(From a different post): http://www.synthzone.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/368061/5

Guys all I got to say is this: Where I come from, (and I am probably the youngest member here...) Arrangers are being bought and used all the time. Both by kids (yes, youngsters) and pro's and it (one man band) is a very profitable business here.

The reason i'm the only one here saying this is because all those guys in my area don't post on this forum. They probably couldn't care less about it any way. They get their way around arrangers very quick and have tons of friends who can help if they have a problem.

May I add also that we here don't care about the styles ANY keyboard comes with, because we almost all use custom made styles. We don't buy a keyboard based on the styles it has, but on the usability.

I don't mean to offend anyone here, quite the contrary, all i'm trying to say is that the arranger business is NOT DEAD, NOR WILL IT BE FOR QUITE A WHILE. Even for the young guys.

"Reporting from Brooklyn"...

Shim,

I agree that arrangers will be around for quite a while, and I'm fairly confident I'll be long gone before the use of arranger keyboards fades into antiquity.

Cheers,

Gary

Gary, you've been dead for three years now, but nobody has the nerve to tell you!
DonM

And all this time I thought it just my deodorant had failed. Guess it's kinda like Weekend At Bernie's - Carol just props me up behind the keyboard, puts on an old CD of me singing and playing, turns the lights down low and nobody knows the difference.

Gary

What type of music do u play ?

What is the medium age of your customers ?

Do you mainly use styles or SMF/Mp3?

Do you play ethnic music (including latin) or Us/UK music?

Is your customers Americans or 1st -2nd gen immigrants?


Do you play alone or with others?(gtr duo?) etc.

What type of music do u play ?

What is the medium age of your customers ?

Do you mainly use styles or SMF/Mp3?

Do you play ethnic music (including latin) or Us/UK music?

Is your customers Americans or 1st -2nd gen immigrants?(mid east/ EU /Asia /south America ,etc)


Do you play alone or with others?(gtr duo?) etc.

What type of music do u play ?
Only music that people can dance to.

What is the medium age of your customers ?
60 to 65

Do you mainly use styles or SMF/Mp3?
Styles, a few SMF and NO MP3s.

Do you play ethnic music (including latin) or Us/UK music?
Latin, Italian, U.S., and I sing about a dozen songs in Spanish and another dozen in Italian.

Is your customers Americans or 1st -2nd gen immigrants?(mid east/ EU /Asia /south America ,etc)
I mix of all, but very few Asians and Middle Easterners. I'm playing a Polish birthday party tomorrow evening, and there will even be a few crazy Russians there.


Do you play alone or with others?(gtr duo?) etc.
Alone, arranger keyboard - I need the money, and I'm too cheap to split the profits with anyone else.

Cheers,

Gary

Gary...no MP3;s?

You just came back from the Tiki bar scene...No one requested Cupid shuffle or Cha Cha slide?

I can play the Cha Cha slide, but no where as good as the MP3..

Same with the Electric slide (original)

How about God bless American..the Kate version...surely life would be easier if you played some MP3's..

Star Spangled banner is another..

They are still making 'home organs'. Doesn't mean that essentially, the form isn't dead.

Be interesting to hear from a pro retailer that sells both arrangers and WS's, stage keyboards, pianos and synths, see what the numbers are. If you restrict the numbers to arrangers that sit in the same price range as decent MOTL WS's etc., and don't count the 'toy' ones, it's going to be a sobering figure, I would expect.

Walk into most music stores. Try to even FIND a good selection of different MOTL arrangers. Best of luck. Dress it up all you like, if arrangers are selling comparatively to WS's and stage keyboards, why the hell doesn't hardly anyone stock them? Racks and racks of Motif's, Fantom's, Krone's and Kronos's, Nords, Juno's, you name it.

Sorry, shim, but the facts don't bear out your impression. Sure, there ARE kids using them. There are kids playing home organs too. Doesn't mean that the majority are...

