Anyone have any insight into the differences / similarities between the Roland BK5 and BK7m? I know I can download the specs but wondering if anyone has hands on experience with both. Thanks in advance

I have a BK-7m, and it's an amazing module. The display could be bigger, but it occupies a unique space in the market. In that sense it's amazing piece of gear that was well worth its street price when it went out of production.

I also briefly owned a BK-5. It was nice, but IMO not as nice as the E-50 that preceded it, so I kept my E-50 and have no regrets. The biggest plusses of the BK-5 vs. the BK-7m are a larger screen, and an on-board Style Composer.

The BK-7m does have Roland's Makeup Tools for revoicing, etc. But there isn't a built-in way to create styles from scratch. A primitive "Style Converter" software was bundled with the -7m. As I recall, it didn't have a way to insert the "Alteration Mode" messages which establish the upper and lower note limits (aka "wrap range") for each style part. These alteration mode events also determine whether a Roland style part transposes "in parallel" or uses a "close" voicing, which makes a lot of difference in the resulting sound! Trivial to most here, but if you're into style editing, you'll prefer the BK-5.

You don't mention the E-A7, which is a couple of years newer and probably the last true Roland arranger. Compared to the BK-5, it has two non-touch displays and the possibility of multipads (you have to develop your own sequences for the pads.) However, the BK-5 is still available new from major online retailers at a slightly lower cost.

Roland is my preferred brand. The styles are highly playable and their chord fingering is easier than any other brand, without penalizing highly skilled players. It's a shame that they have pretty well abandoned the arranger market. IMO the BK-7m, BK-5, and E-A7 are all good instruments and worth owning.

Thanks for the reply and info. I should of mentioned I already own a BK9 and a BK7m. I have a 61 key controller for the BK7m and was wondering if it would just be easier to get a BK5.. Mostly for small in/out quick gigs.
Not familiar at all with the E-50. Does it accept a thumb drive and Styles from a BK9 ? E-A7 is also on the radar but just collecting info right now
thanks again

I also have a BK9 and a BK7M, and have done a fair amount of time on a BK5 that a friend owned.

To be quite frank, I was deeply unimpressed with the BK5, I felt it’s action was cheap and plasticky, the buttons felt fairly cheap, and it’s overall sound felt a bit thinner than my personal Roland’s.

Personally, I do not think that the BK5 would make a strong master controller for a module. And it has no sliders or definable buttons, so it isn’t much use there either.

I am a little confused, though… With a BK9 being only 20 pounds weight, why would you want to use something far less capable, far less good sounding, and with a much inferior action? Yes, it is a hair longer, but still plenty compact, and the weight difference is negligible.

I use my module exclusively as a sound module for my keytar rig, and even there I badly miss the chord sequencer, VK organ section and SuperNatural guitars. I’m not seeing a compelling use for a BK5 if you already have a BK9…

I think what I’d do if you are looking to have a spare backup keyboard or need an arranger in two different locations would be to sell the BK7-m and look for a used good condition BK9.

That way, a) you have a backup, b) you have 100% data equivalency.

There are a lot of sounds and kits in the BK9 the BK5 doesn’t have, so you are likely to need to do quite a bit of work in the Makeup Tools, and you’ll have to completely redo your Performance Lists, because the BK5 cannot read BK9 UPS’s…

There’s a lot to be said for not having to do everything twice!

I'm not sure what Bill's goals are. The BK-9 lacks built-in speakers. If it's truly a room-sized gig, then a BK-5 or E-A7 could be the answer. But with only 12 watts of amplification and no built-in subwoofer, for anything larger he would need an external amp anyway. As you pointed out, the BK-9 is remarkably light for a semi-pro action 76-key synth.

Maybe I'm just over thinking things. My BK9 is great but in its Gator Pro case its a bit heavy and bulky. Even though its a semi rigid case I think it weighs almost as much as the keyboard but the protection it gives is worth it.
I've got a 61 key controller for the Bk7m ( I also like using the BK7m with my FP90 piano at home so I'd never sell it.) but thats two ac adaptors, midi cable, and a two tier stand.
Mostly something for a cocktail hour or quick senior gig or a short jam. For sound I have a JBL Eon10 which is amazing for its size and weight so I don't care about onboard speakers. Like I said maybe I'm just over thinking things.

