From what I understand talking to my colleagues from Japan it is very different to the West

They are into ensemble music in a BIG way. The schools start off with Suzuki Melodions which teaches breath control, keyboard skills and the basic principles of Music. Suzuki have a government contract and supply many of the schools with Harmonicas (melodions obviously) and Hammond Organs. They have a little instrument called the Hammond Jnr that you won't find anywhere else in the world. It is a 37 note keyboard with a set of 9 drawbars. There are plastic coloured slides that you can use to form a drawbar shape.

They also use Hammond XE1 keyboards to lead an ensemble of maybe 50 people playing melodions and mallet instruments.

Karaoke is obviously the big thing over there and most places will have a Karaoke center rather than a guy with a Ketron SD1 playing in the corner.

They still play Organ. And schools will have a Hammond XT/XH and Yamaha have instruments that sound like EL series for the home market and these are also used in schools and for organ concerts. Their is no old fart stigma attached to organ playing there...they just love music.

Hammond has become more popular and there are a number of very good Jazz Clubs now.

The younger generation love western music including the supergroups from past decades.

The older generation also learn instruments, but more traditional. The taisho koto (harp) is very popular among this group.

I might be off the mark - as I say its just what i have gathered from talking.

TWD


[This message has been edited by Tonewheeldude (edited 03-13-2010).]

Sorry for the misquote, Dan. Thing is, when arrangers really started to hit he scene back in the eighties, so did WS's. But WS's have moved on radically from where they started, and arrangers, to be honest, haven't. WS's of today are quite capable of sounding like today (because that's what much of the hits were MADE on!) but they still don't have a fraction of the arrangers' ease of use, live.

But arrangers are still mired in the roots of mom and pop's living room organ, sound and style-wise, and are rapidly becoming irrelevant to younger players, especially here in the US. We are buying WS's by the container load, but arrangers have become VERY hard to find, especially TOTL ones. My local dealer has M3-88's, FantomG's, MoXS's up the ying-yang, but there isn't a Tyros for miles, or a PA2X or a Ketron for HUNDREDS of miles. And I'm in a fairly retiree-friendly part of the US!

And that is ENTIRELY the fault of the manufacturers. There is nothing intrinsically dated about the arranger control paradigm. It is as easily adapted to modern music as any other. It's just the sounds, the styles, and a few basic functions that hold it back. As I said, the DJX proved that, if done right, a hiphop/rap arranger sells like hotcakes over here (and to be honest, anywhere else in the world where American music is an influence). There is NO defined 'market', only what the product can and can't do.

And I'm sorry for discounting the Asian community, but you have to realize that these things ARE made primarily in Europe, primarily for Europeans (continental ones at that), and you have to have special models made that are relevant to YOUR musics and sounds. And they sell well because of it. Let's face it, they weren't until the Asian sounds and styles got added.

That's ALL I'm talking about... if the Asian market is sufficiently big to warrant a whole product re-vamp, why not the world's largest economy? How about the PSR910US, or the GW8-US? GW-8 came out with THREE variants, not ONE of which was geared to modern America. Asia, Europe and Latin America got tailor made soundsets and styles. But the world's largest economy..?

Zip, zilch, nada...

If I were an arranger company stockholder, I'd be asking some VERY pointed questions at meetings about the DJX and why no-one followed up on its' success.

Diki said "But WS's have moved on radically from where they started, and arrangers, to be honest, haven't. WS's of today are quite capable of sounding like today (because that's what much of the hits were MADE on!) but they still don't have a fraction of the arrangers' ease of use, live.
But arrangers are still mired in the roots of mom and pop's living room organ, sound and style-wise, and are rapidly becoming irrelevant to younger players, especially here in the US. "


I had a conversation with friends over at musicplayer.com and talked about workstations. The general comment is none of the big three are doing much of anything with bringing out something new in a work station that is not born from the previous workstation. Yamaha has a relationship with Steinberg ( they own it) and there are strides from that end.

But Ketron's Audya is something new in the arranger market and everyone seems to agree with that the keyboard sounds amazing. Let's hope that the refinements will come out and we can all talk about music production.

I know that I could not record with a traditional workstation the way I have recorded with the SD1.

I will be very interested in a module or 61 note Audya for home use. My Church is getting money together for the 76 note Audya.


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http://www.esnips.com/web/SongsfromDanO

[This message has been edited by DanO1 (edited 03-14-2010).]