Using GSI Burn with Kurzweil PC3

[LeesKeys]

If anyone has used these two items together, I have a question for you. If I have a PC3 setup with 2 zones, is it possible to run the GSI Burn effects on just one of the zones?

[rockinredeye]

No GSI burn here but I do have a PC3, which I'm not in front of right now. There are two sets of stereo outs, four 1/4" plugs in all. Normally each zone is routed to both the Main outs and the Aux. outs. But you can route any zone to just one or the other. So, in any given Setup you have to route the organ zone to one set of outs by itself and all other zones to the other set of outs. You have to do this for every Setup that has organ going to the Burn. Check out page 7-6 in the PC3 Musicians Guide. It says you set the Out parameter in the Program on the CH/PROG page. Maybe it's possible to make a KB3 program routed to Aux. out and always choose that one and it will always use the Aux outs every time. You would still have to send the other zones to the Main outs, though for every Setup. You have an awesome machine there LeesKeys.

[Jazzmammal]

I did some demo's with my PC3 and the Burn then shortly after I picked up a used SK1 which blows the PC3 away for organ. The Burn has the bypass switch so I didn't need to do any routing. When I wasn't playing organ I hit the bypass and then the other PC3 patches were simply passed through to my amp.

 

My problem with the PC3 for this was trying to remove the leslie effects from the KB3 patches. There's a whole thread here from earlier this year describing my problems with that. Some of the patches that I really liked sounded like crap when I removed the leslie effect. It wasn't just the leslie, that effect radically changed the tone of the patch as well. I never did figure that out and then I got the SK so I forgot about it.

 

On the basic KB3 patches, the Burn does make a positive difference. I know what your next question is, I'll have to dig up those files, I put them on Soundcloud but had a problem with my account, don't know if they're still there. It's Xmas, we're pretty busy but I'll check for you.

 

Bob

[Tom Williams]

If the question is "How do I reroute KB3 away from the internal Leslie?", I think Kurzweil has written the issue up here. I've done the same with the KB3 patches on a 2500R and a 2600. Or did I misunderstand the question?

[Jazzmammal]

That wasn't LeesKeys question, that was my comment. Yes, I followed those instructions but the patch I'm talking about is the Big Leslie. It has great tone, good overdrive but when I tried to remove just the leslie effect it lost all it's balls, became quite muddy. For me anyway I no longer care, I have my SK1 and love it.

 

Bob

[ElmerJFudd]

This is an interesting topic to me as well - I've been eyeing a second hand PC361 since funds for a new PC3K6 have not become apparent. I don't want to carry more than two boards to a gig and I have the 88k weighted spot filled. Hot for a clone wheel, I've been studying them all - but I'm not convinced I want to sacrifice the entire 2nd tier to a "one trick pony" if you get what I'm saying. I'd like waterfall keys, but I'd also like pitch and mod wheels and decent MIDI controller ability. Anyway, this has all been covered in an earlier thread I had started,

Modern Live Rig Advice

 

Long story short, I'm interested to see how you go about routing and wiring this up. Surely the KB3 organ does as decent a job delivering the basic drawbar organ tones as most of the sampled or modeled methods out there. Amping and Leslie FX do play a major part in realism when the real thing isn't possible. The GSi Burn and Ventilator are pleasing a lot of people right now and I've heard plenty of examples running everything from an original Korg CX3 to a Casio XP-P1, or even Hammond's XK-1c or SK-1. They all benefit from the dedicated rotary emulators.

 

[Jazzmammal]

Surely the KB3 organ does as decent a job delivering the basic drawbar organ tones as most of the sampled or modeled methods out there.

 

Actually no, that's what I thought until I got my SK1. As soon as I set it up and started playing some organ I could tell the KB3 wasn't close and now I don't even want to hear it any more. I did a jazz gig a few weeks ago that was mostly piano so I took the PC3 and I did do one tune with it on organ and hated it. It really sucked because now I'm used to the SK1.

 

Our ears are easily fooled when we're on stage with a band. The KB3 sits well in a classic rock band and the Big Leslie sounds really good imho. BUT, it still pales in comparison to my SK. And then when I use my SK with my BURN, it really rocks.