I have an early version of this hard case - iSeries 5014-6 Narrow 76-note Keyboard Case from SKB, and although it looks like on paper it won’t fit, you take out the padding and it just squeezes in. If you have an oversized case, maybe this is something to try.

Yes, it weighs as much as the keyboard, but it is a hard case, ATA legal (although without the padding, I’m not sure I’d be comfortable letting baggage handlers throw it around!), and a soft case weighs very little less (SKB’s soft 76 weighs almost the same!). Bottom line, unless you are comfortable putting your BK9 in a garbage bag, you are not going to save yourself much weight at the cost of losing almost all worthwhile protection.

A BK5 only weighs 3.5lbs less than the BK9, and by saving so little, you lose so much. The microphone in (now you need to carry a mixer with effects), the pro action (other than the lack of aftertouch, I’m of the opinion the action is easily as good as a PA4x), you lose the expression pedal input (only one input, so either sustain or expression, not both), no SN sounds, no VK organ, no chord sequencer, no key audio stuff (the BK9’s answer to multipads), no independent mastering section for keyboard and style/song sections (so playing loudly doesn’t duck the backing), no FC7 input, the list goes on and on and on…

It just sounds like an enormous step back to save yourself maybe 10lbs at the kerb. And yes, without a sub, I would never inflict those speakers on anyone! So between the sub and a mixer, I bet you end up carrying more than you are already…

I have a backup BK9. I honestly don’t think I will ever buy another keyboard to gig with. This is as good as it gets at the weight point..!

The minute I find myself looking at something else, I make myself learn a new tune. Now my time is actually productive!

Thanks Diki

You talked me down off the ledge. No real benefit to the BK5. Love your last line.
"The minute I find myself looking at something else, I make myself learn a new tune. Now my time is actually productive!"

Great advice !

About the only thing that tempts me at the moment is hooking up the BK9 to my iPad, and using the amazing modeled instruments from SWAM (the saxes and the solo strings are absolutely as good as it gets!), and some of the virtual synth stuff like the OBXa and Memorymoog emulators.

But there’s very little weak stuff in the BK9, only stuff I would really like is more SN guitars (I’d kill for a good Strat and a Les Paul to run through the amp sim!). Pound for pound, dollar for dollar, this is the greatest arranger Roland (and, IMHO, anyone else!) has ever made. What a shame it was the last…

I have a Yamaha YBNP76 case, which only weighs about 4 lbs and can hold the BK9. Of course, it's not the same rugged protection you've got there, and I wouldn't suggest it if you've got roadies handling your stuff. But if you're carrying your own gear reasonably carefully from home to car and car to stage, it's sufficient for that, and there's your weight savings. You can get it for about $60.


I have not yet really looked into using the BK9 to control an iPad sound source. In a brief scan, I couldn't find anything in the manual about, for example, specifying an external part for Upper 1 or Upper 2, or otherwise specifying any kind of recallable external zone (e.g. having a sound over some part of the keyboard trigger an external iPad sound, using whatever MIDI channel and some Program Change command for selecting the sound). How would you go about integrating the kind of iPad sounds you're talking about?

Kind of getting back to the topic of this thread, having first played the BK9, I wondered about whether a BK-7M might be a better choice for me. But...

...having "favorited" a bunch of BK9 sounds, I was surprised at how few of my favorites were in the BK-7M. To my ears, most of the best sounds are exclusive to the 9.

... I'd miss the clonewheel organ

... I'd miss the BK-9 Editor which makes it easy to customize sounds via an iPad. That appears to be the only model that has such an editor. (Editing on the small BK-7M screen doesn't seem so appealing,)

... I don't think the BK-7M has a way to create your own rhythms...?

The area to look into is the MIDI Sets. You only get eight, but that’s plenty enough to work well with a modest iPad setup (I’m primarily just using a few solo sounds, as you have noticed, most of the BK9’s sounds are bang on).

In the MIDI Set, you select which Keyboard or Song/Style Parts get sent out the MIDI/USB connection. Then select which MIDI Ch# you want to transmit on (so it doesn’t have to use the Internal Ch#) and decide which controllers, sysex etc. you want to send or block. At this point it’s send mode only you need, so make sure to turn OFF all incoming MIDI, especially sysex!

