Today at 3pm UK time (Or you can watch it later), plus as the software is the same for all OAX instruments, it also applies to the OAX1.

Enjoy

Bill

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxERvoArfpU

Hi Bill,

I enjoyed listening to the full 90-min demo of the Wersi OAX Version 3 by Trevor.

I tune in every Tuesday to hear Trevor and Tom’s highly entertaining demos.

How do the Wersi Organs compare withj other brands like Lowrey, Roland, Bohm, Allen, Ringway, Thomas, Estey, etc.?

Is the Wersi the most advanced of them all?

How do they compare with the Roland Atelier organs or the Yamaha Electones like the STAGEA ELS-02C?

I know that Kawai stopped building the Lowrey Organs since Jan 2019.

Could you give us a breakdown of the current state of affairs in the Organ World?

Which countries enjoy the most popularity?

Lowrey: Easy to play but not the most advanced technology wise. (They always sound great though)

Bohm: is the competitor to Wersi, as they also constantly update (At a cost) their instruments, (Some requiring hardware updates) but definitely worth having a good look at. (There are plenty of You Tube videos featuring the Sempra models)

Allen: is for the dedicated Classical & Theatre organ enthusiasts, so no home entertainment features are included.

Ringway: are a very popular instrument as they are reasonably priced (For an organ) and are easy to play, however you are stuck with what you get, so you need to change the instrument for an upgrade. (There are 2 types, one voiced for the western market and one for the Asia market)

Thomas: the original firm ceased production decades ago, however the name was bought by I believe a Dutch company, but I haven't heard anything of them for years.

Estey: budget instruments which never seemed to take off.

Yamaha: still big in the Asia market, and many have imported them to western countries, (NOTE: the elctone (Organ) team are not the same as the arranger or synth teams) if you like Yamaha (And plenty do) then they are a great instrument but feature wise fall short of Bohm or Wersi.

Roland: great instruments, but they pulled out the market a long time ago, so the technology is older than current instruments still in production by other manufactures. They are great value on the used market, and their onboard amp and speaker systems are fantastic. (Defiantly worth a look at if you like the sound)

Hammond: well! there is Hammond, so no more needs to be said.

The rest went by the wayside long ago.

Popularity sales wise:
Asia
Europe
US
It is a niche market, but there are still enough buyers to keep the existing manufactures going.

As always, there is no one size fits all, so the choice will be up to the individual.

BTW: the VB3 organ used in the Wersi, is actually a Hammond emulator VST made by GSI, (Hence the VB3 name) which Wersi have licensed from them and designed their own interface. (All the other organ emulations have been created by Wersi)

Bill

Wow!!

Thanks for that detailed breakdown Bill. This is why you are the resident expert on all things Organ related.

Many decades ago it was watching a skilled performer on the Technics SX-GX7 organ that got me first interested in the Arranger World. I could not believe my ears how this single instrument was recreating the sound of a full orchestra.

I could not afford it. It was too big, too expensive and too heavy.

My first arranger was the Technics KN1000.

I watched how home organs got replaced by portable and affordable arrangers from Korg, Yamaha and Roland over the years.

The Korg i3 was the first professional arranger released in 1993.
The Yamaha Tyros was released in 2002.
The Roland G-70 was released in 2005.

These 3 models were the standard bearers that paved the way for the state of the art Arranger Landscape we are in today with the Yamaha Genos2, Korg Pa5x and the Ketron Event.

I am sad to see so many organ manufacturers leave the market. Technics pulled out because Korg and Yamaha introduced more feature rich arrangers at a lower price point. Eventually, Roland dropped out. The G-70 was their best arranger.

It is now a 3-way race between Korg, Yamaha and Ketron.

I am happy to see that traditional organ players still have WERSI and BOHM to advance their hobbies. They are constantly reinventing themselves to keep up with the times.

The Yamaha Electones are popular in Asia. It requires a certain skillset to play them. They are not sold in the US. I guess organ players in the US do not want to deal with dual manuals and a pedal board. The concept is too complex.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxUdoWCfvNA


Wersi and Bohm will continue to thrive in Europe catering to a mature clientele.

Here is Brett Wales at the Musical Museum entertaining his audience on a Wersi.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08dNYy0NydY


The talented Brett Wales is to Wersi as Peter Baartmanns was to Yamaha.

