Keys / Midi / Mellotron ideas

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roseylarose
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Keys / Midi / Mellotron ideas

Post by roseylarose » Thu May 05, 2011 9:02 am

Hey there -
So I was wondering if someone could give me some advice. I've been recording with the following keys: Wurli 200, Rheem Mark VII combo, and Mellotron (well, M-Tron pro). I've gotten a band together and my friend started playing keys.

We're trying to figure out the best way to convert the sounds from record to live. We're trying to avoid using both the wurli and the rheem (weight and fragility factors), and we're missing the mellotron. So we're trying to come up with a solid fix to still get all 3 sounds (in a tour-friendly environment).

I know there's the Nord, but I'm interested in exploring other options. Using laptops live has always made me a little weary (I saw one not work during a friends set and they were left helpless) but I'm completely open to ideas. I'm a greenhorn in the midi world...

Any suggestions would be great! thanks!

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Post by kslight » Thu May 05, 2011 10:29 am

Sample on something like a Korg Triton, or use a module like the Emu Vintage Keys.

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tonewoods
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Post by tonewoods » Thu May 05, 2011 12:55 pm

I really like the Alesis Fusion loaded with the Pinder samples as a stand-alone Chamberlin/'Tron....

It would do those other keys nicely too....

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ott0bot
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Post by ott0bot » Thu May 05, 2011 1:51 pm

A band I recorded had a key player who used a Nord Electro, and that things sounds great. He used the Wurlitzer setting all the time, and the leslie emulation is pretty good. Also, it did have a decent rhodes-ish setting, and the thing sounding pretty fantastic through an old traynor mark III. This band was more Tom Waits-y americana, but the same key player played in gospel band I recorded and the organ sounds were perfect as well.

The unit itself was pretty durable and the menu's weren't too tricky to navigate. Worth checking out at least.

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ChrisNW
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Post by ChrisNW » Thu May 05, 2011 8:33 pm

Satisfied Nord Electro owner here. Very high quality instrument in both its sounds and construction.
Audio Mastering in Portland, OR
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apropos of nothing
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Post by apropos of nothing » Fri May 06, 2011 6:51 am

These are all good ideas. Nords are great, Emu's platforms are almost always good. Kurzweil, Korg and Roland all have some great boards out right now that'll get you pretty close to where you want to go.

Go to Banjo Mart or Sam Ass or what have you and check out some options. Also check your fave local consignment shop (presuming you have one) and see what it looks like.

Also, a really important consideration is monitoring. Most of what is marketed as "powered monitors" these days are awesome, loud and clean (e.g. JBL, Mackie, etc.). I have never used anything marketed as a "keyboard amp" that sounded like anything other than ass.

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Marc Alan Goodman
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Post by Marc Alan Goodman » Fri May 06, 2011 9:57 am

I always used an Akai Z4 rackmount sampler. It's their last generation rack sampler so it interfaces great via usb. Plus is has a built in hard drive and works at 24 bits. However it's still takes a bit of getting used to the setup. Once it's rolling you can just have a setting for each song and flip to it in a second but you need to set everything up properly, plus either purchase samples or record them yourself.

Oh, and they're cheap as hell nowadays.

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Post by cgarges » Fri May 06, 2011 10:42 am

Roland made a keyboard called the XP-30 (And I think there was an XP-50 and maybe an 80) that had soem extra expansion cards available including a couple of "Vintage Synth" and "Sounds Of The 60s and 70s" cards that were pretty fantastic. My friend justinf (who posts on here occasionally) turned me on to it and I bought an XP-30 for the studio (primarily for the Mellotron sounds). It's pretty much exactly what I was hoping for.

I've heard great things about the Emu Vintage Keys unit, too, but don't have much experience with it. The great thing about the XP-30 is that once the expansion cards are installed, there's no external rack or midi stuff to worry about. It's all right there in one unit. I highly recommend investigating those things.

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roseylarose
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Post by roseylarose » Sat May 07, 2011 8:52 pm

Thanks everybody for the advice. I got to say every step of the recording process I always turn to this message board and am always met with tons of help.

So... I'm leaning towards the E-mu Vintage Keys. Would love to get the Nord (and hopefully eventually will). But I found someone selling the E-mu in keyboard form - which seems like a plus since its primary purpose is live and not have to drag around a rackmount unit seems nice. For $450.

