He really should stick to the Motif XS. He makes the tyros look and sound like a toy. His humour is dubious and yamaha may well have shot themselves in the foot by using him. You can almost hear the sarcasm in his voice and he is really taking the mickey out of the keyboard and his audience. Not good

judge for yourself
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnhZmWhKnI8&feature=related

Ian would say he is aiming his presentation at EXACTLY the kind of people that mostly use the Tyros, NOT us "pro's"

'Home keyboard' players...

Well, believe it or not, having been in the home organ business, the predecessor to the arranger keyboard, for 30 years, this guy would be considered an excellent salesperson. He evokes a lot of enthusiasm and emotion, and emotion is what sells the real customers, as Diki pointed out.

The "pro" market is really a very small fraction of who buys arranger keyboards.

Interesting to note, that it was well known in our industry that a "pro" was not one of our customers. Why? Because it was well known they didn't have any money or credit to buy one. Sad but, it was/is the case.

My wife, who I met at Fletcher Music Centers, the worlds largest home organ retailer, selling only home organs, watched this, and agreed that this guy was a great salesman.

Compare this with what you get in your average Guitar Center type stores and then tell me this guy is no good

Best
Scott
http://ScottLMusic.com

Correctomundo on all counts, Scott.

Bert is an awesome demonstrator and knows his target audience very well, again, as Diki has so sincerely pointed out.

Humor always breaks the ice effectively, and he knows the instrument well....and HE MAKES IT LOOK EASY.

Very important.

VERY EFFECTIVE!

His demo on Motif synths is not much different...he again uses humor and lots of enthusiasm...and, again he makes it look easy.

He's a demonstrator...not an entertainer....although he's clever enough to blur the line and make it work to his advantage.

Bert's a cool guy.

You are spot on about the arranger market...very, very few pros.

Ian

I have to agree that his job is to demonstrate and sometimes showmanship sells. His playing speaks for itself and I wouldn't want to match chops against him No harm in my book.

Well... Well, I listened to all his demo's.
WOW, WOW, IMHO, the last thing he did is make the T2 look like a toy or make fun of it... He is a geat demo guy and a great keyboard player also. He made it look easy. And it sounded great!

Yamaha is lucky to have him.

Makes me want to buy all those instruments!
Maybe I will keep my T2 afterall?

If I could play 1/2 as well as Bert I would be so happy!!!

Lee

What bothers me a bit about the T2 is the screen that hides keyboard fingering. I can imagine the audience doubting that someone is actually playing

They should have a camera on his hands...it's a problem with most keyboards...not just Yammies.

Ian

maybe i judged it wrong then. To me if a man stands next to his keyboard and dances and talks about how "the intro are too long" and "it plays itself" whilst joking around ruins the credibility of the machine. But i guess i am not a yamaha customer anymore so thats perhaps reflected in my opinion of the demo. In the XS demos, Bert actually plays the instrument and shows what it can do. I forget that the tyros is not a Pa1X.

Yes, Spalding...thanks for the reminder.. all us Tyros2 fans exhale a sigh of relief.

Ian

I watched both parts of the presentation. He is adressing some guys who speak Spanish as their native tongue, there is also a guy that does the introductions and translates what he says.

He did a "Greek impersonation" in 5:40 of the second part. It was a stereotype, but made me smile.

He was fun but not funny (funny as in clown-funny) and made me laugh, and making the customer laugh is a sure way to reach for his pocket.

the guy is gooood.

And one thing I am SURE of...

If he was presenting to a room full of 'pros', he could play some stuff that would make your jaw drop, Spalding, and let the arranger speak for itself.

That guy has some SERIOUS chops...

oh i know the guy can play !!!! I just wish he had actually played the T2 rather than just push some buttons and make silly faces and jig about. I hope yamaha sell a ton more T2 in 61 note form (even if its just to tick off Diki):-)

(You no i am kidding right - no declaration of war !)

Again dont judge a book by its cover....Bert is a serious PRO make no mistake about it.He demonstrates that playing a KB is fun....that's his job.
Why has the SZ lately become a "PUT DOWN" on whatever is posted leading into a Pee pee contest on everything and everything? maybe Gary was right?

DP

Play Music Every Day, & Smile I do

Demonstrations like this have been done by all manufactures for years, (It was certainly done to sell instruments from at least the 70s, which is when I first became interested in Organs and Keyboards) and its great entertainment. (Don’t take life so seriously, just enjoy yourself)

Bill

Uh, like the C1, right? Donny, I know you're in one of your 'alternate' personalities at the moment, but still, coming from YOU, that statement sounds like some kind of joke.

On the other hand, at least you're trying. Just don't get TOO indignant, remember how most people feel about 'reformed smokers'.

fondly,

chas

whoops....

Yes Chas your right......its depends on the mood, drinks, coffee & whatever happens in the course of a day Pre Posting scenario that drives an unknown force inside each of us causing our mood swings Upppppp & Dowwwwwwwn. lets just call a truce on the C1 saga & continue to enjoy whatever we choose to play. Lets also try to help each other rather then fight each other its makes more sense & in the long run we'll all be better musicians for it dont you think?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwozCzjLb0w

[This message has been edited by Dnj (edited 05-02-2008).]

