Get playing FIZZ

Start

• On screen: click Play FIZZ. The FM-1 is drawn on the page: click or touch its keys and buttons, drag a knob up or down (or use the wheel). The computer keyboard plays it too (the key map).
• With your FM-1: it needs RemoteFM1, installed from the browser in about a minute (any other firmware can go back on later). Then Connect FM-1 in Chrome or Edge: its keys, knobs and screen become FIZZ's, and the sound comes from the computer.
• On the FM-1 itself: FIZZ is also firmware for the FM-1, playing on its own with no computer; put it on from Install.
• A MIDI keyboard (settings ⋯, Playing: Enable MIDI) plays the selected track: the page sends it to FIZZ on channel 16, whatever channel it sends on.
• Live labels: on the drawn panel, every knob, button and key is named with what it does right now, as FIZZ tells it; hold SHIFT and they flip to its shortcuts. The settings (⋯, View) turn them off.
• FIZZ wakes on its bubbles screen. Press anything to get to the step view. PLAY starts and stops.

The step view

• Tap a white key: that step plays the track's note. Tap it again to remove it.
• A new step plays the track's defaults (its notes, velocity, length…). Change a default and every step still using it follows.
• SELECT turns the page: a track has 8 pages of 16 steps.
• HOME always brings you back here, from anywhere. SHIFT + HOME cycles PIANO ROLL, STEPS, EDIT and GEEK OUT (SELECT turns its pages: METERS, NUMBERS, VOICES, SCOPE); HOME comes back. HOME keeps the view: you always return to the one you chose, GEEK OUT on its last page.
• Colours tell you what a step plays: warm white its own notes, cyan the track's, violet a lock with no note. While playing, a red marker walks the steps.

Hold a step, and the black keys

1. Pick what to edit with a black key, nothing held: B1 NOTEB2 VELB3 LENB4 MICROB5 RATCHB6 CHNCB7 CONDB8 TRIGB9 FUNCB10 SOUNDB11 P-LOCK The screen draws the page for that choice: steps with their own value in colour, the rest grey.
2. Hold the step's white key. The screen shows that step with a magenta frame, and it plays (when stopped).
3. Turn SELECT or KNOB 1 for the value, or press a black key B1 … B10 for one of ten values (VEL 13 … 127, LEN ¼ … ∞, chance 10 % … 100 % …).
4. B11 puts the step back on the track's default.

• Chords: in NOTE, hold a step and press black keys: the first replaces the note, more pressed together add to the chord (up to six). SELECT moves the whole chord; KNOB 1 … 4 move notes 2 … 5 each alone. F1 / F2 shift the ten keys an octave.
• Several steps at once: hold several white keys.
• No holding: LFO (LATCH) is the step latch: tap steps to select them, then edit as if held. Double-tap a step to add or remove it. With nothing selected the black keys choose the mode (MODES, the default; hold LFO and turn SELECT for VALUES, where they set the selection's values or the track's default). LFO or HOME ends it.
• A track's default: hold the mode's black key and turn the knobs; B11 resets it.
• P-LOCK (B11): hold a step and turn KNOB 1 … 4 to lock FREQ, DECAY, HARM and FDBK on it.

The knobs

• The knobs accelerate: slowly one step a click, spun much faster. SHIFT + a knob is the finest step (but SHIFT + SELECT is the track, below).
• SHIFT + SELECT changes the track, in every view (the big track picture). SHIFT + B6 taps the tempo (the TAP screen: the BPM, the taps as dots, and a breakdancing gorilla that jumps to its next pose on every tap and grooves on the beat; past 180 BPM it goes wild), SHIFT + B8 turns page follow on or off. SHIFT's black-key shortcuts work in the sound editor too.
• Every knob turn shows its name and value in a band at the top of the screen.