 

These things all depend on how picky you are and what kind of a rig are you willing to haul around and set up. Right now my PC3 76 is basically retired, I'm using a double rack with my SK on top of a Roland FA06. The FA acts as the lower manual plus it has virtually all the other patches the PC3 does but only weighs 12 pounds. Love it and I wish I had left the PC3 at home for that jazz gig.

 

Bob

[ElmerJFudd]

That's interesting, Bob. Can you share a little bit about how you ultimately decided on the SK-1 over the other clone wheels? (Electro 4HP, Numa Organ 2, or even the XK-1c or even the XK-3c). Also, what did you pay for it used? Are you using any of the non-organ patches?

[MoodyBluesKeys]

I also have an SK1-73 and a PC361. I do like the Hammond/Leslie emulation better on the SK1. BillW of this forum posted some PC3 Hammond/Leslie patches on the Mastering VAST forum that improved the Leslie emulation better than anything I could come up with, but I still like the SK1. I do use some of the Auxiliary Sounds - the Wurly and Rhodes are quite good (IMHO), the Bright Acoustic Piano does a good job of being heard in the band, I use an evolving Pad from them, and a couple of other patches. Overall, the PC3 has better non-organ sounds, but I don't feel bad using the SK1 by itself (weighs a bit over half what the PC361 weighs). I bought an Electro 3-73 several years ago and sold it when I got the PC361 - I don't like the Nord organ (at least in that generation) as well as the Hammond.

XK1c is same organ as SK1 but without the other patches. XK3c is more faithful to a real B3 or A100 in placement - but way too heavy and the older Leslie emulation would necessitate a Vent or Burn for me to use it. I've never seen the Numa.

 

I do still use a PC3 (and PC2) at church - the BillW Leslie patch Leslie effect has replace most of the original Leslie effects in my patches. I do have a very quiet Hammond patch that I posted on Mastering VAST (sweetb3.pc3) which sounds good - no drive, starts out 0080 0000 00 and adjustable with the sliders. The slow Leslie sounds OK on the Kurzweil, getting the fast Leslie sounding right is the problem part.

 

Just to top it all off - I now have an ultra-portable rig with a 49 key controller into an iPad mini Retina - using Korg Module's organ patches and also Galileo app - which is a very good Hammond emulation. The Kurzweils make good controllers for the iPad - the sliders can be set to change the drawbars on Galileo, and the swell pedal works. Leslie speed changed with a footswitch.

 

 

[Jazzmammal]

I chose the SK because of the extra voices and yes I use them a lot. Good used ones should be in the $900-1,100 range. I'm one of the few here who thinks the AP sounds pretty good and the EP's and other sounds are really good. Are they as good as my PC3, no but then Kurz is world class. However my FA06 has some really excellent sounds in it. The SK is still pretty good though. If you are just talking piano playing it's tough playing piano on a waterfall 61 key Hammond. When I did my little vid with Aspen trying out the Spacestation I had a chance to play the new 88 key Casio and absolutely loved it. It only weighs about 15 pounds and now it has me thinking...

 

Anyway, when I say I now think the KB3 sucks that's me as a former long time user of a real B3 talking. I let the idio.., er fanat.., er B3 experts here influence me into becoming one of them. It's my roots ya know? Now I'm really into getting an authentic B3 sound again and I'm really enjoying it. It's the same with the piano experts here, they don't care so much about organ but man, can they get into the nuanced details of one AP patch vs another. I started on accordian then organ I never had piano lessons, I'm basically self taught on piano so I'm not so fanatic about that part of it.

 

Take what I said about the KB3 with a grain of salt. I used the old PC2X for years including that antique version of the KB3 and thought it was decent at the time then got the PC3 which is a huge improvement. I'm still a big Kurz fanboy, just no longer a big fan of the KB3.

 

Bob

[Bill W]

I also have an SK1-73 and a PC361. I do like the Hammond/Leslie emulation better on the SK1. BillW of this forum posted some PC3 Hammond/Leslie patches on the Mastering VAST forum that improved the Leslie emulation better than anything I could come up with, but I still like the SK1.

