niacin

Favourite (alive) Abdullah Ibrahim aka Dollar Brand. Often quite simple playing, no superfluous notes, always soulful, sounds like no one else. Saw him live twice about a decade ago, solo and with a small ensemble. Favourite (no longer with us): Sviatoslav Richter, 1958 recording of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition. Why? Touch, phrasing, tempos, dynamics. Fast passages are fast, even for Richter who pushes his technique to its limits, like a car chase along a cliff's edge: it's not 'perfect', he fluffs a few notes, but who cares when the ride is this enthralling. Honourable mention: Ahmad Jamal. Touch, technical fluency, use of space, conversational interplay in a trio or quartet setting. Saw him in 2009 with James Cammack, Herlin Riley and Manolo Badrena, my favourite live concert.

Can't have a Blossom Dearie thread without this song:

the Korg Vox Continental stand is made by (or marketed under the name) Sequenz: https://sequenzmusicgear.com/en/products/

This. I play with a funk trio - keys, guitar, drums - and we have a singer in on part of the gig. Sometimes I'd love to have a bass player, but the way 3 of us can wring changes, hits and stops on the fly, even with really late calls when the ball's past the batter and almost in the catcher's mitt, that ain't gonna work with a 4-piece.

A few years pre-COVID I had a guy I’d met only briefly swing by a late night pop gig I was doing, he’d cone from a gig with one of the top function bands in town and brought the bass player along cause he’d heard I played left hand bass (in this case a P-bass sample). He and the bass player stood at one corner of the stage in jaw drop pose for the best part of a set. It’s curious to me how jazz guys just take it for granted but in a pop or funk context you get wtf-pick my jaw off the floor reactions. I do a lot of the gigs I do because drummers seem happier with my left hand than many of the bass players around. But I’m no Neal Evans, his playing has me collecting my jaw from the floor, lol

B. Hammond SKpro, previously Hammond SK1

Classical - Sviatoslav Richter: Pictures at an Exhibition (Live recording Sofia 1958) Marie-Claire Alain: Johann Sebastien Bach Complete Works for Organ (1980) Jazz - Ahmad Jamal: The Awakening Oscar Peterson: Night Train; Portrait of an Artist Soul Jazz - Charles Earland: Cookin' with the Mighty Burner Big John Patton: Got a Good Thing Goin' Soul - Donny Hathaway: Live Fusion - Joe Zawinul: with Weather Report, Mysterious Traveller & Tail Spinnin' Funk - Herbie Hancock: Thrust John Medeski: with John Scofield, A Go Go Jon Cleary: Jon Cleary and the absolute monster gentlemen Delvon Lemarr: Live at KEXP! Rock - Gregg Rolie - with Santana, first 4 albums Rick Wright - with Pink Floyd, Wish You Were Here Elton John - Tumbleweed Connection Electronic - Vangelis: Bladerunner; Antarctica Jean Michel Jarre: Oxygene; Equinoxe

I could buy a Nord Stage Compact 73 for $6k Australian, or for the same money I could buy a Hammond SKpro 61 AND a Korg Vox Continental 73. YMMV.

Dave playing an organ solo on a better day (and on his own rig): And tearing up the solo we all associate with Kenny Kirkland, not easy shoes to fill:

Years ago I went through a period of trying phaser and wah pedals, often the sweep range that is fine for guitar doesn’t work so great on keys. I found a Lovetone Meatball at a reasonable price, if you can find one and have the cash to splash they are sooooo good.

https://blokas.io/midihub/ ?

https://midisolutions.com/prodmrg.htm

Wurlitzer’s version, in puke ‘beige’ 🤮

I'd sell the SK1 and buy an SKpro rather than getting a Ventilator to use with the SK1, and you need to be a distance away from a Spacestation to appreciate it's sound and you may not get that on a bar stage. BUT at this stage I wouldn't buy anything, just take your SK1 and a stand, run it through the band PA and see what you want to improve, you might want a real Leslie, you might want a 2 manual organ, you might want better pianos (try Yamaha's YC61 or 76), or better electric pianos (e.g. Crumar Mojo 61), play a few gigs and see. Me, for bar gigs, I'd sell the SK1 and buy an SKpro and run it through the band. ymmv.

