Arranger Song Lists - are they really useful?

A friend and I were having a discussion about Song Lists on arrangers. Neither of us use them and I don't know any professional players in the UK who use them, but I do see the subject pop up here quite often.

So my question is if you are a semi/pro player do you find the song list useful or do you prefer to create your own registrations?

I assume you are talking about the "Song Lists" that come resident on the KB when purchased. If so, I use them when looking for a style and voices for a particular song. I will try to find a song title in the Song List that approximates what I am looking for and then 'tweak' the style according to my needs ... On the KORG Pa900 there are a number of song titles on the list where the style comes pretty close to the title.
One thing I find is that the pads often need to be changed.

Hi.
As an amateur I mainly play by use of styles, and I'm usng both options.
Songlist is very useful IF it guide you to a proper style for the song you want to play.
Arrangers have hundreds of styles to choose from, so it's OK with a little help from songlist.
Otherwise, I create own settings and save as registration or add to the songlist.

I use them ,like the others, in that I get ideas about new songs and the basic style. I seem always to change them, also.

I use them as a general guide and usually make change. some styles they suggest for tunes and I have wonder what the developer(s) was thinking, since they don’t seem to fit.

I created my own 750-song list, with about 175 or so favorites. I found, as a professional entertainer, it an invaluable tool that pretty much eliminated dead time between songs, unless you really wanted dead time between songs. I never agreed with those that seemed to think they needed a lot of banter with the audience while they fumbled through their books and I-pads trying to figure out which song to play next, then spend forever pushing various buttons to set up to perform that song. I recently posted a video on this site of just how effective and useful that song list, or in my case Music Finder Directory, is for someone who is an entertainer.

Our arranger keyboards have a huge number of wonderful, onboard tools available at our fingertips. However, there is a learning curve required in order to use them successfully. I am utterly amazed at how many entertainer/musician/singers that never take the time to explore these features, and often never take the user manual out of the zip-lock back that it arrived in with the keyboard.

Gary

As soon as I get a new keyboard, I listed to the styles, with intros (and the songbook/reg entries) ... just to see what the creator had in mind. More often than not, these trigger a lightbulb in my head to either and that song, or something similar to my repertoire. Without fail, EVERY time I try this - I come away with a few new songs, and even more ideas for existing ones.

Hello !

Speaking of repertoire...........I miss that function on my Genos. I never realized how much I used it before when auditioning new styles. It is good to know what the style creator had in mind. I love to ad lib a right hand melody when trying a new style. Sometimes its an original melody, sometimes it's not. I used to use the repertoire function to see a recommended song. Then I would go online and get the chord progressions and get things going. I always liked (and still do !) when one song would morph into something else. It feels like magic and I love it !! -charley

Thanks for your input. Its interesting to see how a song list is being made use of in different ways. Taking a tool and adapting it to fit your requirements.

Gary - you are right about people not exploring features. I would say most of the pro players I work with are very set in their ways. Most want the new arranger to work exactly the same as their old one and dont like adapting or changing.

For me, as Charley says, I like that a good arranger inspires - I find well produced styles lend themselves to being creative - often melodies just come to mind, some recognised, some completely original.

Song lists dont interest me as such, but i can see the value of using them as a starting point.