It's great
I was thinking about getting the new version of mela but classic works better for what I'm doing I don't need the other features of the new one
All three Mela versions are amazing.
I have been a supporter since version 1. Mela 3 falls right in line with the consistency and quality of the developer. After playing with each of them for differences , there are slight improvements with each version. Is it worth the upgrade? Absolutely, is it worth buying if you never heard of it? Without a doubt.
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Cross device Synths are THE future
Very nice synth and high quality synth.
Deleted synth for design changes
Having to manually enable background audio EVERY TIME I play it in the background is very dumb (right up there with ripiff subscriptions)! You’re fostering dropping IQs by thinking for less intelligent people exacerbating the situation. I can’t endorse this kind of thinking. I love Mela but sorry, but I cannot endorse that philosophy.
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Response from developer
Update: After talking to more users and asking them what behaviour they prefer, I decided to make Mela retain the Background Audio setting even after the app is restarted. So, it now behaves as you expect it to. Previous reply: Hey, when implementing features I always think about what sort of experience I want from an audio/music app. Too many times I've woken up to a dead iPad because some audio app was draining its battery all night by running in the background because I launch it for a few minutes to do something quickly with it. Or sometimes I would accidentally pocket-launch an audio app on my iPhone which would drain the battery. I didn't want Mela to cause this issue for me or others. So, that behaviour was a design decision, that if the user wants background audio mode they need to enable it again after the app is killed. Having said that, after you emailed me about this I took your feedback and said I would figure out a solution for it. Sorry, you found this behaviour frustrating. I'll see if I can improve it. Btw this feature didn’t change over time. It was always like this, since Mela v1.
great, amazing synth
U cant get it yo ryn un abelton, like many mac au or vst. ipad works perfectly. Super creative and fab UI
Response from developer
You should be able to run Mela and Mela FX plug-ins in Ableton Live 11.2 or later. If you still have issues please email me directly and we’ll investigate.
Amazing range of sounds and effects...
... with an easy to use and understand user interface. Great design and a great synthesizer. Works great in both iOS and on macOS (and you get the desktop version for free if you buy it on iOS!).
Great synth and audio effects. MIDI plug-in is buggy in Cubasis.
This is a great, package deal for the price. One thing I really like is that you can scroll through the parameters in the Cubasis effects frame. That makes parameters easy to get to without feeling cramped. I really like the synth and effects. The synth and audio auv3 plugins come with a lot of mice presets. The midi plug-in with only 10 presets, but it’s enough to get you started. The Mela MIDI plug-in works in Cubasis, but it’s not very usable. When I loop a section in Cubasis with the Mela plug-in activated, the plug-in stops arpeggiating when the loop repeats. When I hit the MIDI panic button, the arp starts playing by itself. I really hope that the developer fixes this. Otherwise, I feel that this plug-in is great for someone who is looking for an all-in-one plug-in deal.
UPDATE: The developer fixed the issue! The MIDI effects plugin now works as expected! This my favorite MIDI effect plugin, now. 5 stars. Thank you, very much!
UPDATE: The developer fixed the issue! The MIDI effects plugin now works as expected! This my favorite MIDI effect plugin, now. 5 stars. Thank you, very much!
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Response from developer
Hey, thanks for the review. I will look into the arpeggiator issue in Cubasis. And more presets will be added to Mela MIDI as I add more modules over time :) Update: I’ve just released the Mela 3.0.1 update, with fixes to the Arpeggiator. Let me know if you experience any more issues.
Amazing synth!
This is a very good sounding synth. Very inspiring to play with. GUI is very neat and intuitive. Only downside is that it can be quite heavy on CPU in AUM.
Vivement Mela 4
C’est tellement mieux de ressortir un nouveau mela que de mettre à jour les vieux.
Response from developer
Hey, sorry to hear you’ve had a bad experience. Feel free to get in touch and I’ll be more than happy to try to address any issues or concerns. If you are unhappy about the purchase, please contact Apple for the refund. The details on how to request a refund is available on the Mela FAQ page. Thanks Nikolozi
Mela 3 is compact, solid, discrete FX give possibilities.
I had Mela 2 and although in Mela 2 it’s billed as an ‘upgrade’, your Mela 2 does not disappear, it’s just Mela 3 appears as a separate synth. The FX warrant a special mention - I lost a ‘dual delay’ from the appstore recently (not the common meaning of ‘stereo delay’ but two in series), and it’s kind of useful to have an identical set of effects, you can shove into an AUv3 FX slot in eg GarageBand, outside of the synth itself. In short - a delay of say 1/4 on the actual synth can be set up, then a delay of say 1/2d on the ‘FX’ slot, giving rise to a long, slowly damping echo/delay into the distance. Mela 3’s FX like delay are in fact, stereo anyway, so you can have TWO stereo delays, in series, allowing permutations.
The same can be done with the other effects, so ‘doubling-up’ of FX in series, can be accomplished. This is a great feature to explore, this ‘carving out’ of the FX unit from the synth, so it can sit as a separate AU to use either on Mela 3 itself (or Mela 2 of course!), or ANY other synth or track.
This seems like great value. If the sound needs beefed-up, add some saturator effect, or similar, even a guitar distortion effect, the usual trick for enhancing keyboards is to add flanger/chorus/saturation not necessarily in that order, ‘to taste’ as it were.
Dodgy/fragile/fickle Audio Units are thankfully becoming more rare, and in this regard Mela 3 is very good. It loads and plays, without glitches or drama and that was true on my older iPad Pro 2 as well as my ‘new’ iPad Pro M1 (bought used is great value - keep making new stuff please Apple, I need the cast-off gear).
