Adan

I've got some wild stories, maybe not by Motley Crue standards, but in my life they stand out. There was the bar gig where an attractive young woman came up on stage and made out with me while I was playing. That was a standing-up (not seated) gig, and I was able to keep playing with one hand while my other hand was wrapped around her. I was hella impressed by my own multi-tasking. I was also thinking it was going to be a happy ending for me, but when I approached her after the gig she acted like it have never happened. Totally performative on her part.

If you haven't been using preset keys then you probably won't miss them. The Soul does feel great, and I think feels closer to a real Hammond than any other clone. This is how I'd rank the actions of some current clones, with the % figure representing how close it gets you to the feeling (not the sound) of a real Hammond (recognizing that real Hammonds can feel somewhat different): Legend Soul: 95-97% Crumar Mojo: 90-92% Hammond SKPro: 88-90% Vox Continental: 86-88% Nord Electro: 80-82% Yamaha YC61: 60-65% (no high trigger) This is just my opinion, having played all of these. Again, this is just feel, not sound.

I ordered my VV with the "Chick Corea modification" based on someone's recommendation. I can't compare it to any other VV, because mine is the only one I've played. But Brad's review of the action is not how I feel about my VV. I find it very playable, much more so than many of the "bad" Rhodes I've played in the past. Of course now I'm comparing a new VV to a spectrum of used rhodes, so not apples to apples. My VV is not as enjoyable as my favorite rhodes, which was the MKI Suitcase that I never should have sold. That one had a sort of squishy connectivity that was so inspiring, and I don't really get that from my VV. However (repeating myself), I also didn't get it from many other rhodes I played. So I would rate the action on my VV as better than the majority of rhodes i've played, but not as good as the best. It wouldn't surprise me if the MK8 is a better playing experience than the VV.

I don't think Conte will be remembered for his keyboard playing, and I'm going to be a bit controversial and say I don't think he'll be remembered for his arrangements either -- they're clever and enjoyable, but not timeless. He'll definitely be remembered for being ahead of the curve in figuring out a formula to dominate YouTube. All good. He's better than 99% of the crap that's being created to draw clicks.

Some other comments have noted this already, but I don't think of Billy Joel as having a distinct style. He's hyper-competent, but in kind of a generic way. I don't think it matters a bit who's "better," but from my personal perspective I'd rather aim to be an Elton John or a Nicky Hopkins, someone who, when you hear a few licks, you know who it is. To me, that's a more interesting thing to strive for.

The more mature I'm becoming, the more sparse my playing has become. To me, that feels like progress. It also doesn't feel easier than playing more notes. If anything, it's harder. The logical extension of this philosophy would of course be to play nothing, which would be absurd (insert John Cage joke here). Let's just say my starting point has left me a lot of room to evolve towards an ideal. So, yeah, Conte is doing something right in my book. Also, it seems like he's making a conscious choice to be the foundation and let others do the ornamentation. It's obviously working for him, so I don't think he cares what anyone thinks of his chops.

It's very cool looking, if I was going to plunk down several grand for an MK8, I might go for this one just for the aesthetics. If you want to fund the planting of trees, you can just send money to an organization that plants trees, and cut out the middle man. Or, you could decide you're going to play a vintage rhodes instead of buying a new one that had to be sourced from minerals and fossil fuel-derived products and that features wooden keys and wood trimming that came from . . . wait for it . . . a tree! We're talking about miniscule amounts of stuff in the grand scheme of things, but if you want to really make a point about saving the environment, there's better ways to do it.

what I want to know is, is there any way to be a humble gigging musician playing mostly 4-chord songs without contributing to the creation and sustenance of ethically-challenged tech billionaires who, more often than not it seems, use their wealth to make the world a substantially worse place? No? ok, just wanted to confirm that.

That's a tough situation. I assume if the money wasn't good, you wouldn't be able to justify to yourself or your partner being away that much. Can't judge you one way or the other on that. When my first child was born I was in a similar situation, playing in a band that paid decent money but could work around my day job schedule. Also, like with your situation, it was loads of fun and my bandmates were all like best friends. I quit the band, and don't regret it. Those early years with the kids are so special, I'm glad I was there for as much of it as I could be. The gig money was nice, but it didn't make or break us.

Crumar arguably does offer some of the best value available. I'm a huge Crumar fan, having owned 3 of the keyboards (still have 2 of them). I think Crumar cuts corners on quality of materials, and I've had issues with mine. Hasn't stopped me from getting tons of great use out of them, but I can see in part how they're achieving lower prices. Comparing a US price on one product to a Thomanns price on a different product isn't super helpful. The Crumar Desktop sells for $949, the Mojo 61 for $1579. If we accept, for purposes of conversation, that Crumar is a price leader, how can we hypothesize a 4-octave clone for $700? At the very least, you're adding a keyboard onto the Desktop. Maybe Crumar could piece one together for $1150? But that's just an attempt at objective triangulation. In the end, the only thing that matters is what it's worth to you. I think Hammond rolled the dice with the M-Solo. As Scott said, they can always drop the price if units are just sitting on shelves.

I feel the same way. Then I tried to explain this to my wife. Clearly, MLB is trying to broaden it's audience, or at least not lose what it has.

Funny to me video, because I've never heard him talk. A true California character: too much sunshine, too much weed. The Californian's retort: no such thing, dude! The one Hammond I owned was a chop. I called it the SteppenChop. Took it to a tech, they examined the innards and said "it's a Model A!"

