Roland is Back! :)

Bald Eagle · Post by **Bald Eagle** » Thu Apr 04, 2013 4:42 pm

EvilDragon wrote:
Bald Eagle wrote:Also the spec for the keyboard lists "Key Touch High, Medium, Low, Fixed". Is this aftertouch with only 3 aftertouch pressures being recognized or is it some sensitivity setting?
No, that's velocity sensitivity. Only 3 curves. If neither fits your playing, sucks to be you. Personally I think that having fixed velocity curves is stupid, users should be able to create their own...

Hmmm, so it would seem that there is no aftertouch then since there is no methon of it. I would have thought that a so called flagship board would have it.

Devnor · Post by **Devnor** » Thu Apr 04, 2013 4:49 pm

EvilDragon wrote:
Bald Eagle wrote:Also the spec for the keyboard lists "Key Touch High, Medium, Low, Fixed". Is this aftertouch with only 3 aftertouch pressures being recognized or is it some sensitivity setting?
No, that's velocity sensitivity. Only 3 curves. If neither fits your playing, sucks to be you. Personally I think that having fixed velocity curves is stupid, users should be able to create their own...

That's because everyone knows folks that buy arrangers are programming velocity curves :p Right? The Tyros 4's extent of velocity control is on or off.

No aftertouch.

rrricky rrrecordo · Post by **rrricky rrrecordo** » Thu Apr 04, 2013 5:12 pm

jimknopf wrote:One more entertainer keyboard with about zero relevance for band keyboarders. A real Musikmesse highlight, is it?

For one-man-band "entertainers" I'm sure it is. Some people make a tidy living doing such a schtick; for these musicians it could prove to be a brilliant tool. Myself, I find that high-level "entertainer keyboards" are a blast to "messe" around with and very inspirational.

Like many others on this forum, music plays a huge part in my life. It's how I pay the bills. I have two main music creation/recording spaces in my house, Studio S(oftware) and Studio H(ardware). Both are in the process of becoming more tightly integrated. S is pretty standard current tech, based around three Macs running Logic and software instruments. H is all about the "old ways" i.e. playing real hardware instruments and recording them in real time. It's populated with 2 Wurlitzer 206As, Yamaha CP-60M, Hammond M3, and other last-century workhorses - Juno 106, JX-8P, DX7, Trinity V3, M1, CZ-3000, K5000S, a rack of hardware synth modules and effects processors, old drum machines and much more. It's a museum of sorts (including some of the Korg stuff you can see in my sig line which I need to update), all recorded into a Yamaha AW2400 DAW with the Waves effects card installed.

I know, there's not much that's impressive about my environment. My point is not to impress, but simply to point out that like many of us on this beautiful forum, I'm a "real" musician who is immersed in (ok, obsessed with) the process of creating, recording and teaching music almost every day of my life.

And guess what: I still frikkin' LOVE arranger keyboards. They are scattered all around my house - the ex just rolls her eyes when she drops by to see our daughter and spots another vintage arranger that I've snagged off of kijiji: "another one... where are you going to put THAT?" Chicks just don't get it, right?

So yeah, this new Roland thingie could be a highlight for me. YMMV

Grapite · Post by **Grapite** » Thu Apr 04, 2013 7:04 pm

http://www.rolandconnect.com/product.php?p=bk-9&l=en-US

jimknopf · Post by **jimknopf** » Fri Apr 05, 2013 12:17 pm

Ricky, nothing wrong with enjoying whatever.

My relation to arranger keyboards is non-existent, because I neither have to live from this kind of job (while respecting any sincere work), nor like what arrangers do: to me they are extreme clichee machines by defintion, and I prefer the more vivid and creative sides of music making.

So still no Fantom G successor, but great news like these:
http://www.rolandconnect.com/product.php?p=fr-8x

Bald Eagle · Post by **Bald Eagle** » Fri Apr 05, 2013 12:34 pm

jimknopf wrote: So still no Fantom G successor, but great news like these:
http://www.rolandconnect.com/product.php?p=fr-8x

So now it looks like Roland has come out with something new in every class including the ever popular accordian except a workstation. Maybe next year we'll see something.

rrricky rrrecordo · Post by **rrricky rrrecordo** » Fri Apr 05, 2013 10:13 pm

jimknopf wrote: ...nor like what arrangers do: to me they are extreme clichee machines by defintion, and I prefer the more vivid and creative sides of music making.

When I create my own styles on an "arranger" - which are far from cliche btw - it's actually a more flexible form of experimentation with pattern sequencing for me, which is something I've always enjoyed doing since discovering Notator on the Atari back in '88. Real time instant transposition of any pattern into any chord in any key while flying around the keys is actually a very powerful creative tool. Like any other electronic musical tool, one must hack beyond the presets, get one's hands dirty and program the thing.

It takes a creative mind to get the best out of any musical instrument, and "entertainer keyboards" can be wonderful instruments in the right hands. They surely do entertain me, at times in vividly creative ways.

I respect your own personal definition though - however far from universally definitive it may be

jimknopf · Post by **jimknopf** » Sat Apr 06, 2013 11:05 am

As far as I know, the possibilities of replacing the factory-material on arrangers in that price class are limited. But I may be wrong. The Musikmesse announcements just fit into the (in)competence pattern of the present Japanese Roland management, showing very limited perspectives for what professional band keyboarders want and use.