The sound editor

• EDIT opens it for the selected track; EDIT again or HOME closes it (F1 does not: it copies steps here, as everywhere).
• The black keys are its groups; press one again for its next page, or turn SELECT through every page: B1 PLAY / MODB2 OPERATORSB3 OP ENVELOPESB4 FILTERSB5 AMP / FXB6 · B7 · B8 LFO 1 · 2 · 3
• KNOB 1 … 4 turn the four values along the bottom; ALGORITHM is the pink badge's (on RATIO: the algorithm).
• Nothing held, a turn changes the track's sound (dark orange frame). A step held, every turn is a lock on that step (bright orange frame).
• Hold an LFO key (B6 … B8) and turn any knob to send that LFO to the value; turning sets the depth.
• Hold B1 and turn any knob to put a modulation source on the value: W1 … W8 choose it while B1 is held (VEL, KEY, MW, AT, PB, BR, RAND, F ENV); turning sets the depth. B1's MOD page shows the eight slots (ALGORITHM picks one). MW, AT, PB and BR come from MIDI on the track's channel.
• Hold B9 a second: the dice shake, then roll for this page's values (let go early: nothing); hold B10 until the cork pops for a whole new sound. SHIFT + F1 undoes it.
• REC in the editor turns its keyboard on, to play while you tweak.
• Portamento (B1, PORT): OFF, ON (every note glides from the last) or LEGATO (only into a held note); TIME, and SLOPE (TIME: the same time for any leap; RATE: the same speed). Chords glide note by note. Lock PORT ON on a step of a MONO track for a 303 slide.
• The filter machines (B4, FILTER: ALGORITHM is the MACHINE; or hold B4 for the six as a popup: a knob or B1 … B6 picks one): MULTI (TYPE morphs LP to BP to HP), LOWPASS 4, LEGACY (LP12 / HP12 / OFF), COMB- and COMB+ (FREQ the pitch, FDBK the ring, LPF its brightness), EQ (a bell: GAIN and Q). BASE's ROUTE puts the base-width before or after the filter.
• CRUSH (B5): BITS (16 down to 1), SRR (the sample rate divided, up to 64 times) and ROUTE, after or before the filter: the Digitone II's bit and sample-rate reduction, in the sound.
• AHD (B5, AMP: ALGORITHM is the MODE): attack, hold, decay. HOLD is a time (one-shot) or NOTE (while the key is down).
• DRIVE's ROUTE (B5, LEVEL, KNOB 3): POST after the filter, as before, or PRE before it.

Tracks, patterns, tempo, the keyboard

• Hold SEL (TRACKS): the six tracks. SEL + B1 … B6 selects one; SEL + tap W1 … W6 mutes, hold solos.
• Hold SEQ (PATTERNS): the patterns, and they stay open when you let go (SEQ lit; tap SEQ or HOME to close). B1 … B4 the bank, W the pattern (it comes in at the end of the playing one).
• F3 (both OCT keys, or hold PLAY): SELECT the tempo, ALGORITHM the swing (the tap-tempo ape dances to it), B1 … B7 the track's note value. OCT− closes it.
• ENV (MIX) is the mixer, FX the effects (ChoralRoot's chorus, delay, reverb and master filter). In the mixer, tap a black key to select its track, hold it to mute, double-tap it to solo (B11 clears them); SELECT turns the page, ALGORITHM the track, PRESETS mutes (left) or unmutes (right). Hold a step there and turn: its level, pan and sends become locks of that step (F2 + the knob clears one). The magenta frame and the count in the corner say steps are held or selected; the locked fader or bar gets a chip. A latch selection from the step view is let go there: select steps in the mixer itself. HOME closes them. On FX's last page, ROUTING, KNOB 1 picks PARALLEL (the sends into three buses, as always) or CHAIN (one path through CHORUS, DELAY, REVERB and the FILTER in the order drawn; KNOB 2 … 4 the amounts); hold a block's page key (B4 CHORUS, B2 DELAY, B3 REVERB, B5 FILTER) and turn KNOB 1 to move it.
• Tap SEL: the track's settings: MODE GLOBAL / LOCAL (GLOBAL: SCALE and ROOT set the project's global key, which new tracks follow; LOCAL: only this track's), SCALE, ROOT, MIDI CH; the white keys are its steps, or notes after a REC tap (the page stays); page 3 gives it a KIND (its icon everywhere its name shows) and a NAME typed on the keybed.
• REC makes the keybed a keyboard for the track, from F like the keybed. Recording works in every view: stopped, hold REC to arm it (it blinks); the first note you play (or PLAY) starts it. Playing, hold REC and let go to start recording; a tap of REC stops it. SHIFT + F1 / F2 undo and redo.
• Takes (SHIFT + REC, KNOB 3 TAKE): CAPTURE, the default, for quick takes: armed, nothing changes until your first note; then the track is cleared to one page of 16 and the take runs from the top. PLAY or REC ends it, and the track becomes as long as you played. REPLACE (a note replaces the step's) and OVERDUB (it joins them) record into the sequence as it is.
• Clear the track: F1 + hold B9 (or SHIFT + B11 twice) clears it to a new track: page 1 only, every page 16 steps. Its sound and speed stay.
• Automation: playing, hold REC and turn knobs in any view: the moves become locks on the steps the playhead passes (empty steps become ghost steps), only while REC is held. The screen is framed red while it records. The record settings' page 2 (SHIFT + REC twice): AUTOMATION on or off for a latched recording.
• MIDI: channels 1 … 6 play tracks 1 … 6 (each track's MIDI CH), channel 15 the selected track, channel 16 is the remote: see MIDI.
• F1 + W copies a step (whole: its locks, its sound, its MIDI FX), then other steps pressed with F1 get it pasted; F2 + W picks up and drops. They work wherever the white keys are steps: the step view, the mixer, the effects, the sound editor and MIDI FX on STEPS, with the same pictures.
• F1 never closes a main page (the step view, the mixer, the effects, the sound editor, MIDI FX): HOME or the page's own key does. Pop-ups (F3, the settings, the projects, the browser) still go back on F1.

