This is a "studio" Roland Integra-7 version of Bert Kaempfert's "Skokiaan" from the early 1960s. I tried to capture every detail of Kaempfert's style. It consists of 10 sequencer tracks all played by ear (prepared via Cakewalk Sonar). All sounds are from the Integra.
http://youtu.be/h4lvr_Sp_Nc

What are your feelings about such music? I have the impression these early Kaempfert tunes are very "remote" nowadays, there seems to be only a small number of people who are particularly interested in this 1960s bigband style. But I haven't encountered any other Youtube demo of digital instruments coming as close to the original style as mine. So please comment. I think I'm lost here in a tiny "niche market", I came to Kaempfert due to my father's taste (he is 85).

For its time very good. Today very dated sounding and no market for it.

There is a much bigger following for Theater Organ Music in
Europe vs the US....

I think it's sad this sound is not appreciated any more. There is so much 'retro', vintage and nostalgia, why not regarding old-fashioned bigband sounds? But it tends to be used for documentaries sometimes.
I assumed at least people over 75 would still be interested in this music, but it seems not to have a strong pull effect in rest homes either.
BTW, anyway, if my Integra version manages to sound as dated as the early 60s, I achieved what I intended, as it is hard to make a synthesizer really sound like dated music. It just doesn't seem to be a profitable business to compile something like this, if there's maybe 1 Kaempfert fan per rest home ;-)

What's Theatre Organ got to do with it?

website

Bill

Most people will know the tunes but can�t remember who its by, hence the name Bert Kaempfert doesn�t bring back memories, also when it is played by Organ/Keyboard players it tends to be played more in the style of the modern orchestra.

Bill

That's why I think it is a quality feature if it is played with the particular 1962 sound instead of the standard modern style. And it should bring back memories more intensely then.

Almost forgot ATOS which swamps the UK & Europe.

Bill

BTW, in case someone IS interested in playing Bert Kaempfert music which isn't levelled and flattened by the standard arranger styles, I began to make a style out of this sequencer file (through EMC software) and might continue working on it. however, I think my EMC software version just allows conversion into various Roland style formats, probably not Yamaha.

Your rendition does sound like the real thing. I like it.

Thanks, happy you like it. So, obviously there are a few Kaempfert fans who found it on Youtube and appreciate it. I could have made more use of the supernatural features of the trumpet (e.g.glissandi), I didn't because when I first midi-recorded the tracks 2 years ago it was for the SonicCell, which doesn't have supernatural sounds yet. But the Integra is really capable of producing an orchestral sound quite close to Bert Kaempfert, if you are familiar with its 6,000 tones ;-).

Just began to emulate a "new" old Bert Kaempfert tune: "That happy feeling", also known as the 'Sandy Becker show theme'. I only prepared the first minute so far, completely on the Yamaha MoXF with some Garritan samples installed on the flash board. I worked a lot on the acoustic guitars, had to record 4 different guitar patterns before I got the right Kaempfert swing. Don't know yet whether I'll do the complete song.
https://soundcloud.com/rorosetree/bert-k...eeling-1st-part

Bert would have a "VERY Happy Feeling" listening to this ... quite a labor of LOVE ...

If I hadn't have known or wasn't listening to closely, I would have thought it was the original. I hear this sort of music on a " nostolgic" AM radio station here in Dallas, Texas so there must be some interest out there. Anyways, fantastic rendition, it must have been a lot of work to put it all together!

I have EMC Universal, which should convert to Others, and I am trying to find some ensemble registrations for backing up my band.

I know Yamaha and others have section sax and horns, and by using harmony, one can fatten the sound up still farther.

I and my senior audience love the "dated' sound, and we all who know Bert was and think you did a great job Rosetree.

I would like to know where I can find more section sounds as it is an art to put it together properly.

Bernie

If I hadn't have known or wasn't listening too closely, I would have thought it was the original. I hear this sort of music on a " nostolgic" AM radio station here in Dallas, Texas so there must be some interest out there. Anyways, fantastic rendition, it must have been a lot of work to put it all together!

Thanks a lot for your comments. Interesting to hear that there is a radio station that plays these nostalgic tunes.
Regarding section sounds, it is an advantage of synthesizers like the moXF or the Integra that you can edit and combine so much yourself. In the MoXF, a single voice can be composed of up to 8 waveform elements. The trombones in my recording consist of two voices (one factory Yamaha Motif voice 'Bone section' and one classical brass voice from the Garritan library) each containing several waveforms.

BTW, comparing the Skokiaan tune, which I realized on the Integra (see first post in this thread), and 'That happy feeling' played with the MoXF, which of the two synthesizers sounds more convincing to you in these two examples? I like the Integra strings better, the other sounds are on a par to me.

Rosetree,
Whether it's dated or not your renditions of Bert Kaempfert's music are superb. I'm a young 68 year old and your songs have certainly stirred the memory banks. Have you done "Swinging Safari"?

By the way this "dated" music hearkens back to the glory days of music. My local radio station had a Top 50 and the diversity and creativity displayed in the music was light years ahead of anything recorded today. Major hits by groups like the Beatles, Stones, Kinks etc. were on the same charts as "Ahab the Arab" by Ray Stevens and other novelty tunes like, "My Boomerang Won't Come Back". Instrumentals were a huge part of the music scene at that time. Anything from The Percy Faith Orchestra's "Theme From A Summer Place" to the Ventures, "Walk Don't Run". Bert Kaempfert was a big part of this musical scene.