Once you’ve set up things the way you want, save as say #2 of the 8. I recommend setting Set 1 to Internal sounds only, no transmit of any kind, no receiving anything (unless you are hooked to a DAW). Make this your Default startup Midi Set, so you always start up with no chance of anything unusual coming from the iPad!

You can probably come up with your own needs, but I definitely recommend one Set for UPR1 transmit, one for UPR2 only, one for LWR, then whatever combinations you need.

BUT…. WARNING!

The MIDI Set data is stored in the Global parameters, which on the BK series, has NO BACKUP at all. 🤯 This means WRITE DOWN ON PAPER ALL THESE SETTINGS! That’s the only way to recreate them if you end up having to do a reset (as are ALL parameters stored in Global, which includes your Mastering Tools data, Mic settings, FC7 assignments and much more). Total PITA, fixed on the EA7…

Then, once you have your MIDI Sets tested and stored, you can Link each individual Performance (all 999 of them!) you create to one of the Sets. From this point onwards, you can basically just use and play the BK9 without worrying about external gear (yes, this system will work with most external gear, whether USB or MIDI). Call up a Performance, and all routing and setups are done for you.

As to calling up the sounds in an iPad instrument, there’s a bit of a wrinkle. Been a while since I tested this, the Keyboard Parts can only SEND the PC#’s of the Internal sounds. This isn’t a problem if your iPad instrument just uses straight 1-128 PC#’s, but if it wants to see CC#00/32 codes for bank select, you may not find an Internal Tone with the same codes. YMMV, caveat emptor!

Song Parts (if you decide to REALLY complicate life by using the iPad/external gear for Song Parts!) can be set to transmit any code, so no problem there.

I’d recommend you walk before you run… get the SWAM tenor or alto (or get the bundle!), hook it up to the iPad, use a simple MIDI Set to transmit just controllers (filter out pc# to not inadvertently change the sound in the iPad) for UPR1 (my #2 Set) and then just bliss out playing that amazing sax sound!

Sorry for being a bit late with the reply… chemo sucks! 🩷🎹🩷🎹🩷

Thanks for all your helpful info!

Since there are only 8 recallable MIDI configs, I don't think the inability to specify MSB/LSB for a program change would necessarily be much of an issue. If I wanted, for example, external sounds to be associated with MIDI Sets 2 through 8, I could put the 7 desired sounds on 7 different channels on the iPad side, so merely having a MIDI Set transmit on a different channel would call up the desired sound, without having to send any Program Change at all!

I think there are also AUv3 hosting apps which, themselves, could respond to Program Changes of your choice (i.e. staying within 1-128 with no MSB/LSB needed), and that app would in turn invoke the desired patch from one of the hosted apps. I'm thinking about Keystage, Camelot Pro, AUM... I think one or more of these would probably be able to do that.

Sorry to hear of your health issues. :-(

The only issue with AUv3 hosts is I think it taxes the system rather more than just addressing the one program (like SWAM or Minimoog Model D).

One thing I found amazing was, because it’s monophonic (although the solo strings can double-stop), native latency is astonishingly low (under 6ms) for the saxes. Highly playable and zero glitches!

My needs for now are simple, I'm still trying to not run before I walk yet!

If you're only running one program, you're probably right. But once you're running multiple apps, at least in my experiments, it seems it is less taxing on the system to use a hosting app. Originally I thought that (for example) running two apps (say, SWAM and Model D, each set to respond on different MIDI channels) would be more efficient than running three... i.e. those same two apps plus a hosting environment (so using the host would be something you'd choose for some other benefit). But while it may very with the app combination, from what I've seen, you actually seem to gain some efficiency (or predictability/stability) by running them via the host, as some elements of the individual apps are no longer being used.

Which host do you recommend..?

My experiments would have been with either Keystage or Camelot Pro. The former has a free demo; the latter's free demo is only Mac/PC, but you could try it that way, and then buy the iPad version if you like it. A lot of people also like AUM, but it doesn't work the way my brain works. ;-)

Thanks…