Last night I had a visit from Ted Krauss of CMC, the distributors of Ketron products here in the USA.
Ted explained that without anything new to show at NAMM as of this weekend, there was no reason for the company to show old models.
He has one Audya in New York, but it is still a prototype and therefore not complete with all the new styles and sounds.
AJ, however, just returned back from Italy and he has been given a finished version which hopefully will make the Don Mason Jam next week.
Ted expects finished products to be delivered here in the USA sometime in February.
We spoke about price and although it has not been finialized, I think it will come in at about the same retail price as the Yamaha Tyros3. However, only when it arrives here will we really know the final price.
Ted has assured me that I would receive my store's sample as soon as they arrive and that we would be able to schedule a "ketron day" with AJ here in Southern California soon after.
Ted left me with some brochures and again pointed out to me that besides all the new functions with styles including live Drums, basses and guitars, the other main exciting features of the Audya is a full Ketron Midjay inside, with all it's faders and buttons as a complete midjay section and a large sampler, allowing for the developement of sounds and styles for all ethnic musicians requiring middle eastern, Indian, Latin, etc. sounds. Ted has already lined up musicians well known for their abilities in these markets to develop new "sets" for the Auyda. This will be a project developed for our market here in the USA.


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George Kaye
Kaye's Music Scene
Reseda, California
818-881-5566
www.kayesmusicscene.com

It's so funny.......I just got a phone call from a synthzone member who got into NAMM and called me to ask "where is the Ketron booth". I told him about my visit with Ted last night and he was not very happy. He said the only reason he came out to NAMM was to get a chance to see and try the Audya. He asked if this meant the Audya really won't be out for at least another year and I said "have patience". It should be soon. I hope I gave him good information!!


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George Kaye
Kaye's Music Scene
Reseda, California
818-881-5566
www.kayesmusicscene.com

All he had to do was read the posts we knew the Audya was not at going to be at Namm? So basicly we have a Midjay with a KB attached?

[This message has been edited by Dnj (edited 01-15-2009).]

[This message has been edited by Dnj (edited 01-15-2009).]

Now that's a little silly.........That's over simplifying the Auyda. Of course there is a slew of new styles utilizing naturally played instruments and newly sampled voices. But the inclusion of the Midjay also allows the Audya to have a means to play live loops, MP3's, Wave Files, etc.
Also, if we really do end up with a street price close to the Tyros3, this should be a very good seller with all the features, extra polyphony (197) and a 76 semiweighted keyboard.


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George Kaye
Kaye's Music Scene
Reseda, California
818-881-5566
www.kayesmusicscene.com

geoirge it was just a basic reply..as I always said when I had my Sd1+ & Midjay that it would be nice to have the features of the midjay in the sd1+.....just the fact that you can use & play all the features & modes of play SEPERATLY & Simultaneously is worth its weight in gold alone.

i LOVE, the idea of new styles/sounds project,

making the AUDYA expandable/upgradable, especially w/ developing new styles, will be HUGE,

i just hope the price is NOT HUGE, and is in line with all other top arrangers...

George/Ted

i just hope they get real musicians who know how to play the music,
ie. latin players who play salsa, merengue, cumbia, bachata, bolero, etc, for a living,

not Japanese/American musicians with No clue, no feeling when it comes to true ethnic styles, rhythms...

we don't need someone site reading and playing like a robot :-)


my birthday is in February, and supposedly the AUDYA will come out in February... hhhhmmmmm :-)

One huge advantage that Ketron have is that their styles, particularly the audio loop using ones, are NOT translatable to other formats. So, if you like them, you HAVE to get a Ketron to use them, not wait until someone runs them through Styleworks and everyone gets them...

As to whether they will be able to generate enough of a revenue stream to fund making these VERY expensive to produce audio styles (this ain't one guy in a bedroom, it takes studio time and talented players) it's going to rely on firstly, whether the Audya users are smart enough to realize that trading these styles around will pretty much ensure that no more get made (until the Audya2), or whether Ketron were smart enough to use copy protection on the styles...

My guess is it is going to rely on the honesty of the arranger owners. So you are screwed

Diki,

It is starting to get a little tiring of your negative attitude toward Ketron. You've been saying all along that the Audya won't work, and now the owners are going to be screwed. I really don't think so. I've owned two different Ketrons and I'm betting the Audya will be a killer board. Ketron has always been on the leading edge of arranger technology.

Have you ever even played a Ketron? It seems odd that you think they are such a terrible company when I'm betting you've never played one.

I also have a G70 just like you and I like it, but it is not THE ultimate arranger. It is a TOTL arranger of which there are many. I'm willing to bet that the folks attending the Jam in Shreveport will leave raving about the Audya.

