Carry-on Digital Wind Instrument Plus - Black

This is an amazing instrument for the price. Not sure why folks are complaining. I have an Akai EWI (electronic woodwind instrument) that costs four times as much, is five times harder to use, will not work stand alone, and does not sound any better. In short the "carry on" is a fantastic product.

If you know woodwind keying (which I do) you can pick it up and play in 5 minutes, otherwise you will need to learn the notes as you would a recorder. It is about as easy to learn.

The "carry on" can be used alone with no other sound or midi device. Alone, it is just as loud as a typical recorder. It plays 3 octaves and it has maybe 7 distinct instrument sounds (e.g., a recorder, trumpet, clarinet, sax, and oboe). You can easily link it to any small external speaker (with a small phono plug). I use it with a Bose and a Sony small speakers designed for i-phones/ipads, and the sound fills up a large room. I also link it (with an adapted guitar cord) to a small guitar amp and I can add reverb and easily fill a small recital hall. While not a true professional instrument it comes pretty close. It is at least as good or better than a regular recorder or Irish whistle or a mid price EWI (costing $500).

One of the best features is that the carry on has built in Bluetooth that you can link to "MIDI" based apps. Once I figured out where to look on the app, it took me 1 minute to link it to all of the music software on my IPAD (i.e., garage band, music studio, cubasis, sample tank). For example in Garage Band, you click on the "gear wheel" setting button (top right for the screen), then go to advanced, and after you turn on the instrument's bluetooth, it shows up below the garage band's "bluetooth midi device". Once you link it, it plays on garage band just as easily as the built in keyboard.

After you link the carry on to any of your IPAD (or computer) apps you can make use of all of the built in sounds in your software. For example, using garage band on my Ipad (which I also linked to the above speakers or amp for concert level volume) I now have access to all the garage band sounds like guitar, piano, flute, and drum kit. With the music studio app (including the woodwind add on pack) I have access to over 125 different sounds including 25+ different woodwinds, which sound just about as good as any high end EWI instrument. Voila, with this $95 instrument (and your Ipad or iphone) and small speaker or guitar amp) you have a semi professional EWI instrument for fun and possibly even playing in public.

This "EWI" offers a whole new way of playing that goes well beyond the built in IPAD key board or even an external keyboard. And this carry on is the best entry level access to the world of electronic MIDI music to all of us who are woodwind players.

So this is now my favorite instrument. You will have almost no learning curve if you previously played, clarinet, flute, recorder or sax. And if you played none of these before, there is no easier way to get started in the new world of digital woodwinds as a complement to your other instruments.

I am reasonably impressed with this digital instrument.

"The Muzic Store Inc" seller is awesome/helpful! When my package went missing, the seller shipped me a replacement and was very responsive and helpful.

Looks and feels good.Ability to play quietly and silently with earphones is nice.