The Akai MPC (originally MIDI Production Center, now Music Production Center) is a series of music workstations produced by Akai from 1988 onwards. MPCs combine sampling and sequencing functions, allowing users to record portions of sound, modify them and play them back as sequences.

The MPC was created by the American engineer Roger Linn, who had designed the successful LM-1 and LinnDrum drum machines in the 1980s. Linn aimed to create an intuitive instrument, with a grid of pads that can be played similarly to a traditional instrument such as a keyboard or drum kit.

The MPC had a major influence on the development of electronic and hip-hop music. It led to new sampling techniques, with users pushing its technical limits to creative effect. It had a democratizing effect on music production, allowing artists to create elaborate tracks without traditional instruments or recording studios. Its pad interface was adopted by numerous manufacturers and became standard in DJ technology.

Development

thumb|The MPC was created by [[Roger Linn (pictured in 2010), who also made the LinnDrum. |250x250px]]

By the late 1980s, drum machines had become popular for creating beats and loops without instrumentalists, and hip-hop artists were using samplers to take portions of existing recordings and create new compositions. Grooveboxes, machines that combined these functions, such as those by E-mu Systems, required knowledge of music production and cost up to $10,000. His company, Linn Electronics, had closed following the failure of the Linn 9000, a drum machine and sampler. According to Linn, his collaboration with Akai "was a good fit because Akai needed a creative designer with ideas and I didn't want to do sales, marketing, finance or manufacturing, all of which Akai was very good at". He disliked reading instruction manuals and wanted to create an intuitive interface that simplified music production. and retailed for $5,000.

After Akai went out of business in 2006, Linn left the company and its assets were purchased by Numark. Akai has continued to produce MPC models without Linn. In the words of Greg Milner, the author of Perfecting Sound Forever, musicians "didn't just want the sound of John Bonham's kick drum, they wanted to loop and repeat the whole of 'When the Levee Breaks'". The rapper Jehst saw it as the next step in the evolution of the hip hop genre after the introduction of the TR-808, TR-909 and DMX drum machines in the 1980s. The producer DJ Shadow used an MPC60 MKII to create his influential 1996 album Endtroducing, which is composed entirely of samples. The producer J Dilla disabled the quantize feature on his MPC to create his signature "off-kilter" sampling style. After J Dilla's death in 2006, his MPC was preserved in the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture in 2014. The rapper Kanye West used the MPC to compose several of his best-known tracks and much of his breakthrough 2004 album The College Dropout.

See also

  • Drum machine
  • Groovebox
  • Sampler

References

Further reading

  • Official Roger Linn site