To be honest, firstly, let me say a big shoutout to Squeak who, IMO, has hit the nail squarely on the head. Yes, younger players want some of the classic rhythms and styles, but they are not going to buy a keyboard (of ANY kind, not just arrangers) that is ONLY capable of those. It has to be able to sound contemporary as well as classic, but NO modern arranger does. But the wild success (and prompt assassination by Yamaha) of the DJX showed that, given a product that DID work well for modern music AND was an 'arranger', it was bought in droves by the younger crowd. Apparently, there's no REAL objection by the young to an arranger... just to its' CONTENT (or lack thereof!).

To be honest, I believe the assassination of the DJX was at the behoove of the WS division, who saw the writing on the wall for their difficult to use product if hip sounding arrangers became widely available...

And sorry, guys, but you can't turn back the clock. Our parents' generation's musicians would have probably been ecstatic if rock had never upset THEIR world, and we have to accept that hiphop is as dominant now as rock was in its' heyday. It took a while for keyboard manufacturers to jump on the rock bandwagon, in fact, some disappeared altogether because they WOULDN'T. I can only hope that the arranger doesn't go the same way.

It's not that the arranger COULDN'T be popular in the States. It's just that they are designed and built by Europeans (some backed by Japanese corporations), primarily FOR Europeans. It's no more likely that instruments designed specifically for Americans are likely to be used by Europeans (until it becomes mainstream and they start copying us again! ) than arrangers will sweep the US.

In my area, back in the 80's, the solo MIDI musician/keyboardist was the King for a while. Maybe a decade or so. Howard Jones, Human League, synth pop etc., that was the music on the charts, and the MIDI keyboardist was the player to play it. But now, acoustic guitarists rule the roost. There's probably a dozen or more for every keyboard player (conservatively!). Frankie mentioned the resurgence in ukulele playing (the poor man's - and player's - guitar). Most popular music is hiphop, and that just isn't a solo form of music. Even rapping takes a team, a crew...

So, the solo keyboard player is now primarily an older guy, playing classic tunes, maybe some jazz in a restaurant, maybe even a real piano (or stage piano). But the plethora of solo MIDI musicians has stopped being popular. So, in fairness, I don't think it is just the arranger that suffers in the US. On the whole, I see FAR fewer young keyboard players than there used to be...

It will change again, in a decade or two or three. It always does. Something gets popular, and what does it best gets to be the King. Maybe it'll be keyboards, maybe the accordion makes a comeback, maybe something nobody saw coming.

But, if arrangers want to survive as more than a niche product to an ever diminishing field of players in the US, the manufacturers got to start thinking that, when they make 'ethnic' versions of an arranger, the USA is one of those 'ethnic' areas. Just as you can't sell arrangers in the Middle East without Middle East specific sounds, styles and features, just as you can't sell arrangers in Latin America without Latin styles and sounds, you CAN'T sell arrangers in the US in any significant numbers until they do AMERICAN music.

Which, I'm afraid to say (as much as some of us would like to pretend otherwise) is HIPHOP