Since you now have both the XE20 and the Liano, any thoughts on how they might divide duties? The XE20 is about twice the weight of the Liano, but is still pretty light and gives you weighted keys. Battery operation for Liano obviously could be the critical factor for powerless situations: is that the main point of having it for you? I haven't played either of them but if the Liano's action is similar to the Vox Continental, then it's about as good as semi-weighted can be for piano. Still, for me at least, semi-weighted never gets me to the same place as weighted, even a mediocre weighted action.

Maybe that's a different (probably less interesting) thread: "band life and day job life." I've always done the opposite and shared my band exploits with co-workers, and often had co-workers come out to shows. That's probably more the norm than keeping it secret. I'm glad I did, though it's not all upside. Occasionally someone makes a snarky comment like "well, if you weren't up late gigging maybe you'd have gotten this project done sooner." But I think overall it's been helpful to have co-workers know more about me, and it's not unusual that when a bunch of them come to a gig they're able to let their hair down and bond in a way they otherwise might not. I have also many times been the ambient piano entertainment at official work parties. That has come about fairly easily, I just go to the party planner and say "hey, can I set up on the sidelines and tickle the ivories?" They always say yes. That's been nothing but a good thing.

I'm hoping it's heavy on not previously seen footage of his playing, and less heavy on the interviews. One of my favorite and most re-watched documentaries is "Straight, No Chaser," and I think it's because there is so much performance footage. I could be wrong, and maybe this doc will prove that I am wrong, but I've always had the impression that Nicky was a quiet, humble person who just went about his business. Not one of the more colorful characters of the music world.

Everyone loves a good conspiracy theory, but it's not hard to look at Ohtani and see an incredibly naive and trusting person, who comes from a "trust society," who must necessarily be focused every day on this job, who has plenty of money coming in from places other than his salary, and see why the story told in the indictment could be, in fact, the whole story. It's much harder for me to believe that the federal law enforcement agencies involved either have missed something significant, or are somehow corrupt. It's not that I believe corruption never happens, but for it to happen in such a high profile case is inconceivable. Did the highest powers in baseball talk to the highest powers in the government asking for a quick investigation and resolution? Very likely, yes! Is that in itself a form of corruption? Maybe that's in the eye of the beholder. If there's something with the word "gambling" in it that is going to make me less enthusiastic about major league baseball, it isn't going to be a scandal involving one or a few bad people. Rather, it's the systemic conjoining of the sport with legal gambling companies that have sprung up in recent years. It's a free country, people can gamble if they want to, but for me personally seeing those ads everywhere always leaves a bad taste that wasn't there before.

This is another one of those topics where the pro/non-pro split is going to be pretty strong. If music is how you pay the bills, your spouse is probably going to sign on with it in a big way. By contrast, if music is how you have fun while making a little walking around money, then it becomes another chip in the never-ending negotiation of who gets to have how much independent fun, where, when, and how. I'm not familiar with the former, very familiar with the latter. In my various relationships and now in my marriage, there is also the elephant in the room, and this elephant is wearing high heels, is on her 4th cocktail, and is trying to flirt with me. That's a major difference between playing in bands and other "hobbies" -- playing in bands can stress-test the trust relationship more so than, say, an enthusiasm for tennis. This was more a problem for me when my wife and I lived in San Francisco and my gigs ran until as late as 1 am. Now I live in a small resort town where everybody knows everybody and it would be impossible for anything untoward to happen that my wife doesn't hear about the next day. In fact my wife and kids are often at my gigs. Now, the gigging is less thrilling, but also less challenging to the relationship.

Right, because watching the Moon cross paths with the Sun should make us reflect on how significant we humans are in the grand scheme of things. 😆

Please report back!

Sunday night hotel gig was fine, but didn't feel all that different than a normal solo gig. Today though, we had a neighborhood block party of about 50 people, so I brought my battery-powered rig of Roland Go:Piano into Roland KC-220 and reprised the eclipse songs in the hour leading up to the event. Not a great sounding rig, but was able to spontaneously set it up within a few minutes of getting the notion to do so.

Totality and almost perfectly sunny skies in Central Vermont. There was about a 5% chance of us having weather like this, and we got it. This eclipse has changed my life: now, I just need to figure out how.

Like everything else about living in a big city, if you love it, you do what you have to do to make it work. The sacrifice either seems worth it, or it doesn't.

I don't think you have a line for key textured, but the Casio does have textured keys and the others don't? Which for me makes a difference for piano playing. I've never been able to get into a real comfort zone playing piano on the CK-61, due to the action and the smaller key size. And yes, I've made adjustments to velocity and offset, which definitely helped but still doesn't get me there. That's the main reason my CK remains a rehearsal board, almost never a performance board. when I've gigged with it, it's been as an organ controller for B3X with internal organ standing by as backup. Liano looks interesting, but the lack of 1/4 outputs, speakers turning off when 1/8 line out is used, and 88 keys are significant negative points. 88 keys somewhat tends to cancel out the advantages of a lightweight board. I generally don't have a big problem playing piano on a 61. It's an adjustment but not a deal breaker. For some people, less than 73 or less than 88 is a deal breaker. The Casio is a board I'd like to try out. Other 61 note Casios I've tried had a decent semi-weighted action with nice textured keys.

A lot of people who think they need a dual manual probably would do fine with a single manual. IMO, organ trio where your left hand is always playing bass is where the dual manual still earns its place.

Also known as bringing the mountain to Mohammed. I think it's fair and appropriate to encourage people to see how far they can go with this philosophy. A lot of situations that you think may be problematic without a weighted action may turn out to be ok. But there will also be those gigs on which you want to sound your absolute best.