This is probably a little understated this synth, and although it does not produce lush complex tones ‘out of the box’ it’s actually only possible to have a limited amount of those in a song before it sounds like mush anyway, so Mela is good for those ‘cutting’ synth sounds, and more pure sine waves. But, I’ve only done limited use with it to date. More is possible, and the M1 slowly leaking out into the used-gear market, is going to help democratise music.
For those not in a position to grab their slice of Apple silicon quite yet, Mela 2 or 3 is a good low-overhead way to let the less capable hardware like an iphone or intel-based iPad, drive several tracks with this compact synth, letting multiple layers of synth/sequencer/arpeggio come forth without over-taxing the device capabilities.
Then later, when you upgrade, you can try swapping out some of the tracks in songs created with Mela 3, and introduce more lush or complex tones as and when budget allows. But, just to reiterate, Mela can be made more complex by adding FX into the chain in Apple’s baby GB, or Cubasis 2 or 3, etc. And of course, Mela also runs standalone, so the FX built-in, is very useful, if you don’t want to run a DAW session every time to try out melody ideas, or making your own sound patches. To that end, there’s a neat window view of the ‘waveform’ and the user can make adjustments graphically for Attack etc.
I have a soft spot for Mela because it works, it’s got the FX built-in and a separate (identical) FX unit, and it’s very compact and not too CPU-intensive (or DSP intensive). It’s standalone and Audio Unit v3, and the new amber colour scheme is more mellow on the eye as well (is that just cos my ‘night-time’ setting is on?!). The economical use of device resources enables anyone to explore even quite complex multi-track sequencer runs.
If I had a grumble, it’s a very ‘generic’ grumble, not peculiar to Mela 3, that not everything that can be done, is ‘baked-in’ when recording in for example, GarageBand, with the Audio Unit. Typically, for a lot of synths, any ‘clever’ features like an x-y pad effect, do not end up in the finished recorded track ie not automated.
This common aspect that many more expensive AUs have too, shouldn’t detract from any synth in particular - it’s going to arrive, in time. In summary : Mela is compact; solid; CPU/DSP-efficient; has a built-in and ‘detachable’ FX module deployable on ANY track/instrument in the DAW; and it’s not a fortune either. Understated really - if Mela 3 occupied a piece of hardware, it’d have a pretty big fascia, because one small section (eg ‘flanger effect’) actually when tapped, displays an entire module just for itself.
The same can be done with the other effects, so ‘doubling-up’ of FX in series, can be accomplished. This is a great feature to explore, this ‘carving out’ of the FX unit from the synth, so it can sit as a separate AU to use either on Mela 3 itself (or Mela 2 of course!), or ANY other synth or track.
This seems like great value. If the sound needs beefed-up, add some saturator effect, or similar, even a guitar distortion effect, the usual trick for enhancing keyboards is to add flanger/chorus/saturation not necessarily in that order, ‘to taste’ as it were.
Dodgy/fragile/fickle Audio Units are thankfully becoming more rare, and in this regard Mela 3 is very good. It loads and plays, without glitches or drama and that was true on my older iPad Pro 2 as well as my ‘new’ iPad Pro M1 (bought used is great value - keep making new stuff please Apple, I need the cast-off gear).
This is probably a little understated this synth, and although it does not produce lush complex tones ‘out of the box’ it’s actually only possible to have a limited amount of those in a song before it sounds like mush anyway, so Mela is good for those ‘cutting’ synth sounds, and more pure sine waves. But, I’ve only done limited use with it to date. More is possible, and the M1 slowly leaking out into the used-gear market, is going to help democratise music.
For those not in a position to grab their slice of Apple silicon quite yet, Mela 2 or 3 is a good low-overhead way to let the less capable hardware like an iphone or intel-based iPad, drive several tracks with this compact synth, letting multiple layers of synth/sequencer/arpeggio come forth without over-taxing the device capabilities.
Then later, when you upgrade, you can try swapping out some of the tracks in songs created with Mela 3, and introduce more lush or complex tones as and when budget allows. But, just to reiterate, Mela can be made more complex by adding FX into the chain in Apple’s baby GB, or Cubasis 2 or 3, etc. And of course, Mela also runs standalone, so the FX built-in, is very useful, if you don’t want to run a DAW session every time to try out melody ideas, or making your own sound patches. To that end, there’s a neat window view of the ‘waveform’ and the user can make adjustments graphically for Attack etc.
I have a soft spot for Mela because it works, it’s got the FX built-in and a separate (identical) FX unit, and it’s very compact and not too CPU-intensive (or DSP intensive). It’s standalone and Audio Unit v3, and the new amber colour scheme is more mellow on the eye as well (is that just cos my ‘night-time’ setting is on?!). The economical use of device resources enables anyone to explore even quite complex multi-track sequencer runs.
If I had a grumble, it’s a very ‘generic’ grumble, not peculiar to Mela 3, that not everything that can be done, is ‘baked-in’ when recording in for example, GarageBand, with the Audio Unit. Typically, for a lot of synths, any ‘clever’ features like an x-y pad effect, do not end up in the finished recorded track ie not automated.
This common aspect that many more expensive AUs have too, shouldn’t detract from any synth in particular - it’s going to arrive, in time. In summary : Mela is compact; solid; CPU/DSP-efficient; has a built-in and ‘detachable’ FX module deployable on ANY track/instrument in the DAW; and it’s not a fortune either. Understated really - if Mela 3 occupied a piece of hardware, it’d have a pretty big fascia, because one small section (eg ‘flanger effect’) actually when tapped, displays an entire module just for itself.
Show more
All three Mela versions are amazing.
I have been a supporter since version 1. Mela 3 falls right in line with the consistency and quality of the developer. After playing with each of them for differences , there are slight improvements with each version. Is it worth the upgrade? Absolutely, is it worth buying if you never heard of it? Without a doubt.
Show more
