Hi Tony,
don't write your Tyros off yet. i don't own one personally , but I do have a manual.
On page 98 of Tyros 1 manual, it explains how you can actually put together a backing track in step time. ie bunch of button pushing and in a matter of minutes you have a complete backing track for a song.
You just pick the style, the parts ie intro , variations fills etc chords and you put them in in steptime. No live playing required. Then you save it as a midifile.
From there you could import the midifile into a computer sequencer for further editing ( probably not not neccesasry at this stage) or if you want it as an audio recording you'll have to ask one of the guys how to go about it.
Hopefully your friend may be able to show you how to do the step recording in the tyros,once you get the hang of it,, it's really quite simple.

If your Tyros is midied to a computer
Busker or Chord Player may be of some use http://www.1manband.nl/
I can't actually try either of these programs with an arranger keyboard( as I currently don't have one) but I get the impression you type in the chord sequence for your backing and you just press the appropriate style parts ie variations, fills etcand I ASSUME you'd hit the record button on the Tyros to record it all then save as midifile.

Start off simple and work your way up.

best wishes
Rikki

p.s. forget softsynths for the moment , all it is is a software synthesizer( synth that's loaded into your computer) as opposed to a hardware synthesizer .
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Tony Rome:
[b]

[This message has been edited by rikkisbears (edited 11-23-2005).]