Category Archives: Akai EWI

Review – Koldot Digital Wind Instrument Holder

Having a stand for your EWI is a good thing. For a while, I had a modified guitar stand for my EWI4000s I was using. I even had a little basket thing I 3D printed for it affixed to the stand. It was hacky, and not very portable.

Fast forward to post COVID in California, and me having a Aerophone Pro AE-30 now as my primary controller. I need a stand for it if I’m going on a gig, or just playing it. So, I found this one on Amazon. Koldot Digital Wind Instrument Holder.

This stand works great. It’s small, folds out easily, and more importantly, FITS INSIDE THE AEROPHONE PRO CASE.

Win, win, and win. Oh, and it’s cheap. $30 on Amazon.

It also works with Akai EWIs and probably other Aerophones as well.

If you are looking for a stand, check this one out.

Petition To Akai to Re-Continue The EWI4000s

The Akai Professional EWI 4000s was discontinued in June of 2019, after 14 years of its release, but it is still in very high demand. Many consider the 4000s to be the best EWI (after 16 years of its release in 2005) for its sounds that are not compatible with newer EWI models. It is very hard to get a hold of one these days because of the discontinuation, because there are so many people looking to get this instrument, and almost every existing unit being sold out. It is unlikely that this petition will do anything, but it’s worth a shot to get this legendary instrument back into production.

Sometimes, you just need a good OLD fashioned petition to fix a problem.

the BEST EWI Youtube Channel?

If you were going to list the “who’s who” of EWI, names like Michael Brecker, and Masato Honda come to mind. Yet, there is a new name that should come up. Eddie EWI.

Seriously, this guy RIPS on EWI. His channel is a pure delight to watch/listen to. He has really mastered the Akai EWI, and sounds f-ing great on it. Check him out!

EWI5000 and Presonus One 5 Pro

Does anyone have experience setting up an EWI5000 in Presonus Studio One to work with Aria Player or any of the VST instrument group included with PS1? I have everything working with one exception… There is no ability to crescendo/decrescendo by blowing harder or softer into the EWI. There is the ability to create a louder or softer note based on the air pressure at the the attack of the note (like key velocity on a keyboard instrument, but once that musical dynamic is set it cannot be changed with the breath controller. I’m assuming this has something to do with midi “expression”(?) but am at a loss as to what to do. So far the support team at Presonus is “stumped”. To date, the folks at MakeMusic (the Aria Player and associated Garriton instruments are part of Finale) – have not replied to my inquiries.

Any suggestions are appreciated.

EWI Tool Is BACK!

EWI Tool, and open source patch editor for the Akai EWI4000s was shutdown almost 2 years ago. And Akai has since discontinued making the EWI 4000s (stupid decision in my opinion).

Seems like if you are a macOS user, you were kinda screwed as if you went to 10.15 (Catalina), you basically couldn’t edit your patches anymore.

Fear not, it is now been resurrected here. I’m excited. During this COVID-19 thing, one of the things I really wanted to do (and of course did not) was to get back into the EWI. And learn Bass. And Harmonica (none of those things happened either).

This is a great example of the benefit of Open Source, and that the community of Akai EWI 4000s users is still going strong!