— Interactive guide · FW 5.0
MicroFreak
Arturia’s hybrid synth, explained properly — all 22 oscillator types, the matrix, the cycling envelope, the sequencer and every setting from the manual, searchable in a keystroke, with Arturia’s videos and the community’s best tutorials beside the topics they explain.
- chapters
- 13 chapters
- topics
- 90 topics
- key combos
- 81 key combos
- videos
- 61 videos
— Where to start
Your first hour
Plug in, browse presets, learn the panel and save your first sound.
Sound design
Oscillator, filter, envelopes and the matrix — the whole voice.
- 1Oscillator basics
- 2The 22 oscillator types
- 3Filter types and cutoff
- 4The envelope
- 5The cycling envelope
- 6The LFO
- 7The matrix
Arps & sequences
Arpeggiate, record sequences and modulation tracks, then add Spice.
Beyond the basics
Paraphony, scales, the vocoder, samples and other gear.
- 1Paraphonic mode and chord mode
- 2Playing in a scale
- 3How the vocoder works
- 4Sample
- 5Loading your own samples
- 6CV, gate and pressure outputs
- 7Controlling with MIDI CCs
— Explore the panel
What does this key do?
Tap any knob, button, icon or the keyboard. Hold Shift to light up the blue functions.
Pick a control to see what it does.
All 47 controls on the panel, from the matrix to the keyboard. Words in blue are what a control does while SHIFT is held.
Redrawn from the manual’s panel photos (§3.1) · not to exact scale
— Contents
13 chapters, start anywhere
Start here
What it is, how to plug it in, and how the sound flows through it.
What the MicroFreak is · How to read this guide · Connections · Powering up · Firmware updates · Signal flow
Panel & controls
Every knob, button and touch control — and what Shift adds.
The front panel · What Shift does · Display, encoders and buttons
Presets
Browse, load, save and tweak the 512 preset slots.
Loading presets · Saving presets · Settings saved with each preset · Panel mode · Digitally controlled analog
The modulation matrix
Patch any source to any knob without a single cable.
Control signals · The matrix · Matrix sources and destinations · Assignable destinations · Matrix ideas
The digital oscillator
Twenty-two oscillator types, from saw waves to granular samples.
Oscillator basics · The 22 oscillator types · Basic Waves · Superwave · Wavetable · Harmonic oscillator · Karplus-Strong · Virtual analog · Waveshaper · Two-operator FM · Granular formant · Chords · Speech · Modal resonator · Noise · BASS · SAWX · HARM · User wavetable · Sample · Scan grains · Cloud grains · Hit grains · Vocoder oscillator
The analog filter
Low-pass, band-pass and high-pass, with resonance and modulation.
Filter types and cutoff · Resonance · Animating the filter
Envelopes & LFO
The envelope, the cycling envelope and the LFO that move the sound.
The envelope · Amp Mod · The cycling envelope · Cycling envelope ideas · The LFO
Keyboard & touch strip
The touch keyboard, glide, hold, Spice, Dice and bend.
The touch keyboard · Gates and triggers · Keyboard response · Glide · Octave buttons · Key hold · Spice & Dice · The bend strip
Arpeggiator & sequencer
Arp patterns, two paraphonic sequencers and their modulation tracks.
The arpeggiator · Arp modes and Pattern · Arp rate, sync and swing · Arp range and transposing · Turning an arpeggio into a sequence · The sequencer · Step recording · Real-time recording · Editing, copying and clearing sequences · Modulation tracks · Sequencer ideas
Scales & paraphony
Lock the keyboard to a scale, play four voices, or stack them in unison.
Playing in a scale · The scale root · Paraphonic mode and chord mode · Unison
Vocoder & speech
The Vocoder oscillator, microphones and the Speech oscillator’s words.
How the vocoder works · Connecting a microphone · Playing the vocoder · Vocoder settings and mic levels · Speech oscillator words and CCs
MIDI, CV & sync
Drive modular gear, sync to a clock and control everything over MIDI.
CV, gate and pressure outputs · Clock and sync · MIDI channels and computers · Local control · Controlling with MIDI CCs · MIDI CC chart
Utility & MIDI Control Center
Preset and global settings, plus wavetable and sample management.
Utility: preset settings · Utility: global settings · MIDI Control Center · Loading your own wavetables · Loading your own samples
— Muscle memory
The combos you’ll use every day
Shift does a lot of quiet work on the MicroFreak. The full cheat sheet has all 81, filterable by key and printable.
Open the cheat sheet- SHIFT + ARP | SEQ
- Toggles between the arpeggiator and the sequencer.
- Long press SAVE
- Quick-saves the sound to its current slot; the display shows
Preset saved. - Press PRESET three times
- Resets the current sound to the empty
Initstate — press quickly, in a row. - Hold MATRIX for half a second
- Clears the selected point and resets its amount to zero.
- SHIFT + KEY
- Transposes the arpeggio, with the interval shown on the display; with Hold on, it lasts until you play a new arpeggio.Arpeggiator
- SHIFT + UP | A
- Transfers the current arpeggio to sequence A.Arpeggiator
— Watch
Learn it from Arturia and the community
Arturia MicroFreak Review and Tutorial: Everything you need to know, including all 12 sound engines
loopop
The definitive overview: every original engine, the filter, touch keys, matrix, cycling envelope and Spice & Dice, fully chaptered.
What’s New? | MicroFreak - Firmware V5
Arturia
Arturia’s own tour of FW 5: the Sample and three Grains engines, sample transfer in MIDI Control Center, the new random key mode and envelope snap.
Using the Arturia MICROFREAK complete deep dive guide tutorial
XNB
Nearly two hours covering every non-oscillator feature (presets, panel, paraphony, filter, envelopes, matrix, arp, sequencer, unison, chord and scale modes) with timecodes.
An independent guide by boog.ie, not affiliated with or endorsed by Arturia. MicroFreak is a trademark of Arturia SA. Content is written in our own words from Arturia’s MicroFreak User Manual (FW 5.0.0, July 2023); community material is credited and linked. When in doubt, the official manual wins. Arturia manuals & downloads