While the G70 was a great arranger in its day, I think that the BK9 surpassed it in many ways, and came in well under $1000 less. Yes, I miss the amazing action, and I miss the touchscreen, and I miss the main Grand Piano sound (the E80 and BK9 have a sound called Classic Piano based on SOME of the same samples, but they aren’t as rich and the default programming has them filtered down duller and less dynamic). I miss having 3 UPR & 2LWR & MBS, but the vastly larger User Set or Registrations (UPS) which went from 128 entries to 999 (!) made it easy to set up multiple Performances per song to circumvent that limitation.

But the return of the Chord Sequencer (missing since the G1000) alone was transformative for the arranger. The audio playback, both backing tracks and Live Loops, made it a modern do everything one man band keyboard (most pro arranger players I know use a lot of audio backing nowadays). And dropping the weight from 45lbs to 20lbs made it a lot gig friendlier. The soundset was completely E80 compatible, and the ROM includes a LOT of SRX card sounds, so having no expansion isn’t a dealbreaker…

They fixed the B3 sim to be MUCH better (it now can grind out Deep Purple without swamping the arranger parts!) and the synth sound selection is the best I’ve ever heard on an arranger (which you’d expect from Roland!).

I still have my G70, but must confess, haven’t switched it on for a couple of years. The BK9 is simply THAT good ❤️🎹

I agree with your observations on the Roland G-70, E-80 and BK-9.

I have the E-80. I like the key action. Inclusion of the on-board speakers and metal casing made this into a massive 49lb beast. It is built like a tank.

Roland addressed the weight problem with the BK-9 and added many of the sought after features that you pointed out.

I was disappointed to see Roland bow out of the portable arranger market. The Atelier AT-900EX was their flagship model in the home organ market introduced in 2007. Roland discontinued the Atelier line in 2015.


https://www.roland.com/global/products/AT-900/


Technics was once a leading manufacturer in the home organ and portable arranger market.
I think the biggest reason for their demise was not the lack of innovation by Technics engineers but rather the greed of the Technics dealers.

Back in those days, Technics allowed their dealers to charge whatever price they wanted to their customer base. The Technics dealers raked in enormous profits from their loyal customers. It spiraled out of control.

Korg seized on this opportunity. Their introduction of the Korg i3 which they called a Professional Arranger with an excellent set of voices and styles at down to earth prices with a set MSRP marked the end of price gouging by Technics dealers.

Customer who wanted a portable arranger now had a cheaper yet feature rich alternative.

The Korg i3 set the stage for the long list of competitive products that followed it.

I know the original post is about organs, so I'll say this first... Lowreys ARE easy to play, I think the primary target market is wealthy seniors! However, even the top-line Lowreys lack a mode where you can control the bass by playing specific inversions of the chord. You can play the pedals yourself if you have the skill. Or you can play the lower keyboard and I suppose the bass always follows the root.

Roland's late great Ateliers were competitive with Lowrey right to the end AND they had Roland's excellent Chord Intelligence with a separate toggle for bass inversion. Wersi OAX has 8 or 9 different chord modes(!) but based on a careful reading of the manual (haven't played one), there's a lot of redundancy and none of them are as convenient as Roland's system.

Circa 2000, Hammond offered an "easy play" organ with arranger features (the XE series.) It also adopted Roland's chord fingering system, and although it wasn't advertised, these instruments could play MSA and MSD styles ported on diskette from Roland's contemporary arrangers! I never got a chance to play one but these looked like nice instruments.

When the Harmony Central site with vintage synth reviews was still around, I spent a lot of time reading there. The highest-rated arrangers circa 2005 were the Korg i30 and Roland G1000. These models were actually rated higher than their replacements like the PA80, VA-series, and the then-new and slightly buggy G-70v1. The i30 was a big technological leap over the i3 and was frankly a lot more advanced than the G1000.

The i3 was a pioneering effort, but in a lot of ways the GEM (Generalmusic) WX-series also circa 1993 was just as advanced, with a more complete feature set. If I ever stumble across a working WX-expander module for a modest price, I'll MIDI it to my 1997 Yamaha QY-700 sequencer (with its chord-following "patterns") and have a combo that feature-wise probably exceeds any current arranger except the Pa5x!

Arranger technology is "mature" to put it mildly. Since 2007 or so, most evolution has been limited to improved sound quality and changes to i/o (i.e., touch screens replacing buttons, USB replacing diskettes, and limited tools for audio playback.) Ketron's EVM has no interface at all, just an HDMI port that works in conjunction with any generic touch screen! Maybe they're not selling many arrangers these days, because whatever is being sold isn't materially better than what folks already have! My $.02.

Hi Ted,

I agree with everything you stated.

