Most modern arrangers, you usually get four Variations. What you DON'T get is enough fills to transition between them all....

The hardest thing to do, when designing styles for an arranger, is to come up with a fill that smoothly transitions between more than one set of variations. It's a piece of cake to design a fill that goes smoothly from, say, VAR4 to VAR3, but to design one that goes smoothly from VAR4 to VAR3 AND VAR1 is much harder. In fact, it is one of the things that makes arrangers less 'musical' than SMFs, that every now and again (depending on the skill of the style composer) a fill just doesn't sound right for the job it is doing.

But wait, you say, won't all these extra fills make style creation MORE complex? To be honest, no.... As long as you know what the fill is going to have to do EVERY TIME, it is a snap.

So I encourage you all to try to put pressure (by discussing it, talking with reps, etc.) to get arranger manufacturers to address this. For the smoothest flow, and to make style creation easier, we need a fill to go from each and every VAR to every other one (including itself!). That's sixteen fills, counting Fill-to Same. Roland currently have seven, not sure about the rest.....

Another feature I would love to see expanded (or even added to Rolands!) is the Break/Fill concept. Why have just one? Why not one per VAR? Once again, it is FAR easier to design 4 Break/Fills that trigger at only one level, than it is to design one Break/Fill fit for all occasions.

While current arranger manufacturers are trying to improve arrangers by adding non-essentials, like HD recorders and samplers that are too slow to use, they are ignoring the fundamental ideas that make arrangers easier to use, musically. I would love to see a return to features that actually improve the ARRANGER, not turn it into a poor imitation of a workstation.

Right on, Diki! Great point.
Probably the smoothest and most complete fills are on Yamaha.
DonM

How many fills do they use, Don?

Overall, I feel that Roland's are also very good, at least in styles developed specifically for the new system, but unless they have the full 16, there is always a degree of compromise....

[This message has been edited by Diki (edited 02-27-2007).]

I agree that Yamaha's are great, almost never sound "wrong" no matter the circumstances. They have one fill per variation ("to A", "to B", etc.), plus one Break.

So.... T2 - 4 VARs, 4 Fills, 1 Break/Fill, 3 Intros, 3 Endings

G70/E80 - 4 VARs, 7 Fills, 1 Break/Mute, 4 Intros, 4 Endings

And yet, here come the Yamaha defenders, yet again, claiming there's no need for ANY improvement. From what I've heard, Yamaha's styles don't transition any better than Roland (and with three MORE fills than Yamaha, Roland MAY be better).....

All I'm saying is, there IS room for improvement..... If you keep rushing to defend your purchase (for who knows what reason) you'll get no improvement or updates (in fact, EXACTLY what T2 users HAVE got, so far!) to your OS.

We'd all still be driving Model T's if no-one ever stepped up and said 'there's got to be a better way'.......

I too agree that yamaha esp tyros has the best fill ins.. But i also think rolands is far superior to korg. Maybe on next years tyros 3 u will get 4 intros etc

I have to agree with the others...Yamaha has the smoothest and most realistic changes.

In this case, more is not always better...it is the musicality that seems to give Yamaha the edge.

I have no reason to "defend" my purchase...I was able to try several new Rolands this past weekend while on a road trip, and I was not impressed with the accompaniment styles, or the fills....I must say the intros were pretty good, especially the major/minor/7th variations...Yamaha could learn a lesson in this department.

Having not played the Korg, I can't comment on the fills.

Ian

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Cha d’dhùin doras nach d’fhosgail doras.

A valid point, Diki, but aren't you a little quick on the judgements? I didn't hear anything in either DonM or Marck's response that sounded defensive, only that, in their opinion, the "fill" thing seemed to be less of a problem with the Yamaha arrangers. I tend to agree even though my T2 is NOT my favorite arranger. Expressing a preference doesn't always translate into "mine's perfect" or at least "way better than yours". Remember, DonM's preference for Yammaha transitions didn't stop him from selling his T2. Also, preferring one brand over another doesn't necessarily mean that you don't want or need improvements in that kb.

Otherwise, keep the good ideas coming.

chas

But which gets the closest to a live band transition.
Enjoy whatever you play

Bill

All these hopes , needs & wants are nice to dream about but.....I feel as sales dwindle in the arranger markets year after year instead of improvements to what we already have or are used to we will see more of a merging between synth & arranger very very soon as in years to come it will all be as one unit....with many features for musical production....watch & see!