Before you post anymore of this NEGATIVE speculation (because all it is, IS speculation), walk a mile in the shoes of a Ketron first.

Tom

Trust me, Tom, the G70 is no more the perfect arranger than the Audya. And I'm sorry if you think that keeping your eyes wide open during the blizzard of hype and bated breath speculation that accompanies every new TOTL arranger's launch, and discussing some of the OBVIOUS shortcomings of any new technology is 'putting it down'....

Do you berate those that simply gush enthusiastically about every unheard feature as if it is a panacea to every playing woe they ever had as 'building it up'? No... you do not. My questions about the value of audio loops on melodic parts (rather than just drum loops) is still a valid one.

And the day you get your Audya, and ask it to play a Min(maj7) chord and it (or at least the live loop part - what you payed a fortune for ) plays a Min(no extension), you will have the opportunity to 'put it down' yourself. That is, if you even CARE whether it can play chords like that (my shitty G70 has no problem with those types of chords)...

Or the day you decide to use it's sampler, and find out that 64MB is not enough to load in what you want (if you even use samples at all) and you wonder why they couldn't allow the 1GB or so that Yamaha allow, or the 256MB that Korg do.

Or the day that you remember that virtually no new 'live loop' styles (that used NEW live loops) were ever released for the SD-1 after it's release (or a fraction of the new styles that Yamaha, Korg and Roland released). Ketron's commitment to producing LOTS of new styles, in a large variety of formats (no two people perform exactly the same kind of music and need exactly the same type of styles for it) at an affordable price is, IMO, essential to the Audya's success.

As has been noted (by someone else, if you want to berate HIM, too!), styles without the audio loops don't sound that different from any other arranger. But the loop styles make a HUGE difference. However, let's say I do a show of primarily New Orleans and Cajun music. What are my odds of getting Ketron to provide live loop styles in those genres? Pretty slim, I'd say. But they are easy enough to find for a MIDI based arranger. Or to make, even.

But Ketron is going to need a studio full of REAL players (and not slackers with a mouse) to produce these. And where is the return on their investment? Shoot the messenger all you want, but it is a fact of life that we trade styles around like bubblegum cards. As expensive to produce as these live loop styles are going to be, what is Ketron's reason to produce additional ones? Yep.... MONEY! How many would they have to sell (remember, there's only ONE product in their entire line that is capable of playing them) to even break even, yet alone make a decent profit. When ONE dishonest owner could 'share' them with all his other Audya friends and nix that idea?

I REALLY like Yamaha's IDG (?) system, with copy protection. You know at least that Yamaha will make enough off the styles to warrant making MORE... And more is what we all want. To be honest, how many or us would even bother changing arrangers if the factory released as many NEW, fresh, as-good-as-the-ROM styles every year as when we bought it..?

But because we trade styles around (little or no copy protection) few are ever made until those that come out with the NEXT generation of arranger. So we all buy the new arranger, mostly for the new styles and sounds.

Ketron are TALKING about changing that, but without copy protection, how long do you think they will keep making a loss? The SD-1 certainly showed the depth of their commitment to a constant supply of fresh 'live loop' styles

But, like I said, shoot the messenger... or buy an Audya, and THEN start talking about these issues. But they are not going to go away if we all close our eyes. And you MIGHT at least acknowledge that I have been one of the most enthusiastic endorsers of the demos. They sound GREAT! I am NOT 'putting the Audya down''. Far from it.

But I AM staying awake, and not letting the hype and excitement blind me to obvious (well, obvious to me, anyway!) shortcomings of this system...

But cross your fingers, if that helps for you...

Diki,

When I play G B E in my left hand the G70 plays Emin not Cmaj7, so you see it doesn't work either.

As far as the Sd-1 (I still have mine) goes, some audio loops are better than none. How many on our G70s?

I'm not listening to all the hype. I don't listen to it regardless of the brand. I'm going on Ketron's track record of producing some really fine arrangers.

Again all your criticism is based speculation. Let's see what comes out of the Shreveport jam.

Tom

What do you play if you want a first inversion Em chord?

I don't use those rootless jazz voicings, because they force you into HAVING to play very specific voicing for for specific chords. I tend to want (because my LH is actuall playing a sound) to have the freedom to voice a chord any way I feel like at the time.

So, my G70 won't give me a Cmaj7 for GBE.... yours won't give you an Em/G. Six of one, half a dozen for the other...

And, like I (and others) have pointed out, the real loop styles are SO much better than the rest.. do you really want just a FEW of what you use to sound amazing, and then you are going to be happy with the rest? Oh that's right... You ARE used to inconsistent style quality already Me, whether it's a ROM style, or an imported style or conversion, I want them ALL to sound about the same...