Yep. You're 100% right. It's a dead issue, as far as I'm concerned.

chas

I really enjoyed that demo. Mr Smorenburg had a warm personality, contageous enthusiasm, and excellent chops.

Beakybird

What singer was he talking about at 3:33, when he said " I Love her Music" ???

The initial post in this thread was the 'put down'. The rest of it simply a response.

No put-down, no response, I guess...

The trouble, I think, is that few threads that ARE about music get started, and even fewer remain on topic... I guess it's just easier to talk equipment, politics (of 'entertainment'), and just kibbutz than it is to talk about music without any examples... As I keep saying, talking about music is like dancing about mathematics. A ten second MP3 says more than a ten paragraph essay, if you are REALLY talking about music

I've seen couple of Bert's presentations of Yamaha synths, and this must be the worst he made.

Sure he has specific sense of humor (comment from one of his presentations: "all you need now is some beat, something like umphhh, umphhh, umphhh, and You gonna get lot of money"), but this wasn't humor, this was totaly ironic.

If I didn't knew he was Yamaha employee, I would have thought he worked for Roland or Korg.

Performing keyboard, and lurking arround boringly while intro is playing to me doesn't look funy, I more see it as: "look at this toy keyboard, you don't have to play it, it play by itself, it's not instrument, it's a toy".

It was definitely not a good idea that synth guy demoes arranger, because you could clearly see his (negative) attitude toward arranger keyboards.

he was probably one of many musicians who made styles for you,


what do you mean by "synth" guy ?
Arrangers are synths also,


[This message has been edited by Vadim (edited 05-04-2008).]

Vadim,

Of course, arrangers are also synths, but what I was referring to is certain kind of antagonism between synth players (musicians in a band) and arranger players (one-man-band musicians), where majority of musicians who play in bands consider arranger players as not really a musicians.

I doubt Bert produce styles, he is professional Yamaha demonstrator, and as such, he have lot's of work to do by demonstrating new Yamaha gear, while somebody else is creating styles for arrangers. Beside, this Tyros 2 presentation was the first time he demonstrated and arranger, before, he demoed synths only (Motif ES, Motif Rack, Motif XS, and MM6) although the later is some kind of cross-bred between synth and arranger.

Yamaha arrangers are usually demonstrated (at least in video form) by Michel Voncken, and he really do the job perfectly.

Kalimero thank you. I thought maybe i had completely misjudged it. I also thought that bert was being not simply ironic but sarcastic. I know that he can really play but he just didnt seem to play much at all perfering to push buttons and dance about. I didnt post this to be a negative post. I thought that it was a poor demo and a missed opportunity by yamaha. But most of the responses seemed to think that it was a good demo and showed good salemanship. Shows how we see things differently. That demo would have me leave the room in embarrasment. I would not want to feel that a product was being marketed to me on tha basis that ' this keyboard plays itself ' and ' you can dance whislt you play'.

I think it totaly depends on the people watching the bert show..... if its a bunch of elderly people they might really love berts show...... If its the nationall convention of pro musicians, they might say yhe Tyros is a boystoy(but then thatwas prolly allready their opinion of all arranger keyboards)

Bert's focus is clearly on the "home keyboard" enthusiasts...you know, the ones with the money...and it is definitely not meant for the pro player.

Like it or not, the majority of arrangers are sold to amateur/home users...not pros...demos are designed to appeal to the former.

Bert knows his stuff, no doubt about it.

Ian

in eastern european countries, musicians call arranger keyboards "samograyka" which translates to english something like "plays by itself"

[This message has been edited by Vadim (edited 05-05-2008).]

[This message has been edited by Vadim (edited 05-05-2008).]

Wonderful technology, isn't it?

Sound like a band by just playing chords and melody.

Fun for the whole family.

"Alright everyone...gather around the old VA-76 and we'll have a sing-a-long...now play us a tune Uncle Vadim."

Just funnin'

Ian

It's really makes difference for whom the show was perform (after all it's not a video demo, it's just recorder presentation).

But still when You compare show performed by Michel Voncken, and this video here, they are miles away.

Anyway, both Michel and Bert (along with some others like Thomas Berlin) really makes excellent presentations (at least in form of video-demo), and everyone who looked at some of their presentations immediately had this feeling: "I got to have this keyboard, it's fantastic".

I listened for the second time. He was dong a demo for Tyros 2, and he was entertaining, my view and one of the best parts --- After the intro there was no let down, he played with the same feel and just as exciting. A thing to envy for most.

He does know the instrument, his playing is great and he puts on an act all at the same time. Does it get better?

John C.

Hmmmm.... Let's think about this for a minute.

Sooo... The majority of arrangers are bought by 'home' users, who can barely play at all... you can set them up so they do large sections of the music without you playing anything at all, and there are even some areas of the world where an arranger is KNOWN as a 'plays by itself' keyboard. Competent players are very few and far between, most are just hobbyist without the skill to play a 'normal' keyboard. (that IS what the presentation was aimed at, wasn't it, Ian? )

And then some of you wonder why the arranger gets NO RESPECT?

Why should it?

Maybe we should all just concentrate on US getting the respect, not our instrument of choice. And that doesn't come from pantomiming playing or dancing around while the keyboard takes over (and probably sounds better for being on it's own!)

You can either be a part of the problem, or you can be a part of the solution. It's up to you... Gentlemen, 'Start your Hannon's'

Yes.