Members Analog & Digital Posted February 23, 2014 Members Share Posted February 23, 2014 I have a Yamaha P-70 piano that has better acoustic piano sounds than any of my other synthesizers, and has 88 awesome weighted keys, but it has no pitch bend & modulation wheels..... I looked around for a small unit with both wheels and a rubber base that I could set on my piano to add these wheels to make it a more complete controller keyboard, but I couldn't find one anywhere.....it seems like someone should make that. What I ended up doing is putting my Yamaha Motif ES6 on a stand right above my piano.....I ran from the MIDI OUT on the piano to the MIDI IN on the Motif......I then took two MIDI cables from the MIDI OUT and MIDI THRU on the Motif to a small MIDI merge turning both of those MIDI jacks into one MIDI cable. I daisy chained that MIDI cable through all my other rackmount synthesizers (MIDI IN & MIDI THRU over and over)....... I ended up with amazing control of all my gear...... I can use either keyboard (the Motif has aftertouch too if I need it) and I can use the MIDI control knobs on the Motif for quick edits on anything and can use the patch select buttons to select sounds in any rack synth I'm using......I usually select banks from the rack synth itself and use the Motif patch select buttons for the rest.....the 8 group buttons and the 1-16 buttons select all 128 sounds in a bank.....on my Roland XV-5050, every time I selected patches from the Motif it would always jump to the General MIDI bank.....I had to turn "Bank Select" off and store the changes to system settings and now it stays on the bank you select.....some controllers won't work on all synths..... the ribbon controller on the Motif wouldn't change the sounds on my Roland JV-1010.....I guess the JV-1010 doesn't recognize those MIDI messages.....the volume pedal on my Roland A-33 totally freezes up my Yamaha TX-802 to where it needs to be turned off & back on (the TX-802 is a rackmount DX7) and what's strange is the volume slider on the A-33 works fine with the TX-802......you'd think they are both are sending the same MIDI volume control message. The only downside my new setup is you can only use the octave up & down buttons on the Motif to control the rack synths when playing on the Motif's keys (I think the octave up & down buttons are like shortcuts on a computer), but on the Motif 8 models with 88 keys, they don't include these buttons anyway as I guess they figure with 88 keys you don't need them. If you look around you can see that the market is full of tiny MIDI controllers with pitch bend & modulation wheels.....just make sure that they have MIDI IN, OUT & THRU or it probably won't work. Some boards may have the ability to turn MIDI OUT to MIDI THRU and visa versa which would eliminate the need for the MIDI merge however this may not work.....you kinda need both MIDI jacks at once for this to work. The current piano that replaced my Yamaha P-70 is the Yamaha P-35 (it's just about identical).....the Yamaha P-105 has no MIDI jacks so I immediately disqualified it as a potential backup or replacement if I ever need one.....I like all-in-one synths like the Motifs but the piano sounds aren't as good to my ears......I guess if they were, Yamaha wouldn't sell their digital pianos......the Yamaha MOXF8 has pianos that are definitely great, 88 weighted keys and 128 note polyphony, 8 insert effects and weigh about 30 pounds.....I didn't buy a Yamaha MO8 or MOX8 as 64 note polyphony and 3 insert effects won't cut it for me....I have a Motif 8 (the original) with 62 note polyphony and when you stack sounds it's always note-stealing.....with 128 note polyphony on my Motif ES I have never had a problem. Both the Yamaha P-70 and P-35 weigh approx. 30 pounds which is awesome for gigging.....definitely buy a nice hardshell case for any keyboard that is going to be gigging.....if you are ever involved in a car accident (it CAN happen), good luck if your expensive board is in a gig bag......Even if a keyboard isn't that heavy, I still like wheels on the case.....sometimes you have to take it a long way from your car.....you'll be glad you have them. If, due to some bizarre act of nature, a fire or whatever, that I lost all my gear, I think the Yamaha MOXF8 is without a doubt the first piece of gear I would buy - - but - - for my top board live, I still would always want a Korg Karma.....I don't like the buttons on a Korg Karma, but the sound set is perfect for a top synth (the acoustic piano is terrible but I don't use my top synth for that)....the Korg Tiriton has the same waveforms but I hate touchscreens (they look terrible and dirty under the lights on stage) but the Korg Triton definitely has better buttons and keys than the Karma.....the sounds in my Karma are sooooo complete and sound sooooo good for a top synth (especially with the synth expansion board)......I'm pretty used to the keys on my Korg Karma and love they way it feels when you use the aftertouch.....I guess the biggest difference between touchscreens and regular displays is if a regular display goes out on you, the price to repair it might be affordable.....if a touchscreen goes out, you better start looking for another synth on Ebay unless you can fix it yourself, but the real expense will be the replacement.... I would definitely buy a Yamaha Motif ES for sampling eventually and something important: The Yamaha Motif ES, and the Yamaha MO8, MOX8 and MOXF8 all have a step sequencer within the sequencer (I didn't include the original Motif because with no USB storage, it's disqualified but it has it as well) but the Motif XS & XF DO NOT HAVE A STEP SEQUENCER !!!!! Also, all the synths I mentioned above that have it also have 226,000 note sequencers where the Motif XS & XF have only 130,000 notes......why do they give you less on the most expensive models? I use my step sequencer all the time to create cool "Alan Parsons" robotic type arpeggios (a step sequencer lets you enter notes by note value....it's an absolute must for me).....The original Motif & Motif ES are the only two models with a breath controller jack too.....I know you can buy a MIDI device to add a breath controller jack, but WHY?.....how much does a discman sized headphone jack cost?....All the Motifs can use breath controller data but it makes it kinda hard without the jack.....My Motif ES is frustrating as loading samples is really slow, but I MUST have a step sequencer......it's something you can do with quantinization, but that complicates the process big time.....with a step sequencer, if you change note values creatively as you go, you will come up with stuff you would never have gotten using quantinization.... The Motif & Motif ES also use PLG boards.....I'll admit some of those sucked, but some were really cool like the DX7 one and the AN (Analog synth) one and the virtual modeling one....the vocal harmony one did some cool stuff too (also, I have collected over 200,000 DX7 sounds....it's cool to be able to use them)....DX7 sounds are different than samples......they definitely make you sound unique if you choose the sounds carefully.....plus, editing DX7 sounds live sounds way different than anything.....the two newer models of Motifs can't use PLG boards.....one other thing.....most people who slam DX7 sounds haven't heard them through really high quality effects (the two original DX7's had no effects)......if you put time and energy into the effects for them, they will sound like nothing else.....use effects processors that are easy to manipulate live..