Moog's New App Is a Spot-on Recreation of a Classic Synth



Five years ago, Moog Music proved you could use the iPad as a real musical instrument when it released Animoog, a polyphonic synthesizer app that made full use of the tablet's touchscreen. You could prop your tablet up on a stand and go at it with four, five, or six fingers to channel your inner Keith Emerson.



A Knob-Twiddler's Delight



The controls are satisfyingly smooth. To twist a knob, just touch it on the screen and drag your finger up or down or sideways. The response rivals that of real controls. Sure, absolutely nothing about the iPad's glass screen exactly replicates the feel of physical knobs, but you can dial in positions with the accuracy of real potentiometers. The synth offers four touch interfaces, too: piano-style keys, an arpeggiator, a ribbon controller, and the dynamic slider keys of the Animoog. And like iOS's other MIDI-powered softsynths, you can connect a keyboard or knob controller to your iPad.

Forged From Metal

Moog designed the app using Metal, Apple's new graphics optimization framework, so the pinching, scrolling, and twisting feels snappy even when you've got a complex sound moving through multiple modules. I tested the app on the new iPad Pro, but it runs on an iPad Air or later as long as it's running iOS 9.3. It also works on iPhones later than the 5s, and any iPod Touch from the last two years. But you definitely want a bigger screen. The iPad Pro's vast display makes the Model 15 a truly formidable instrument. It helps that the Pro sports four speakers, making the app just loud and rich enough for jamming with other musicians. Plug it into an amp and your hair stands on end.

In the video below, you can see synth pioneer Suzanne Ciani playing the app at the Moog factory. She also designed one of the preset packs, and she wrote a song with it which she uploaded to Soundcloud.