Just like I wouldn't want to be in a band that sucked at some music and was GREAT at others. Not if all those different types of music had to be played.

Now go and beat up on someone else for putting a Yamaha down. Or a Wersi. Or the MS. Or a Korg... No? So it isn't the PRINCIPLE of criticism you object to... it's just YOUR arranger brand that shouldn't be scrutinized, eh?

I only scrutinize what I have gotten my hands on, that's the difference. I don't play an Emin chord in it's first inversion. I have lots of criticisms about the G70, I had some dislikes about the Tyros that I had. The Sd-1 doesn't do everything superbly either.

Criticize whatever brand you want but don't do it off from press releases and gossip on the forum. Try it yourself then give an informed opinion. Your opinion has yet to be backed up by what we logical thinkers call facts.

I'm going to make a guess here. You don't have a Ketron to try so you don't have access to the facts. I'm guessing your next rant will be about the lack of availability.

Tom

Tom, I agree with you. As I've said all along, let's wait until we can see and play the Audya before condemning it, or praising it too lavishly.
I fully expect it to be the best arranger ever made. I can tell you it won't be perfect, and it won't suit every player, but what does?
As usual, I had quit reading this thread when it starting sinking to the bashing-without-reason status, but accidentally opened it again.
One guy already embarrassed himself by ranting for pages about some USB issue of which he was not informed. Why not wait until we have concrete, hands-on information?
I don't know how much AJ will allow us to experiment with the Audya--probably not much--but I will sure try to ask him about the issues raised about uniformity of sound and chord recognition. I expect them to be non-issues, just as the USB thing was.
DonM

LOL!

Has a fixed release date been given for the Audya in USA? Ketron Portugal stated 16th Jan a while back (probably due to it being the NAMM show date) but now European sites are stating between Jan and March 2009, so it looks like it is anyones guess here in the UK.
Ketron UK are not exactly good when it comes to getting info out of them either

The Audya really sounded great last night here at the jam....AJ really went into detatil in his Demo to try to explain all the great features......& also show us what you can achive with this new KB.Plus I recieved a new Ketron T Shirt YIPPPEEE!
More to come for sure......this may be the only KB you ever need

At almost £4000 I hope I don't want another keyboard, otherwise I'll need to take out a bank loan hehe



[This message has been edited by Keyman_UK (edited 01-19-2009).]

Is this one you are considering, Donny?

Well, to be honest, I'm not criticizing the Audya from a hands on perspective, but I'm not praising it from that either...!

Yes, the demos sound great, but I guess the difference here, Tom, is that I'm NOT criticizing the underlying technology from a 'hands off' perspective. I don't know about you, but I have been using audio loops in music production for over ten years. I am already pretty intimate with what can, and can't be done with these things. I am also pretty informed about how easy/hard they are to produce.

So, just as YOU don't need to have 'hands on' with a keyboard that uses MIDI (you are already pretty familiar with what can and can't be done with MIDI), I don't need 'hands on' on the Audya to realize some of the pitfalls of audio loops.

One of the prime ones being... if a loop doesn't exist for a particular chord type, it can't play it. There are no NTT's for loops. They are what they are, and that's all they can ever be.

I've got to PLAY an Audya before I can talk about this?

""One of the prime ones being... if a loop doesn't exist for a particular chord type, it can't play it. There are no NTT's for loops. They are what they are, and that's all they can ever be.

I've got to PLAY an Audya before I can talk about this? ""


Well said Diki.. I am am anxious to hear your thoughts on this board after a couple hours on it...


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createsongstyles.com

Very little chance of that, in my neck of the woods (FL Panhandle)...

I don't feel like enriching ANY dealer by 15% or so (of probably $3500+, @$500+) just for a tryout...

I know many of you that think $500+ is chump change. Not me...

Diki,

I'm with you,$500.00 is not chump change to me either. I would not buy it from a company that charges a restocking fee either. I have however purchased three keyboards without ever seeing or playing them based on the recommendations of forum members I respect. One of them was you. I bought my G70 sight unseen. I figure I can always resell it if I don't like it.

You are one of the most knowledgeable people here on the forum and you have shared your knowledge with myself and others freely and I thank you very much for doing that.

Diki if you are like me you don't know everything there is to know now or in the future. We only know from our own perspective. I'm sure people told Samual Morse the communication using electromagnetic waves would never work. He new something they didn't. It is starting to look like the engineers at Ketron invented a method using audio loops that you didn't know about, or didn't exist before, be happy about it.

My wife and I are wondering where to go on spring break. We have vacationed in Gulf shores in the past and like it there very much. If we decide to go there this year I really would like to meet you and hear you play.

Tom