Diego Capoccitti has released MPEdie, available as a FREE download.
If you’ve ever played a hardware synthesizer with MIDI Polyphonic Expression (MPE)—like a Roli Seaboard, LinnStrument, or Expressive E Osmose—you know how transformative it is. Unlike traditional MIDI, where bending pitch or modulating cutoffs affects every note playing simultaneously, MPE gives every individual finger its own voice. A single note can glide, swell, and filter-sweep entirely independently of the chord sustained around it.
However, specialized MPE hardware can be expensive and heavy to tote around.
Diego Capoccitti (34Audiovisuals) addresses this with MPEdie—a powerful, customizable, and remarkably honest MPE controller app for iPhone and iPad.
Whether you’re producing inside an iOS DAW like Loopy Pro or AUM, or sending MPE data over Wi-Fi/Bluetooth to your desktop setup, MPEdie turns your touchscreen into an expressive multi-touch performance surface.
MPEdie is purely a controller—it makes no sound on its own. Instead, it acts as a expressive front-end for any synth, sampler, or virtual instrument that supports MPE.
Here are the key highlights that make it a compelling addition to any iOS music toolkit:
1. Four Unique Playing Surfaces
Not everyone wants a traditional keyboard layout on a glass screen. MPEdie offers four tailored modes:
- Piano: The familiar layout your hands already know. Sliding your finger vertically or horizontally follows the pitch under your finger rather than restricting you to key widths.
- Isomorphic Grid: A geometric grid where chord shapes remain identical regardless of key. Customise the rows, columns, and interval offsets to fit your playing style.
- Ribbon: One continuous, frictionless strip with no key boundaries—ideal for fluid, fretless pitch glides and subtle microtonal expressive work.
- Scale Grid: Highlights only notes within a selected scale (with 14 scale presets available), ensuring you never hit a wrong note during live improvisation.
2. Upfront, Honest Touch Mechanics
Many touch controllers claim to offer “pressure” sensitivity on iOS screens. MPEdie tells it like it is: iOS glass cannot measure true downward force. It measures contact area (how much of your fingertip flattens against the glass).
MPEdie exposes this directly in its matrix rather than faking it, giving you consistent, predictable response curves you can actually dial in and rely on during performances.
3. Comprehensive Modulation Matrix
Every movement of your finger is routable across an 8-source by 7-destination modulation matrix:
- Sources: Sideways glide, absolute/relative vertical position, contact area, force/velocity, time held, or fixed values.
- Destinations: Pitch bend, timbre (brightness/cutoff), pressure, strike velocity, lift velocity, and two unassigned MIDI CCs.
- Customization: Each link features individual gain, offset, inversion, and response curve settings.
4. Seamless AUv3 & Desktop Integration
MPEdie functions both as a standalone app and as an AUv3 MIDI plugin inside iOS hosts like AUM, Drambo, or Loopy Pro.
Additionally, it includes a free desktop companion app for macOS and Windows. The desktop utility receives MPE data from your iPad over the local network and publishes it as a virtual MIDI port in your DAW (Ableton Live, Logic Pro, Bitwig, etc.). Your DAW sees MPEdie just like a plug-and-play USB hardware controller, allowing you to record per-note expression directly into your tracks.
For more information and to download MPEdie, click here:
NOTE: Some of the links you click on may be affiliated. Clicking and purchasing using these links helps support and fund The Beat Community. Thanks for your support.
