SamuelBLupowitz

Hooray! Happy birthday!

This is a treasure trove. I always love bands with both piano and B3 players in a rock context (Springsteen, The Band, mid-70s Billy Joel, some of the Beatles' Let It Be stuff with Billy Preston) but I haven't heard much of that in jazz. In gospel, of course, it's pretty common!

My animated nature behind the keys (but especially when playing bass) is legendary among my bandmates past and present, hahaha. Anyway, good to hear all this. I don't think the wireless purchase would be immediate, but it's good to keep an eye on what I might want to spend some money on in the future. Need to invest in a sturdier TRS cable for my wired beltpack in the meantime, and keep weighing pros and cons of the Galaxy or the Shure wireless system.

Hey all! So, I started using in-ears right before the pandemic hit, and while I haven't gigged with them as much as I would have had things not ground so horrifically to a halt, I am definitely of the mindset that I will never go back to wedges. It's the single best thing I've done for my playing and especially my singing in a live context. Now, seeing as I'm usually stuck inside a fortress of keyboards, I've been content to stay wired, with an XLR or two trailing from my beltpack at gigs. But the urge for a little more mobility, plus a really bad experience with a cable that went bad before my set the other night (what's worse than no monitors at all? Monitors cutting in and out and distracting you from what's happening), have me thinking it might be time to liberate myself like the guitarists and bassist have, and go fully wireless. But a lot of the functional-but-affordable wireless monitoring systems for players like us, who aren't hitting up Madison Square Garden anytime soon, are mono only (a lot of folks I know use the little XVive U4 transmitter/receiver combo that charges over USB and plugs right into the mixer, but that's mono only). Monitoring piano and organ in stereo is a much more pleasant, immersive experience for me. So I'm wondering if any of y'all run wireless ears in stereo, and how much you've invested in those systems, if there's anything you'd recommend. Obviously I want something that's reliable, but I also am trying to be realistic about the price points and what they mean -- how much money do I *need* to spend to get a wireless setup I'd be happy with, rather than "what's the best, most bulletproof thing that all the pros use that will set me back 3k?" Aaaaand GO!

I think it also depends on what you mean by a "pop" song. Is there much B3 on a Lil Nas X record, or a Dua Lipa track? Probably not (but I haven't heard either of those artists, I just know that I'm a 32 year old man and even though pop music was never really for me I'm exceptionally out of touch now). But aside from the Hammond's iconic status as a vintage "vinyl era" instrument, it's a go-to of contemporary rock, funk, reggae, soul, and jam bands -- not just "old guys," young folks who tour full-time and sell out theaters and play big festivals, like Turkuaz, Pigeons Playing Ping Pong, Grace Potter, Dawes, Goose, Vulfpeck... I could go on. You won't hear any of those bands on Clear Channel top 40 radio, but they're thrilling and delighting audiences and record buyers/streamers all over the place. It's just that the musical landscape is so much broader and more segmented now, given the tight corporate control of radio, algorithmic recommendations of Spotify and Pandora, and how much easier it is to make your record and put it on the internet! Instruments, sounds, and styles go in and out of vogue. Juicy 80s synth patches are really in right now, whereas while I was growing up in the early aughts I remember that being the definition of cheesy. But certain sounds and instruments transcend the time and space that popularized them, and they just become a classic: the drum set. The piano. The acoustic guitar. The saxophone. The cello. And yeah, I'd go out on a limb and say the Hammond organ.

As threatened... [video:youtube] The left channel "guitar" is a clav that I just slammed through a Fender amp with a wah pedal. Aside from managing to get a nice two-guitar rock band vibe with only one guitar on the track, I got some nice feedback effects out of the deal!

Aw, thanks you guys! I'm so happy to have the forum, and all of you. Especially as I lurch into my old age. :wink:

Oooooh boy I had just talked myself down from the Hydrasynth because I want something a little smaller and lower profile if I get a new live synth... damn them!

My investigation for when we ultimately replace the carpet in my studio led to a lot of good acoustic points for vinyl flooring -- similar sonic character to wood, but much easier and less expensive to install. My wife and I were also looking into some of the acoustic floor padding to go underneath the vinyl, to quiet things down a bit.

Ugh. Can't say I didn't see this coming, but still disappointing as a Seaboard user.

There's a song on my new record coming out next week that's built around full-on Clav-that-civilians-will-mistake-for-crunch-guitar. In an act of absolutely shameless self promotion, I will share it here when the record drops.

Thanks for sharing this! I had missed the boat but will be following now. Great resource for hearing what we're all up to easily. That is correct!