Keep up the great work.

God Bless,
Don

And let us not forget Sergio Mendez and Brazil 66, and Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass ...

The kids today hardly know who they are..

Heh, glad I'm not a kid anymore. Well, not a little one.

Thanks a lot. Yes, Swingin' Safari was the first one I emulated on the Roland Integra a while ago:
http://youtu.be/R6AemUtvxpc

when I was a teenager I did not know many of the artists from the early 1900's either ...

Yep, schlepping a calliope around on gigs must've been a chore.:)

...two, if you wanted stereo.

chas

another great example of a well loved sound source that was mono. Stereo Schmereo.

This might be interesting: I replaced the Yamaha MoXF guitars in my "That happy feeling" production with a Roland Integra finger steel strumming guitar. I think this is one of the most realistic acoustic rhythm guitars I've played on a synthesizer:

https://soundcloud.com/rorosetree/easy-l...trumming-guitar

Is there an equivalent strumming guitar in the Tyros 5? In that case I would be interested in demos. In the Motifs there isn't (because there is no behavior modeling). To me it seems to be one of the reasons to definitely keep the Integra.

If no Tyros 5 users contradict here regarding the Integra strumming guitar, I assume they are eating humble pie... ;-)

I am unable to open the link ...can you post it direct to SZ?

I got it to work with Google Chrome..

I'll try to attach the file directly:

Still no opinions? I'm just asking about the strumming guitar, not about this very simplistic easy listening piece.

Guitar "strumming" sounds very muddled in this demo....IMO T5 wins this in this category, T5 Guitars are hard to beat..

Sometimes Yamaha sounds are very bright,but not too realistic, so I'll look for demos which beat this in realism...

I think your strumming guitar sounds very realistic...what is perceived as "muddled", in fact is what a real guitar sounds like in this range..

Folks like the Yamaha guitars because they sound good...but not always real...Tyros5 does have some of the best guitars...very playable, but not always realistic...
Your demo shows a nice strumming technique..

Finally, a new addition to my Kaempfert tunes: The Happy Trumpeter. Again, I further optimized the typical Kaempfert strumming guitars and "Knack bass". Trumpet, flutes and bass played live, other parts pre-recorded as sequencer tracks.

Excellent! I'm a big fan of Bert.

His music doesn't sound dated to me at all. Au contra ire, it's timeless.

Taike

I really like this music, too. And I like making my instruments sound like an orchestra of the 1960s instead of a present-day mainstream (arranger) sound.
There doesn't seem to be a large Kaempfert fan base, but I have a few subscribers who really like it, one of them is a professional trumpeter from the US, with whom I'm going to record a Kaempfert tune together some time.

You sure succeed at recreating that sound, Rosetree.

You'd be amazed at how many people love Bert's music. Granted, most of them are in their fifties and up, but still a force to reckon with. In fact, those that love Hansi, love Bert as well.

First time checking out this thread. Yes, really nice work to accurately reproduce that nostalgic feel from the 60s. Not easily accomplished.

I'm sure you must of worked on the DSPs to minimize the stereo spread for that mono effect, added some LowFi effects, and tweaked the reverb to get the ambiance close. I guess if these effects were added to a nice guitar strumming sample, one can argue that the overall sound becomes a bit "muddled", but that is the exact effect you require to get that nostalgic feel correct.

In regards to the Tyros 5 guitar voices and strumming effects, several styles do have a really nice strumming programming for those style parts. A few multipads, and of course you can change to any other suitable guitar. Good strumming style parts and different rhythm variations are not that easy to find. Whenever a nice Premium Style is introduced that has a good quality guitar part, I sometimes purchase the style just for the strumming guitar part and rework those style parts into other styles as I need them.

Even then, all the effects are optimized for that modern premium processed sound you find on all the new arrangers. No lack of of really good guitar voices, programming, and DSP/AMP effects on the Tyros 5 or latest S970, but to obtain that nostalgic sound that you nailed with your Integra Sound Module would require a lot of experimenting. The other option of course, would be to sample sounds and voices from that era and compose on any sampling arranger.

Nice job, good thread. Thanks for sharing.

Marcus

Thanks, nice you like it. Actually, I didn't really work on the effects, and I didn't reduce stereo. Only for the flutes part I changed the equalizer to reduce bass to get a more typical cool and distant sound. The Integra SN-A Marcato strings are also good for the more demure, distant Kaempfert sound.
The crucial components are the characteristic "knocking" pick bass and the strumming guitars. For the bass, the extremely versatile choice of the Integra's 6,000 sounds is a real plus to find the right one. It is on the SRX 03 expansion, but I edited it to enhance the "knocking" part. The guitars were complex, it's one guitar with a fast ternary movement played by the Integra EX-SN4 steel strumming guitar (a very dry sound but with realistic strumming, but each chord played manually by me) and a more "juicy" sounding steel guitar from the MoXF with a slower pattern (also played manually).
So the Kaempfert sound is more created due to the careful choice of sounds and the way of playing (each track played live when pre-recording, also drum brushes) rather than due to effects here.