NAMM 2020: The best gear of Day One

NAMM 2020: We’ve officially wrapped up Day One of NAMM 2020 and suffice to say, we were thoroughly impressed by what was presented. Here are five of our best finds from today:

Novation Launchpad Pro Mk3

Novation has updated its Launchpad Pro to include an integrated 32-step polyphonic sequencer, along with new Micro Steps, Probability and Mutation controls. The new Launchpad Pro Mk3 can even detect and display drum racks on the grid.

Korg Wavestate

Korg announced the Wavestate earlier this month, featuring a 37-key layout, and a 64-voice and four-layer setup. The Wavestate uses an advanced form of wave sequencing to ‘see’ the sequence and pitch of each sample as an independent characteristic and add more parameters into the mix.

Yamaha YC61

Yamaha‘s YV61 fills that sweet spot of a stage keyboard that’s compact and lightweight, yet also features real drawbars that have been optimised for haptic feedback. The Japanese brand claims to have reinvented the stage keyboard with the YC61. The new instrument uses Virtual Circuitry Modeling to accurately recreate a tonewheel organ, rotary speaker, pianos, and even has an FM synth built in.

Korg ARP 2600 FS

The Korg ARP 2600 is a legendary piece of hardware with many notable achievements to its name, which is why Korg’s announcement of a one-off, limited production reissue is something worth sitting up and taking notice of. No news yet of the semi-modular synth’s pricing or availability, but you can be sure that it’ll go fast.

Universal Audio Luna

UA‘s Luna recording system is designed to integrate with the Apollo interface and features “no discernible latency” via the new Accelerated Realtime Monitoring feature. The system also features built-in Neve Summing and integrated multitrack tape emulation. Users can also take advantage of Luna’s virtual instruments like the Moog Minimoog and Ravel grand piano.

Keep up with NAMM 2020 news here.