 

I'm glad you're still getting some mileage out of those patches. I finally sold my PC3K7 so there will be no more tweaking from me.

 

I do have to agree with Jazzmammal regarding the shortcomings of the basic KB3 tone. I ran my PC3K7 through a GSi Burn for a while but could never find the combination of settings I was happy with. That's what drove me to start working on Kurzweil's internal Leslie sim. Once you strip it down to a single Leslie and spend some time dialing it in, the results are rather good.

[ElmerJFudd]

Ah, OK then. Thanks for following up, Bob, and for Bill chiming in. There aren't many dedicated clone wheels where the developer has addressed the notion that the instrument would fairly frequently be a second tier keyboard to an 88k stage piano or workstation. And being in that spot it might need some good MIDI controller features - maybe pitch and mod wheels, a few midi outs, ability to send on different channels, send program change data on different channels, that kind of stuff - oh and after touch even, I know heresy for an organ. I was looking at the Numa Organ 2 as a pretty nice effort on Studio Logic's part for an organ, and it has a few features in addition to being a decent clone wheel (like pitch and mod wheels believe it or not, but from my reading and from users here it sounds like the MIDI implementation is weak). Which then drew me to the trade off I might get using the KB3 on the PC361 (K or otherwise) which is of course an all around good choice as main axe with an organ that doesn't flat out suck. Haven't decided yet by any means, but just thinking out loud.

[Jazzmammal]

EF, it really depends on how fanatical you are about getting that correct B3 sound. I've had my PC3 for 4-5 years now. Virtually every single musician I've played with thought it was the most killer B3 they've ever heard outside of a real one. In a classic rock setting it screams. An example is last summer I did a pure 60/70's rock gig on Catalina. The guitarist is the leader and is an expert on those tunes and how they should sound. I took the Hammond this time but for prior gigs with him I had the Kurz which he absolutely loved. When I showed up with the SK he asked me what's that and where's your Kurz? He was worried but later said the SK sounded good. I asked if he had a preference and he said no, they both were good. Well, I just wrote what I think but to other players, the PC3 is awesome. The mod wheel adds good sounding distortion plus some gain. Going out through the PA in front of 1,000 people or in a small bar, it has serious balls and people love it. The double leslie is designed to go out as a mono patch and it really works well live. At home it sounds squirrely but not live.

 

It was only after joining this forum and reading about all the B3 guys here and remembering what it was like touring with one in a past life I decided to look at other options.

 

Where you fit into this only you can decide.

 

Bob

[ElmerJFudd]

I got it now, I get where you're coming from. There is a lot of mojo involved in getting these digital devices to replace the real deal. The Hammonds are not only delivering a proper modeling engine with amp and rotary effects. These boxes also have the right keys, the look and feel, the layout, the right controls and behaviors all the way down to control of a real Leslie cabinet. I'd love one, I'm painfully contemplating how it would fit into my rig though. I can't say I've ever done an organ exclusive gig, even if the night is straight up jazz. I'll be the first to admit I'm a pianist first. But that sound, love love love it.

 

So right now I'm thinking PC3 delivers about as nice an organ sound as you're going to get in a swiss army knife board which probably means least amount of gear to drag around. But then I've got this little voice in my brain going, "get the clone wheel and throw your JV-2080 in a rack with a mixer, MIDI it all up like the old days!". Ah, the pain... the agony. Decisions decisions.

 

 

 

 

[Delaware Dave]

If anyone has used these two items together, I have a question for you. If I have a PC3 setup with 2 zones, is it possible to run the GSI Burn effects on just one of the zones?

Leeskeys, the answer is yes. The trick is to attach the Burn to the aux output jacks. You can then have multiple zones in a setup, whichever zones you point to the aux outputs will flow to the Burn and whatever zones you flow to the main outputs will avoid the Burn. The control for this however is actually not in the setup itself but at the program level. As an example, you have two programs, one is piano and one is a rhodes. In the piano program, point the output in the PROG FX page to 'main' output and in the rhodes program point the output to the 'aux' output. Put the two programs in a setup. Each of the programs in the setup represent a zone. The piano 'zone' will go out the main output and the rhodes 'zone' will go out the aux and to the Burn.