It's gorgeous, Dave. Congratulations! My 200 is one of my prize posessions. A beautiful instrument with loads of character. Enjoy.

Just to keep this wonderful discussion going, but also throw some different parameters into the mix -- one of the other options I've investigated, and would be interested in comparable boards, is the Yamaha Reface CS. Doesn't have the patch memory or output routing options of some of the other boards (granted, a lot of the stuff folks have mentioned is 5-10 times the cost of the CS), but it's small, lightweight, and relatively versatile for my needs, and I could use an iPad for patch storage and not have to rely on it for sound output (no disconnection from the sound source, or hung notes, if it fails). That's sort of the opposite end of the spectrum from a Prophet or Nord Stage 3 Compact, but is more of a "replacement" for my Seaboard/bluetooth rig as a complement to my much bigger, heavier organ and piano boards, keeping my rig as more of a 2.5-piece rig rather than the full 3!

...and just as a follow-up on my last post, put out a music video for one of the new album tracks today, just showing me laying down all the parts in my studio. [video:youtube]

So true! Unfortunately, late last year my old Mainstage Mac had a hard drive failure and I had to replace it. I think the issue lies more with Roli and their push to cloud service than the Apple OS updates, but it was enough to give me a headache and bail, since my complicated setup for our 25-minute rock opera was not going to fly without significant reprogramming. I've used my Seaboard's built-in Bluetooth on many, many gigs without issue in the before times; not really sure what was causing the dropouts on this show. Interference from everything else going on at the outdoor pavilion? Some user error I wasn't thinking of? The now-aged OS on my iPad? These are the kind of troubleshooting questions I don't feel like I have the same energy to deal with as I did before Covid, hahaha. I actually got one of the CME WIDI devices when they came out last year, with the intention of equipping the Mojo with it for smaller gigs where I could use it as a dual-manual controller with built-in organ. I haven't gotten there yet! All the suggestions are great; I'm eating 'em up. Giving me toys to salivate over for the many months it will certainly be before I'm ready to invest in anything new... just nice to have something to look forward to!

I'm finding that after a year and a half of pandemic, I no longer have the patience or drive to deal with the Mainstage/iOS/MIDI controller life I was deeply invested in for the couple of years prior to the intial lockdown. It's just seemed so time consuming and tedious to prepare, and I've had so little bandwidth. The last straw for me was prepping for the first show by Noon Fifteen (my main band) since January 2020 -- many of the patches I had programmed for our material in Mainstage no longer worked, having been killed by updates and such in the interim. I went with a stripped-down iOS rig rather than spending the hours to re-program my complex mix of synths, samples, and sound effects triggered by various boards, and at the gig had to deal with a host of Bluetooth dropouts and stuck/hung notes. It was distracting to me, and (the hung notes in particular) the rest of the band. So I think it's time to enter a new phase where I stick to hardware for awhile. And while my trusty Novation Ultranova can fill my synth void for the time being, I can't help but think about what kind of synth or workstation might better fill that "third board" need -- I have a dedicated organ and piano, so this would be for pitch bendy leads, basses, and (ideally) pads. How versatile a board sonically I need, well, that's something I can ponder! With my Seaboard/controller setup, I was primarily controlling synths, but also Mellotron, clavinet, pitched percussion, and anything else that wasn't covered by the Mojo or my Wurlitzer (now more often a Yamaha CP88). But I can definitely get into more of a "this is one instrument that can cover a lot of roles" like a Poly D or Hydrasynth, rather than "this can play any sound you can imagine" like a Nord Stage Compact or, I don't know, fill in the blank. I haven't done any research yet... I just thought all y'all were the right people to come to talk about, pipe dream, what would be the coolest thing to put over my piano to shred like Wakeman as well as groove like Stevie when Hammond or piano won't do? I know I want reliability and immediacy -- something I don't love about the Novation is that, while it's very knobby, the rotary encoders need to be individually programmed for every patch, which is incredibly tedious, so I wind up not using them and mostly being a preset jockey (even if I've programmed the presets myself). I like a combination of patch memory and real-time control -- the live sets on my Nord Electro are really the ideal for me. Aftertouch would be great, expression pedal control would be ideal, and a light, fast action is a must. Ideally three or four octaves of keys, but I could be swayed to more or less. Oh, and I love stereo when I can get it, but I also love my talkbox, and it would be a sick bonus to have something with programmable outputs so I could have certain patches routed separately to the talkbox and don't have to worry about toggling the box on and off. I'm sure there are zillions of directions I could go with this. So... what would YOU do?

