Having followed the discussions on the pros and cons of the current wave of new arranger keyboards I would like to dwell on these three for a moment. In particular since I added a Yamaha arranger to my Korg one thing has become more obvious to me than ever. You all know that I offer several sets of Resources for the Korg PA models that often took me months if not years in programming. I was always of the opinion that Yamaha sounded much better "straight out of the box" and it basically does , at least compared to Korg, but even with my current Yamaha PSR750 you are still a long way off if you do not delve into programming yourself. A lot has been said about the style market and how there are thousands and thousands of styles available for the Yamaha arrangers, whereas Korg is playing second fiddle here. (mind you I am talking quantity here, not necessarily quality). Nonetheless it has become apparent to me over the last three months that basically the Yammies need substantial tweaking as well to make them really shine. The first thing essential is the basic quality of the sample, a matter subject to discussion but a matter that cannot be altered.( apart from the limited RAM sample loading)
I share the view with may of you that some basic samples are superior on the Korg and others on the Yamaha. ( incidentally, and that is less of a personal opinion but I think that the ketron drum sounds and samples are superior by far to the other two brands). Having said that there is a lot that can be achieved by changing the filter, the EQ ( high/low),volumes and effects ( in particular reverb settigs) in both the Yammies and the Korgs. On average it is my opinion that factory wise but also in all the Songbooks and Music Finders there is way too much reverbs. ( often a default of 64 out of 128 level.) Similarly the EQ settings are neutral and subsequently rather bland. A piano needs more high than say warm strings, etc. Volumes is perhaps the greatest deficiency and luckily also the easiest to remedy. When I select a song from the factory Songfinder (yamaha) or Songbook (Korg) it is often staggering to notice how wrong these settings are and how bad the mix is. Sure, all of these things are subjective but one does not have to be a pastmaster to ascertain that for example the acc. section is way too loud in relation to the upper sounds or that one acc. track is far too loud or too low in relation to the other acc. instruments.
What I am trying to say is that with a decent amount of tweaking of rather obvious parameters ( volume, reverb, eq) you can go a long way in making your arranger sounding at least twice as good as it does factory wise. And that is an understament..............
In doing so myself I have grown fond of both my Yamaha and my Korg arranger keyboard.

regards,
John

John:

I agree totally with your comments. I have always modified the Style. Mostly the volume and Reverb settings but also by eliminating channels, substituting voices, especially bass and drums and changing tempo. The most common issue is that the volume is to loud. Rarely do I ever use a Style as it is.

Joe

John,

I totally agree with your statements above. You would be amazed at the number of people that have contacted me over the years that had no idea they could even adjust their keyboard's global EQs, let alone tune the styles, individual voices, drum kits, etc... Talking with many of them on the telephone and walking them through the EQ process, you frequently hear them say "WOW! I can't believe how much difference this makes."

Cheers,

Gary

John,

I feel the reason audio drum tracks have a better sound than MIDI drums is due primarily to the fact the all of the audio drums are recorded in the same room and at the same time giving the "real" sound we all seek.

Drums have such a fast decay naturally - reverb destroys drums natural sound I think

Bill g

[quote=billyhank]John,

I feel the reason audio drum tracks have a better sound than MIDI drums is due primarily to the fact the all of the audio drums are recorded in the same room and at the same time giving the "real" sound we all seek.

Drums have such a fast decay naturally - reverb destroys drums natural sound I think




Bill, I agree with you...On another post comparing drums ..Audio verses Midi...there are examples showing this...Even though they are audio samples ..there is a Yamaha sample..recorded with too much effects...and the recent PA3x midi drum sample..with too much effects...It causes both to not sound realistic...The Ketron sample (audio drums), sounds realistic because more care in recording effect wise..I also believe the BK samples sound more realistic , because of sensible effect use..

Korg and Yamaha have too much reverb on all styles.I don't know why.It's ok in bedroom , but when you put them through PA they sound bad.
I try to keep it to minimum on drums or I change it to some room ambiance effect.

As a matter of fact Joe they are the ones next on my list of variables and of course they may alter the style rather drastically if applied properly.

Gary,

I know, my first keyboard was the Roland E70 and though it could only be tweaked in a very limited fashion people could not believe the piano sound that came out of mine!! By the way I do admire your tenacity with the PSR3000. It is a good keyboard I had it myself for a while and I am sure you will enjoy the PSR950 in time.

Bill and Fran,

I have never paid too much attention to Midi or Audio drumtracks but rather to the overall impression/sound. I always cut down the reverb on drums and often percussion as well to a bare minimum. Nearly twenty years ago I had the Solton MS50 (Ketron these days) and their drum sounds then where lightyears ahead of the competition. Last year I had the Ketron SD5 for a short while and the drums in there were again impressive to say the least...

Overall I simply wanted to point out how much can be achieved with virtually any arranger keyboard if you take the time and effort to get to know it properly and make it work for you. In that respect I can well understand folks like you Fran and Diki who still think the world of their G70 ( which personally I do not like all that much) and who know how to handle and tweak it to their heart's content.

regards,
John

A lot of styles and even whole arranger ROM sections are voiced for the continental EU market. And one thing you'll notice on much of their older popular recorded music is a penchant for a large 'beerhall' kind of sound. Probably because many of those venues are still in use, and the majority of arranger players tend to be, let's just be kind and say 'older' (!), the arrangers from over there tend to have ROM styles drenched in reverb.

