The Field Manual

I. Knowing the Box

Every control on the FM-1 has a purposeful role in the bard's hands.

FX    SEL   ENV   LFO   EDIT   GLO
HOME  SAVE  ARP   SEQ   PLAY   REC

The Awakening (Boot Sequence)

At power-on the screen paints the white-and-blue curved monogram of Mother Melody with flowing musical waves. As the 6-note physical harp chime resounds, the Blue Rose blooms, proclaiming:

EVANDER'S MUSIC BOX — MOTHER MELODY HEARS THY SONG

A light wave sweeps across the keys. Tapping any button after 0.5 s skips the animation. The Box wakes exactly where you left it: the same mode, track and Scale Lock, with every song and loop (it keeps itself every 30 seconds).

II. The Two Ways of the Box

III. Bardic Crafting: the Workshop

Four musical companions sit around the workshop table:

Selecting & Muting Tracks

Drums Layout (Track 4)

Black keys play an accented soft ghost hit of the drum to their left.

Knob Pages (K1–K4)

Tonewheel Organ & Leslie Rotor

The 64-Step Sequencer (SEQ)

Scale Lock: Playing Like a Harmonica

The Scale Lock holds every note of the Box in one scale: the keys, the sequencer, the Encounter scenes, freestyle and MIDI notes. With it on, a wrong note cannot be played. Hold GLO and the glass shows the keyboard with what each key sets; while GLO is held, keys do not play.

• Sequenced notes and scenes move into the lock's scale degree by degree, so a melody keeps its shape; a scene keeps its own register.
• Press the same root key again to step through the scales: C MAJOR → C MINOR → C DORIAN → Phrygian → Lydian → Mixolydian → harmonic → penta major → penta minor → diminished → Phrygian dominant, then round again. A new root keeps the scale.
• Live keys outside the scale play the scale note just below. Drums are untouched; timpani and gong tune to the root.
• While the lock is on, GLO is half-lit and the header reads LOCK with the key. Tapping GLO alone still opens the Modes page.

The Knob HUD

Turn any of K1–K4, on any page, in either mode, and a card in the knob's own colour names exactly what it changes and shows the value (TRACK 2 LEVEL, REVERB DECAY, FILTER CUTOFF, INTENSITY…). It leaves a second after the knob stops.

Modern Mode (a Secret)

Some bards travel further than others.

Press HOME + FX + GLO together and the glass says MODERN MODE UNLOCKED. PRESETS now steps through a modern bank as well:

Press the chord again (BACK TO THE OLD WAYS) to hide them; tracks playing a modern sound return to the harp (drums to the tavern kit). The choice survives power-off.

Keeping Songs (Autosave)

You never need to save the workbench. Every 30 seconds, if anything changed, the Box keeps every step, loop, instrument and setting (Scale Lock and Modern Mode included), plus the mode, track, octaves, last scene, tempo and music volume. At power-on it wakes exactly there; the footer says KEPT: AUTOSAVED after each save.

Clearing a flash sector silences the FM-1 for a few hundredths of a second, so the Box clears sectors only while stopped and untouched, and saves into blank ones while you play. Only after two minutes of unsaved changes without ever stopping will it take that short gap mid-song.

The Battle Purge (Panic Recovery)

IV. Encounter: the Herald

When the Box is strapped to the forearm in armor or robes, Evander does not compose. He calls. Each white key is a mood of the field; once one sounds, the sharps bend it. The Box waits for the bar line, then turns the music as a minstrel troupe would.

The Sixteen Scenes (White Keys)

Each white key is a scene, counted 1 to 16 from the left. Keys 1, 5, 9 and 13 (the first of each mood) are half-lit so you can count in the dark.

• Press a white key: it blinks fast and the glass counts down (NEXT). On the next bar the new scene fades in over the old one.
• Press the blinking key again to cancel. Program change 1–16 over MIDI, or Cue in the Preset Console, does the same.

The Variations (Black Keys)

Once a scene is chosen (playing or queued), all eleven sharps become its variations; before that they stay dark and do nothing. A variation lands on the next beat, and one pressed while a scene is queued waits for that scene. Choosing a new scene clears them all. A variation's sharp stays lit while it holds.

A change of mood keeps each note's place in the scale: the same tune, a new colour. Under a Scale Lock the moods and key changes leave the pitch alone; the rest still work.

Freestyle: Take the Stage

• Every key is in key: the scene's scale as it sounds now (mood and key changes included), or the Scale Lock. No wrong notes.
• The loop keeps playing and its lead steps aside for your melody. PRESETS picks your instrument; OCT- / OCT+ move an octave.
• The glass turns pink and says FREESTYLE. MIDI notes play your freestyle voice too.

Knobs & Controls in Battle

V. The Lights in the Dark

A bard in a dark forest cannot read small text. The reactive LED matrix communicates state at a glance:

Stealth Mode for Night Ambushes

Configure on Box page (GLO → GLO → K3):

• GLOW (Default): Full reactive scale lighting and ambient cues.
• LIT: Removes ambient background glow; only active functional keys illuminate.
• DARK (Stealth): Blackout for covert night raids. Only playing scene, queue blink, beat pulse, and active variations shine.

VI. Every Shortcut on One Page

MIDI Control

On a Computer (USB Audio + MIDI)

Plug the FM-1 into a computer with a data cable. It appears as a USB audio input and a USB MIDI port, class compliant: no driver on Windows, macOS or Linux. In a DAW or Audacity, choose it as the recording input and you record exactly what the Box plays (16-bit stereo, 44.1 or 48 kHz). MASTER and the OUTPUT ceiling apply to the recording too. The port is named Felucca, after the hardware layer the Box is built on.

VII. When the Box Falters

A bard's last trick: when every string is cut, hum. Mother Melody hears that too.