Creating Poly Rhythm Effects with KETRON and YAMAHA Arranger products:- https://youtu.be/kEvefTNRrZs

So this is, essentially, Korg's new 'two styles at a time' system, but using two arrangers to achieve it...

If Ketron were to adopt ONE totally new arranger feature that is utterly groundbreaking, following in Korg's footsteps here (I don't see anything proprietary in the ability to run multiple styles simultaneously) would be it...

This one feature is the end of 'style fatigue', it exponentially increases the amount of ROM styles (you can make MANY different sounding styles simply by combining only TWO styles, now extrapolate that to hundreds of styles you can mix and match!😱).

There are quite a few things that Korg's system needs work with (synchronization, integration with the Songbook, picking which intro/ending gets used, and timebase adjustments for things like this, where you are in essence mixing and matching a 3/4 timebase against a 4/4 timebase...

Korg made an amazing leap forward but have failed to capitalize on the potential. Here's Ketron's chance to leap ahead....

Yes indeed, but with more flexibility. Although having the dual style capability in the same arranger does give you a lot of the flexibility you've touched on above, the limitation (which this method of using 2 different brand arrangers breaks) of having both styles use the same sound source is broken. Added to this, you can now tap into features that one offers which the other does not.

One totally new arranger feature KETRON has introduced in the EVENT series (an expansion from the Audya and SD9 series) is having complete Audio styles. Despite some limitations, these do eliminate style fatigue and virtually place a complete live band (and not the work of just a good midi musician style programmer) at your fingertips. Now, the ability to combine both Audio and Midi to compensate for each other's limitations. and create styles that run on both is groundbreaking in the music industry (as far as styles with complete audio elements with real-time chord changes go).

It still possesses challenges, however, which are some of the reasons no other manufacturer (yet) has ventured into this new world (... except Yamaha, who attempted this with the Tyros 4 [50 styles which had audio drums only] ).

Thanks,

It's mostly the cost aspect of Korg's system that is its major practicality. Sure, you got two TOTL arrangers hanging around or $8000+ to buy two, kudos..!

But back in the real world, if ONE arranger can pull off this trick (and Korg have shown they can!) that's a boatload of money saved 💵💵💵😎🎹🎹🎹

While having two different soundsets is nice, it's not that important if your arranger already has a great comprehensive set already (which all the TOTL arrangers do). All you need to do is mess with the header if you're running two different guitar parts (e.g.) to ensure they're different (if needed).

The feature is in its infancy. One thing that will expand its functionality will be to allow each variation to have a different combination of Part Mutes (currently it's one per style combo). Another way it can be made more musical will be to deliberately write dual styles with subtle differences and then either randomly or deliberately (a footswitch command to move from one to the other style and back would work) change them. THAT is the end of the rigid 'four variations/four fills' box that most arrangers force you into.

For many genres, especially jazz, four variations is simply not enough. You can make it work, but it's a shadow of what real musicians would do! Two VERY similar styles allowed to be jumped between is a lot closer to reality. It would also allow things like halftime and doubletime variations without leaving you only two 'normal time' variations.

The potential of the idea has been barely scratched. And I'm not sure Korg recognize it. Ketron should jump in!

My views on audio styles are well known. Chord choice restrictions and complete lack of editability make them of limited use. I always felt the best use of them was drum and percussion loops. No chord restrictions!

In terms of the variety and choice of styles, 'two at a time' style play vastly expands your choices. 'One at a time' no matter how sonically realistic the audio parts are cannot come close, and no extra $4000 arranger will be able to leverage the potential of the idea without vast complexity setting both arrangers up so that selection of both styles, the muting of unwanted parts, and the selection of which intro/endings/break fills get used is automatic and stored as a single registration.

Audio styles are wonderful for the 'preset player' home musician (and I'm aware that that's probably the majority!) but for the pro and advanced amateur, the 'two style player' offers a massive advantage in diversity of styles, and with a repertoire of hundreds of songs in a particular genre or two (or three!) is the answer to HAVING to use the exact same style over and over again.

It is dismaying that only as the arranger market contracts and fewer and fewer new arrangers are designed does the answer to style fatigue finally appear, and only on ONE very troubled design of arranger.

I've been waiting for this for decades!

Are the Audio Drums in the Ketron proprietary, or are they like the Wersi styles that use a standard format. (Wersi use REX files which are easily edited in a DAW, with thousands of loops available to download from the web.
BTW: Wersi have had Audio Drums since 1999/2000

Bill

SD1, 2002... Ketron weren't far behind, abacus!

Thanks, although I thought the SD1 came out earlier than that. (It was always a toss up as to who got there first)

The only thing missing now is whether the Ketron drums are proprietary or not?

Bill

I would imagine that all audio ROM drum loops in arrangers come with the same copyright restrictions that also apply to their ROM sounds and the ROM styles...

You can use them for musical purposes, but you can’t use them to create competing audio products. In other words, if you copy the samples and then use them to create a competing sampled audio product (say for instance a software drum machine that uses Korg's latest PA5X drum kits and their styles) you are likely infringing copyright.

But if you sample those same kits and styles to create something for your own use ONLY, it likely comes under 'fair use' laws. Mostly it comes down to money..!

The situation might be more flexible with a LONG discontinued product, especially if the company that produced it went belly up. But most of the time if it's sounds from a reasonably recent keyboard (or software ROMpler) I wouldn't recommend sampling it bit for bit and trying to sell those samples or loops.

Sampling synths is a bit of a different case, because you're not duplicating the exact synth engine, just recording one of millions of possible sounds. But copy a workstation's raw ROM for a commercial product, I'd run that past a competent lawyer first!

All quite valid points, however I was wondering if it was like the Wersi, which as it uses standard REX files means you are not limited to what's onboard, or what the manufacture is prepared to produce for you.

Bill

The Audio format used by KETRON is not proprietary - we use WAV files (44.100Hz/16-bit).

Thanks,


The Audio format used by KETRON is not proprietary - we use WAV files (44.100Hz/16-bit).

Thanks,