mynameisdanno

Bucking the trend, I gotta say the Kawai ES110 is a steal at the current widespread $699 price drop. I know it's mostly about blowing them out since the ES120 is around the corner, but that suits my purposes just fine – I just picked up another one, just because I love the action and I need something with 5-pin MIDI, which the ES120 loses. I just sold a couple of Nord Stage 2's to fund a new Stage 3 (finally taking the plunge), and through a combo of inflation and the Nord's legendary slow depreciation, I sold them both easily for a couple hundred bucks more than what I paid for them (also used, 2-3 years ago). Funds from the two of them will barely cover the purchase of the new Stage 3, but only because I'm treating myself to a brand new one, which I've only done twice with Nords.

I generally keep to that same rule, and was deeply annoyed to find that the MR18 was by far the best solution for my particular application on that tour. I settled for buying it used.

I like your plan. I used a Midas MR18 on the Heart tour in 2019, and configured four aux sends as two stereo subgroup outs, one for "real" keys sounds (piano, strings, etc.) and one for synths/Mellotron (they ended up getting submixed into one pair due to late-arising input list constraints, but I ended up doing that final submix with a Radial Space Heater which was in my rack anyway doing some other jobs). I was able to control effects return volume on the MR18 with a knob on a MIDI controller, to give my accordion a slathering of reverb for one tune. Never tried any more sophisticated MIDI control of mix parameters or scene changes beyond that, but I know the XR18/MR18 can do quite a bit with MIDI control. Regardless of how you do this, I would definitely advise isolation transformers as the final step between all your gear and the sound company. Noise issues aside, lots of gear with line-level XLR outs responds *very* poorly to phantom power being sent into their outputs, even momentarily, and that's very easy to have happen either accidentally, or it might even be unavoidable on boards that have global phantom power. I've had gear require repair back before I learned this and once I finally figured out the culprit, no matter how pro the sound company or how fixed an installation a rig is in, I always have some transformers between me and the audio dept. Back on the Heart tour I used a Radial Twin-Iso for that, mounted in the back of the rack with a J-Clamp to make it convenient to patch into. It worked great, except for one day when the monitor tech accidentally hit the polarity switch while hurriedly patching into my rack during changeover. I could hear the weird out-of-phase sound in my stereo IEMs from the jump, but both the monitor guy and FOH's attention were elsewhere, and I thought maybe the problem was just in my IEM mix - maybe somebody repaired the XLR cable to my IEMs and miswired one side. Song two was Magic Man. The big glide down in the synth break was usually a gut-shaking Moog assault, further fortified by a send to a sub-octave generator that our FOH engineer kept on a volume pedal just for that moment - he would just goose it up until the rafters started rattling. They'd kill the lights and turn on the laser show just then too – it was always a big moment. That night, as that Minimoog note glided its way down to the low G, as soon as it hit the crossover frequency into the mono subs, the fundamental promptly faded out, leaving nothing but the harmonics. It was a comically flaccid moment approximating how "Magic Man" must have sounded through a transistor radio (but with lasers). I noticed the front few rows weren't staggering back from the subwoofers like usual and immediately realized what must have happened. We removed the polarity buttons from the Twin-Iso and never had that problem again.

In minor keys, you chart the tonic chord as 6m. Why? Because part of the goal when making a Nashville chart is to be able to chart a song you've never heard before in one pass, while the songwriter strums through it for you in the control room before you start recording, and without them having to talk you through the whole tune first. The clock is ticking. And unless it's a blues, at least half the time, when they start singing Verse 1 in a minor key, the chorus or bridge is going to end up in the relative major. And do you really want to be writing (or reading, five minutes later) "b3 b7 1m b6" on the chorus? No, you do not, you want to see 1 5 6m 4. And yeah sometimes this means you end up charting a whole tune with a bunch of 6m, 2m, 3m, etc. You quickly get used to it. Edited to add: I highly recommend the Chas Williams book if you're getting into this. The system is essentially an evolved shorthand, and there's nothing wrong with everyone having their own shorthand. There are some things I do differently in charts solely for my own personal use than the "standard." I've made thousands of them, but I've rarely had a Nashville chart handed to me, and I've rarely had anyone say they could use one of mine. I've only played a handful of sessions in Nashville, and they're just not the norm in west coast circles. The only reason I started doing all my charts this way was an extended period of time when I was constantly traveling and also constantly having to learn new tunes for gigs. I found myself doing about 90% of my chart-making on airplanes, without a convenient pitch reference.

The things that get mic'd most often in my project studio are the Leslie cabinet, accordion, and pump organ (I have a nice one, lovingly refurbished by a local hobbyist who rescues them from the landfill, restores them and sells them cheap). Clavinet, when it's called for (rare), always gets a mic'd Fender amp. About half the time I'll mic up an upright piano, the other half of the time I use samples (Nord Stage 3 about as often as computer libraries). I have a real Wurly, but it's recorded direct or through a Styrmon Iridium 99% of the time lately. I am looking into a future where I might need to find another studio space, and wondering if the latest Leslie sim plug-ins are "good enough," as that's the only thing loud enough to disturb neighbors that I regularly record. It's also probably 70% of the recording I do. I kinda don't want to know...

