Arturia AstroLab Packs A Complete Synth Studio into a Single Keyboard
Meet AstroLab, Arturia’s greatest hits in a stage keyboard with 34 instruments, 10 synth engines and 1300 presets.
After teasing a mysterious announcement across its social media channels over the weekend, Arturia has announced a new product at a livestream event this evening, the AstroLab.
AstroLab is a stage keyboard equipped with more than 1300 sounds from Arturia’s Analog Lab software, a sound library that features an extensive selection of presets from both the Pigments synth and the company’s V Collection, a comprehensive collection of vintage synth emulations.
This means that – in a single keyboard – it gives you access to acoustic sounds, like piano and strings; classic stage piano sounds, like Rhodes, Wurli and Clavinet; vintage synths sounds, like CS-80, DX7, Emulator II & Jupiter-8; organ sounds, like B-3 and Farfisa; string synth sounds, like Solina; West Coast and East Coast modular sounds; and more.
AstroLab’s concept combines Arturia’s ‘Lab keyboards, V Collection instruments & sound banks into a holistic system.
The Arturia AstroLab gives you instant access to presets from a 34 instruments, including:
- ARP2600 V
- Augmented GRAND PIANO
- Augmented STRINGS
- Augmented VOICES
- B-3 V
- Buchla Easel V
- Clavinet V
- CMI V
- CS-80 V
- CZ V
- DX7 V
- Emulator II V
- Farfisa V
- JUN-6 V
- JUP-8 V
- KORG MS-20 V
- Matrix 12 V
- Mini V
- Modular V
- OP-Xa V
- Piano V
- Pigments
- Prophet-5 V
- Prophet-VS V
- Sampler
- SEM V
- Solina V
- SQ80 V
- Stage-73 V
- Synclavier V
- Synthi V
- Vocoder V
- Vox Continental V
- Wurli
AstroLab’s 61-key, semi-weighted keyboard is equipped with channel aftertouch, and sits below a beautifully designed interface based around a circular display that also acts as a rotary encoder. Two additional banks of rotaries operate macro controls for the AstroLab’s sounds and its 12 onboard effects, which include delay, reverb, chorus, phaser, distortion and more.
The keyboard is kitted out with an arpeggiator, chord and scale modes (that work in conjunction with its 61 LEDs above the keys) and a 32-bar looper, in addition to a vocoder engine that can be used with an external microphone. AstroLab’s 1300+ sounds can be split across the keyboard or layered together in multitimbral patches.
In addition to AstroLab Connect, a mobile app for browsing presets and purchasing new sounds, AstroLab comes bundled with Arturia’s Analog Lab Pro software which can be used to access more sounds, customize the keyboard’s sound library and assign custom macros. Owners of Arturia’s software instruments can also go beyond Analog Lab’s four macro controls to design customized patches on the computer to be loaded on to the keyboard.
As for connectivity, AstroLab is equipped with both WiFi and Bluetooth for hooking up with its companion apps, USB-C and USB-A ports, MIDI In/Out, a stereo line output and a headphone output. You’ll also find a stereo combo input for running a microphone into the keyboard, along with jacks for sustain and expression pedals.
Official AstroLab overview:
Features:
- 61-note semi-weighted keyboard with piano-size keys and aftertouch
- 10 sound engines
- Virtual Analog
- Samples
- Wavetable
- FM
- Granular
- Physical modelling
- Vector Synthesis
- Harmonic
- Phase distortion
- Vocoder
- Over 1300 in-built sounds
- More than 10.000 sounds via Arturia software
- Navigation wheel & screen for easy browsing
- 10 Preset Buttons for quick sound access
- 4 macro controls for quick editing
- Brightness
- Timbre
- Time
- Movement
- 12 insert FX
- 4 dedicated knobs to control FX including dedicated Delay/Reverb
- Multis/Keyboard Split
- MIDI IN i/o, balanced stereo input, sustain, expression, aux 1 & 2 pedals
- USB-C connection and USB-A host
- Bluetooth audio input and WiFi for wireless control
- Arpeggiator, MIDI Looper, Chord & Scale modes
Arturia AstroLab Demo:
AstroLab is priced at $1999. Find out more on Arturia website.
