Been around the market for well over 40 years (Well over 45 years if you include passive involvement) and have seen many changes, here, in Europe and the US, I can assure you that Pro arranger players are negligible in comparison to home players. (Remember over 90% of arranger players (Or any type of player) don’t post on forums, so forums cannot be used as a guide)
Unlike most other manufactures that had a home and professional division, Korg was always professional, which is why their early arrangers got a reputation of being difficult to use, now things have settled down, they know how to make their arrangers do both in a form that most can understand, (Something manufactures with 2 divisions have problems with) hence they are going from strength to strength.
As to youth, then forget arrangers as they are for the old, (Uncool) and it requires something completely new to entice them. (If you don’t believe me just talk to today’s youngsters)
Bill
Just try and look outside your local situation...
In middle east, asia, and many other regions, arranger keys are by far the most sold keyboards... not just for homeplayers, but also for most local professional musicians.. because these keyboards are to versatile for performers to neglect..
In any market, consumers will follow the professionals, as those are the people who in general make use of the most features and will see shortcommings and flaws much easier then an amateur...
Having 45 years of experience in the buiseness might actually have blinded you from whats happening outside of your local situation. The general arranger market is quickly moving away from 70+ year old europeans towards the needs of the asians which by now make the biggest market..
And guess why yamaha is loosing out on that market to the Casio MZ-X and the Roland EA-7? (Because the around €1000 mark is huge huge huge in Asia). Those are mostly young people that want tomperform and they are using arranger keyboards..
Thats because yamaha is mainly build with home players in mind...
Previous Topic
Index
