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Is There a forum where Keyboard Designer/maker interacts? or do you know one??


minimoog

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I would really like to talk to one, Somebody that makes or desings the Hardware and sound design/sintesys maker.

Could such a place existe where the keyboard player (consumer) talks to the Keyboard maker?

I have never heard anywhere that a Keyboard maker will talk the consumer. only in NAMM

wouldn't that be a interest conversation


P.D I know the are something that they can not talk about.

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Back in the late 80's early 90's I worked in music retail and attended Ensoniq School in Malvern, PA. They sent us keyboard reps up to learn their products so we could demonstrate them and sell more I'm sure. Aside from the usual factory tour, educational stuff and the great eats and drinks, I remember them sitting us all (about 10 of us) in a conference room and allowing us to brainstorm on future products. They had one of their engineers in with us to keep things based in reality but I found it fascinating. I can only image how many good ideas turned up in Ensoniq gear from sessions such as that. I realize they are sadly no more but they did a lot of things right. I hate that they are no longer with us. Sad that more manufacturers can't try recruiting forum members for focus studies like that.

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Hey Athan. Thanks for chiming in. It's good to see that Yamaha is listening to the users over at Motifator. Bad Mister has indeed saved my ass numerous times as well. I haven't personally been involved or invited to any end user surveys myself, but it's good to know that you guys are listening to the end users.

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Quote Originally Posted by minimoog View Post
I would really like to talk to one, Somebody that makes or desings the Hardware and sound design/sintesys maker.

Could such a place existe where the keyboard player (consumer) talks to the Keyboard maker?

P.D I know the are something that they can not talk about.
Present, but I'm currently designing UX and UI for non-keyboard MI products. What would you like to know?
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Quote Originally Posted by The Audacity Works View Post
Present, but I'm currently designing UX and UI for non-keyboard MI products. What would you like to know?
Well for starters What Major or specific knowledge would i need to have In order to work in the keyboard desing in terms of Hardware and also in Sound Design in a keyboard company ? making some really serious educational choises any advice id more than apreciated.

I know there very different paths but i would like to know all i can about them
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:headdesk:

I know a Korg rep hangs around this forum. I think a Kurzweil one as well.

Plenty of software synth / effects / mastering / DAW manufacturers hang around a sprinkling of places. Seen em at KVRAudio, Northern Sounds, or Gearslutz, depending on the focus.

Plenty of modular manufacturer reps over at Muffwiggler.

For the smaller companies sometimes you are talking to the person actually making or coding the product.

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Quote Originally Posted by Athan Billias

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Um, www.motifator.com has been around for over ten years. Bad Mister has over 20,000 posts and there have been end user surveys for every feature of every Motif that we ever developed.

 

That's great to know. I visit Motifator pretty frequently, I haven't actually seen any surveys. Is there a particular page on the site where one can go to participate in surveys, or a way to register for a list to be contacted? Also, apart from a general post on the Motifator forum, is there any good way to make a suggestion to Yamaha about a way to make a feature work more smoothly, or other things along those lines? I'm thinking in particular of things that might be addressable in a software update (as opposed to ideas about future hardware)... interface enhancements and the like.
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Quote Originally Posted by midinut

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Hey Athan. Thanks for chiming in. It's good to see that Yamaha is listening to the users over at Motifator. Bad Mister has indeed saved my ass numerous times as well. I haven't personally been involved or invited to any end user surveys myself, but it's good to know that you guys are listening to the end users.

 

Bad Mister hass helped me a few times too. The guy is good!
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There are several of us from keyboard manufacturers who participate on this and other forums.
I hit Sonikmatter and Mastering VAST daily, as they are Kurzweil specific and I try to hit this forum and Musicplayer Keyboard Corner a few times each week.

For us, interaction with the forums is hugely important - many of the features that were added to our PC3 line were the results of users requests from forums like this one.
And I must confess, occasionally certain forum posts also provide us with much needed comic relief from time to time, lest we take our jobs too seriously.

Dave Weiser
Kurzweil R&D

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Quote Originally Posted by minimoog View Post
Well for starters What Major or specific knowledge would i need to have In order to work in the keyboard desing in terms of Hardware and also in Sound Design in a keyboard company ? making some really serious educational choises any advice id more than apreciated.

I know there very different paths but i would like to know all i can about them
Hardware - You will want to have an electrical engineering degree/background. Learn everything you can about ASIC chips, FPGAs, microprocessors, etc.
Also, learn everything you can about analog audio electronics, pre-amps, EQs, filters, etc.

Sound design - You will want to have a strong music and audio engineering background. Become very familiar with how a recording studio works. Learn everything you can about acoustic and electro-mechanical instruments - how they're made, how they function, how they are played, etc. Everything from violins and guitars to B3s, Minimoogs and Mellotrons.

Also, you will want to become very familiar with as much music as possible. Listen to and study every Beatles song, every Motown song, every hip hop song from the the 80s and 90s, new wave, alt, metal, folk, blues, Latin etc. Study the bass lines, guitar parts, drum parts, string arrangement, etc.
PLUS you need to be very familiar with current pop music from the US, Europe and Asia (and with the music of your home country, wherever that is).

Spend some time learning about hardware synths - current and past. Learn what makes a Minimoog's oscillators and filters different than the ones in a Chroma or ARP Odyssey.
Become familiar with the architecture and UI of synths like the Kronos, Motif, Fantom, etc - study their strengths and weaknesses.

Last one for sound design - be prepared to wait tables or bar tend for several years while you look for a job. (I waited tables for 8 years before landing the job at Kurzweil!)

Good luck!
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Quote Originally Posted by minimoog View Post
Well for starters What Major or specific knowledge would i need to have In order to work in the keyboard desing in terms of Hardware and also in Sound Design in a keyboard company ? making some really serious educational choises any advice id more than apreciated.
i think Dave hit it on the head, but note that there's generally very little design work done in the US for non-US MI companies. The big three are all Japanese and as such, their respective American distributors have little to no design input, at least not until much of the products are almost baked.

The first place I'd check for jobs is a manufacturer's website
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Mr Dave Weiser I really can't start where to begin to thankyou for the advice, please accept my most greatfull sincere thank's

You to Audacity, you really aded some good critical info on that. My most sincere thanx

I need to know as much as posible becuase the desicions I'm making are really crucial ...

I want to be like stefan Schmidth single handedly did the Schmidth keyboard (I think)

BTW 2 . There is no Videos of how they maje keyboards
i have only seen one. or more info about it.

P.S I have to start learning japanies??

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Theres' plenty of capable people in the U.S wha'ts the differance?

Or all does skills go to NASA and The military and for the Xbox?




BTW I'm studiying a Engineering in Renewable Energy The cool thing
It that it involves Electronics and Software programming. i Was thinking
maybe i can Xpand tongue.gif

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