Tools

• Tap SEQ to open TOOLS on the selected track; SEQ again or HOME leaves.
• The tools on the black keys (PRESETS steps through them all):
  • B1 ROTATE: shifts the steps round
  • B2 REVERSE: plays them backwards
  • B3 RANDOM: rolls new steps
  • B4 EUCLID: spreads N hits evenly
  • B5 GRIDS: a drum pattern from a map
  • B6 HUMANIZE: loosens timing and velocity
  • B7 QUANTIZE: pulls them back to the grid
  • B8 LENGTH: doubles or halves the loop
  • B9 STRETCH: squeezes or spreads in time
  • B10 CLIP: COPY, PASTE, CLEAR (KNOB 1 picks, OCT+ does it)
• B11 or ALGORITHM: what it works on, SELECTED STEPS, PAGE, TRACK or PATTERN. W1 … W16 select steps; SELECT the page.
• KNOB 1 … 4 the tool's values. You hear the change at once; the white keys show the result, the steps it removes as ghosts.
• OCT+ keeps it, OCT− puts it back; SHIFT + F1 undoes it later.

MIDI FX

• Five groups of eight slots (kept with the project): ARP, CHANCE, REPEAT, HARM, TRANSPOSE, SCALER, RANDOM, CHORD, MONO, SELECTOR. A track plays through one group or none; two tracks can share one arp.
• Tap ARP to open the track's group: B1 … B8 the slots (again: the next page; hold one, it lifts, turn a knob to slide it and let go to drop it there), PRESETS the effect, KNOB 1 … 4 its values (KNOB 4 its CHANCE), ALGORITHM the track's group, B10 bypass (the arp on / off), B11 twice remove, F1 + B copy then paste, F2 + B pick up and drop (held, F1 and F2 show the copy and the hand). The white keys play through it; REC turns them into the track's steps (it is the main REC keyboard switch: from the step view the screen opens on the steps, from the keyboard on the keys, and you leave the way it is): hold steps and turn ALGORITHM to give them their own group. ARP's light breathes while it is open (bright: the arp is on). On STEPS, F1 + W and F2 + W copy and move steps. ARP again or HOME close it.
• A step held while stopped plays through its MIDI FX group.
• Hold ARP or SHIFT + ARP anywhere: the track's MIDI FX on / off, the group kept (its page still edits it and shows OFF); a popup says which. ARP is lit while the track's MIDI FX is on. Tap SEQ anywhere: TOOLS (SEQ again or HOME closes it). SHIFT + FX held: FILL.
• The arp's pages 3 and 4: the MOD and TRANSPOSE lanes on the white keys (SHIFT + W a random step).
• A step's own group: hold it in TRIG, KNOB 2 (or B4 TRACK, B5 OFF, B6 … B10 groups 1 … 5).