Shim

I'd also like to know more about the business in Brooklyn. I'm from north Jersey and when there was probably the only arranger player I knew of. Along with it I had to do a lot of DJing to get through the gigs. Down here in South Jersey its Kareoke wonderland. Went out last night to the Elks club and they had a two guys (sorry but I can't call them a band) One guy played a little guitar and the other guy sang. Not a bad singer but the MP3's backups sounded like they just did a voice cancel on the original recordings. Sounded totally fake to the point I wondered why not just have the jukebox on. And thats all over down here. Real music and even arranger players are hard to find.
So please enlighten us as to the music scene in your area and why do you think its different.

Fran, no one in the keys asked for the Cupid Shuffle or Cha Cha Slide, or any other song I would need an MP3 file for. I have them in the PC - just in case of an emergency. Hey, the Florida keys are America's version of the Bahamas - not the Jersey Shore. Lots of Jimmy Buffett, a smattering of Bob Marley, lots of country, some 60s, 70s, and 80s rock, all stuff that's in most, quality, arranger keyboards. I guess some folks need MP3s, but I'm just not one of them.

Gary

So Gary..you do have MP3's available...when needed...that was my point

Yes, I have a folder with a couple hundred MP3s just in case the arranger keyboard were to meet it's untimely demise. But, in all the years I've been using arranger keyboards I've never had one die - not once. Consequently, the MP3s are never used. So, if that emergency ever arises, then I'll fire up the PC's MP3 player and become a DJ until the end of the job. When I get home, I'll put my backup keyboard in the case, fix the one that died, or send it to the local repair guy, who would get it back to me within a week or less.

Cheers,

Gary

Cupid Shuffle is my most requested Hottest line dance at this time....play it MP3 almost every night...give the people what ever they want !

Can't argue with that Donny - give them what they want!

Gary

You two guys are really funny!!!

To answer your questions in short?
The ultra orthodox Jewish community. Williamsburg, Boro Park, Crown Heights, Flatbush. Like I said: reporting from "BROOKLYN"...
Israel, and the middle east in general as well HEAVILY use arranger keyboards for gigs like weddings, "bar mitzvah's", etc.

I know for a fact from talking to people here, there are YOUNG people buying keyboards all the time. From Psr s710, korg pa500 to pa3x and Tyros..

And the reason I say its not dying is because thank G-d the Jewish community is thriving bli ayin hara and constantly growing, AND one man band is a staple of Jewish life here. The average wedding hires a one man band, and, thank G-d, there are lots of them. This is partially I believe to limit the overall cost of the wedding which would be raised considerably were they to hire a full band.

Now DIKI, this is the reason we all use custom styles. Because we play unique jewish "hassidic" music, which, unfortunately the keyboard companies do not include styles for...

I'm saying all this to encourage you all, from first hand knowledge, that the arranger, and one man band business is not a dying but to the contrary, "thriving" here and in Israel and the middle east. Thank G-d.

That was exactly what I expected.Mid east ( iran/arabic/turkish)/mediterranian ( greek/labenese/cypress etc),Balkans and USSR,soutb EU ( Italy and Spain)some west EU ( Germany and even some UK) immigrant and 1st to 3 rd gen hyphenated ameican community living in US have mainly arranger use.( mainly in major cities like NY/LA/Ch etc)

Mid east and balkans especially.( ask the US retailers about their customers who buys TOTL arrangers - they will tell you it's mainly from immigrant community in US).Of course synthzone memebers are minority.Total synthzone members combined will be still less that arrangers users/buyers from Cairo or Istanbul or Tel Aviv.

The reason for TOTL or MOTL reason is sampling and 3rd party style support ( Korg /Roland/Ketron has major style sound support in there since local musicians create currenly or legacy ethnic styles) .Sampler is also common since you dont have good Oud presets are hard to find even in TOTL Korg or Ketron.

