Most MPE software assumes you already own the hardware. That assumption is exactly what MPE Insight 2.6 removes. The August update to Christophe Kalkau's real-time MPE performance environment adds Typing Keys, a two-manual layout mapped onto an ordinary computer keyboard, and routes it straight through the app's DRIFT processor so every typed note leaves as a full MPE voice with its own pressure, pitch bend and timbre.
For anyone curious about per-note expression but not yet ready to spend four figures on a Seaboard, a Continuum or an Osmose, that is a genuinely different entry point.
Two manuals on a laptop
Typing Keys splits the computer keyboard into two playable manuals of eight white keys each. The Q W E R T Y U I row forms the upper manual, Z X C V B N M , the lower, with the sharps sitting on the row above each. Crucially, these are mapped by physical key position, not by letter, so a QWERTZ or AZERTY board falls under exactly the same fingers. The Keyboard module even prints your own keycaps onto the on-screen keys so the mapping stays readable.
The space bar acts as a sustain pedal, Shift accents a note, and the arrow keys or numpad move the octave far enough to reach every key of the chosen keyboard size. Switch DRIFT on and each of those typed notes becomes a genuine MPE voice rather than a flat note-on. As the developer puts it, a laptop on a train is now enough.
That matters beyond novelty. Learning to hear what MPE data actually does is the hardest part of getting into per-note expression, and until now that learning curve was gated behind hardware. Being able to watch pressure, bend and CC74 move while typing removes the gate entirely.
FORGE takes the picture apart
The headline visual feature in 2.6 is Point Cloud, a new mode in the FORGE module. FORGE already turned a loaded image, video or webcam feed into a scene you could fly through, using an AI-generated depth map computed locally with Depth Anything V2. Point Cloud goes further: it rebuilds the image as a grid of individual points and pushes each one into real depth, so the virtual camera flies between them instead of across a flat plane.
And the cloud responds to playing. Strike a note and the points inside its disc rush toward you. Pressure holds them out. Slide widens the cone. Pitch bend moves the whole field sideways. You can render the points as hard Dots, soft Splats, or Glyphs that stamp a typed character per point, so a photograph can come back written in your own letters. A new Spin control turns the cloud on a free axis, winding up while you play and settling upright in silence.
A second new mode, Cells, takes the opposite route: it leaves the frame whole and redraws it cell by cell as ASCII, halftone or dither over any source. Both modes require WebGL2.
What else landed
The 2.6 release notes cover more than the two headline features:
- CASCADE impacts now combine — ten independent layers at the key line instead of a single choice, so a shower of sparks can sit inside a fountain. Note ribbons gain a Chrome finish alongside Diamond and Glass.
- Expression Overview gains a fifth mode, Rack, drawing each signal source as the piece of studio gear you would normally read it on.
- MIDI Learn now reaches the FORGE Conductor, with learn slots for Enable, Range and Cycle so a pedal or fader box can drive it hands-free.
- The MIDI Stream Log splits into four views — Events, Notes, Channels and Stats — with eight message types in editable colours.
- 25 keys joins 88, 61 and 49 as a keyboard size, and the sustain pedal is read as a switch, as continuous, or detected automatically.
- DRIFT's power switch is now part of app state: presets state it, snapshots restore it, and Panic switches it off.
Where it fits
MPE Insight sits in an unusual spot. It is not a plugin and not a synth — it is a standalone desktop app that reads your expressive stream and renders it as live notation, analysis and generative visuals across nine modules on one draggable canvas. For performers it is a visual instrument. For educators and for anyone debugging a controller setup, it is the clearest window available onto what a keyboard is actually transmitting per note.
MPE Insight is a one-time purchase of €34.99 with updates included, available as a direct Windows download, on the Mac App Store and on Steam. Windows 10 (1803+) or 11, or macOS 12+ on Apple silicon. Full release notes are on the updates page.