After I got my feet wet into the world of Arranger keyboards with the Technics KN1000, I switched to the Korg i3 when it was released in 1993.

The Korg i3 was a ground breaking product that redefined the arranger landscape at a very reasonable price point.

Korg launched the i30 as its successor in 1998. Yes, this was a big technological leap forward. I purchased it and was 100% happy with it. Korg had taken the lead in the Professional Arranger market.

Things changed when Martin Harris and his team designed the Yamaha Tyros in 2002. The Super Articulation voices and carefully crafted Yamaha Styles in the Tyros line ushered in a new level of realism.

I waited until Tyros 2 was released in 2005 to switch to Yamaha Arrangers. I was mesmerized watching Martin’s demo of the Tyros 2 Super Articulation voices at NAMM.

You are absolutely right that Arranger Technology has matured to the point where customers are happy with the gear they have with little reasons to upgrade. Now it is a cut throat competition between Yamaha, Korg and Ketron to entice customers with extra voices and styles.

Lowrey Organs like the Grand Marquee still fetch a hefty price in the used market.
They maintain a website even though Kawai stopped manufacturing them since 2019.


http://www.lowrey.com/product-library/elite-series/grand-marquee/


Fletcher Music Centers in the US carry a large selection of used Lowrey Organs. They have virtual classes several times each week offering demos and tutorials to a captive audience. Interestingly, they have begun to sell the Genos 2 realizing the end of the road for Lowrey organs.


https://fletchermusic.com/



Lowrey, Wersi and Bohm will continue to enjoy a loyal following amongst rich retirees.

Hi TedS

Can you explain the differences of the Roland chord recognition system compared to other types out there. (What makes it so good?)

Bill

Hi Bill, you've asked a good question, unfortunately the answer is a long read...
Chord Intelligence enables playing the most common types of chords with a minimum of keys pressed, and a minimum of hand movement. Majors can be triggered with one key, minors can be triggered with the third above OR below; and four-note seventh chords can be played by pressing only two keys. It's a skill multiplier that makes it much easier to play smooth progressions.

Intelligent chords are a SUBSET of the full chord, so a progression will NEVER be more difficult than it would be on a piano or organ. You never have to play "extra" notes that aren't part of the chord, yet it does not penalize you for playing all of the notes if you're used to doing so (i.e., no re-learning). In the worst cases such as Augmented, Sixth, or m7b5 chords, you do have to play all of the constituent notes. Thankfully these chord types are less common in the music I play.

One thing that makes the Roland system good is that Bass Inversion ("Leading Bass" on the Ateliers) is a separate control. When you activate it, you can STILL play major chords by pressing one key (which triggers the root bass.) You can still take advantage of simplified fingerings (such as C2-Eb2 = C-minor/C bass). However, when bass inversion is active, the lowest note played determines the bass. So Eb2-C3 would give you Cm/Eb; Bb2-C3 would give you C7/Bb, etc.

This same fingering was used by GEM and the Hammond XE-series, which are now unfortunately out of production. Ketron, Casio, and Korg employ the same concept, however there are subtle and often unpublished differences which I have uncovered by experimentation and direct comparison that IMO make them slightly inferior, and require re-learning "muscle memory."

For example: on the Ketron SD-series, the most convenient 3-note inversions for minor seventh chords tend to be recognized as a sixth chord, which "gets in the way." [Rolands require FOUR notes in root position to trigger a sixth chord.] Casio gets around this issue by having a mode that disables 6th chord recognition altogether!

Like Roland, Casios have a mode in which the lowest note played controls the bass, while still permitting other one- and two-finger shortcuts. It's good; fingering conforms about 95% to the Roland system. However, in its latest generation of arrangers, playing a fifth below the root, i.e., G2-C3 doesn't change the chord. To get C on G bass you have to reach up and add the E above. Personally I think this is an oversight by the programmers, but inconvenient nonetheless. On Rolands, two notes suffice to trigger C/G.

Korg has more two-finger shortcut intervals than any other brand. One of them, the augmented fifth, was implemented 26 years ago with the i30 but it's never been documented in a manual! The problem is, when you're trying to play on-bass chords these shortcuts get in the way. For example, even when Bass Inversion is activated, E2-C3 gets you E#5 (E aug) instead of a more common C/Eb. To get C/Eb, you have to add the G2 in the middle, so you're basically playing the full chord. G2-C3 gets you Gsus4, to get C/G you have to add the E3 above, etc. These unwanted behaviors could easily be suppressed with a menu option but have not been.