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members 1001gear Posted February 23, 2014 Members Share Posted February 23, 2014 ... should be placed at both ends of the keyboard. IOW redundant left and right control panels.In other news, I have a Yammie MCS 2. Has two wheels, assignable buttons and sliders and BC input. Made a rudimentary but effective controller out of my PF 80. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Analog & Digital Posted February 23, 2014 Author Members Share Posted February 23, 2014 I had a PF80 from 1987 - 1992 (I think I bought it in 1987)....when I bought it, the PF-85 had not been released.....The PF-80's sounds were all made by the DX7 and the PF-85 had sampled sounds.....both are heavier boards than I like to move now.....I remember how awesome the action on the PF-80's keys were.....a PF-80 MIDI'd into a Yamaha Motif rack ES or XS would be awesome for acoustic piano What type of sounds did the MCS 2 have? FM? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members SoundwaveLove Posted February 27, 2014 Members Share Posted February 27, 2014 It's probably a good thing that it doesn't have them. If you start pitch bending piano sounds you'll be deep into yanni territory. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Analog & Digital Posted February 27, 2014 Author Members Share Posted February 27, 2014 I would mainly use the wheels when controlling external synthesizers from the weighted keys on the piano although the modulation wheel can sometimes add reverb or chorus to the built piano sounds, if it's set up that way.....I never use the bender for piano sounds though.... There is a cool pitch bender trick.....if your synthesizer has an option under pitch bender settings to bend only the highest note or only the lowest note in the chord you are holding, you can actually change what type of chord it is just by using the bender.....you select which note will give you the effect you want by using the right inversion of the chord and the right amount of half steps setup on the pitch bender wheel.... If you don't have this pitch bend setting in your synths settings you can get the same effect using the same sound on two or more tracks with a sequencer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RockPianoman Posted March 8, 2014 Members Share Posted March 8, 2014 I only use pitch bender on sounds that work with it, but not on piano sounds... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members 1001gear Posted March 9, 2014 Members Share Posted March 9, 2014 It's probably a good thing that it doesn't have them. If you start pitch bending piano sounds you'll be deep into yanni territory. You're probably safe without the blonde financier. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RockPianoman Posted March 10, 2014 Members Share Posted March 10, 2014 I found a new, unopened Roland A-37 on Ebay the other day and I will be putting it in place of my Yamaha P-70 piano in that setup......the keys are sooooo much faster and way better for synth & organ sounds.....it will be setup the same way though and will be able to use the Motif's wheels, controllers & patch select functions....this will be my first A-37 although I have an A-33 and have had several A-30's over the years.....I really like the feel of the keys on all those.....the A-37 has aftertouch too where the A-33 & A-30 don't..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RockPianoman Posted March 10, 2014 Members Share Posted March 10, 2014 Roland A-37, A-33 & A-30 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members JeffLearman Posted March 12, 2014 Members Share Posted March 12, 2014 It's probably a good thing that it doesn't have them. If you start pitch bending piano sounds you'll be deep into yanni territory.Of course, there's the pitch shift in the piano at the end of Great Gig in the Sky. ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RockPianoman Posted March 12, 2014 Members Share Posted March 12, 2014 That's true....I never thought of that....but usually I wouldn't use pitch bending on piano (however effects can be great like tremelo or reverb, maybe chorus etc....) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RockPianoman Posted March 16, 2014 Members Share Posted March 16, 2014 The Roland A-37 arrived....nice board....I need to go through and turn reverb, chorus & delay off for all the patches and then it won't change effects on sounds I call up with my Yamaha synths (I tested it)...Roland synths work without any adjustments....also, at first it was changing banks when I would select sounds, but I corrected that by adjusting MIDI settings in each synth....now I can select all patches in all my synths from the panel buttons (I change banks on each synth and select sounds from the A-37)..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members JeffLearman Posted March 21, 2014 Members Share Posted March 21, 2014 That's true....I never thought of that....but usually I wouldn't use pitch bending on piano (however effects can be great like tremelo or reverb' date=' maybe chorus etc....)[/quote']Yup. For many years I played GGITS on a CP70 and at the end, looked wistfully at the lack of pitch shift wheel on the left. When I upgraded to an Ensoniq MR76, oboy! But that is the only case where I use pitch shift on piano. The very idea makes my skin crawl, frankly. I'm sure some true artist could make it work, but I ain't that guy. Seems to me that my CD version of DSOM doesn't do this. I know my Mobile Fidelity half-speed master does, but I haven't set up the turntable in a coon's age. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RockPianoman Posted March 22, 2014 Members Share Posted March 22, 2014 I don't use pitch bender & vibrato on piano (except maybe to add tremolo sometimes on electric pianos) but I control so many types of sounds from it that I really appreciate having it.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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