At at least one point in almost every show I play, I need both my feet simultaneously, so I almost always sit by default. Every once in a blue moon if the visual aesthetic of the band calls for it, AND it won't limit my ability to execute the music the way I want, I'll set up standing. It's probably been less than five times in 20 years. I think a sitting keyboardist on an upstage riser, side-by-side with a drum riser, is a great look. That way, both the musicians that are seated, and more-or-less stationary due to their instruments, are elevated in the back. On big productions that's usually where I ask to be (if anybody asks). When the energy levels get sky-high (usually in a closer with a loud rock band), occasionally I'll stand up and "play down" at my top keyboard. Also I love playing accordion on a song or two when appropriate – I stand for that, of course, and it's a nice visual change-up. I think the energy and interaction you bring to your fellow musicians and the audience onstage is more important than sitting vs. standing. I'm talking to myself here – I tend to close my eyes and live inside the music much of the time, if I'm not making a conscious effort to engage.

Thanks for that round-up. I guess I should say "decent-feeling to me", actions being subjective. I've just never gotten along with the Korg or Privia offerings. The Kawai ES110 is just such a standout in its class, as far as the feel of the action is concerned. Yeah, it hadn't even occurred to me that the ES110 was missing USB MIDI. I can see how USB is a smarter choice for the market as a whole, if a choice has to be made. The needs of live musicians are admittedly niche when weighed against the market as a whole for a keyboard in this price range, but the ES110 just feels so darn good, in such a compact, easy-schlep package, works so well as a weighted controller for Nords, and has been more roadworthy than I ever would have guessed. It's just annoying to lose a key feature on an otherwise perfect and reasonably priced unit. Oh well.

Ugh, no 5-pin MIDI? The ES110 was the last decent feeling compact slab 88 with a blank top that still had it, I was hoping they'd keep it up. Guess I better see if I can find an ES110 on closeout.

My keyboard selections for any gig are essentially dictated by the desire to keep a tight-as-humanly-possible setup in both depth and height. It is an artificial limitation that has kept me from seriously considering a lot of great gear (any major weighted 88 workstation with a deep control panel is pretty much out of the question), but it's important to me. Fortunately the Nord Stage 2/3 Compact over any ol' slab 88 (used strictly as a controller) checks all the sonic boxes for 95% of my gigs. It also has the side effect that the board with all the brains and custom patches is easily flyable as checked luggage. For these reasons, if the Nord Stage Compact or some similar beast didn't exist, I probably would have gone to laptop world a long time ago.

I'm booked or I would be throwing my hat in the ring for sure. This would be a blaaaaast. +1 to the Carey Frank idea.

+1 on what everybody has to say here about the live album. I recently stumbled across this footage, which was new to me. Awesome to see footage of this band. Also, he was a BRILLIANT orchestrator. The way the timbres of Donny's Hammond and his orchestral arrangement coexist on this cut in particular... wow. Not a note out of place from the whole band either.

I guess we all agree on the real problem here - musicians that fail to listen to each other on stage or in rehearsal and adjust what they're doing to make the ensemble sound good. And nothing drives away audiences and turns playing music into shoveling coal quicker than that. Hard to make a funny meme about it though! P.S. Firmly in agreement with the notes of several about high-pass filter on keys. I try to bake this into the patches where it's appropriate (most of them), so for the songs where I do need the low-end, the sound engineer won't have already rolled it off at the board. Often they will regardless, but I prefer to at least give myself a chance! My only exception to my general "never try to tell FOH how to do their job" rule is that I will usually give them a heads-up that if I'm playing quietly, it's deliberate for arrangement purposes - no need to ride my fader to compensate.

I know this is one of those 80/20 things, but it grinds my gears when people talk about this like it's some absolute rule. It depends on the music and the players, of course. I always loved Richard Tee on this topic... "if there's a bass player there, then there's gonna be two bass players, my left hand and him... that's just me, I can't help it, and I doubt very seriously whether it will ever change." @ 11:53 One of my favorite things in the world playing country music is to link right up with a bass player. This was common back in the day but sometimes harder to hear on the old recordings. Here's a modern recording with one of the originating masters of the style, Pig Robbins, linking right up with Dennis Crouch. Tell me that doesn't groove. You just gotta take a few minutes and agree on the line and hook it up.

I've always heard it as one of those early Wurlies, like a 112.