Time to share one of my favorite mashups of all time. [video:youtube]

"WUFPH" and "Snip Snap" were already on my list, believe it or not, and I wound up titling our guitarist's two instrumental originals "Did I Stutter?" and "Second Drink." "The Boboddys" and "Chair Model" are inspired, as is "Few Word Trick." I was trying to come up with something like that â The Blupowitz Organ Company, or Blupowitz Organ Corporation? â¦with their signature tune, "Blupowitz Blitz"! (yeah, I know it's Sam B. Lupowitz, but I never read it like that, and in my mind, you're stuck with it. ) I appreciate the respect for my left hand bass work and your assumption of my leadership role, but I think all y'all are *vastly* overestimating how much work I'm doing relative to the guitarist and drummer!

Does anyone have any short, easily digestible videos they like to introduce someone to the basics and little hacks of Hammond drawbars and leslie speed? Starting to get the band together for my album release show next month. The sax player in the band, a longtime collaborator, is going to be covering auxiliary keys on the show so I can focus more on piano and vocals. He"s a brilliant musician all around, and describes himself as 'competent' at keys â definitely capable of 'give me the progression and I"ll play a pad.' But he"s never played Hammond before, so I"m looking for an easy way to introduce him to 'pull these four out,' 'the white ones are even harmonics,' and 'speed up the Leslie to build into the chorus' without me just talking at him. Easy enough to YouTube search but I thought some of y"all might have educational resources you particularly like!

I had an extremely ill-timed return to indoor gigging this weekend, but I am basking in the satisfaction of the first show with my new organ trio, a low-key but surprisingly effective side project with the guitarist I play with in pretty much everything and a new drummer we found who is the total package â great attitude, unbeatable chops, easy to work with, can pick up anything we throw at him immediately. Pulling the weight of bass, comping, and melody in an instrumental organ trio is a big step for me â I"m lucky to be flanked by two incredible musicians, but I"m also really proud of myself. That kind of satisfaction has been hard to achieve these days. We"re doing sort of a funk/R&B approach to the format, more like Soulive than Jimmy Smith, and we covered the Beatles, Marvin Gaye, Traffic, and Led Zeppelin, as well as played a few meter-shifting originals the guitarist brought in. We don"t have a name yet â made a long list of names that mostly reference The Office, and we"re heavily leaning toward Save Bandit! Anyway, just feeling good about it after the gig and wanted to share. It"s great to be able to rehearse with my A100 and 147, but the Mojo/Motion Sound KBR-3D was a formidable gig rig. Looking forward to doing more of this. Such an easy setup and sound check, and such freedom on the gig.

I am appalled that you would so blatantly rip off a Jack Lemmon / Walter Matthau comedy from the 1990s!

Announced my upcoming solo release, No Man Is an Island, today -- full album won't be out until September but I made a track available in advance with the pre-order on Bandcamp. It's a sort of Ben Folds Five-inspired anthem about overcoming my bitterness over my hometown rival's ascent to the fame I once aspired to, and it's called Table Flip! Mostly a one-man-band production, but I got to reunite my old band from high school/college, with the other guys contributing some acoustic guitar, percussion, and backing vocals remotely (one of the guitarists literally just yelled his vocals into his phone and texted them to me). It's a lot of fun, and also probably NSFW, as a heads up... some four-letter words in this upbeat little ditty. :wink:

Plenty has been said already, so all I can add is this nugget of wisdom from the legendary Frasier Crane: 'If less is more, think of how much more more will be!'

And unfortunately, unlike on the YC, the CP doesn't give you a way to selectively play its sounds from an external controller (it's all or nothing). Oh, that's unfortunate. I thought I remembered going through some of that with Fortner in his GearLab review, and he had basically sussed out a way that you could have a certain patch set for a certain zone to respond to a certain MIDI channel so that you could trigger that alone from a separate board. But that was a long time ago, and it may have been hypothetical? Also that's a pretty complicated series of hoops to jump through just to not bring a second board. I think I just wanted to know if I could trigger the CP clav from one of the manuals in my Mojo in a two-board rig. Very true. Knowing what the real thing feels like is a gift and a curse. Yeah, you know, I guess that while clav is a "staple" classic keyboard sound, really knowing the ins and outs of the instrument is even more niche than Hammond has become, so I think some manufacturers still don't expect anyone to really know or care about the difference? Of course, the preamp on my D6 is shot, so I haven't been able to use the pickup switches on mine for a few years until I can afford to get it rebuilt anyway... I've gotten used to settling for one tone!