my first weeks on the pa1x pro.

Hello friends,

Since i have now for three or four weeks my pa1x-pro. I have some customize it for my playing.

The pa1x-pro is a "hi-tech" keyboard and you must do many things for customizing this
keyboard for your own gigingstyle.

some examples:

Like some members of synthzone know, i had before ketron stuff and i love the groove's that playing with the styles on this keyboard... I have sample all this grooves in this keyboard to the korg pa.. (i import this grooves in the pad area of the keyboard)than i choose a style on the keyboard and synchronise the pad with this style and the ketrongroove follows every beat (i go from 90 bpm till 150 bpm)...nice feature !!!

some other features:
1. the "ensemble menu you want for example the "george shearing" sound:
upper track: vibe plays unisono the lead
upper track 2: plays the block voice in piano(recognize on the chord you play left)
and upper track 3 plays the jazz-guitar unisono one octave bellow the lead.(save this in a single touch or performance with a style and you have a amazing sound.

2. the optional "mp3" kit reads all formats of mp3's like 128 kps,196kps, 256kps, 320kps,...

3. You can make drumkits from samples and save it to a drumkit usersound. so you make
real-drums sound for adding in the styles(also possible to ad to the factory styles !!!)


4.If you are working with cubase or cakewalk
make your arrangements in your home studio with different modules and keyboards for a great sound (like vst instuments and great sounds of your different modules/keyboards) and save it to mp3..load it with usb to your pa1x-pro or pa1x (if you have the optional kit for mp3) and play along with this file (you can choose 4 single touch settings with this file!..also 4 single touch on playing with a midfile!!!)

6. when you record a "pad track" you have different features: you can do a "one shot" thats is when you hit this button the pattern you have record plays once, if you choose continue you loop this pad with the styles (and it synchro to the tempo you choose). you can also choose for the "tension" button (in the edit menu-record menu) than it plays the "tensions notes" you add to the left part of the arranger. You can choose also when you play "tensions" like add9, add7, add 11 what note you want to replace like the root or the fifth.(amazing !!!!!!!!!!!)

6. you can split the 3 upper tracks to 3 zones on the right side of your keyboard ex. bandoneon to c4 till c5...strings in block voice c5 till c6,.............

7. the vocoder and vocalist mode in the pa1x/pa1xpro are great..customize it to your own feeling with effect, male/female voicing for the 4 harmonizing voices.

my notes:

the Korg pa1x/pa1x-pro is a "hi-tech" proffesional keyboard with many features but you must read and understand every detail thats written in the manuals. (i have worked and testing on this keyboard several weeks!!). I think this keyboard is the first keyboard with a keyboard and synth feature !!!! ...you must take the time to know every detail of all the menu's and understand the manual!!!!

****) one minus:

if you play standard midifile's (i have do the test on my ketron x1 and put the same file in the korg pa... change the sounds, effects and pan,... also make a new mix off the volumes and it sound right !!!!

conclusion:

the pâ1x/pa1xpro has "pro" features but you must know this keyboard very in detail and work on it !!! don't play it in factory settings. give this keyboard your soul !!!!

I hope to give you some examples in the future (demo's) of my work, I promise but now i have no time to do it.

**) I hope this topic helps people to decide for choosing a new keyboard... my opinion: if you want a "userfriendly" keyboard choose: Ketron, Roland, yamaha (with many factory registrations on styles). if you know what the features are in "synth's" and "samplers" and you know much about editing sounds, styles choose for the korg pa1x/pa1x-pro.


many greetings to my good friends here like,

Dreamer, Scott, Ud, Djdaddy, ...........



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[This message has been edited by notlos (edited 02-10-2005).]

Have fun with your new toy! And thanx for the nod !

Dirk,
thanks for your review and.... can't wait for your MP3s!
Andrea

I also have the PA1xpro and it is truely a professional/synthesizer/arranger.

I do miss the sound of the SD1 styles, if you have made combo styles from the sd1 to the korg , please send them my way thanks

NOTLOS, I ALSO HAVE THE PRO,I LOVE IT BUT I AM NOT A PROFESSIONEL, LOVE PLAYING IT & LEARNING IT MORE ALL THE TIME , THANKS FOR SHARING ,BEST REGARDS BENNO

Hi Dirk! Thanks for your excellent review report on the PA1xPro. Your evaluation confirms my thoughts as well following my brief time auditioning and playing it in my local music store. The PA1Xpro definitely has a LOT of powerful features (just too bad (for me) it has no rootless chord recognition ). I especially like the optional high bit rate MP3 support. I also like the ability to easily select pad 'play once' or 'loop play'. I wish Yamaha supported that for all internal pad sequences. I'm particularly interested in hearing more from you regarding the PA1XPro's vocalizer as I somehow recall (perhaps wrongly?) that the PA80's vocalizer was more or less a vocoder, and limited in the advanced chordal harmony dept. Is the PA1Xpro's vocal harmonizer a big step up from the PA80's and does it include triggering auto accompaninent (and vocal harmonies) with either right or left of split of keyboard too? This provides an important feature to allow you to run manual bass lines in the left hand and playing piano comping chords in the right hand, allowing for auto accompaniment drums & other instrument (other than bass) auto accompanimnent playback.

Dirk, 'How many' fills are included with each style, and how are they triggered? Is each fill linked to a dedicated button on the keyboard, or do you need to go into a sub menu to access them all? Though Yamaha only includes 4 fills, what I particualarly like is that they are integrated with & conveniently triggered (with auto fill turned on) by merely pressing the associated (A,B,C,D) variation button. Since I like to trigger spontaneous live fills at different intervals in my songs, I'm curious to find out exactly the way fills, intros & endings work on the PA1Xpro.

