No, it’s not. I’m not such a good player, but I have been playing the Osmose for a few weeks now, and it’s not difficult to start using the expression it offers in how you play. All the demo videos show off the pitch bending, but I find myself only really using that for vibrato. The “pressure glide” portamento is more useful for sliding between notes.

One thing I found is that the presets are not that inspiring on a first listen, but when you work them in as elements in a piece of music alongside other synths, they can lend the whole piece a more organic feel. Also, it’s good as an MPE controller. Playing my OB-6 via MPE on the Osmose makes the OB-6 really come alive in new ways.

It pays on the Osmose to play lightly, which has probably been the hardest thing to learn. To get a melody to come through it’s best to ease up on the accompaniment rather than playing hard on the melody. I realize my default is to play accompanying chords a little harder than this instrument likes, which can make the sound get congested. And unlike a regular keyboard you have to maintain that lightness throughout the note - you can’t just let your finger sink into the held note after starting it softly, which I have discovered I do on regular keyboards.

I’m also now attempting pointless vibrato on regular keyboards, which shows this starts to become intuitive pretty quickly.