Berlin has a specific relationship with the sequencer. Not as a tool for note entry, but as the instrument itself — something you play, patch, and reshape mid-performance. KOMA Elektronik built their reputation on that idea with the Komplex Sequencer back in 2015, a four-channel beast loaded with 87 patch points, 64 sliders, and no screen anywhere in sight. A decade later, the Monoplex takes one channel of that same philosophy, adds a microtonal scale system that would have been unthinkable in a module this size, and prices the whole thing at €498.
What the Monoplex Actually Does
The KOMA Elektronik Monoplex is a 42HP, 16-step analog/MIDI sequencer where almost every parameter has its own CV input. First Step, Sequence Length, Skip Step, Gate Length, Repeat (with ratcheting), Glide, Play Mode, Transpose, and Clock Division — all patchable. That list matters because it’s the difference between a sequencer you program and one you perform. Route a sample-and-hold into Transpose and the melody shifts unpredictably but in time. Patch Sequence Length from an LFO and the pattern contracts and expands on its own terms.
Outputs are equally practical: CV Out, Gate Out, Trigger Out, and MIDI Out for both Note and CC data. Output range is switchable between 2V, 5V, and 10V, with unipolar/bipolar CV output options. The sync section covers Clock Input, Clock/Division Output, Start and End Triggers, Reset/Pause, MIDI In, and full MIDI Sync Master/Slave — it connects cleanly to anything in a modern hybrid setup.
The Quantizer Is the Story
Standard quantizers are a solved problem. The one on the KOMA Elektronik Monoplex is not that.
It implements the Wilson MTS-ESP scale system — a framework rooted in the theoretical work of Erv Wilson (1928–2016), a Mexican-American music theorist who spent decades developing systems for scales built on just intonation, Moments of Symmetry, and generalized keyboard geometries. Wilson worked largely outside academia; his ideas are only now finding their way into accessible production tools.
Three user-definable scales can be loaded via MIDI SysEx through a browser-based editor — no software installation required, and it works from a phone. You can pull from a library of thousands of microtonal options, define and audition your own, or capture a scale live from an attached MIDI keyboard as you play. For MIDI synthesizers that don’t natively support MTS, microtonal output is transmitted via Pitch Bend data — which works across the board but limits you to monophonic expression on most targets. A future firmware update will add a slider-based method for defining scales directly on the hardware itself.
A Pattern from KOMA Worth Noting
If you followed our Superbooth 2024 coverage, you’ll remember we flagged the KOMA Chromaplane as one of the most promising — and unusual — instruments at the show. At the time it had no price, no release date, and looked, as we wrote, like “a closed old Windows laptop.” It shipped in 2024, went on to win first place at the 2025 Guthman Musical Instrument Competition, and is now available at €398.
The Monoplex is a different kind of product — utilitarian where the Chromaplane is expressive, Eurorack where the Chromaplane is standalone — but both point to the same thing: a Berlin company that is making deliberate, focused design decisions rather than chasing spec count. The Komplex Sequencer reissued in 2023 at €1,999 proved the demand for KOMA’s hands-on approach was still there. The Monoplex is what happens when they build for a wider audience without watering down the concept.
Why This Lands Now
Ableton Live 12 brought native tuning and scale support into the mainstream DAW conversation, giving producers access to custom scale files without specialist tools. Hardware sequencers have been slower to follow. A Eurorack module that can load thousands of Wilson-derived scales from a browser and transmit them via pitch bend to any MIDI synthesizer in a rack is a meaningful step forward — not a feature buried in a menu, but part of a live performance workflow.
KOMA debuted the Monoplex at Superbooth 2025 (booth O400) in Berlin, which is the right context: a city and an event that has always taken sequencing seriously as a performance discipline, not just a compositional shortcut.
Pricing and Availability
The KOMA Elektronik Monoplex is priced at €498 and is available now through KOMA Elektronik directly and selected dealers worldwide.