MIDI

Everything in one place, with the full CC map and the implementation chart: FIZZ and MIDI.

• In, over USB or the TRS jack. Channels 1 … 6 play tracks 1 … 6 (a track's MIDI CH, track settings page 1, runs 1 … 15). Channel 15 plays the selected track. Notes play the track; MOD WHEEL, BREATH, aftertouch and pitch bend reach its modulation; the clock and START / STOP drive the transport.
• CCs set the sound, the same map for every sound (the CC map): FREQ is 74, RESO 71, the amp envelope 73, 75, 62, 72, and so on. With REC and AUTOMATION on, CCs to the selected track record as locks.
• The remote, channel 16: a controller plays the FM-1's panel. Notes 53 … 79 are the keys, CC 20 … 33 the buttons, CC 40 … 46 the encoders (relative), CC 47 … 50 KNOB 1 … 4 for faders (the remote's map).
• Out, over USB: track settings page 3, KNOB 4 MIDI OUT sends a track's notes on a channel. SETTINGS (GLO + SEL): KNOB 3 CLOCK OUT the clock and START / STOP, KNOB 4 CC OUT the knobs' moves as CCs.
• MIDI tracks: track settings page 3, KNOB 3 ENGINE MIDI. The track makes no sound and sequences other gear: EDIT gives seven pages of four CCs, SHIFT + a knob picks a slot's CC number, and holding a step locks a value (more).

Bluetooth

• Which package. The install page offers two: USB (the default) and Bluetooth, which adds Bluetooth MIDI and keeps everything USB does. The Bluetooth package has room for less: 4 projects, 128 MY presets, and a shorter undo (a whole dense pattern can't be copied or undone in one go).
• Switching packages erases the FM-1's projects and presets. Back up in the Manager first, then RESTORE there after the install. A USB backup onto the Bluetooth package keeps 4 projects and 128 presets: the Manager asks which. The other way nothing is lost.
• Connect on a Mac: Audio MIDI Setup, Window → Show MIDI Studio, then the Bluetooth button. The FM-1 shows as FM-1 and four characters: press Connect (no pairing code). It then appears to your apps as a MIDI port ending in Bluetooth.
• On iPhone and iPad: connect from a MIDI app's Bluetooth settings (most music apps have a "Bluetooth MIDI devices" page).
• On the FM-1: SETTINGS (GLO + SEL), then SELECT for page 2: KNOB 1 BLUETOOTH ON / OFF, and the state beside it: OFF, WAITING (nothing connected) or CONNECTED.
• What works over Bluetooth: all of MIDI (notes, CCs, the remote, clock, MIDI out) and the Manager: BACKUP, LIBRARY, POOL, EDIT, PROJECTS' moves. Needs the USB cable: installing, writing FIZZ's data, RESTORE, and the PROJECTS tab's WRITE. USB audio is always over the cable.

