Tanzbär 2 the hybrid drum computer from MFB is ready to make beats
We saw this drum machine at Superbooth back in May. Tanzbär 2 contains both analog and digital drum sounds and a sneaky analog bass synthesizer all run by an advanced step sequencer.
Tanzbär 2
The hybrid nature came about through a desire to build in more versatility. 7 analog drum sounds make it across from the original Tanzbär and to that they’ve added an analog bassline synth. That kind of pushes it into the realms of groovebox rather than drum computer. The 8 digital instruments are slightly confusing in that they get described differently in different places on the website. There are 3 Sample Voices and 10 sample instruments of which 2 instruments share a sample voice. Or, there are 5 sample instruments with 2 types for each voice, plus the 3 sample voices. They probably mean the same thing but let’s go with the idea that you have 8 channels of analog sound and 8 channels of digital, sample-based sound.
On the analog side, you get two kicks, two snares, and three tom/conga channels. hi-hats, percussion and a cymbal. The analog bassline offers some waveform choices and control over filter, envelope and tuning. In the confused sample side you get hi-hats, percussion and cymbal but you can exchange samples with something of your own via a free software tool – or does that only refer to the 3 sample voices? Tanzbär 2 can store around 300 seconds of samples to a total of 208 files. Each channel has its own multi-waveform LFO.
The step sequencer is the heart of the drum computer. It can store 100 patterns and you can chain up to 4 patterns to create 64 step patterns. There are different flam types, 4 different accents per instrument and sound parameters can be stored per step. You can route two tracks out to external MIDI devices.
There are a load of knobs for real-time parameter tweaking and faders for the level of 12 channels. The other 4 being sample voices which are controlled elsewhere. And 12 individual outputs.
It could be a very exciting machine but at the moment it’s difficult to penetrate the specs and work out what it’s capable of. There’s a great sound demo video (below) but they need a bunch of demonstrations to help us get our head around what the digital side is all about.
The Tanzbär 2 is available now for €979.
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2 responses to “Tanzbär 2 the hybrid drum computer from MFB is ready to make beats”
Available now? Where? Analog hi hat, cymbal and percussion? Where did you got that info from?
There is a dco bass synth with analog filter. Analog kicks, snares and toms, the rest is digital…
It’s available for preorder via Thomann here:
https://www.thomann.de/gb/mfb_tanzbaer_2.htm
You’re right, the cymbals are digital – see what I mean about it being confusing?