Shim

Thanks for the explanation. Kinda what I was thinking. Sort of a ethnic niche. I knew a guy here in Jersey made a living doing just Irish music. I used to work at the same restaurant with him for a bunch of years. Him in the bar and me in the back room. He found a niche and was well known for it.
What is surprizing is that DJ's haven't killed your market too. They pushed the bands out because of price but now cost as much as the bands did, but the damage is done. Peoples expectations have changed.
Glad to hear some musicians are still able to keep going in todays market.

Yep... Niche markets. Unfortunately, that's not going to drive sales for the arranger market. It's a mass market world. I'm sorry, but Jewish kids in Brooklyn are not going to save the type. US/UK/EU kids are.

Ditch all the Granny styles, fill it with hiphop, rap, alternative, you have a chance of selling it to the vast majority of kids. Don't, and they get relegated to elderly players (50 60 and 70 year olds) and niche folk music players. That, like what happened to the 'home organ' market, won't be able to sustain the R&D necessary for new arrangers to keep progressing and improving. Just imagine what an affordable 'home organ' could do nowadays if they hadn't lost the market to synths and WS's...

sadly the arranger KBs of today will become the home organs of tomorrow....the way things are going if you gigout DJ's will rule the roost almost entirely in the future..plain honest truth.

Lets see now. I'm 19 years old, I drive a 10 year old car, I'm up to my ass in college debt, working at Micky D's to keep my head slightly below water, begging my parents for money so I can go on a date, but they just told me that they're not paying for any more college tuition, especially when I went in a binge with my dorm mates and overdrew the checking account. Oh yeah, I want to perform rapp and hip-hop music, so I think I'll go out and get one of those new keyboards designed just for that kind of music. NOT!

I'm 55, drive a 5-year old car that I paid cash for when it was new, the mortgage was paid off 10 years ago, the kids are out of college and those bills were all pay as you go, and the only expenses I have are groceries, entertainment and taxes. I think I'd like to have some fun playing music, the same music I enjoyed when I was 19 years old, in college, dating hot chicks, and driving an old, beat-up, fast car. I guess I've drive up to New England, stop by at Frankie Vee's place, try out some of the keyboards, and if I find one, I'll write him a check for payment in full. Sounds perfectly logical to me.

Finally, I'm a major, arranger keyboard manufacturer. I'm in the business to make money - lots of money. I've spent millions of dollars and thousands of man hours researching the arranger keyboard market. I've determined that younger Americans are often deeply in debt, and do not have much in the way of spendable income for the purchase of recreational musical equipment costing more than $1,000 - that's why our company also makes low end keyboards and guitars. I've also determined that demographically, most Americans over age 50 are financially able to pursue leisure activities without encumbering themselves with long term indebtedness. That's why our company makes MOTL and TOTL arranger keyboards with music styles that are tailored toward that generation.

Diki, The top manufacturers in the arranger keyboard industry are NOT all a bunch of stupid, old people that don't research their markets. They're pretty damned intelligent, and in the case of Yamaha, they have a lot more irons in the fire than just arranger keyboards. In fact, arranger keyboards are just a small facet of their overall business. However, you can bet your bottom dollar that Yamaha, Korg, Roland, etc..., would all be producing huge volumes of keyboards with the very styles you continue to tout if there was a viable market out there. There just isn't! Just because you say there is, doesn't make it true - and from all the times you've posted something along these lines you have yet to come up with a single shred of hard evidence that specifically spells this out in no uncertain terms.

On a sailing forum I frequent there's a lengthy thread about why there are very few young people involved in sailing. The same is true there as well. Young people, most of which are referred to as the "Me Now Generation," tend to want things small, cheap, fast and now. None of those things apply to sailing. Sure you can find smaller sailboats, but they're not cheap, they rarely exceed 10 MPH, and in some states, in order to go boating you need to take a boating safety course, so you can't have it now. The older folks have the money, and that industry, which over the past few decades has taken a financial beating, tailor makes their boats for people over 50 years of age, people that don't need to go fast, and have the money to pay for the boats.

Personally, hip-hop, rap and to some extent, dance, will be long gone, while R&B, swing, jazz and other musical genres of the past will still be around. Time will tell, though.

