Are there any tutorials on the web explaining how to set up the Vocal Harmoniser?? Apart from Page 130 and 131 in the manual which seems to be written for people who understand all this "stuff" I cannot find any more help. Maybe boys know all these technical terms but not the fairer sex.
I have armed myself with the very best SHURE BETA 58 MIC.I have mostly kept to standard duet and close choir as they seem to give some result. I have fiddled with everything, but don't really know what I should be changing- Is it the equalising bands or the compressor or the noise gate or what? Then there is that very confusing editing page!!!I can't find this page in the manual.
I sing mostly country and folk, with an Ann Murray style voice mostly singing around the Ab range. Any girls out there doing similar? Any help would be greatly appreciated. At the moment the mike is great but I am better off without the harmony. Cheers. Jean Olivia.

I should have added to the above, that on the mic. setting page I have the balance at 12 o'clock--Keyboard to off-- mode to
chord and chord to off and I have left the rest to default settings.Reguards. Jean.

Check out www.psrtutorial.com

Jean,

Here is Michel Vonckens settings for the PSR 9000/Pro which would also be suitable for the PSR 2000.



PS: Michel Voncken is a Roadshow expert player for Yamaha Europe. These are his personal settings that he uses for his PSR 9000PRO. The graph is similar to the PSR 2000's Mic Settings.

Best regards,
Mike

I'm going to answer this, but have to run. Stay tuned for the REAL settings.
DonM www.donmasonmusic.com

Thank you Guys for all your answers. I will wait for Don's answer and then try out all suggestions and let you know the results.
Cassp-- I've checked the PSR tutorial but they haven't covered it yet as far as I can see.
Keybplayer- this is so great! Thank you. I am only using the vocal harmony to accompany me when I am playing my own songs. I have not tried out any smf midifiles with a harmony track yet. .....I don't think you can buy them here- the shops don't seem to know about them. Reguards. Jean.

Jean,

That's one of the jobs I promissed I would do for Joe Waters in the near future--just haven't had the time yet. If you wish, I will be more than happy to email you the setup file that Donny Pesce and Don Mason use for this. It is right on the money and and I believe it will work as well for what you're hoping to accomplish.

Gary

Here's the way mine is set up. You may have to adjust the e.q. on the mic because female voices sometimes require cutting or increasing different frequences.

On most mics, I use the FACTORY DEFAULT settings on the e.q. This cuts the 56 frequency a little to eliminate mud in the vocals. The human voice doesn't go this low, so all it does is cut low-end noise.
The middle frequency, 1.1 I think, is cut 4 db. I think it would not be cut for a female voice though.

The high-end frequency is boosted 4db. This adds life and sizzle to the vocals.
Play with these settings and, if you can, record yourself using them. You will almost certainly find you need to adjust them at least a little.

I sometimes use the compressor/limiter and again, use the factory default settings. Using the c/l increases the initial mic volume, so you may need to adjust that. It allows you to sing more softly, as is necessary for lower notes, and still have the sound level high. The Limiter aspect prevents overdriving the mic and getting too loud (very useful for guest vocalists). It can also save your speakers from frying because of high-end feedback.

I don't use the Noise Gate. Maybe if you have loud outside sounds going on you might need it, but it isn't necessary for me.

On the Microphone effects, press Instant Access button and the mic DSP. The default DSP is Tempo Delay. I change this to Echo and set it to about 25. This gives a single slapback to the vocal. And tends to fatten the vocal some and isn't really noticeable as a heavy, repeated delay. The Tempo Delay that is factory preset would only be useful to me in a special situation. To use it on every song would cetainly detract from your vocal sound.

I use Hall 3 for the Reverb, and set it at 25 or 30. All these settings are easily changed from the screen that appears when you press Instant Access and the Mic DSP button.
You can save the settings to registration memory. You will have to be certain the Registration Parameters are set to remember the vocal settings. This screen appears when you press the Save button as you save the registrations.

Again, most female voices that I've heard must have more of the middle frequences than are typically used my males. Just experiment, record and listen if you can, and make adjustments.

I do set the Vocal Harmony at the factory default also, but you may find it better to cut the level of the harmonies a little.
I find myself using the simpler harmonies, such as the first two presets. You will need to experiment with your mic technique to make them sound best without distorting or feeding back.

The input level of the microphone (adjusted by the small knob on the back of the keyboard) is very critical. I would suggest setting the mic level quite high, about 120, and then adjusting the input knob as low as possible to eliminate overdriving the mic input. The green light on the mic input indicter will come on occasionally on loud notes, but should be off most of the time.
These levels are very critical, but using the Compressor/Limiter helps a lot.

One additional thought--the overall keyboard E.Q. (accessible through the Mixing Console screen) also affects the vocal settings. If you are using an external mixer, either before or after the keyboard, the e.q. settings there will also affect your sound.
It is easy to overboost certain frequencies because the mic sound is being influenced by several different e.q. points.

I love Ann Murray and look forward to hearing you too!
Good Luck!
DonM

If you want the harmoniser to read chords from midi songs, you will have to set the chord to a channel number. Sometimes it's one, sometimes five, or ??? It can vary with the song.
I don't remember the "keyboard" setting that you have to off. That doesn't sound right, but I will check when I bring the KB into the house.
DonM

Boy! I'm gonna change my name to Billy Joe or something like that. Has anyone besides me noticed the long answer DonM gave the fairer sex. The answers he gives me are only sentence at most, if I'm lucky.

