Members Anderton Posted December 27, 2006 Members Share Posted December 27, 2006 Just got this somewhat enigmatic email, excerpts follow: "This is Joe Goodman. I will be doing press and events for Kurzweil & Young Chang/Weber for the 2007 NAMM show. Mike Papa is the NEW National Sales Manager for Kurzweil...Young Chang is Having a 50th Anniversary Party on Sat., 1/20/2006 at [NAMM]...New Products...New Management Team...Details next..." Mike Papa worked at Oberheim back in the days of the OB-8 and has remained in the industry since then. Joe Goodman is another veteran. We've heard this before, but maybe this time, Kurzweil is back...I'll keep you posted. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members mobobog Posted December 27, 2006 Members Share Posted December 27, 2006 Those are great news, i love kurzweil keyboards, but i wonder how are they still in business with so outdated gear. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members DiegoE Posted December 27, 2006 Members Share Posted December 27, 2006 It would be great to see Kurzweil back, the big 3 may have to be worried about it ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members blue2blue Posted December 27, 2006 Members Share Posted December 27, 2006 Whew! I was afraid this was an alert that tiny, malevolent nanobots had escaped into the wild and were manufacturing new copies of themselves at breakneck speeds, planning for a major assault on carbon-based life forms. This is a relief. Also nice to see some veteran industry guys being tapped. The OB-8 was the first "modern" synth I used and compared to the Moog modular (based on a Model 15, IIRC) that I did my first learning on, it was, indeed, a glimpse of the future of synths. (Actually, by the time I was using one in 1981 or '82, that future was pretty much kickin' down the door. But learning in that classic path, starting out with patch cables connecting up the various modules...) [bTW, Wikipedia lists the introduction of the OB-8 as 1983... but I'm pretty sure I was using one as early as summer 1982, if not a year earlier.] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members chipmcdonald Posted December 27, 2006 Members Share Posted December 27, 2006 ..... for a moment I thought maybe that meant an AI had got loose somewhere.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jon Gnash Posted December 27, 2006 Members Share Posted December 27, 2006 Originally posted by blue2blue Whew! I was afraid this was an alert that tiny, malevolent nanobots had escaped into the wild and were manufacturing new copies of themselves at breakneck speeds, planning for a major assault on carbon-based life forms.Don Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members UstadKhanAli Posted December 27, 2006 Members Share Posted December 27, 2006 I'm sure that's the same Joe Goodman from Goodman Music (a string of music/keyboard stores in the L.A. area a while back). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil O'Keefe Posted December 27, 2006 Share Posted December 27, 2006 It could be very good news indeed if Kurzweil returns. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mr. Botch Posted December 27, 2006 Members Share Posted December 27, 2006 Two days left to order a Fusion 8 and get free powered monitor speakers, and this is announced. Thanks Craig! You've staved off my GAS for at least twenty days! (din't need no steenkin' powered speakers anyway...) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Boffinry Posted December 28, 2006 Members Share Posted December 28, 2006 More choice is always good. I'm a Roland fanboy myself, but spent a large chunk of the mid-late 90s lusting after a K2500 (after reading Jim Aikin's review in Keyboard magazine), then a K2600 after that. Never actually acquired one, Kurzweil fell off the radar and my GAS passed. Would be great to see them back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members chipmcdonald Posted December 28, 2006 Members Share Posted December 28, 2006 I think the term "Singularity" should refer not just to AI maturity, but also coalescence of all of the new technologies (nano, genetic, materials, quantum). It's weird that it has a name now, I've been babbling about this online since there was an "online".... You still see a lot of Kurzweil K250's around... Did they make their own action? Doesn't Fatar make everything now? / wonders if his MicroPiano module wlil one day rise against me Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Raymar Posted December 28, 2006 Members Share Posted December 28, 2006 I've got a perfectly good Kurzweil synth attached to an old Turtle Beach soundcard that also works but they don't make ISA slots on motherboards anymore, in fact PCI slots are getting rare. It would be nice if Kurzweil or somebody could make a box that would house the soundcard and provide a USB connection on it. There must be quite a few soundcard/synth/rompler/samplers out there that are collecting dust but still very capable. Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members mobobog Posted December 28, 2006 Members Share Posted December 28, 2006 what do you think ruined kurzweil? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members pdiddy Posted December 28, 2006 Members Share Posted December 28, 2006 1. Falling behind on the poliphony wars. Even if their poliphony was 4x deep, they never stressed that point in their marketing.2. If you had a PC88 like me, you got pretty tired of replacing the white key counterweights - the tabs kept breaking off and you'd get a kilckety klackety keyboard - pain in the butt.3. Eventually other mfrs sounds got better and caught up whilst Kurz did not dramatically improve - they started out the best (IMO) though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil O'Keefe Posted December 28, 2006 Share Posted December 28, 2006 3. Eventually other mfrs sounds got better and caught up whilst Kurz did not dramatically improve - they started out the best (IMO) though. The SP88x still has one of my favorite "from a plug-in or a box" natural acoustic piano sounds. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members philbo Posted December 29, 2006 Members Share Posted December 29, 2006 Originally posted by Phil O'Keefe 3. Eventually other mfrs sounds got better and caught up whilst Kurz did not dramatically improve - they started out the best (IMO) though. The SP88x still has one of my favorite "from a plug-in or a box" natural acoustic piano sounds. Yeah, and the orchestral sounds also kick some serious sonic a$$! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members mobobog Posted December 29, 2006 Members Share Posted December 29, 2006 Originally posted by Phil O'Keefe 3. Eventually other mfrs sounds got better and caught up whilst Kurz did not dramatically improve - they started out the best (IMO) though. The SP88x still has one of my favorite "from a plug-in or a box" natural acoustic piano sounds. +1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Prog Posted December 29, 2006 Members Share Posted December 29, 2006 Originally posted by mobobog what do you think ruined kurzweil? I always thought of Kurz as the Pro gear, whereas the others were for the Guitar Center crowd (the Pros got them free as promotion gimmicks). High-end always sells less than what is meant for price-point people. Ford always sold more Taurus's than GT Cobra Mustangs. I'm sure that the Yamakorglands sold more synths than Moog. That doesn't make them better, though. Then, the rumours start that they are "ruined". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members pdiddy Posted December 30, 2006 Members Share Posted December 30, 2006 Its seems that Kurz dropped the ball some time after the K2600 and failed to maintain the imagination of the high end crowd. Then, with their back against the wall they decided to go after the mainstream folks which alienated the "pro" crowd further. Now, without a new flagship they have alot of catching up to do! I hope they come back in a big way. I've defected to Yamaha in the meantime. My only complaint is that you can't switch from one sound to another on the Yammy without an embarrassing dead spot like you can on the Kurz. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mike Martin Posted December 30, 2006 Members Share Posted December 30, 2006 Originally posted by Anderton Young Chang is Having a 50th Anniversary Party on Sat., 1/20/2006 at [NAMM]...New Products...New Management Team...Details next..." Mike Papa worked at Oberheim back in the days of the OB-8 and has remained in the industry since then. Joe Goodman is another veteran. Mike Papa was the National Sales Manager when I worked at Kurzweil. Very interesting that he's back. I assume they mean that the party will be 1/20/2007 right? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Prog Posted December 30, 2006 Members Share Posted December 30, 2006 Originally posted by pdiddy Its seems that Kurz dropped the ball some time after the K2600 and failed to maintain the imagination of the high end crowd. Perhaps, but I think the high-end crowd has diminished in size. "Cheap", as opposed to quality, seems to be the operative word. The 2600 is a great machine. Even the 2500 is far from obsolete. But, the last 15 years has not produced a keyboard-oriented group of players. "Producers" , yes. Players, no. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members TIP Posted December 30, 2006 Members Share Posted December 30, 2006 I still have a fully loaded K2000RS...sadly it doesn't get much use these days, but it was a great machine for the time. I made more than my money back using that machine to score stuff for TV...the stock Orchestral sounds(+pianos) alone were worth it! Look forward to see what they will come up with in the future. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members nat whilk II Posted January 5, 2007 Members Share Posted January 5, 2007 Kurzweil, after being bought by Young Chang, was caught up in mega-corporate politics as I recall - - - Mike Martin can probably tell you most of yesterday's news on all that. Kurzweil has always had a unique corporate philosophy about product support and legacy support - in short, they really mean it. Maybe that took the edge off new sales, I dunno. But their stuff is quality and the K2XX series is still miles deeper than 99% of synth users ever dream of going. Let's hope they return to the game and up the ante again like they did with the K2000. nat whilk ii Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Myshell Posted January 6, 2007 Members Share Posted January 6, 2007 I have a K2000 as well...mainly use it as a MIDI controller:freak: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members mobobog Posted January 6, 2007 Members Share Posted January 6, 2007 I received a mail saying that a PC3 controller is on the way for namm. I hope it is something new, and now another variation of the same. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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