Dirk: I can only say that if you (or anyone else here) can CONVINCE Korg to PLEASE add 'rootless chord' recognition to the PA1Xpro chord recognition palette, I would be ever grateful, and most likely then purchase a Korg PA1Xpro myself.


Scott

Hi Notlos,
Gratulations for your new toy. I have the PA1X (61 keys) and i wonder to know, how do you split the upper track to 3 zones. Please , could you describe how do you do that?

Franky

Hi Silva,
here a short briefing for settings on 3 separate uppertracks.

1. choose 3 uppertrack sounds you want to use ex. upper1 grand piano upper2 dark pad and upper 3 bandoneon (set all sounds to play mode not mute !!!) now you have the 3 sound on the right side of the keyboard if you have choose the split mode for playing with styles!!!

2. press while holding the "shift" button the "ensemble" button (this is a short-cut to go to the ensemble-menu)

3. press on the touch screen the tab "key velocity" and look at this menu to top key menu, bottom key menu.

4. settings in this menu are:

top key menu change to g7 b5 b4
bottom key menu change c6 c5 c4

5. play now on the keyboard the right parts from c4 cromatic and you will see that the piano plays only at the first octave, the second track plays in the next octave and the thirth track plays in the follow octave.

i hope you understand this information.

let me know!!!

Hope this information helps you.

regards,

Notlos.

Hello Dirk,

Many thanks for your report ....I should say no better.. Thanks also for your greetings...You wrote :
"the Korg pa1x/pa1x-pro is a "hi-tech" proffesional keyboard with many features but you must read and understand every detail thats written in the manuals. (i have worked and testing on this keyboard several weeks!!). I think this keyboard is the first keyboard with a keyboard and synth feature !!!! ...you must take the time to know every detail of all the menu's and understand the manual!!!!"
Absolutely true.....I agree 100% but what a wonderful keyboard....
For the rest I call you in the morning....
See you later...Tot binnenkort...
JJ



[This message has been edited by Daddy JJ (edited 02-12-2005).]

Hi Notlos, MUITO OBRIGADO

Thank you very much. Like you said "the Korg pa1x/pa1x-pro is a "hi-tech" professional keyboard".

Every day i´m surprised by the positive way with this machine.

Thank you again
Franky

Hi scott,

I have ask the manager of Korg (in the netherlands) to see for the arranging mode (like yamaha does) for the rootless-voicings in the left part.
He will ask it to the technical people or korg.

For the rest:

You have two fills and one break on different buttons, you can also link the one touch settings to the four variation-sections of the arranger(ex. var1 grand piano, var2 bandoneon,....)

Every custom style you can change the drum-track to a other mood (i think 6 different mappings!!!) this feature is not changing the drumkit like from standard to fusion kit, korg has factory include some other mappings that can change the drumkit. ex. you have on variation 1 a bad sound in the drum-kit you can go to the drummapping and you here 6 different drumarrangements you can choose for this variation (sometimes with other percusion instruments like conga's cymbals...and this for all variations you can choose a different mood!!! save it in the global style prefference and the next time you have this new style conversion!!!

About the harmonizer, I don't sing and use it not very much (only at home and not so much, but i think it's really good) I have tried the vocoder mode and this make a great modern sound you can modify to your mood. (i working now on a file of one note samba with the vocoder mode and he follow all the tensions i play on the right part !!!

About the retriggering of fill's:
You must know the just time for tapping the buttons of the fill for correct respons to the break or fills, one minus some styles will give 2 measure's on the break hitting knob while i want 1 measure !! but you can change that and save it (global style prefence)
You can also change the style preference menu: every time you choose another variation it wil start with a fill you choose (like fill 1 fill 2 or break)

I hope this information helps you to understand some feature of the pa1x/pa1x-pro

Regards,

notlos,
www.notlos.com

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hey scott,
the vocal harmonizer on the PA1X is a HUGE stepup from the 80...it is a full blown TC Helicon voice engine, with so many harmony types and variations all customizable by the user, from barbershop tp simple dual country, to jazz 4ths 9ths etc etc etc..plus you cna option it like i have to include "voice modelling" where you sing into the mic and you can sound like joe cocker, or britney spears eeeew!!!! LOL, plus you cna also have realtime pitch correction, mate it goes on and on...and yes you can trigger the harmony from upper or lower or both.. hope that helps, but if you want to aks more q's please feel free.

dennis

peace,out

Hey ScottYee -

I am not sure you got a good answer to your question regarding the Pa1XPro Fills.

There are two Fills per Style, and one "Break". The break is not always just empty, it may have a drum thing or a pick-up drum hit. Fill 1, Fill 2 and Break each have an individual button. You can make a variety of things happen automatically when you hit a Fill - it can advance to the next Style Variation, Go directly to a certain Style Variation, alternate back & Forth between a pair of Style Variations - this can be set for each Fill button in Each Style - very flexible.

One other thing I want to mention about the Pa1XPro Fills - you can select them instantly in your performance - , and the fill will play for the remaining number of beats in the bar. When I played the PSR3000, where each fill button is tied to a particular Style Variation, it always waits to the top of the measure to do the fill - not very spontaneous and somewhat musically limiting - in my opinion.

I forgot how to set it so it will automatically use a fill when a variation is changed?

Frostbyte, many thanks for providing the answer I was looking for regarding 'fills' on the PA1XPro. Having all those 'fill/break' options (and easily accessible to boot) is definitely a 'live' performance advantage. - Scott

--another thing worth mentioning--in PA series

if you double click the fill it will continue to repeat(non stop)until you press 1 more time to continue thr style.this is true for both fills and the break.