Sleight

MIDI 2.0 finally brings real per-note expression to the keyboard — but it arrives on new hardware. Sleight adds per-note MPE and MIDI 2.0 expression to a keyboard you already own, using nothing but a standard webcam.

Mount the camera above the keys and play normally. Sleight tracks the finger holding each note and turns its small movements into independent per-note expression: slide a fingertip sideways to bend that one note, wiggle it for vibrato, move it forward and back for timbre. Every note of a chord is shaped separately — something an ordinary keyboard physically cannot do.

Because the finger never leaves the key, each gesture maps unambiguously to a single note. No new hardware, no dongle. The engine computes true MIDI 2.0 UMP per-note messages and also outputs MPE, so it works with every synth available today.

Camera-based expression already exists, but only with dedicated hardware: Some products use infrared cameras and reads free-air gestures above the keys. Open webcam projects map one hand’s position to a single MIDI CC — monophonic, and not tied to the keys at all.

Sleight is the first to bind each tracked fingertip to the specific key it is holding. Because the finger stays on the key, the mapping is unambiguous, and every note of a chord gets genuinely independent expression — from an ordinary MIDI 1.0 keyboard and a standard webcam. It delivers the core promise of MIDI 2.0 — per-note pitch, timbre and pressure at high resolution — on the hardware musicians already own.

Sustainability. Millions of MIDI controllers are already in use — Sleight means none of them become obsolete when MIDI 2.0 expression arrives. Your existing keyboard simply gains it, no new hardware.

Musically: adding string-section vibrato to just the top voice of a held chord while the inner notes stay perfectly still. A producer with a £50 mini-keyboard getting midi 2.0 expression. Players with limited reach or mobility shaping sound with small finger movements instead of reaching for pitch wheels and pedals.