For some, there’s the step sequencer you dream of. Maybe it has a massive array of buttons for patterns, capable of spreading musical ideas across a lit grid. Maybe every last rhythm is visible, maybe it juggles layers and patterns with ease.
Ryan B just went and built what he wanted.
Under the moniker RNInstruments, he constructed a killer hardware step sequencer with a massive 16×12 grid. And this isn’t like a monome – or Push, or Launchpad, or the like – in that it is truly standalone MIDI hardware. You don’t need any computer, period. See the walkthrough above and pics and demo below.
And what inspired it? You did – the makers who have built your own projects, and readers who have helped build this site and tipped us off on those projects. Ryan explains:
I find so many things inspirational and it is great to see what people can come up with [on CDM]. I was even inspired to make my own MIDI sequencer based on an Arduino. This was my second Arduino project (the first being an LED controller board) and something that I mostly came up with on my own. I’m not a musician, computer scientist, or electrical engineer, but I made this entire sequencer, wrote all the code, and designed working circuit boards and I am pretty proud of that.
Building takes time, of course, so sometimes documentation has to come second. But it is coming. “I do plan to set this up as a DIY project in the future,” Ryan tells CDM. “I am getting ready to build another one and create a detailed instruction guide for the DIYer that I hope will be done at the end of the year.”
We’ll be watching. Congrats, Ryan.
In the meanwhile, you can check out his YouTube channel or his blog:
