Nick have you considered downloading some user sample sets from the Korg Forums?

I'm sure I saw a whole bunch of Dance sounds (hopefully a few good lead synth sounds in there) that you could use.

Maybe sample your own?

Edit the existing sounds???????

mate i have tried and searched for dance samples... there arer PLENTY but they are only compatible with Triton and M3 and NOT the PA arrangers...

i have tried not really dug deep into the sound editing YET but the thing is - the standard synth sounds on thekeyboard are terrible... there really is not much u can do with them in my opinion. i am yet to hear some good usable trance leads and gated pad voices...

maybe I am just too use to the awesome sounds that my motif XS had.

You need to dig into the sound-editing mode to see what the pa800 can really do. With 16 oscialtors you should be able to make some good sounds. As far as ARP's go , pads should get you very close to them.

Don't give up yet! Read the manual!

I’ve been thinking about this thread all week and remembering the glory days when I used 3 keyboards + vocals to put out a full orchestra sound.

In front of me, a DX7 (as my master) MIDI’d to a Roland Pro-E arranger on top and a Roland U-20 to my right. On the floor was a Roland U-20 module also MIDI’d to the DX7. I used a Yamaha MIDI processor (routing, cut-off, bypass, transpose, etc) to mix my MIDI signals to all units.

It worked like this. My left hand on the DX7 gave me sounds when I wanted (based on velocity sensitivity) from the U-20 module. One of three volume pedals controlled that volume. The DX7 also spoke to the Pro-E arranger to dictate what chords I’m playing. The U-20 on the right was a stand-alone, just used for sounds. A second volume pedal controlled that volume.

I had instant access to any sound I wanted and could change patches on one keyboard while I played the other one.

But...the many sounds I could produce was SECONDARY to my main effect. That was to give the listener the impression it actually was a whole band. I did this a number of ways. Example: playing lead on one keyboard, I could move my hand to the other for fill-in’s. Most effective was to take over the melody note from my right hand with my left hand (near the end of a phrase) and while still playing the melody line with my left hand, bring in another instrument behind it with my now free right hand.

Of course, in those days, there were not only “players” but listeners too. Audiences have become an endangered species lately. Not a lot of incentive anymore for putting that kind of a setup together again!

Lucky