektron gear for a few more months. i’ll have some time to simmer with it. leaning towards the AK tho, gonna need some keys at one point or another, might as well have elektron keys
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Duuuude, thats some smart patching! Will definetly Try that.
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this is great stuff, thanks for posting!
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