🎼TouchMe — tuning

Parent page: TouchMe — complete guide. Start there if you have not done the first-time setup.

TouchMe ships with a chromatic scale that starts at MIDI note 48. A chromatic scale is flexible but unforgiving — every touch plays a different note, and many combinations sound harsh. The web settings page lets you pick a scale that is easier to play.

Open the tuning page

1. Plug TouchMe into your computer.
2. Open settings.playtronica.com/#/touchme in Brave or Chrome.
3. Click Allow on the MIDI permission prompt.

If your device does not appear in the device dropdown, close the tab, plug in the device, and open a new tab. The browser scans for MIDI devices when the page loads.

Pick a scale

A scale is a set of notes that work together. The settings page has these presets:

• Major — bright, predictable, classic. Good for tutorials and demos.
• Natural minor — moodier, still familiar.
• Pentatonic (major) — only 5 notes per octave. Every touch sounds intentional. Best choice for first-time players.
• Pentatonic (minor) — same forgiveness, darker mood.
• Phrygian, Dorian, Mixolydian — modal scales for specific musical contexts. Phrygian fits flamenco. Dorian fits jazz. Mixolydian fits blues.
• Whole tone — every step is a major second. Eerie and dreamlike.
• Chromatic — every semitone. The default. Maximum flexibility, hardest to play.
• Custom — set each of the eight pads independently.

Pick a key

Within a scale, you can shift the root note. C major and G major use different notes but have the same melodic feel. The key dropdown shifts everything up or down without changing the scale.

A reasonable starting point: C pentatonic major. Easy on the ear and fits most synths in our online library.

Save the choice

Click Send to push the mapping to TouchMe. The choice is stored on the device. When you plug TouchMe into a different computer tomorrow, the scale is still there. You do not need to set it again.

Per-pad mapping (advanced)

In Custom mode, you can set each of the eight pads to any MIDI note (0–127) and any MIDI channel (1–16). Useful for:

• Drum pads — map each pad to a different drum sample.
• Multi-instrument setups — odd-numbered pads to a synth, even-numbered pads to a sampler.
• Velocity behaviour — set pads to fixed velocity or pressure-derived velocity. Fixed velocity is predictable for live performance. Pressure-derived velocity is more expressive.

For deep-dive options like CC routing and performance setups, see TouchMe deep dive.

If the page does not see the device

• Use the right browser. Brave or Chrome only. Safari and Firefox do not support Web MIDI.
• Plug in the device first, then open the page. Not the other way around.
• Check MIDI permission. If you clicked Block on the MIDI prompt earlier, the browser remembers. Open browser settings → Site Settings → MIDI → find settings.playtronica.com → set to Allow.
• If nothing works, see the firmware reset guide. The Nuke recovery brings the device back to a known state.

Ask the community

🤝 Other Playtronica users have probably hit this before. The Playtronica Friends Facebook group has 4,400 members and is the fastest source of creative and technical help. Search the group's history first (use the magnifying glass at the top — try playtron mobile no sound, all leds lit, touchme biotron no sound, koala sampler midi, or whatever fits your problem). If your question is not already answered, post a new one with a [Device] prefix in the title. See the community page for what to ask there and what to email instead.

Still stuck

Email support@playtronica.com with the subject TouchMe tuning and a screenshot of the settings page.