In fact, when the G70 was first released in the US, there was an almost universal dislike for how wet they all were. Few people looked past this issue, and the poor thing had a pretty rough time of it. You never get a second chance to make a first impression!

I also dislike the modern trend to over compress and EQ the things. TBH, most of them are made radically better (IF you are trying to sound live) by switching the compressor off and rebalancing the styles without them.

I'm pretty sure that if anyone made an arranger that sounded 'perfect' to me OOTB, no-one else would buy it!

BTW, Roland's have been using drum samples from their class leading V-Drums products for years, now. It is one of the reasons they sound so live. If it's good enough for a drummer, it's good enough for me! You'll also notice that most of the V-Drum kits' samples have a bit of the drum room included in the sample. This is what, IMHO, helps them sound live... You can still add more reverb to certain parts of the kit (just like they do in studios), but there is always that 'air' around them.

I simply don't understand why Yamaha don't get this. They also make very good E-drum kits, but you don't hear anything from THEM on their arrangers. Yet they make a point, in their S950 promo literature and videos, to emphasize that their audio styles WERE recorded in live rooms, how this makes them 'better', and you can hear it (in fact, a bit much half the time!). So it's not like Yamaha aren't aware of how the room helps make the drum sound. But so far, very little of it has made its way into the KITS in the S and T series.

Once Yamaha fall in with Roland and Korg, perhaps we'll finally get the 'live' sounding Yamaha so many of us want. Don't worry... they'll leave in all the legacy kits for those that want to sound like a CD, but samples with 'air' is, IMO, the way forward, NOT audio styles.

Arrangers are primarily voiced and set up in the UK, Germany & Japan (The US has little (If any) input into them) due to the fact that arranger sales in the US are miniscule compared to Europe and Asia.

Also Arrangers have always been designed for the Home User first, with the Pro player way down the scale, (Manufactures assume that all Pros will use Workstations not arrangers) this is why arrangers sound great in the home, but need a lot of work when put in a gigging situation.

In addition most countries produce their own styles & pre-sets etc. for their particular type of music, whereas the US produces little. (Even though US users complain that arrangers sound too European)

Bill

I can count the user styles that have compared favorably to the best ROM ones on the fingers of one hand... Unfortunately, as you point out, arranger sales are pretty flat in the USA, so expecting RolandUS to come out with a set of good styles for the American market is unlikely.

Fortunately, it's a walk in the perk to drop the reverb off the EU styles (actually, Roland came out with an update shortly after the G70 launch that revoiced the styles to be less wet - I think even the UK players thought they were too wet, too!) so it's not the kiss of death...

Another thing to take into account is that most people that have an arranger at home have it in an acoustically dead living room. So gobs of reverb helps open out the sound. But pros play in pretty large rooms, so the style doesn't need much. The room itself is providing some 'space'!

Diki,
with all due respect but this is total nonsense. It may apply partly to the German market with their Schlager music, other than that it is incorrect. You and Abacus are correct though in the assessment of the arranger keyboard market which was and is essentially a home-use market and which first florished in countries with a strong organ tradition ( even related to church visits etc.) such as Holland, Germany, Belgium and the Mediterranean countries. But to the best of my knowledge there has never been any excessive love for REVERB in any of these countries and all manufacturers have continued to market their models with more often than not a default setting of 64 ( out of 128) for their reverbs. Perhaps it is the easiest way for them to take up a stand right in the middle ? I remember my first Roland E70 sounded like garbage out of the box.......

regards,
John

Sorry, but I hear what I hear.

Most arrangers with a default of 64 on the reverb, I find myself lowering it to 40 or so.

I go along with that definitely. On average I bring down reverb levels on drums to approx. 15-25 and bass even zero.
As to the acc. tracks I generally cut out the reverb ( or most of it) on pianos etc. whereas I am quite generous with strings and to some extent brass,trumpet, sax etc. This was how I started out when programming the PA80 way back in 2002 and only with those ( in itself minor) adjustments, folks would be pleasantly surprised as to what their keyboard was capable of.
Just imagine tweaking most other variables !!!!


regards,
John

Well, that pretty much confirms my description of 'drenched'!

If you listen to pop music from the 60's and 70's from Europe, and compare it to US stuff of roughly the same period, I think you'll hear that reverb is FAR more prominent. This may be why we tend to find ourselves turning it down so much. These things ARE voiced for their primary market... and it sure ain't us Americans!

I'm with you on this, Diki. As youngsters in the UK we could always tell a European record by the veil of reverb draped over everything - most unnatural. The odd thing was though, that when the Beeb recorded their 'live' bands for shows like Jimmy Young and Terry Wogan, draping reverb was standard practice. So it was backing tracks, lead vocal track, and harmony vocal track. Get that all down, five songs between 7 a.m. and noon with a tea break at 10:), then a wash with reverb, and it was done.

Doing session work around London in the sixties, bass was almost always recorded dry. With drums, producers usually wanted the snare heads tuned so loose they were almost like the skin of a rice pudding, a tuning no drummer would dream of on a live gig.

Hi Diki,

What you are saying now.... that I have American taste ???!!!

John

Just finished setting up a few reg banks for St. Pattys day songs on the S950....let me tell you many of the sounds are drenched in Too Much reverb, even teh ones that were transferred from the S910 I had to go in there and really do some FX surgery on many of the sounds and OTS setups......
not hard to do, but seems a bit much for default settings.
All done for now...