Yamaha uses a different paradigm, bundling the "on bass" functionality within their own intelligent mode ("AI Fingered"). IMO this is less flexible than having bass inversion as an independent setting. Under this system, many 2-note combinations are interpreted as slash chords. The root bass can always be obtained by playing ANY 3-note inversion. However, it's not always possible to obtain a desired slash chord directly. For example: if you want A7/G and you play A below G, you might get Am7/G depending on the prior chord(s). You can't even "force" Am7/G by playing G2-A2-C2 because that would give you Am7 with root A bass. What's worse, playing a single note results in a thin-sounding Unison (1+8)! This is no help at all when you're used to playing major chords with one finger. I can't even play "Happy Birthday" without re-learning years of muscle memory! What were they thinking!? Before my last Roland arranger croaks, I'm going to commission a third-party utility that edits the CASM of Yamaha styles, adding a third and fifth to all style tracks, so that you hear a full major chord pattern whenever a unison is recognized by the arranger!

One advantage of Yamaha's approach is when a song contains a mix of slash and basic chords, you can use the 2-note fingerings for on-bass and play the other chords in any convenient inversion without changing modes. But there IS a workaround for Rolands that restores much of the lost flexibility, which I'll detail below...

Yamaha's approach also raises the issue of how to play "incomplete" chords. I personally have no use for Unisons, I've never seen them on any of my score sheets. But if you want to play heavy metal or a song like 10cc's "I'm Not in Love," these won't sound right without the open fifth "power chords." You can get this on Yamaha or Casio by playing 1+5, i.e., C2-G2. Unfortunately in Intelligent mode, Roland recognizes this combo as C-major (which is a waste, because you could also trigger C-major by playing C2-E2, or C2-E2-G2, or just C2 by itself!)

The workaround is pretty crazy, but there is one... Roland stores the chord recognition mode as part of a registration. By using a combination of outboard MIDI Solutions gear and specially configured registrations, I have my BK-9 set up so that when I hold the left footswitch down, it shifts into "Standard" mode allowing me to play incomplete chords like open fifths, C7 no 3rd, etc. As soon as I release the footswitch, it reverts to Intelligent mode. [Some Rolands have a native function to switch between Piano and Standard modes with the press of a pedal. Unfortunately their engineers didn't envision my use case for real-time switching between Intelligent and Standard.] You would have to take a similar approach (summoning an alternate registration by foot pedal) to play incomplete chords when using intelligent mode on a Ketron. Due to a dumbing-down of the registration controls, I'm not sure this workaround is possible on any Korg made since the Pa3X!

A similar workaround makes it easier to play songs that consist of mostly basic chords with the occasional slash chord thrown in. I'm also using outboard MIDI Solutions gear to turn bass inversion into a "momentary" function (i.e., only active while the pedal is pressed.) As soon as I release the footswitch, chords may be played in any convenient inversion. This is built-in functionality on Roland's FP-series style pianos and entry-level arrangers sold in the late 1990s. However on the BKs and E-A7 it's implemented as a latching function which requires two pedal presses. Depending on how many slash chords there are in a song, my momentary real-time approach with a foot pedal is easier than leaving Bass Inversion on for the whole song. IMO it's easier and more consistent than Yamaha's implied mode switching, because among other things, AI Fingered doesn't allow one-finger Majors (unless you were to edit the style CASM in the manner I described.)

The bottom line is I come from a chord organ "one finger equals a major chord" background. If someone learned on a non-intelligent instrument and is already used to playing 3- and 4-finger chords, the subtle differences in these systems fade into the background, except for the possible tie-up between the minor seventh and sixth chords. All brands of arrangers should allow more customization with regard to chord fingering.

A couple other considerations: I'm strictly a left-hand chord guy. But Roland arrangers allow you to configure either half of the keyboard for any type of chord recognition, in any mode. This is a nice convenience if you want to play the bassline with your left hand, or with foot pedals. (On some other brands, you would have to fool the OS by feeding MIDI output back into the board, or by using a second keyboard controller, etc.) Diki plays pianistically and he has offered a lot of praise for Roland's "Pianist" (whole keyboard) modes, compared to other brands. I use my RH strictly for melody and wouldn't know what to do with a sustain pedal. So my treatise above doesn't address the nuances of full keyboard recognition across brands. Perhaps Diki will weigh in, or search his posts to find out why he thinks Roland does a better job than the others with Pianist, or "whole keyboard" chord recognition. If you made it this far, thanks for reading!!