Gary

I'm not claiming anything to the tune of "we're going to save the market". All i'm saying is that in our communities, arranger sales are alive and well and will be for quite some time.
Are they selling lots of arrangers in the average guitar center? Probably not. But what you were saying is that kids don't buy these keyboards, and I contest to that. Simple.

Fact is, arranger keyboards IN GENERAL are a "niche market"... And you guys here on synthzone are also a minority and "niche market"... However, these kids i'm referring to are growing up on these keyboards, and will likely continue to use them for years to come. (Providing the company's make them).

Actually, I believe a lot of the reluctance to make arrangers just for the kids is that they would scavenge sales form existing divisions.

It's going to take an arranger maker that doesn't make anything ELSE to get the ball rolling. TBH, Lionstracs screwed the pooch with the MS. The way to sell them wasn't to old farts like us, used to the cream of the TOTL crop, with great styles and sounds (for us!) ready to go. The way would have been to stuff it with modern stuff and go after the generation that could use something like that. But it would still boil down to having the resources and money to put it all together.

I believe the market is there. But for the majors, it means pulling customers for THEIR existing products away from them to buy (for the same money) something that's going to cost a lot to make. They have the sale already. Why should they bother?

But an arranger ONLY company (either existing or new) would not have that issue.

I would have to say here in Dallas, TX arrangers are pretty much un heard of. In the stores about all you can find are Yamaha psr. In the few venues that have dous and solo acts, they all seem to use guitar players. A few very upscale places use pianists. On the NH home circuit, the only other arranger player that I am aware of is our own SZ member Deane. I'm sure there must be some more out there but in the NH that I have worked at, all the other entertainers are singing guitar players, Sax players with tracks, or Karaoke singers (lots of Elvis impersonators and a few Sinatra ones too) I'd love to go out and get to hear some arranger keyboardist perform around here but I haven't found anybody... I may drive all the way to Louisiana this weekend to hear Don M.

We go to Mexico every year (Mx City, Cuernavaca, Acapulco, Veracruz) It's not at all unusual to find arranger players (of all ages) performing in all sorts of venues. However, I noticed more and more Karaoke entertainers too...

Arranger keyboard Are predominantly found in almost all the junior and secondary schools in the UK. These are the instruments that children are being don't want to play the piano keyboard on. The reason why you'll find many arrange a keyboards in music shops today is predominantly because the profit margin on them is smaller compared to the larger workstations. Very few customers will purchase top-of-the-line arranger unless they are professional musician or a very wealthy hobbyist. In general music stores are losing out in sales all round because of the Internet. Just because you don't see them in the stores does not mean that range of sales are falling.

Hi Spalding. So is the UK similar to the rest of Europe in terms of adequate gigs for arranger players? I'm thinking pubs and clubs as opposed to the retirement/ NH circuit which seems to be the norm here in North America.

There are plenty opportunities for musicians with talent and business sense and drive to play at pubs and clubs up and down the country in the uk whether they be arranger players or other musicians . What is lacking is individuals who possess enough of all three attributes.

spalding, I believe those attributes apply worldwide - not just in the UK.

Cheers,

Gary

Also the attributes needed for any "Business' to survive. ;-)

Bill G

Ha, beat me to it, there, Gary and Bill.

Hi. Got onto this forum late. Fascinating discussion. I wanted to offer an opinion that there IS an arranger keyboard of sorts for young musicians performing modern musical forms like electronic dance music, hip-hop and the like. It is Casio's XW-G1, and to a lesser extent the XW-P1. No, these keyboards won't do automatic accompaniment but they do come loaded with the equivalent of 100 rhythmic loops and patterns, each with eight variations, for the built-in step sequencer, 100 preset phrases for the phrase sequencer/recorder and 100 preset arpeggios. The sequencer can be "played" in real-time using the keyboard's nine sliders and a series of buttons. It's all very much in the spirit of an arranger keyboard but for more electronic kinds of music.

Nigel posted a link in the Casio forum to a review by Craig Anderton from last year. Check it out and see if you agree.