Boo why assume? .....
"Jean" could be either boy or girl......?

heres an example:....

http://www.showbizspot.com/celebrities/b/jean-paul-belmondo/

GARY,

I've also been awaiting your mic settings on Joe's website. I know you're always busy though and know you'll get to them when you can. In the meantime I would appreciate if you would also send me Don Mason's and Donny Pesce's mic settings by email - if you don't mind (and if they don't mind).

Thanks for your time.

vc

Vern,,

You've got mail!

Don. Thank you for you great response. I am going to spend some time the week end with our sound guy trying out all the suggested settings and getting the best for me. Four ears are better than two.!!
The keyboard setting I was referring to on the mic page. is under the VOCAL HARMONY CONTROL section - third column from left and gives a choice of OFF-UPPER or LOWER.Like all the other settings on the mic set page I did not really understand their usage, and am so pleased to get some explanation from you with reguard to what they do.
Gary. I have sent you an E-mail reguarding being unable to open your attachment. Hope to be able to solve this. Details in my E-mail
It seems as though there could be quite a lot of interest in this subject. I heard Scottie sing THE COFFEE SONG and liked the way he just fuzzed his voice on the choruses-no harmony, just another voice in Unison, I think.
Dnj-- Oh Come on!!! Do you know any guys that sing like Ann Murray??
Where are all the girls, by the way, Don't they play keyboards??.
Thank you all for your interestand help.
Cheers. Jean Olivia

Thanks Gary,

I still don't see how you have time to provide all the help - here and on Joe's website. And still have time to make chile. And yes, I'm gonna try your recipe; it sounds great !!

vc

Jean.....My apologies, I should have read your the first post regarding Ann Murray ...

"Open mouth insert foot"

------------------
www.donnypesce.com

Hi Jean, as my memory recalls, on the Coffee Song, I believe I used the vocal harmonizer preset 'Std Duet', and then simply set the harmony (H) voice (Bal: L/H) to a lower setting than default.

Jean, do you by any chance do the song "Could I Have This Dance"? It would be terrific if you could post some of your music for us to enjoy.

Hi Don, terrific informative post covering the Yamaha keyboard's vocalizer/mic settings.

Scott

Scott. I have not got around to learning to record and post songs yet-but I will learn. I do sing that song so I will try it with the effect you mentioned. Thank you for your help. cheers Jean.

Trivia: An acquaintance of mine, and a good friend of one of my best friends, wrote "Could I Have This Dance". His name is Waylon Holyfield. He once said he thought it was a pretty good song, but had no idea it would become the multi-million seller it did. For years it was a classic at weddings and anniversaries.

In 1972 or 1973, my friend had gone to Nashville to visit Waylon. While he was there another songwriter in the office was working on a new song. He sang it for my friend and asked what he thought. My friend liked it so much that he named his first daughter "Amanda". The guy was Bob McDill and Amanda was one of his first big hits. He went on to write numerous hits for people such as Waylon Jennings, Don Williams and more.

My friend's name was Mac McBryde, and his wife Leslie, used to sing with me. She was one of the best I've ever heard. Waylon Holeyfield brought her to Nashville, wrote several songs for her to record and was very pleased with the result. He shopped Leslie and the songs to RCA Records. They listened and loved them. They called Leslie and Mac in for an interview. They told Leslie to go home and lose about 8 or 10 pounds and they would sign her.
As my friend Mac told it, "We went back to Little Rock and Leslie didn't stop eating until she had gained 20 more pounds! I never asked her to record again."

I don't know if there is a moral here, but evidently somewhere deep inside she didn't want to be a star.
As far as I know, she still makes commercials around Little Rock. Mac passed away a few years ago, and I've sort of lost touch.
Wow, this got off topic and personal and rambling. Maybe I'll delete it after I read it.
DonM

Great information Don. It is good to know a bit about the people who write the songs we sing.I am working on all the VH suggestions I have been given and I must say I sound much improved already. Did I read somewhere that the PSR3000 had an improved vocal harmoniser- that may be even better than the 2000?
I bought some of Carrillon's style disks last night and am just waiting for them to arrive on my E-mail. It is quite exciting - I hope they are good. Jean

Jean,
I suggest you go to PSR Tutorial Page. http://psrtutorial.com/
There you will find all sorts of free styles. Be sure and download Gary Diamond's Gig Disks.
Don

Don. I have got all the styles from the tut. site, and am very grateful to Gary and the others. What I am really short of are Modern Waltz styles with lovely strings. I have plenty of the oom- pah pah type which are good for songs like Ce sera Sera, but one of my Singers wants Desert Song and nothing I have seems to sound right.I will have to learn to mix my own.However the Ballroom disk I have sent for has a Modern and Slow Waltz on it so I have my fingers crossed that is is what I need for this task.
Gary-- Believe it or not--I have never tasted Chilli.!!! Cheers Jean.

Jean,

Never tasted chili? Wow, you lead a sheltered life--gotta' get out more!

Cheers,

Gary

How about Kangaroo Chili? Any recipes Gary?

DonM