Do you need a settable split point for internal sounds on the Kawai, or for the external modules/keyboards that you're controlling with it? If it's the latter, and you can't just program your splits on the receiving devices, I believe a MIDI Solutions Router can be programmed to route incoming MIDI note data according to a split point of your choosing, either rechanneling it, or routing it to one of the two physical MIDI outputs on the box. If you need to change the split point on the fly, it looks like you can pre-program different split point rules for each incoming MIDI channel, and then you can just change the output MIDI channel on the ES110 to access those 16 different pre-programmed split points. Never done this stuff myself but the MIDI Solutions Application Examples page seems to indicate all those results are achievable. http://www.midisolutions.com/applicat.htm

I think Sweetwater has mistakenly listed *exterior* dimensions for that case. However, that case isn't wide enough for you, it's made for 73 key Electros. Interior dimensions are 42.5” x 14.2” x 5”. Your NS3 HP76 is 44" wide. Let's put this thread to bed. https://www.roland.com/global/products/cb-b76s/ Internal Dimensions: 49.75" x 14" x 5" NS3 HP76: 44" x 13.6" x 5" $160, in stock at Sweetwater. Wrap your sustain or expression pedal in a towel and stick it down at one end to fill up the extra 5" Done.

Co-sign everything @AnotherScott said. After 10 years of Stage 2 and just now finally getting into my Stage 3, I am still so thrilled with the clarity and speed of the Nord approach for quickly programming for a new project, and their relentless focus on keeping their 73-key semi weighted boards contained in a flyable form factor, that I rarely get irritated anymore on those rare occasions when I wish I could do something that falls into those 10% of needs that they choose not to accommodate in the name of interface simplicity. There's almost always an easy workaround. I do wish the Kawai (and more 88's in general) had an expression pedal input, but at this point I'm just thankful that there's anyone left selling a lightweight, compact slab 88 with a pleasing action, minimal top-panel controls and 5-pin MIDI at a reasonable price.

Your 76 definitely won't fit in the 73 bag. It's a perfect (quite snug) fit for the 73.

I am sort of a fanatic for good cases. I have been known to spend more on cases than the cost of the gear contained within, on occasion. The only company I ever really pined for an endorsement deal from is Pelican. So I know my recommendations on cases tend to be overkill. Having said that, I really do feel the official Nord gig bag is *so* worth the premium for self-handling situations. They are perfectly sized, adding hardly any bulk, which makes it so easy to toss them in a smaller vehicle. The handle is comfy. The build quality is great. And if circumstances change and you ever need a more heavy-duty case for it, you can just buy a Pelican 1750 with no foam. The NS3C in the official Nord gig bag fits inside perfectly, with room for a pedal or two at the end of the case. And it's <50lbs all-in, so you can fly with it as checked baggage and be within standard weight limits. I've flown with this setup over a hundred times with no damage. Bring it on a work trip, throw it on the hotel room ironing board, plug in some headphones, you're set.

I use the ES110 strictly as a controller for the Nord Stage 2 Compact, running in "Dual KB" mode, where Slot A is controlled by the internal keyboard and Slot B is controller by the ES110. If your external keyboard has an expression pedal input (and sends that data via MIDI CC#11), then you have the ability to set up Control Pedal morphs that apply to slot B on the Nord. So, for instance, you can have one expression pedal connected directly to the Nord, controlling filter cutoff or organ swell or whatever on Slot A, and another expression pedal connected to your external board controlling, say, volume of a strings layer on a piano sound on Slot B. When I need a control pedal for Slot B stuff, the MIDI flow is ES110 --> MIDI Solutions Pedal Controller (with Yamaha FC7 connected) --> Nord Stage. The MIDI Solutions box merges MIDI data from the ES110 with CC data converted from the attached pedal, and sends the combined data out to the Nord. Works great, just as if the ES110 had an expression pedal input on it. No power supply required - the voltage on the Kawai ES110's MIDI out is sufficient to power the MIDI Solutions devices. I can't remember if I had to do the special MIDI Solutions configuration dance on it when I bought it, or if it came out of the box pre-set for CC#11 and the FC7 polarity and resistance - it was so long ago when I bought it. But it works great.

Another vote for the Kawai ES110. I enjoy it quite a lot as a weighted controller for Nord Stage 2/3 Compact. It's also proved quite roadworthy considering its weight/price point. Wish it had an expression pedal input, but I just bring a MIDI Solutions Pedal Controller when I need one.

Only used it once, but I was sure glad I had it! How do you like the Booker Labs stuff @Tonysounds?

+1 to furniture dollies, they're perfectly sized for moving a Leslie. For transport, I put a soft cover or moving blanket on the Leslie, and then use two ratchet straps criss-crossed over the top of the Leslie and under the dolly, ratcheted down tight enough so it's basically one unit when lifted. Makes it easier to lift out of the van by giving you a place to hold under the Leslie. Before that I used refrigerator dollies with the stair-climber treads. I still will bust out that move if I know there are going to be stairs. But as I age, I am less and less likely to bring a Leslie if I know there are going to be stairs. 😆 I mostly just leave the Leslie on the dolly in my studio for ease of moving around. If I ever played organ bass, I would probably notice the difference from the lack of coupling with the floor, but... I don't, and I don't. The dollies the big box hardware stores sell get chintzier and chintzier on the casters. ULine still sells good ones.

In a pinch I’ve been known to fold up a few bills of paper currency. I’m not familiar with the Kronos but perhaps using a latching footswitch in the assignable footswitch jack and setting it to sustain would work. +1 on trying Jimbo’s programming one long note into the sequencer idea.

Or if you prefer a more Emersonian approach…