Paul Woodward

So a simple rebadge and the same keyboard with the EX already installed. Thought they might have taken the opportunity to bring Poly AT to compete with other brands. I do wonder if grabbing a used Fantom and adding the £199 EX yourself might work out to be more cost effective. As one site asked, why not just give a coupon for the upgrade with new boards rather than make this?

Well, I have played with numerous setups for iPad and I have settled on a Korg Keystage which connects to the iPad with just one cable (and the iPad can power the Keystage). Audio comes out of the Korg and essentially that’s it as you see in the picture. Has sustain and expression pedal as well as standard 5 pin midi in/out. Stand for the iPad is included with the board. You may not need the Poly AT or Midi 2.0 of the Keystage, but I thought why not get something a bit more future proof. Oh, and the software bundle included wasn’t bad.

I like what you did there 😉

I think it's still a lot for what is in essence a preset player with a fairly standard keybed and minimal controls. My eyes are getting old so I would struggle with the screen and even then, you need to be invested in their engines for this to be a solid investment. It's not for me, but I hope those who buy are happy with it.

The 19791 can take up to the 12.9 iPad Pro

Thanks for sharing, it’s great to get an insight into shows like this which many of us cannot attend for one Reston or another. Curious to see what Korg have there and any other big names.

Arriving in the UK this week, and cheaper than I thought..

The nature of the clamp (flat foot on the screw plate and rubber pad in the well) means it grabs the square tube just as well as round. Going nowhere.

The K&M tablet holder 19791 could work, it fits the 18881 perfectly

Asked about this in another thread and noticed there are few up to date topics on the net about this, so why not start one here. Lets start with what I know… Moog seem to have this covered in their AU units and IOS apps. Animoog Z is a fantastic showcase for Poly AT, but Animoog, Modular and Model D also utilise this feature. Arturia Pigments is good and has MPE A few Gadgets on the MAC respond to poly AT, IOS is limited to whatever apps you had. So iM1 accepts AT. Wavestate Native is good and accepts poly AT (but you expect that as it’s showcasing the new Keystage) Alchemy in Logic and GarageBand also accept AT (not poly though) Korg IOS apps need some updating to accept any sort of AT, I think it’s just the iM1 that responds at all. Any other experiences or recommendations?

They make it clear it’s not a clone, but inspired by, so no reason it couldn’t…but I don’t think it does respond to AT

D1 has aftertouch, but it’s the only one that actually mentions it on the product page….

Curious, does this respond to aftertouch (channel or poly)? Had a play and haven’t yet seen how to assign AT nor do any patches I have tried respond so I’m assuming no…

Yup, that was the price I would have grabbed it as I know I would use it more than the other pianos, and it turns my Keystage and iPad into a decent sounding instrument. But, £30 is really milking this when something new and much more powerful like the Nerd synth is £4.99. For the record, I always thought Korg app prices were very reasonable, especially given the regular sales, but this is their most expensive expansion and, for that, you might hope for a Kronos quality piano set.

I certainly don't think the Oasys piano deserves a £30 price tag.

Nice choice. Enjoy

Hard to say really, depends on what you need for your live set. I couldn't imagine gigging anything more than a small gig with just an iPad, but I would still want a stage piano regardless of whatever VSTs I had. A laptop will have greater flexibility even if some iPad have more power under the hood

I would normally agree on that, but once in a while you need some simple sound, sample or hit as well as the two main sounds. Alternatively you may wish to stack sounds in one or both sides of the split as I had to on the CK61 to get some big synth or pad sounds. Nord and Yamaha have had three simultaneous sounds for years now and multitimbral options go back decades. Regardless of preference, this is the latest keyboard to market and you would hope it had the option at this price when the CK does it for half the price. It has already chosen to exclude poly AT and a decent display/interface. It's clearly not for me, but someone will love it I'm sure. I just don't get the lure other than being able to leave the laptop at home assuming you only use Arturia plug ins. If it let you add others it would be a different matter. The price just confuses me even more when you consider the top end controller keyboard features you are NOT getting. A small laptop or tablet and full featured controller gives way more power and flexibility and probably for a lower price. Still, if this had an Apple badge on it and ran Logic and AU plug ins, it would sell like hot cakes.

Given they upgraded little on the Grandstage X, I can't see this happening...which is crazy with that CX-3 organ engine. Original GS had no way to map a controller to the drawbars either...

Ditto, long time Yamaha piano user up to the CP4. Loved Korg synths, never liked any of their pianos. Grandstage changed that and, after trying a Yamaha CP88 and owning two YC61's and a CK61, I decided to stick with the GS.

Oasys piano only just released in the 'sale' so no idea what full price is 🤔 from memory, many of the others seem to be 50% off...but I bought quite a few already so it's not showing me the prices.

Seeing as you are considering AUM, why not go down the Gadget route so you can integrate the full blown synths such as Polysix, MS20, M1, Wavestation etc. With decent acoustic and electric piano expansions, gadget is getting close to 'budget' Kronos sounding territory at that point. This is my gripe with Module; can't integrate my Korg apps, but it's a better live set up than Gadget (unless you invest in AUM)... Gadget already supports the Keystage functions. If it updated to include the live set functionality, I would likely move from Module altogether.

Try the demos first, but Hybrid 2 has been useful and some simple synth tweaks in that engine. I'm really on the fence about Oasys piano, I really enjoyed it for pop/rock playing.

Know what you mean about the sale prices, I can't believe Oasys piano is £30 full price so maybe just a smaller than 50% discount. You might expect that price for Ivory, but one sound set from 20 years ago?!? The sales happen regularly so wouldn't worry unless you need them all now.

You really need the pro expansion that offers layers, splits, cc learn and more. Scarbee is fantastic, can't recall what organs are in there as I had the organ and clav expansion from day one. Hybrid expansion is useful but not found Triton to be invaluable yet. Ivory piano better than stock, but I would probably choose the Oasys piano now for band work. I use with the new Keystage and really hope Korg update Module to make the most of it as it's a really smooth lag free experience.