[ElmerJFudd]

Boom! And there you go, thanks, Dave!

[LeesKeys]

I love posting to this forum. I get an answer to my question and so much more :-)

[rockinroller]

My last post of 2014: I've got both the PC3-76 and the SK1-73, which I use in live performing (a Bob Seger tribute band). The keyboard parts are meat-and-potatoes R&R: piano and B3. I chose both boards to use because: (1) it's cool to have two keyboards on stage (and I place mine perpendicular to each other, not stacked on a single stand--gives me a decent stretch workout for the time on stage!); (2) neither board gives me all that I want or need. I am a veteran "real Hammond and Leslie" user from the old days of lugging around a B3 and two Leslies to gigs, so I have a fair amount of baseline expectations in trying to dial in a legitimate sound on today's portable boards--and more elusively, the effect of a Leslie. As is the case with most performing musicians, the cost factor has always been a part of my equipment decisions as well.

 

I guess, in summary and as a recommendation, I think you can get away with probably 80% of your Hammond/Leslie needs with the PC3 alone--especially if you drop another $300-$500 for the Neo Ventilator rotary effect box. The PC3 is one of the most powerful keyboards ever built, with an almost infinite set of variables that are user-adjustable and save-able. And that's on top of the over-1000 factory sounds and programs internally.

 

In summary, if I had to have ONE board that provided what I need it would be the PC3. With the Hammond on my side I have a bit more latitude in using the PC3 for other sounds and not relying on it for its Hammond (and particularly weak Leslie) sound, although as I said earlier, it's a very acceptable sound, especially when amped to a live audience.

[Dave Osoff]

Glad to hear so much positive feedback on the new Kurzweil PC3s. I had a lot of bad reliability and quality control experiences with some of their older keyboards, PC2, PC2x and some of the modules so I have stayed away from Kurzweil for years just for reliability reasons. Maybe I'll give them another look now.

[zemzem]

Hi guys, quite an old thread but...anyone has recorded something with pc3 + gsi burn? I'm still not sure if a burn is enough to improve the kurz tone or...if I have to save my money for a nord electro :-)

[ElmerJFudd]

You can't win this organ war... there's folks who feel Nord's organ engine isn't authentic - overly hyped interpretation of the Hammond organ sound. Also, plenty of forumites are done with the idea that you need a Vent or a Burn to improve on the most recent Leslie simulators opting for the internal sim on the SK line or HX3 or Mojo/61 as good enough and dropping the extra box and cables. Maybe the goodness of a dedicated pedal is splitting hairs. Only you can decide for yourself. However, you have a PC3 - maybe one of the pedals would be an improvement over the internal sim... But keep in mind you have other options as of the last week. Electro Harmonix has a $178 Lester K pedal people are liking and Hammond recently updated the firmware on the Leslie Cream Pedal which got very favorable response from Keyboard Mag in a recent Round Up. Hammond will also release a more affordable Leslie K variant variant this week at summer NAMM. Street price lower than Vent or Cream Pedal - MAP of $329. Definitely lower than the Vent and the Burn.

[zemzem]

ok Elmer, thanks for these infos... I'm not a "true" hammond player, I need a cool hammond sound to use in a band situation (progressive rock, basically..)...that's why I want to improve my overall sound with a pedal, and i'm trying not to buy an extra-keyboard ;-) . I'll have a look at those pedals, too

[MoodyBluesKeys]

Hi guys, quite an old thread but...anyone has recorded something with pc3 + gsi burn? I'm still not sure if a burn is enough to improve the kurz tone or...if I have to save my money for a nord electro :-)

 

On the Mastering VAST Forum, a forumite with a screen name of BillW came out with a PC3 patch that has about the best internal Leslie I've been able to find - I've used the Effect on just about all of my PC3's KB3 patches. Note: Disclosure, I am a moderator on the forums, and download requires paid membership ($6 AUS per year, not a princely amount).

 

I'm quite satisfied using the patch in band situations, the slow is excellent, the fast not quite as excellent. When I really need Hammond sounds for solo work, I either use my SK1 or iPad with Galileo or Korg Module.

