John good luck with the Audya....prepare to be amazed......please keep us posted on your progress and review.

While the audya audio styles are mostly superb, i think the solo play instruments are one step behind yamaha, roland, korg... There is nothing like the SA2 or ensemble instruments in the Tyros range for example...

My friend....
You are right... it is very big art...
But i think is too big art to create a new audio style from (zero)
If you think it's very easy to make a Audio style (from zero) I am willing to send to you the original Audio recording from Drums, and you can to create (from zero) with this audio Record a Audio Style (with midi sequence) like this of Audya.....
I do not mean something (loops ready) but a single recording....

You must to make everything:
1) Audio Mix of Audio Drums record...
2) Audio procesing, edit etc
3) Export one by one to audio loops
4) Audio quantize
5) Backing sequence and arrange (different file) for drummer (to record)
6) Audio Mastering and Balance for Audio loops files... and and and......
And of course you need a very good equipment and Studio or Home Studio for this....

I respect your opinion but I think that is not easy to build a complete audio style from (zero)....

i dont think you understood what Bill meant to say..

Exactly my thoughts.
I find the Audya styles amazing, much more alive and dynamic (and "in your face") than Yamaha styles.
But the sounds are not as good as the Yamaha keyboards (IMHO!!)

Maybe....
I'm sorry if I said something bad My apologies......I had no such intentions ....

I am sorry but I have to disagree... big time!
If you listen to the example posted by Sokratis on Soundcloud the part that NO midi kit will EVER be able to reproduce is not the flashy (albeit impressive) intro with all the drum rolls, but the little fills played on the hi-hat and the cymbals, and do you know why? Because everytime a drummer hits an hi-hat or a cymbal it does so not only with a different strength (that you can somehow try to mimick with the midi velocity), but also in a different place of its surface and also with a different angle of the stick and this difference you cannot reproduce with samples taken at different velocities. A cymbal can have a diameter of 40, 50 or more centimeters and every part of its surface will sound different, not just the center (often called bell) or the rim. And the hi-hat, even if has a much smaller diameter, is even more challenging, because a real drummer will never hit it with the same degree of "openness" and this variability you cannot reproduce with just three samples (closed hi-hat, mid hi-hat and open hi-hat).
Combine these with the differences in velocity and angle and the possibilities become almost endless.
That's the reason why a real drummer playing an acoustic drum kit for "X" bars will always sound more authentic than the same drummer triggering a sampled drum kit through a series of electronic pads, for the same amount of bars.
You may call them grooves, loops or whatever, but they will never "breathe" in the same way.
BTW: the same principle applies for all the percussions, with the possible exception of the kick, where the felt hits the drum always in the same place and with the same angle; the only thing that changes is the strength (equivalent to the midi velocity).

Sokratis,

there is nothing to apologize for; you are not only a musician, but also a sound engineer with first hand experience on the field and thus much more entitled and qualified to express your opinion compared with many others, self proclaimed experts.
I actually wish that you could post more, both here and on the Ketron Forum, because I, for one, value greatly your input.

I agree: if we could combine the Audya audio styles with many of the Yamaha (or Korg) sounds we would have the ultimate arranger; that's the reason why I had so many hopes for the Tyros 5 and its audio styles... unfortunately they were the biggest letdown of all: not only there are just 40 of them, but they are bland exactly like the midi styles and to make things worse they have also short loops, so after a while they too sound boring and repetitive.
What a waisted opportunity!

I was lucky enough, as I was still working for Yamaha, to see a very well made and interesting video of the process used to make Yamaha's S950 Audio Drum styles.

You are totally correct...it is far from easy.

Yamaha even went to the trouble of using the same drums, mixing board and effects units, as well as recreating or using the original studio environment.

And that was just for drums.

Ketron goes a good deal further, and does much the same with bass and guitar parts.

The styles sound like a "real" band, because, essentially, they are a real band.

Ian