Making Music on Android

There are an astonishing 2.5 Billion active Android devices currently in circulation. There’s a good chance you may even be reading this blog, right now, on an Android device! What’s less well known though, is that it’s quite possible to make music using an Android device.

We’re well known, at iConnectivity, for helping you connect to computing devices of all kinds. Whether it’s your home computer, Mac. PC or iOS device; iConnectivity has been helping people connect for years. Computing technology and especially mobile technology is changing though, and we’re changing with it…

USB Type-C is increasingly becoming the predominant connection across all computing devices. With the release of our latest mioXC MIDI interface, we realised that Android devices can also enjoy some iConnectivity magic!

Android MIDI Music Making Apps

We put our heads together, asked some trusted friends, and put together a list of some of the most useful Android MIDI-based Apps currently available. What’s even better, is that almost all of these apps are free! It seems there’s never been a better time to experiment with making music on Android!

MIDI Keyboard

How many times have we needed to just play in some MIDI data but not had a controller keyboard handy? MIDI Keyboard is a super-simple, free app that turns you Android device into a MIDI Keyboard (as if you couldn’t guess).
Plug in a mioXC and you’ve got an instant DIN-MIDI controller. How useful is that?

Midi Commander

Midi Commander is an app we think should be an essential for any Android based musician. Turn your Android device into customisable MIDI controller. You’ll find this invaluable for use as a show controller for example, setting “pads” as cue points and show start commands.

Additionally, why not use it to add real-time control functionality to an older MIDI sound module? Simply plug in a mioXC and because the mioXC is class-compliant you can use Midi Commander to control any DIN-MIDI gear.

Another free Android app which seems like a “no brainer” download to us.

Caustic 3 - Single Cell Software

Caustic 3 is a DAW based around a number of virtual synths, effects, a mixer and a song sequencer. Single Cell Software describes Caustic 3 as a “music creation tool inspired by rack-mount synthesizers / samplers rig”.

There’s conceivably everything here you could need to do an improvised live electronic set, completely off an Android tablet. What’s even better is that the basic version of Caustic is free!

Use a mioXC connected to your tablet and you potentially have a whole virtual synth rack under hardware MIDI control. Alternatively use the inbuilt sequencer to control hardware synths. How can you go wrong?

Cubasis - Steinberg

OK, so we admit it, you’ll actually have to spend some money to get your hands on this Android app. We felt we had to include Cubasis here though, as it’s such a useful and fully featured Android music making app.

Cubasis is perhaps the most powerful Android music-making app currently available. The chances are at some point you’ll have used Steinberg’s legendary DAW, Cubase. Well, Cubasis is a slimmed-down version of Cubase designed for mobile computing platforms.

We can’t think of anything else which offers the same sort of power, on a mobile platform, as Cubasis. You can run Waves plugins, record, playback and mix multi-track audio and of course, sequence MIDI. It’s here we think Cubasis on Android offers the most. We love the idea of using Cubasis as a touch screen live sequencer/arranger for hardware MIDI devices.

So go on, what’s stopping you from grabbing that Android device lying next to you and getting creative? Grab yourself a mioXC and a USB-C equipped Android phone or tablet and just think of what you could achieve once you interface it with some of your hardware gear…

Free Android MIDI Music Making Apps