Saving

• Nothing to save by hand. FIZZ writes its project by itself a moment after your last change, while you play too. Here the page keeps FIZZ's flash in this browser, so your projects are back after a reload (give it two seconds after an edit).
• Eight projects (four in the Bluetooth package), each with 64 patterns and its own pool of up to 128 sounds (a new project's pool starts empty), the palette its steps lock. The pool holds references to presets, not copies: replace a preset and every pool and every step using it play the new version (a pattern's tracks never change: each holds its own version of the sound it loaded, so REPLACE in A02 leaves A01's tracks as they were). The preset library is shared by every project: the built-in presets (INIT, the 16 FM TONE sounds, six drums) and MY PRESETS, up to 256 of your own (128 in the Bluetooth package). Every preset carries one or more tags (BASS, KEYS, PLUCK, PAD, LEAD, DRUMS, FX), and its pan and its chorus, delay and reverb sends: loading it sets the track's (a step's sound lock does not).
• PRESETS browses the library: each detent plays the next preset on the track, in the pattern or as a short note. F2 loads it, F1 or HOME brings the track's own sound back exactly, edits included. B1..B8 filter by tag (the filter's key solid, the chosen preset's tags breathing on B2..B8), SHIFT + B2..B8 toggles a tag on the chosen preset, B9 cycles ALL / MINE / POOL. B10 adds the preset to the pool (the cassette's outline turns lime: lime means in the pool, champagne not), or takes it out when it is there (it pops back out of the tray in a fizz of bubbles) (steps using it ask first with a red X, and go back to their track's sound). B11 deletes one of MY presets: the first press shows a red X and DELETE? with how many projects and steps use it, the second deletes it, takes it out of every pool, and sends those steps back to their track's sound (SHIFT + F1 brings it all back).
• SAVE (SOUNDS) opens SAVE PRESET with a name made from the sound, selected. When the sound came from one of your presets, NEW and REPLACE both show and F2 switches between them; SAVE does the chosen one (otherwise it saves a new preset). An edited sound shows a * after its name.
• A step held + PRESETS picks its sound from the pool; the picker stays up until you let go.
• Typing a name: the keybed is a typewriter, drawn on the screen with a letter on every key: the black keys are A..K, the white keys L..Z and SPACE (hold SHIFT for 0..9 and signs). The first key replaces the suggested name (a pair from the owner's namesizer, such as SPICY WALRUS); PRESETS (or KNOB 4, or KNOB 2) right rolls a new name every detent, endlessly (namesizer pairs, now and then a made-up word or the sound's own), left walks back through the last ten, ALGORITHM moves the cursor, SELECT or KNOB 1 turns the letter under it, F1 deletes, SAVE confirms, HOME cancels. The same keyboard names a project (B10 on the project page).
• In the page's settings (⋯): named saves of the whole flash, export and import, and Start blank.
• Digitone sounds: drop Elektron Digitone (.dnsnd) and Digitone II (.dn2pst) FM TONE sounds on the player (or use its Import sounds button). They are converted in your browser (nothing is uploaded), the page lists what could not come across exactly, and Send puts them in MY PRESETS (or the project's pool), where PRESETS finds them. Each keeps its pan, its reverb, delay and chorus sends, and its tags (the Digitone's mapped onto FIZZ's BASS, KEYS, PLUCK, PAD, LEAD, DRUMS and FX). A Digitone sound with drive keeps it before the filter, where the Digitone has it. The first can also go straight onto a track. SHIFT + F1 on FIZZ undoes the whole import.
• My presets: export MY PRESETS from the player as files to keep or share (one as a .fizzsnd, several as a .fizzlib library), and load them back with Import sounds; a preset already in MY PRESETS can be skipped or kept twice. They can also go out as Digitone (.dnsnd) and Digitone II (.dn2pst) files, experimental for now, with what does not fit listed first.

The FIZZ Manager

• The FIZZ Manager talks to an FM-1 running FIZZ, in Chrome, Edge or Brave (Web MIDI).
• BACKUP: the whole unit, kept in the page and saved to a file. LIBRARY: tags, rename, delete, reorder, add to the pool, EDIT, LOAD ON FM-1, EXPORT. POOL: the project's 128 places. IMPORT: Digitone sounds (.dnsnd, .dn2pst, .dn2snd) and FIZZ's own (.fizzsnd, .fizzlib, .fizzbak).
• EDIT: all 110 values of a sound on one page (a MIDI sound: its 28 CCs). It follows the track selected on the FM-1; the TRACK switch turns live editing of it on.
• Over Bluetooth (the Bluetooth package, connected in the computer's settings) it all works except RESTORE and PROJECTS' WRITE: the page asks for the USB cable. A project moves between the packages as a .fizzprj (KEEP on one, LOAD INTO on the other); with MY PRESETS full, its sounds come as the project's own copies, so it plays the same.