The Hammond SK1-73 was F to F, we have a winner ... oh wait

There is a list from the net of the gear Rick used on each album attached below, it comes down to Farfisa organ, Hammond organ, Wurli, Rhodes (replaced with a Wurli for live), Clav, Solina string machine, Minimoog and occasional Moog Taurus bass pedals. There's a really good article from an old Keyboard magazine attached below on programming the synth leads, and these two links might help you, not sure how close Gaia will get you, and you'll need delay fx: https://www.musicradar.com/tuition/tech/how-to-make-a-pink-floyd-style-lead-synth-sound-209117 https://www.synthtopia.com/content/2015/04/10/the-iconic-sounds-of-synthesis-pink-floyds-welcome-to-the-machine-lead/ Rick's organ settings are all pretty basic: he EQed the top end out of the Farfisa to get rid of the shrillness, tab settings are discussed in this link: https://organforum.com/forums/forum/electronic-organs-midi/combo-organs-keyboards/41658-rick-wright-echoes-farfisa-settings Hammond is often first 4 drawbars all the way out, set the Leslie mic angle pretty wide. For Cigar I have a Clav / Wurli / Solina split on the upper keyboard and synth lead on the bottom, my left hand goes between clav and Wurli, my right between Wurli, Solina and synth lead. Yes there's a lot to cover once you factor in the clav, but in a live mix you might leave the clav out and not miss it much. The intro to Shine is layers: tuned wineglasses with water, Solina, a touch of Hammond, Moog Taurus for the bass. The piano on Echoes goes through a Leslie. When you get to Animals you need to know that alot of it is a result of experimenting with fx, keys through a vocoder and that sort of thing. For Comfortably Numb this is worth watching to hear the orchestra parts: Samples: take what you can direct from the original recordings, which is pretty much everything except the spoken bits in the middle of tracks on Dark Side. I rolled my own for Learning to Fly by editing audio from a Youtube flying lesson video. There are lots of samples out there but the quality isn't great. Good luck. WrightGear-rev156.pdf The Wrighht Stuff.pdf

It made me think if this. Also 70s. Some nice Wurli, and the vocals aren't too shabby either:

The best advice I’ve had is to listen to singers who also play piano or Hammond: Aretha Franklin, Nina Simone, Harry Connick Jr, Diana Krall, Elton Hohn, Billy Joel, Gregg Rolie, Allen Toussaint, Dr John, Stevie Wonder, Billy Preston, et al. And as mentioned it varies from genre to genre, Chicago blues pianists tend to be going hammer and tongs behind a guitar solo cause that’s what works in that context but you wouldn’t do that in most settings.

Best - Ahmad Jamal quartet, Sydney Opera House, 2009, w. James Cammack, Herlin Riley and Manolo Badrena. They were all on that night, grins from ear to ear, the interplay was magical. Honourable mention - Royal Southern Brotherhood (Cyril Neville, Devon Allman et al.), Great Southern Blues Festival, Narooma (Australia), 2015 (seen from backstage). A masterclass in having the discipline and good sense to just play the groove: despite the phenomenal collective chops on stage, they all understood that the effectiveness of musical fireworks is in inverse proportion to how often you use them. Worst - a few I won't mention cause it wasn't their fault, it was the guy at the desk working the suck knob.

I used this for years for my SK2 and it turned out that despite the dimensions listed by Gator it fits the SKpro snug as a bug in a rug with room for extra padding and protection as shown https://gatorco.com/shop/keyboard/bags-keyboard/61-note-keyboard-gig-bag-gkb-61/

fwiw she makes that dress look way better than I ever could (I don't have the legs for it), but having done a lot of Postmodern Jukebox style gigs over the past few years I'd have played this as a New Orleans rumba, a quick run through it tells me it would work a treat.

I cut down the second tier support so that the tier arms just clear the lower keyboard

I have one, I think I purchased it from Manny's/StoreDJ.

When I bought mine secondhand I factored in the cost of a new screen because having to replace the screen is quite common but fairly straight forward, and yes definitely check youtube videos on how to do it right.

What do you mean? An African or European hi-hat pattern?