A gripe and a question...

Please permit me to complain for a moment in the form of a letter to Yamaha...

Dear Yamaha...

WHY ON EARTH DID YOU SPREAD THE COUNTRY STYLES ALL AROUND THE S970SX???

Yours Truly,

Bill

Seriously, I'm probably late to the party on this but good grief, why do this???

Here's my question: Can I create my own style folder that will show up in the same place as the preloaded styles are? I'd like to stick all of the Country styles I use most often into one easy to access folder.

What's the best workaround for this?

Bill, you can create a folder, name it Country, but it cannot be placed in the onboard area. However, you can place it in the Expansion/User area, where it is easily accessed with a single button touch. Or just copy the individual country style files to that area, which will then list them alphabetically with each page showing 10 style files. This is where I store all my modified, onboard styles, many of which I have renamed to song titles. Someone asks for a particular song, it is very easy to open that page and using the scrolling wheel quickly go through the list and find that song/style. It's very quick, easy and efficient. However, I also have a backup copy of this area on a USB drive, just to be safe.

I think someone at Yamaha made a big mistake in eliminating the Country styles section from the selection area, and I know for a fact they have had loads of complaints about this. Unfortunately, the problem cannot be solved with a software change alone, for it is also a hardware change that must be made, which is not practical at this stage. I'm reasonably confident they will bring back that country button on ensuing models.

Hope this helps,

Gary

Thanks, Gary!

I try to subscribe to the old adage, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

I imagine a developers meeting and someone says, "Hey, let's get rid of the dedicated Country folder for our Country styles?"

And the whole room just looks at the guy real funny....

SX 900 just as bad

Putting all my favorite styles in favorites

Hello, Bill, I guess by writing "S970SX" you meant SX900 (or I missed a new one?);
I think the reason is quite simple. Before SX900 we had 12 buttons with style categories, now we have 10. All for the sake of a bigger screen. I can speculate that Yamaha didn't really want to use a touchscreen for PSR because they knew that it's not that practical, and it was the pressure of the modern culture when touchscreen is just new normal. Yamaha didn't really change the interface that much and it didn't make operating the instrument faster, in some cases it even slowed it down.

Yes, you're right...

Also, your explanation makes perfect sense....

Thanks!

Time to ditch ROM Categories altogether. They are imho one of the major reasons younger players won’t touch something festooned with ‘Oldies’, ‘Samba/Bossa’ and ‘Ballroom’ buttons. And no ‘Trance’ or ‘Triphop’ or ‘Speed metal’.

Time has long passed when the category buttons got lit buttons that can be labeled. You get ONE master style list and you create your own categories.

Can you imagine how easy it would be to sell an arranger to a kid if the front panel reflected THEIR tastes..?! All it would take is the manufacturer creating a couple of loadable presets (Under 30 and over 40!) that the salesman could call up depending on age of the customer.

And for catalog sales, no pre-loaded categories at all, let the customer decide for themselves when they startup for the first time.

And you still have the ROM Master Style List, to allow correct call up for demo registrations and Factory Songbook.

Plenty of modern keyboards and loopstations got lit buttons that can be labeled, even on fairly inexpensive products.

Hi Diki, tend to agree. How much better to just start with a blank canvas. Add the style categories we want.
PA5x has sliders and buttons ( for functions) that can be chosen and are named, why couldn’t they do that with a style category button .
Basically you can have your own set up in the user area or on usb sticks, but you have to navigate folders, not just simply press a button.

And no doubt off putting for the younger generation to see ballroom styles, and for oldies to see more and more edm styles.

Better still if countries could add their own type of styles. I personally don’t use the styles that are listed under traditional or world styles, yet I assume the people that do , would probably wish there were more of them.

...on the other hand, from a manufacturer's point of view, who would you rather have for a 'target' market; and old geezer with with fond memories of 'oldies' and tons of disposable cash OR a kid with no job and no prospects living in his parents basement? Just sayin' .

chas

Chas hit the nail on the head!

However, all the styles that Diki spoke of are in the newer Yamaha arranger keyboards, under the Dance category, which I believe was probably created for younger buyers that have generous parents who will buy them an arranger for Christmas or their birthday if they promise to get a job and move out of the basement.

Cheers,

Gary

I’d say, as a marketer in a rapidly shrinking segment, I’d want ALL demographics covered. You know why organs died? Because they didn’t embrace synths. At least, very few of them. They also thought that the rapidly dwindling demographic of elderly ‘geezers’ happy to trot out ‘Tie a yellow ribbon’ would still be enough to fund continuing R&D to stay in business. It did not. The home organ went from a thriving industry to essentially dead in ten years, simply because the industry’s hubris stopped them changing.

I wonder what happened to the buggy whip industry?

The kids’ market for parent bought toys are thriving. None of us here (other than the few that will buy just about anything sight unseen) will touch them with a barge pole. But arrangers for ‘musicians’ are dwindling, coming out much slower, and seemingly at times released in a completely unfinished state. That’s not the sign of growth, that’s the sign of contraction.

And condescendingly thinking that parents or grandparents are going to turn anything around just goes to show how out of touch an ‘old geezer’ can get.

I believe that if you look at the number of musicians, using arrangers, or not, you will find that number has dwindled considerably since 1999, statistically by 41 percent. Nearly all the musicians I know have either retired, or took up another occupation since Covid destroyed what little was remaining. As for the buggy whips, they are still in use today, mainly for trotters. But, I would not expect most folks on an arranger keyboard forum to have much knowledge of that industry.

All the best,

Gary (an old geezer - and damned happy to make it this far!)

Try using "Search" to quickly find any style.