Actually I think it will be a standard keyboard with buttons and screen, to which you will plug in a USB Stick with the type of keyboard you require, (Arranger/Workstation/Organ etc) the USB stick being the equivalent of a Removable Hard Drive. (So no OS or software to load as it is already on the USB Stick, also no moving parts)
Whether it will be an open system or manufacture specific remains to be seen.
Enjoy whatever you play

Bill

hey Bill......then it will be

"MY Plug in Is BETTER than YOUR Plug In"

I don't own a Yamaha right now, and yes there is plenty of room for improvement in all of them. That's why I applauded your suggestion, Diki.
As I remember Yamaha has a fill to each variation and a fill to self on each variation.
All this is accomplished with one button push for each one. They also have a break and the intros and ending can be used as fills as well.
Not perfect, but I like the way they work better than the other brands I've tried.
On the PA800 I briefly had, the fills were, in my opinion, not as musically accurate and much harder to use. There were also fewer.
The Midjay, which I'm now using, has fills for each variation but must be called specifically by first pushing the var. button, then the fill, unless accessed by midi where each fill is accessible directly.
The G70 was somewhere between. I found the fills fairly smooth and complete but there is no real break/fill.
Again, this is an important topic and I would love for it to be addressed by the manufacturers.
You people must know by now that I have no brand loyalty!!
DonM

Has anyone tried to use a tempo lock to transition from a dance style to a disco style seamlessly or 8 beat to 8 beat ? or bossanova to a bolero ?

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Former Ketron demo guy. Backline Charm City on eBay.

Correct Dano ....Tempo lock, bass lock, & Drum Lock were the best features on Ketron arrangers that I have performed with aside from the fantastic in your face sound....
I miss those super usefull features very much...sigh!

I use it. I am loving the Midjay again!!
DonM

The other feature I have been digging for quite some time is the "unplugged" feature on Ketron.. I can call up a style, isolate any part of the style and "unplug that part instantly. Works great with styles that have great acoustic guitar strums on a style like flksingr or 16 beat 1 etc...

I'll bring up another thing I like witn remixing styles .. I took string parts from a up tempo baroque style (temp= 120) and mixed them with an 8 beat at 72 beats and have them mix beautifully and sound musically correct!

I've recently remixed a part from a techno style and mixed in with an r&b style... sounded very cool........

Q1:What exactly does the bass,drum lock do?

Q2: how are you guys setting up your variations,that make them sound unrealistic?
Why not just have a very similar bass and chord going to a main but a tad different? my breaks sound much like the mains they come from(yam 9000)

lets say your playing variation #2 with a walking bass line....and you jump to Variation #4 the bass line will change to maybe lets say a jump bass line.....but you love the walking one....so you push the Bass lock button and it will change to variation #4 but the #2 bass line will LOCK and remain even though your in Var#4 very kool works the same with Drum Lock etc etc the combinations are endless..... great feature for live play.

Wouldn't saving the type of bass/drum voice to a bank registration be quite similar to the'lock' function?

i remember about a very old casio model(small 49 keys) having separate buttons for each accomp track, with four positions each, so you could use different drums (4 types) different bass (4 types) different two accomp tracks (4 types of course) of a style at your free will.
that was very long time ago, i think i saw this model... 17 years ago.
but more modern concept from roland it seemed quite interesting to me, but unfortunatelly was not implemented after VA series, meaning morphing style function.
i am sure something similar could be developed also for fills, or intros or endings. having degrees of combination between two fills/var/intro/endings can give almost unlimited posibilities, you'd never sound like the other owners of the same keyboard....

I agree that Yamaha has great fills, but Diki's idea would definitely be an improvement.

I agree with Diki that the most important function is the arranger function.

Beakybird

we are talking Bass LINE variation...
not bass sound.

It depends on your background.
If you are used to playing the backing yourself (Organ/Piano etc) then super all singing all dancing arranger functions are not so critical, (I come from an organ background and all these sofisticated arrangements sometimes completely annoy me) and this is why it will be most unlikely that I will purchase the Wersi Open Art Arranger Software (At least at present) when I move up to OAS 7, as the standard arranger functions are way above what I require, and the multiple additional facilities of the OAA would most likly not be used. (One of the many reasons I like Wersi is that you can buy what you require and not what the manufacture says you should buy)
Another point of view

Bill

[This message has been edited by abacus (edited 03-01-2007).]

[This message has been edited by abacus (edited 03-01-2007).]

hello mr.9000 ....

Ketron can lock any part of any style in real time , registrations are not needed.

Whether you are using the full arranger, or just bass and drums, or even just drums (as I often do myself) the smoothness and musicality of the transitions is the main thing.... Having a dedicated fill FROM each Variation TO each variation would be the best way.

As I said earlier, Yamaha's, newer Roland's, many good arrangers sound VERY good. BUT..... it takes considerable skill to create a style yourself with this degree of smoothness. It is (to my ears) the main difference between pro styles, and user styles. If there were this more elaborate fill system, it would make smooth styles a piece of cake to do yourself, rather than relying on the big 3 to produce as many as we want, with as much style variety.

That's all I'm trying to say, I guess. The main style writers already have very good skills at making fills that perform double (or triple or more!) duty. But for the rest of us, it is a difficult challenge. Only having to worry about making one fill go to one destination would speed the process up drastically.

Imagine.... to make a great fill, you only need copy the last bar of the source variation. You then carve off the last two or three beats and perform a fill that transitions to the destination variation. Job done! No worrying about how well it also transitions to three OTHER destinations, too! Rinse, and repeat. You now have created a style that could rival the top stylemakers.

I would hope this would lead to an explosion of good user styles, rather than trying to find something suitable from the limited selection of commercial styles.... Something we would ALL benefit from.