Here's the item: http://www.sonicstate.com/news/2003/03/ ... -keyboard/

I'm going to check it out tomorrow and as long as the mellotron, wurli, and a few organ sounds are solid, think I'll go for it. I have a beautiful Rheem - which I'd love to tour with but its already acting up. Let me know if you have any other thoughts/experience. Thanks again!

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trodden
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Post by trodden » Tue May 10, 2011 12:20 pm

Also interested in the EMU vintage keys module as well. Is the "pro" version that much more to offer?

Also, is there a standard acoustic piano preset? Or just various electric pianos?

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Jed
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Post by Jed » Wed May 11, 2011 8:58 am

This is back into rack mount territory, but the Korg TR rack can be had for pretty cheap and has nice sounds. Might be a bit thin on the mellotron but decent organs and wurli for sure.

I picked up mine for about $200.

Sounds can be heard here: http://www.synthmania.com/TR-Rack.htm

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apropos of nothing
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Post by apropos of nothing » Wed May 11, 2011 9:34 am

trodden wrote:Also interested in the EMU vintage keys module as well. Is the "pro" version that much more to offer?

Also, is there a standard acoustic piano preset? Or just various electric pianos?
Emu/Creative had/has a single hardware platform, which they periodically refresh with larger memory/more polyphony (mostly relevant if you're sequencing). So the Vintage Keys module is the same as the Vintage Keys Pro, except less polyphony.

There are four versions of the platform with some cosmetic and functional twists:

Rack units -- work like you'd expect
Command module -- drum machiney things
Command station -- multi-rackspace sequencer, much like the command module but different form factor
Keyboard -- generally not as many outputs and knobs.

re: piano, they released a rom called "sounds of the ZR-76" which you can put into any of their units. It has a sample block called "perfect piano" which is ... Very good. Unfortunately it is also their most popular block and out of production, so they tend to go for a lot. You can find it natively in the keyboard they marketed as the "Ensoniq Halo."

Had one of these for a long time. Good board.

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trodden
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Post by trodden » Fri May 13, 2011 2:54 pm

Just grabbed a emu vintage keys rack unit off of eBay.

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Post by roygbiv » Sat May 14, 2011 9:51 am

trodden wrote:Just grabbed a emu vintage keys rack unit off of eBay.
dude, good snag. I was eyeing one of those on teh iBay myself, but ended up not bidding (there was a flurry of last minute activity on that sale). Glad I wasn't bidding against you trodden. Was yours the one with the expander chip in it?
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E-Mu stuff

Post by Paul Fury 161 » Mon May 16, 2011 5:35 am

Hi guys,
Thought I might chime in to clarify a few things about the e-mu units. The original ones were Vintage Keys Rack, followed by Classic Keys Rack and Vintage Keys Plus Rack. The Classic Keys has a wall wart and is a cut down version of the Vintage Keys - the the VK+ is a VK with more sounds, you could orginally buy the ROM as an upgrade for the VK. VK and VK+ don't have any inbuilt effects apart from the filters and envelope sections (which are awesome), the CK has a chorus, I think. A few hardcore users suggested to me once that the CK had slightly better/more approproate Mellotron samples. I had a VK and it was great, very useable. A decade later, E-mu made the Protues 2500 series, of which the Vintage Pro Rack and Vintage Keys Keyboard were part - this often confuses people as they think the VK Keyboard is older/the same as the VK Rack. As the E-Mu stuff is basically all sampled, they made a large range of expansion ROMS, racks and keyboards that all can take the same chips -each unit will take up to four ROMS - and you can remove the original one, so be careful buying a Vintage Pro or Vintage Keys Keyboard as the ROM they share is one of the most desirable. You also get some sub inputs that let you run other devices into the unit (all the 2500 series racks or keyboards do this) , through the effects and mix to your outputs, so if you've got an old module with a sound you have to have, you can integrate it easily. I'd say the Vintage Pro still doesn't sound quite as good as a Nord Electro, but they can still be found for reasonable dinero. The older VK, CK and VK+ modules are great fun for cheap. I prefer all of them to the Roland "60's & 70's" and "Vintage Synth" cards - YMMV etc etc ;-p
In terms of sounds, the VP does a large choice of rhodes and wurlies, a few different hammonds that all sound pretty good, a vox continental, most of the main mellotron stuff you'd need, some frankly ace CP70s, and a whole bunth of analogs, some good, some not so good;-p
Also, if you want a tiny ROMpler for vintage analogs try the Akai SG01V, really fun.
Hope this is of some help - give me a shout if you have more sepcific questions relating to these pieces and I'll do my best to answer.
Cheers all,
Paul
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