 

PC3 makes a fine board for prog - I have all three sizes.

[Delaware Dave]

Is this good enough for your use?

 

[ElmerJFudd]

That's a good one. Seen it many times. Just goes to show you how much the "such and such blows it out of the water" talk around here needs to be taken with a grain of salt. And of course, it always pays to have a real Leslie.

[Delaware Dave]

If you listen to the video the leslie is a little phasey in the low rotor but there are ways to minimize that. Also, the KB3 is a little brighter than the B3, especially the upper drawbars. This can be somewhat adjusted by going into the 'Tonewl" page and changing the 'wheelvolmap' from 'bright' to 'mellow'. Also, decreasing the 'Uppervoladjust' also reduces the brightness/shrillness and can get it closer sounding to the hammond. Of course if you like it the way it is then no adjustment is required.

[zemzem]

thanks dave, nice suggestion.

[b3plyr]

If you listen to the video the leslie is a little phasey in the low rotor but there are ways to minimize that. Also, the KB3 is a little brighter than the B3, especially the upper drawbars. This can be somewhat adjusted by going into the 'Tonewl" page and changing the 'wheelvolmap' from 'bright' to 'mellow'. Also, decreasing the 'Uppervoladjust' also reduces the brightness/shrillness and can get it closer sounding to the hammond. Of course if you like it the way it is then no adjustment is required.

 

Excellent info and dead on. On another note (pun intended), take a listen to the Forte. The KB3 ToneReal is quite an improvement, particularly in that it doesn't rob polyphony. I'm using it in lieu of my Mojo in some cases.

[Rusty Mike]

Inspired by this thread, I decided to revisit connecting my PC361 to my BURN. Overall, it certainly improves the rotor simulation, but the improvement is incremental and a little convoluted.

 

First off, to properly map the MIDI controls from the PC3 to the BURN, you really need to be in setup mode. This allows you to match up the MIDI CC numbers. In my case, I want to control brake as well as fast/slow, and be able to turn the OD on/off and adjust the OD amount. I mapped brake to the foot pedal switch (I prefer the older Jimmy Smith style sound that uses C2/3 and brake/tremolo for a lot of jazz playing), fast/slow to the switch above the mod wheel, OD on/off to the ARP switch and the OD amount to the mod wheel. I don't recall the specific CC numbers I used, but that's not really important. One quirk is that the switches have to be in Momentary mode, and not Toggle, otherwise it takes two presses to turn things on and off. I don't know why.

 

Because I was in Setup mode to control the BURN, it was a bit awkward switching back and forth between Setup and Program modes to tweak the organ patch and then the controls. I created a program that uses a modified version of the KB3 effects, which drops the rotor half of the effect, and just keep the KB1 part to keep the C/V element (I believe this is described somewhere on the Mastering VAST forum). An odd piece of the Kurzweil KB3 architecture is that the C/V is part of the effect and not the KB3 construct itself; it's part of the first block in the Leslie emulation effect.

 

I still have a few bugs. The major one is a significant drop in loudness and bass in the program. In Program mode, the dry sound has a decent volume and a fairly beefy bottom end. That goes away once I reroute the output to the secondary (which is where the BURN is connected). Overall, I think the output of the BURN is kind of weak, even when connected to my old M3. I've messed with the output level on the BURN, as well as looked at the parameters on the PC3, but still haven't found the culprit.

 

The other thing about the BURN is that the OD is just way too hot. The tube will saturate very quickly, so it's either "clean amp" or "Jon Lord" mode. I still haven't figured out how to just get some nice crunch. I usually just keep the tube off.

 

Even after all that, I still don't think the PC3/BURN combo sounds as good as my Nord Electro 4D, and it's much more finicky to work with. I was hoping to get a satisfactory B3 sound so I could use the PC3 as my top board with the fusion band. That would give me more synth lead and pad capabilities. But I'm not happy with what I've been able to do so far.

 

On the flip side, I've been getting some pretty cool results out of the E4D using the sample library as well as some unique approaches to lead sounds with the tone wheel engine.