Techniques for Emulating Instruments on Keys

[Chordite]

A useful video this guy has put up recently on key techniques to to play say acoustic guitar sounds convincingly on keyboard.

It is quite long but will repay the time investment

(not totally convinced by the choir but that is the lack of human vocal dynamics in the "ooh or aah" synth)

 

[video=youtube_share;bmQETKtz1Ws]

[Phil O'Keefe]

Love the old 80-8 in the background in the beginning - boy does that bring back memories.

 

He wastes little time in bringing up what I think is the single most important thing to keep in mind when trying to emulate other instruments - don't think like a piano / keyboard player, or play like one. You have to think like someone who plays the instrument that's being emulated. It also helps to keep the intrinsic qualities and strengths and limitations of the actual instrument in mind. That includes using typical chord voicings and inversions, instrument-specific phrasing and breathing (especially crucial when emulating wind instruments), etc.

 

It's a good, instructive video - thanks for posting it!

[Chordite]

I had an 80-8 a few decades back. I ended up losing a lot of material because by about 2005 the tapes in store degenerated and went sticky. So I recommend people using 1/2 inch dub stuff across to another medium within a few years. There is probably a better way to store them or maybe just spooling every year or so would help. It was a great little machine to learn basic multitracking on pre computer era though.