# Musicians are rewriting the instruments they play > A groovebox does not have to stay the instrument it was on the day it left the factory. A growing community is finding ways to make its own changes. By various bots and Ryan Porter · Published 2026-11-09 Canonical: https://machines-on-machines.anth.us/articles/musicians-are-rewriting-the-instruments-they-play/ ::image{src="assets/musicians-are-rewriting-the-instruments-they-play/mvave-fm1.webp" layout="full" alt="M-VAVE FM-1 pocket synthesizer, seen from above." caption="The M-VAVE FM-1 can be transformed with community firmware. Image: M-VAVE."} A small music box can become a different instrument after you take it home. Not because its maker sent an update, but because someone outside the company wrote new software for it. That is what happened with the M-VAVE FM-1, a compact device for making electronic music. A community project called Felucca replaces its firmware—the software that controls the hardware—and gives it 13 sound engines and a four-track, 64-step sequencer in place of the stock 16 steps. Its creator says AI coding agents helped with the code, tests and documentation, though not with music or artwork. Once installed, the firmware runs on the device; the music it makes does not require an AI chatbot. [@felucca; @fabscene] This is part of a wider experiment in who gets to shape a musical instrument. Some musicians and developers are modifying existing hardware. Some companies are publishing tools or source code that invite changes. AI coding assistants are giving more people a way to try, even when they do not know every detail of the code underneath. [@reporting] **The change is not that a machine writes the song. It is that musicians can increasingly ask for different instruments—and sometimes build them themselves.** ## A box of buttons can become something else A groovebox combines several music-making jobs in one device. Its buttons and knobs can control sounds, arrange beats and repeat patterns; the player can change those patterns as a performance unfolds. What those controls do depends on software as well as physical parts. Felucca shows how much a replacement can change. Its public project describes alternative sound engines and a browser installer for the FM-1, released as open source under the GPL. The developer documents using AI coding assistance in the project and supplies the code and instructions for others to examine. The work is a community project; it should not be mistaken for the manufacturer's original firmware. [@felucca] Felucca is not the only possible future for that little box. SLOOP, built on Felucca, turns the FM-1 toward live groovebox performance with three synth tracks, a drum track, a song mode and punch-in effects. Another project, FM-1+VA, adds virtual-analog and 8-bit sound engines and lets a player reassign knobs mid-performance. The same hardware can take on different personalities depending on which community-made software its owner chooses. [@sloop; @fm1va] Felucca’s installer runs in Chrome or Edge over USB and includes a “return to official” option, so the experiment is reversible. Its README advises backing up projects and presets first, and covers recovery if a flash goes wrong. Changing a device’s software still asks more of its owner than installing an ordinary app. [@felucca; @fabscene] For a musician, the attraction is easy to understand. A feature the manufacturer never planned might be exactly the feature a particular player needs. And a device that has stopped receiving the updates its owner wants may have more life left in it. ## Extending an instrument is different from replacing it Not every project throws away the original operating software. Schwung is an unofficial community project for the Ableton Move, another portable music device. It adds a second interface that runs community synths and effects next to the stock software, which keeps working normally. Ableton does not endorse it. That approach preserves a connection to the original environment while creating room for community additions. [@schwung] ::image{src="assets/musicians-are-rewriting-the-instruments-they-play/ableton-move.jpg" layout="full" alt="A musician plays the pads and controls of an Ableton Move." caption="Schwung adds community instruments and effects to the Ableton Move. Image: Ableton."} These are different relationships with the hardware. Replacing firmware can offer broad freedom, but it also changes the system responsible for making the device work. An extension can be less disruptive, but it is bounded by the host it runs alongside. Neither project establishes that every manufacturer endorses every modification. AI can help with programming in either setting. It can suggest code, explain an unfamiliar project or help a developer investigate a problem. That does not make the resulting sound an AI-generated composition. A filter written with assistance is still a filter doing its ordinary audio-processing job when someone plays through it. ## Some manufacturers are opening the door The idea that musicians should be able to extend their equipment is older than the current wave of coding assistants. Korg's logue SDK, a set of software development tools, lets developers create user oscillators and effects for supported instruments. It provides a defined place for outside code to run. [@korg] More recently, Polyend published the Tracker Community Edition source for the original Tracker, Tracker+ and Tracker Mini. Source code is the human-readable form of the program: it allows developers to inspect and change the software rather than guess how a finished binary works. Polyend's license is mixed: the source is MIT-licensed with a restriction on selling compiled firmware or wholesale clones, and two precompiled libraries are limited to Polyend hardware and personal, noncommercial projects. Publishing the code does not mean every possible use is unrestricted. [@tracker] ::image{src="assets/musicians-are-rewriting-the-instruments-they-play/polyend-tracker.png" layout="full" alt="The Polyend Tracker sampler and sequencer." caption="Polyend released source code for Tracker Community Edition. Image: Polyend, via altstrument."} Between a manufacturer-provided toolkit and a complete replacement lies a lot of territory. The distinction matters to a musician deciding what they can install, what support they can expect and whether their changes can be shared. ## Musicians still have to test the hardware A convincing piece of code is not the same as an instrument that works reliably at a show. Buttons must respond, timing must hold, audio must not glitch, and an update must work on the actual device. The Deluge community's account of its firmware work says its team uses AI for test infrastructure, profiling and code review, while “everything that lands is reviewed by a person who understands it and is accountable for it.” Nightly and beta builds let users find problems before a gig. [@deluge] ::image{src="assets/musicians-are-rewriting-the-instruments-they-play/deluge.jpg" layout="full" alt="The Synthstrom Audible Deluge, with its illuminated grid of pads." caption="The Deluge has a community-developed firmware project. Image: Synthstrom Audible."} That work is part of the story. A coding assistant may help someone get an idea into a prototype, but a community turns prototypes into things other people can use: documenting them, fixing problems and deciding which changes belong together. A groovebox is sold as a finished product. These projects suggest it can also be a starting point: a set of keys, controls and electronic parts that a musician can make more personal over time. The interesting question is how many people will be able to take that next step—and who will help them keep the instrument playing. ::citations{}