Superbooth 2026: Modor Music NF-1k is available now: the keyboard version of the NF-1 digital Synthesizer, featuring an upgraded engine and a polyphonic aftertouch keyboard.
Mordor had shown the keyboard version of the NF-1k Synthesizer at the Machina Bristonica 2025 event, which will be taking a break this year.
In addition to a polyphonic aftertouch keyboard, the keyboard offers several other features, including dual polyphony, touch strips, and more.
Just in time for Superbooth 2026, the Modor NF-1k has been released and is available from retailers. It’s available now for $3999,99/3299€ worldwide.
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Article from September 27, 2025
Belgian developer Marcel Belmans launched Modor Music 10 years ago. His first product was the NF-1, a desktop digital Synthesizer with a striking white design. You can find the story behind it in my developer talk here.
The one-man company is celebrating this anniversary with a surprise at the Machina Bristonica 2025 event. Modor Music is showing the prototype of the NF-1k, a keyboard version with some great extras.
Modor Music NF-1k
At first glance, you’d think the developer plugged a keyboard into the NF-1. Yes, that’s what it looks like, but there’s more to it. The design of the Modor Music NF-1k is sure to be polarizing. It’s large, measuring 73x51x14cm and weighing 12kg.
There is a lot of space on the interface where more control could have been incorporated. It seems a bit too big to me, but that’s a matter of personal taste. It bears 44 knobs and 27 buttons for hands-on control over the engine.
Two elements: the synth and the keyboard. For the latter, the developer utilizes a Fatar polyphonic aftertouch keyboard with 49 keys, enabling expressive play of the NF-1k engine.
Additionally, a new large touch strip (50cm) is available for pitch bends, and two small touch strips (2x 10cm) on the side can be assigned to modulation.
Digital Modor-Style VA Engine
In terms of the engine, the NF-1k is mainly identical to the NF-1 desktop. However, there are some significant upgrades.
First of all, it contains an extra voice board that doubles the polyphony to 16 voices, instead of the eight voices. This also turns the NF-1k into a bi-timbral Synthesizer as you get two NF-1s in a single housing.
Then, Modor Music added a unison, a chord mode, an extensive synchronizable arpeggiator, and a hold function in the NF-1k. All the necessary buttons are added to the front panel, making them easy to control.
The internal patch memory remains the same, with 448 single patches, but now also has slots for up to 64 full patches.
Otherwise, the engine remains the same:
- three identical oscillators with 10 waveforms (classic and unique waves such as sonar, wind, arcade, FM, and a feedback sinus FM pair.
- mixable 12dB/oct resonant multimode filter (low, high, bandpass, and bandstop)
- formant filter with three morphing vowels, with 10 selectable vowel presets and user-controllable formant frequencies.
- a modulatable multi-FX processor with a comb filter section (chorus, flanger…) and a delay section for echo effects.
- four 3-stage envelopes, three-level settings, and four time settings
- two multi-wave LFOs, one tri-LFO, and a random S&H
- modulation matrix with seven user-definable modulation wires, 19 source signals, 86 destination parameters
On the backside, everything remains the same: 220V power connector, 5-pin MIDI IN/THRU/OUT connections, two 6.35 mm jacks (one a TRS for driving headphones), two expression pedal inputs (sustain/volume or modulation), and USB for MIDI duties.
Like the NF-1, the Modor NF-1k is also fully MPE compatible.
First Impression
Congratulations to Marcel and the NF-1. Time has flown by. I’m happy to see the NF-1 will get a big brother with the power under the hood. In my opinion, the NF-1 is a very underrated VA synth with a unique sound.
I hope this new keyboard will also bring the desktop version back into focus for music producers.
The NF-1K is currently a prototype and is in development. The hardware design, however, is ready, and they are about to start production. You can pre-order it in the coming days.
The price has not yet been fixed, but Marcel estimates it to be around 3,000€, including VAT and assembled by hand in Belgium. The first production will be limited to 30 units. More will be produced depending on the demand.
More information will follow here: Modor Music
I had the Modor NF 1 before. It sounded fine and had its own digital character. It also was pretty easy to use.
But two things stood out. One is that the knobs felt cheaper than any I have ever experienced on any synth. They wouldn’t pass Wal-Mart inspection. For a $4k synth, I really hope he addressed that. Two, the screen was dated then and is even more dated now.
I understand it’s a boutique company, but $4k to me seems like an incredibly ambitious price. We’re into Nord territory here for a digital synth. It’s particularly hard to understand when used NF 1 units are going in the $1k range.
The Modor dev is very defensive about his knobs. I’ve seen in several interviews he defends them strongly even though many people have said how flimsy and awful they are.
I recognise this is largely a one-person operation, but that does not excuse the direction this is taking. Each revision looks more visually incoherent than the last, while the price escalates to a level that is increasingly difficult to justify. The display choice is especially indefensible—it feels cheap, ill-suited, and completely out of step in any price range save for a beginner home project.
I must offer my mea culpa after perusing his site again to gain a clearer understanding of the cost structure. My earlier criticism was not justified. This is an instrument intentionally built in Belgium with minimal outsourcing, which materially increases cost.
Why it’s expensive:
• Local manufacturing and assembly → higher labour costs
• Small production runs → limited economies of scale
• Close supplier control and original DSP engineering
• Hardware-first design → increased component and build complexity
It is also worth noting that many claim to support fair wages yet few actually pay for it. This company demonstrably does.
However the low-grade LCD remains difficult to justify and complicates the pricing.
Yes, Modor is a one-man company. He develops and built them in Belgium
I don’t mind paying more for quality. It’s a basic equation everyone knows. And certainly paying more to keep small devs going using local manufacturers is as it should be. If 100% comes from China then we’re all worse off. But of course the product must be top quality if you pay a lot more.
The design aspect is something different. I’m also not a fan. The DR2 drum machine looks OK but the design of the new keyboard is poor imo. I can’t see what aesthetic principles are being followed. To what sense is it designed to appeal?
It’s a shame because I think the sounds from Modor machines are extremely good.