MusiKraken

MusiKraken is a modular MIDI Controller Construction Kit, empowering you to fully harness the capabilities of your mobile device's hardware.

Winner of a 2022 MIDI Innovation Award!

Make music using device sensors like Touch, Motion Sensors, Camera (face, hand, body and color tracking) and Microphone, or connected devices like Game Controllers.

Choose from several types of modules in the editor and connect the ports to create your own personal MIDI controller setup. Route the MIDI signals through effect modules to control multiple instruments simultaneously or invent creative new MIDI controller combinations.

MusiKraken supports sending and receiving MIDI data over Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or to other apps on your device. And it can send the sensor data via OSC. MusiKraken is also one of the first apps to officially support MIDI 2.0!

You already own a very powerful device with all kinds of sensors and connection possibilities. With this app you can use these sensors as inputs, combine them with all kinds of MIDI effects and send the resulting MIDI events to your computer, synthesizer, any other MIDI-capable app to to create your own, expressive MIDI controller setup.

Your device for example might have a multitouch screen. Use this with the Keyboard module to slide on the keys to control multiple musical parameters simultaneously. Using MPE, MIDI 2.0 or the Chord Splitter also allows you to control these parameters separately per key. Multitouch is also used by the Chords Pad to play the chords of a selected scale, or the Touchpad, which allows you control values via touch gestures.

Another unique input sensor is the camera: MusiKraken supports tracking your hands in front of the camera, your body pose, your face or objects with specific colors. This way you can for example use your device as a Theremin, jump or dance around in front of the camera to generate notes or control audio parameters, use your mouth to control the sound of a virtual trumpet, or any other combination.

Your device might also have motion sensors: Accelerometer, Gyroscope and Magnetometer. They can be either used separately, or combined to get the current rotation of the device in three dimensions. Use this to generate sounds or control parameters while shaking or tilting your device.

Your device might also have a microphone, and MusiKraken can detect the pitch or amplitude of the signal.

MusiKraken also allows you to make music using Game Controllers (trigger events on button or thumbstick changes, motion sensors and light on Game Controllers that support it).

The real power comes once you start combining the sensors with the effect modules. There are effects that can be used to change or filter the MIDI events. Some effects allow you to combine multiple input sources into new output values. Or splits chords into separate notes so that they can be sent to different channels.

Important: Please note that some of the modules only work on devices with specific hardware: Camera tracking for example needs a camera, and might be too slow on older devices. MusiKraken tries to make full use of the hardware, but of course this depends on how good the hardware is.