And I've got a lot of questions!!

I tested out a number of boards yesterday:
Tyros 2, S900, S700, E-50, E-60, G-70, E-09, DGX-620 and CASIO WK3700.

I'm searching for a board to use for gigging. Ideally I would like a board, where I can play like a pianist and have the autocomp follow me. So far none, of these boards will follow my style of piano playing. The DGX, E-09, E-50, E-60 and G-70 were a joke in full keyboard mode. I tried every chord recognition mode, and it changed chords like an arabic band on acid. I was able to get the Rolands to work sort of right, but then I had to seriously alter and adapt my playing. The yammies on the other hand did a better job, but none of the boards took synchopations well. And playing a pentatonic lick on all boards while in a chord, made the yammies change from the pentatonic chords (add9, 6, 69) like crazy. Did not sound good. I woun't even comment on the WK... it was horrible to play.

So my question is for korg owners, how does full keyboard mode work there? Does it change every time you play a key? or does it wait until it gets an x number of keys?

The reason I ask is that noen of the stores I've been to have a korg on display.

Also when I hear demos online of the yammies. And when I hear the stuff some of you have posted, they sound real good. But the ones in the store sounded like crap, at least when I played them. The styles didn't sound realistic at all. They all resembled quite accuratly the sound in my DGX-305. Offcourse the megavoice keyboards had a lot of slides, guitar noises and stuff like that. But it didn't sound realistic at all, it sounded like a guitar sample and a technician put in a lot of noises in the mix. It didn't really sound like a guitar does in a real mix. So why is this? Is it me who cannot play properly? Is it the boards have been messed with being on display so the settings are all screwed up? Or is it that the demos online are so fine tuned and produced that they don't really give an accurate representation on how the board sounds?

I really couldn't tell much audible difference from the Tyros 2 and S900. At least not while playing styles.

I found the user interface on the yammies to be pretty cumbersome. The lack of a touch screen makes it a bit less userfriendly than the Rolands. And I expect the learning curve to be a bit steaper.

And what is up with those bogus Music Finder, and Music Assistant entries?

Doc-Z

Get your hands on a KORG Pa800 or the new Pa2X it might be what your looking for for your style of playing.

"
Two new recognized chords. Two additional chords can be recognized: the all-important jazz chords Flat Fifth (5b) and Diminished Seventh (dim7).
http://www.synthtopia.com/content/2007/07/23/korg-pa800-update/

Excerpt from Keyboard Magazine, April 2007 issue, "Arrangers un-cheesed", by Stephen Fortner:

"The Pa800 features a new RX grand piano sound (this stands for “Real eXperience” in Korg’s marketing materials), and I hope Korg takes this as a complement: The keyboard action, which is silky smooth, has aftertouch, and seems perfectly matched to every other sound in the machine, doesn’t do this piano justice. With some practice, I got good dynamic and harmonic range from it, but played via MIDI on a weighted controller, it becomes a whole new instrument. By any hardware keyboard standards, arranger or otherwise, this is a world-class sound.

When it comes to following your chord changes in a way that makes musical sense and doesn’t come off as mechanical, all arrangers at this price and above are very good. That said, the Pa800 is my current favorite. One reason is its top-notch chord recognition. Like on all Pa models, a pair of buttons determines whether the keyboard scans the left hand, right hand, or both to tell what chords you intend, which is often a function of some less-obvious mode choice on other arrangers. In practice, the display identified just about every altered chord and extension I threw at it, including augmented, diminished, sixth with and without an added ninth, major seventh (with a major or minor third), flat and sharp ninths, suspended second and fourth, even sharp 11th. With Bass Inversion active (a button found on many arrangers, including the rest of the Pa series, the Ketron SD-5, Generalmusic Genesys Pro S, and Roland E-80), even “slash” chords such as Fmaj7/A were recognized properly. It wasn’t just lip service either: Style playback was uncannily hip to the displayed chord, and seemingly, to my intentions. Was there the occasional clam? Yes, but less frequently than with most hired guns I’ve worked with, and the Pa800 doesn’t ever raid the buffet."

link to article here

You will need to adjust your playing style for it to work on any arranger. I play full piano mode all the time. With the korg there need to be at least 3 notes in a chord for the instrument tio recognise it and it will scan the entire keyboard , not just the left hand or right hand to detect a chord. Try setting the chord recognition to 'inverse bass' . Go back to the original shop so that they can reset the instrument. In this mode the instrument recognises your lowest note on the keyboard as your root note . That way you can play pretty much any chord with all the inversions of that chord and so long as the bass note in your left hand is the root note you will get the correct chord sounds in the accompaniment that you are supposed to hear following your chosen chord. I dont know if i have explained myself clearly but post again if i havent and i will try again !

If you are anywhere near a Wersi dealer (In the USA www.wersimusic.com) have a look at the Ikarus with the OAA, (Open Art Arranger) as it should do everything you require, and you can also use VST Piano instruments. (VSTs can also be used in Styles and Sequences)
Hope this helps

Bill

I guess the most subjective part about this post is sound. Most keyboards that are on display in stores have really been messed with, mainly by kids who don't know a thing about arrangers but they sure love to push buttons.

