Recording - April 2018 - 53

choose from and can play over multiple
octaves and trigger chords as well.
Put all of these features together and
you get a very capable controller that
excels at getting the notes you want into
a DAW. For a lot of musicians whose
primary instrument isn't a keyboard,
this is a very big deal. Thanks to Scale
Guide, Easy Scale, and Chord Mode,
you don't need to know a whole lot
of music theory or keyboard scales to
be able to step-enter melodies and
harmonies for virtual instruments to
play. You can easily build a great arrangement for your demos, leaving you room to
stretch out with your chosen instrument
later and record its parts over the top.
The only part of setting up a nanoKEY
Studio that might be tricky is assigning
its controls to MIDI commands in your
DAW. MIDI Learn makes the operation
itself easy in any DAW, but be prepared
to take notes on which control does what!
My only gripe with the nanoKEY Studio
is that neither the keys nor the pads are
pressure-sensitive, but that won't bother
the majority of users. The nanoKEY Studio
really hits the mark when it comes to
mobile desktop production, especially for
folks nervous about creating arrangements in a DAW.

nanoKONTROL Studio

The nanoKONTROL Studio is an
8-channel control surface with a 50mm
fader, pan pot, and Mute, Solo, Record
Arm, and Track Select buttons for each
channel. There are also transport controls,
marker and track navigation buttons, a jog
wheel (which can work as a scrub control
in some DAWs), and a Scene selector.
The control surface can act in one of
two modes: Assignable, where every
control has a MIDI message preassigned
by the user, or DAW Mixer Control, where
the entire control surface operates under
the Mackie Control protocol. Powerup
key combinations fine-tune operation for
several DAWs: Cubase, Digital Performer,
Live, Pro Tools, SONAR, and Studio One.
A separate plug-in is required for use with
GarageBand or Logic.
In my tests, I found both Assignable and
DAW Mixer Control modes to work perfectly out of the box. The faders and pots
are smooth, the jog wheel is lightweight
but works without jitter, and there were no

nasty surprises in terms of correspondence
between controls and expected actions.
This is a perfect example of a device
designed for one task that does it well.
If you don't feel the need for a full-featured
portable control surface to do your
songwriting, then you won't miss having
the nanoKONTROL Studio, but if you
love hands-on control of your DAW no
matter where you are, then it will pay
for itself in a hurry.

And then there's Gadget

We first reviewed Gadget, Korg's
amazing mobile virtual-instrument DAW,
in February 2015, and it's grown a lot
since then (enough for a second look
in a future issue). Both of the new Korg
controllers are Gadget-ready out of the
box, and add a lot to the experience.
A pair of switches on Gadget's Settings
page activate one or both of its Native
Modes for the two controllers, depending on which you have. (There's a setting
for the nanoKONTROL 2 as well.) Once
you do that, the nanoKONTROL Studio
takes over the mixer and transport in
Gadget and replicates their essential
functions in hardware, and the nanoKEY
Studio gives you hands-on control of
eight of the most commonly-used parameters in any Gadget you call up-usually
things like filter cutoff, resonance, effects
sends, and envelope settings.
Mixing and overwriting automation
becomes much easier with actual faders
in hand, and it's more fun and adventurous
to tweak sounds as you play if you can
just turn a knob. The overall experience
is greatly enhanced, and for an app
that's already as good as Gadget is,
that's saying something.

Conclusions

Korg continues to offer compelling
and truly useful products for the mobile
songwriter and composer, stuff that
goes beyond "cute toys" and really
brings value and creative options to the
desktop. These two controllers add to
that legacy, and you should definitely
check out what they can do for you.

PRICE: $149.99 each
MORE FROM: Korg,
www.korg.com
RECORDING April 2018

53
http://placidaudio.com http://www.korg.com
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