Take the Integra as further example. The basic idea of this module is fantastic, and it could have become a new rack standard, wouldn't it have come with all kinds of silly limitations right from the start.

Now they announce the delivery of a useful JP80 library for it: synth legends. On a JP80, people are struggling to integrate sounds of their choice from this library into their existing banks, because Roland delivers the sounds without the proper librarian tools for single sounds exchange.

Delivering "synth legends" for the Integra is a fine thing.
But in their unlimited wisdom the Roland managers made the following decisions:
- buy Cakewalk with a Windows only sequencer for use with their gear
- announce a Mac only editor (you really need one to be able to make good use of the new sounds) for the Integra
Makes perfect sense, does it?

These announcements happen on this page:
http://www.roland.com/synth/integra/
while the Integra isn't even available in big shops I checked worldwide!
Of the two biggest German resellers one has no delivery date at all, and the other says it is announced for September(!) 2013. So the new announcements, which normally could push selling the Intergra, can't have any effect of that kind at all.

All this looks like another true masterpiece of Roland Japan management coordination, does it? Or is the canteen cook meanhwile managaing the company?

cello · Post by **cello** » Sat Apr 06, 2013 1:21 pm

jimknopf wrote:... for single sounds exchange...

For the sakes of absolutely (picky!) accuracy, the onboard OS does allow for export and import of single or multiple sounds. The difficulty comes because you can't remove sounds you don't want hence can't create room for say the Synth Legends pack (assuming of course you've been doing some sound creating for yourself and saved them). But you're right in principal.

Edited to add - you can overwrite sounds but of course you have to do serious homework first to find out which sound you can safely discard as you don't know immediately which registrations and/or Livesets may use them... and there's thousands to check (literally).

Have to say, the lack of a Librarian at this Messe is a real, real let down and very disappointing. The JP-80 desperately needs it.

The relationships between the constituent parts (Registration, Livesets and Tones) are very difficult to manage manually and the V-Synth which is equal in complexity does have a Librarian, so Roland MUST know the JP-80 needs one!

Well, you'd think so anyway

Jan1 · Post by **Jan1** » Sat Apr 06, 2013 3:07 pm

Well, there's a new cook in charge of Roland since April, so hopefully he'll bring Roland back on course.
All too often the company ends up obstructing itself through strange decisions, awkward implementation of features, and turning a deaf ear on requests made by their own consumer base, so I think a new fresh wind and a good dose of common sense will do the company good.

rrricky rrrecordo · Post by **rrricky rrrecordo** » Sat Apr 06, 2013 9:12 pm

jimknopf wrote:As far as I know, the possibilities of replacing the factory-material on arrangers in that price class are limited.

From Grapite's link above:

A built-in 16-track sequencer provides a professional platform for composing and editing SMF data, while the Rhythm Composer lets you create and customize your own rhythms with ease.

Even my ancient mid-range PSR3000 offers this capability, as do some of my early "classic" 1980s Yamaha and Casio auto-accompaniment gems.

Without trying to sound as if I am trying to indoctrinate anyone, I would point out that even the most "cliche" styles on many arrangers can often be transformed into uber coolness simply by altering tempo, the sounds for each part, and the effects. It's easy to turn almost any techno style on the PSR3000 into a NIN kinda groove, I've done it many times. This Bdog (BK-9 hehe i invented a nickname, clever me, let's pin a star on my ass) is clearly able to blow the 3000 to smithereens, so I expect it will be a very versatile exploration device for people like me

cello · Post by **cello** » Sat Apr 06, 2013 9:24 pm

rrricky rrrecordo wrote: ...Bdog...

Bdog = classic!! Consider your @ss starred

jimknopf · Post by **jimknopf** » Sat Apr 06, 2013 9:53 pm

Ricky, still not my cup of tea or bottle of beer: just have fun with it!

rrricky rrrecordo · Post by **rrricky rrrecordo** » Sun Apr 07, 2013 4:51 am

jimknopf wrote:Ricky, still not my cup of tea or bottle of beer: just have fun with it!

My problem (ok ONE of my problems) is that if anything has black and white keys attached to it, it's my cuppa tea, and man I squeeze the beejebus outta that teabag

xmlguy · Post by **xmlguy** » Sun Apr 07, 2013 5:51 am

Devnor wrote:
EvilDragon wrote:
Bald Eagle wrote:Also the spec for the keyboard lists "Key Touch High, Medium, Low, Fixed". Is this aftertouch with only 3 aftertouch pressures being recognized or is it some sensitivity setting?
No, that's velocity sensitivity. Only 3 curves. If neither fits your playing, sucks to be you. Personally I think that having fixed velocity curves is stupid, users should be able to create their own...
That's because everyone knows folks that buy arrangers are programming velocity curves :p Right? The Tyros 4's extent of velocity control is on or off.

No aftertouch.

Tyros 4 has 5 levels of velocity control and it has aftertouch. SA voices also have articulations based on velocity and aftertouch, such as guitar string hammer-ons and slides. The Yamaha mid-range arrangers PSR-S9xx don't have aftertouch, but do have the velocity control and some of the SA voices with velocity articulations. This Roland arranger seems to be positioned to compete with the PSR-S9xx price range. I think EvilDragon was referring to the fact that the velocity curves aren't programmable, not that they don't have velocity curves at all.