Do a master reset or System Restoration on any keyboard you intend to test--this is important. Next, most keyboards do not sound good right out of the box. On Yamaha boards, go to the Mixing Panel and tab to the EQ page, then scroll down to User1/Edit and adjust the EQs. A good starting point for the 5-band graphic equalizer would be: 5, 4, 2, 4, 8. Then store the EQ settings in STORE1. Makes a big difference.

There are loads of options with fingering modes, including Full Keyboard, which I assume is the way you wish to go. Most manufacturers have this feature, and it usually requires at least three keys to be pressed before it will recognize the chord. Those keys can be pressed anywhere on the board. You can, however, adjust the split point to the extreme right side of the keyboard to make some very creative changes. I only know of one person that does this, and he always sounds great.

Finally, instead of listening to the keyboard through either onboard speakers or the store's ElCheapo PA system, take a good set of headphones with you and listen to the keyboard through them instead. This eliminates outside noises from kids pounding on instruments in the store and other distractions, thereby providing you with a truer picture of what the keyboard actually sounds like.

Hope this helps,

Gary

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Travlin' Easy

Thanks for all your input. That wersi looked good, to bad there isn't any dealers here in Norway, at least none that I've found.

Regarding full keyboard modes.

On the Roland keyboards, it seemed to change chords almost everytime I had two or more notes played at the same time. I tried both the Intelligent and Piano recognition mode, and neither worked any good when playing like a piano player. As a piano player you don't always use all the notes in every chord you play, and often you play some melodic fills, that fit the current chord. On the Rolands whenever I played a fill with a blue note, or any note that didn't fit the current chord, it changed chords. So playing a mixolydian scale lick over a G7 chord for instance, had the arranger changing chords for almost every note I played. But as long as I just kept to playing only chord notes it was fine..

The Yammies did a better job when fills are concerned. It only changed chords when you pressed three or more keys down at the same time (The Rolands seem to treat sustained notes as chord notes). And playing unchordal notes in fills went fine. But pentatonic scales messed the chords up bigtime! It changed chords everytime I played notes from the pentatonic scale.

The DGX changed chords for every note I played, I mean every note!! As did the Casio.

I used a pair of studio headphones on all keyboards, to get the right sound.

Maybe I was doing something wrong?

But I was under the impression, at least that is how they market this function, that you could play like a pianist, and have the keyboard follow you.

Maybe I need a band and not an arranger?

Doc-Z

I have to agree with you, Doc...the "piano modes" on all arrangers are very lacking if you try to play as a piano player.

Haven't tried the Korg, but my experience with Yamaha and Roland arrangers was not at all satisfactory.

The user has to adjust their technique to suit the instrument which may or may not be what they want.

Ian

Ok, good to know it's not just my playing!

It seems this feature is falsely marketed.

The adaption of playing looks like something I have to do, if I want to move into this realm of music.

The reason for this is that I'm sick of lugging all my equipment arround.

Right now I have this setup:

DGX-305
Boss DR-3 drum machine
2x Behringer B212 speakers
Phonic MAX2500 Amp
Keyboard stand
Mic stand
Yamaha MG10/02
Behringer MiniFex800 DSP
a bag of mics, calbes and power adapters.

This is 4 trips to the car when doing a gig!!!

I imagine having two powered speakers, a headset mic, and a keyboard with a mic input and all my songs organised in set list on it, would save me a couple of trips to both the car and to my naprapat... That alone is worth adapting my playing style..

Now, one question:

Accourding to the tutorial video on Korgpa.com the Pa800, Pa1x, and Pa2x can save custom songbooks. Each item can have not just style and songname, but almost every setting on the board as well. You can save tempo, muted parts, orchestration, key, etc. etc. Can the Yammies and Rolands do this as well? (Music Finder, and Music Assistant)

When I tested these features they seemed to have a huge list of bogus song names, and they set up the tempo and style. As well as OTS.

It would be great to be able to store my set lists in this. As well as creating different lists for different venues.. all jazz, rock'n'roll, drunken maniac party etc.

Doc-Z

Doc,

Yamaha's Music Finder Directory (MFD)is a great tool, but it is limited to what can be stored in each selection. The MFD is essentially a mini version of a registration. It will store the name of the song, tempo, intro and variation that you use for a specific song. The bogus titles in the onboard MFD were put there for copyright reasons, and the corrected titles are available from www.psrtutorial.com .

For saving additional information, including lyrics in .txt format, plus a host of other things, you will have to utilize the keyboard's registrations. Each registration can be named as a song title, or you can name a bank of 8 registrations as a song title, thereby giving you a nearly endless array of items that can be stored.

I don't know if they are available in Norway, but if possible you should seriously look into a Rock And Rollerk cart for loading and unloading your gear. They are very versitile, hold an enormous amount of equipment, yet the cart folks down to a compact size and very easy to transport.

Hope this helps,

Gary

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Travlin' Easy