The arrogance of Yamaha?

[Threadslayer]

In my experience they have to occasionally put out fires and positive spin on whatever choices/policies Japan decides on.

I totally agree.

[allan_evett]

Looking back to the original post here, one thing that Phil taught me early on is that there simply isn't a perfect 'all-in-one' keyboard instrument; and, I doubt there ever will be. The three most comprehensive keyboards I own - a Forte 7, Kronos 61, and S90XS (formerly a Motif XF7) provide fantastic sound coverage, but I'd be hard pressed to pick just one as my 'desert island' electronic instrument.

Also, another point reinforced by Phil is that expecting an instrument to nail something that a specialized product does better is a dead end. Yeah, I did my share of bitching and moaning, early on, about the lack of a clonewheel in my Motif (thankfully Phil was patient with me); but ultimately just slapping a Voce module on top of the keyboard solved the problem, and I was able to stop wasting time and get back to making music.

 

I'm thankful that we have product specialists like BadMister; there are several, among musical instrument manufacturers, that have been invaluable in my music production journey. Always a learning experience to interact with them.

 

 

[Sven Golly]

Maybe its just me, but i saw this reaction from a Yamaha representative when someone inquired about only having 256 user memmory locations for arps, and not having a sampler ( or many of the other creative tools they took away from the Motif/Montage)

 

Bad Mister wrote:

 

No not really. People THINK they want to create their own arpeggios; people also THINK they want to create their own instruments (sample); the reality is that they purchase Libraries and they will be able to get new arpeggios either with those libraries or by loading them in. Not very limiting at all, actually.

 

I stress the word THINK, because creating your own arpeggios might seem to be an easy thing, until you have your first experience do so. If you are a Motif, Motif ES, XS or XF owner, how many (truthfully) arpeggios have you written. Even if your answer is 1000, you would be the exception not the rule. It is now February - the product ships in May. just saying.

 

To me this feels so much like arrogance... Because he is telling people that they dont know what they want and that they cant use those features anyway because they must be brainless... He is telling people that only Yamaha knows what they want and that they just should frack up, stop complaining, and buy the dang product and use it as Yamaha tells them to do..

 

They are taking away the creativity and giving people a childrens box with building blocks..

 

So let's just cut to the chase, shall we?

 

So, Bachus, how many arps have you created on your Kronos?

 

I mean, you must be an arp-creating fiend if this is important enough for you to complete paint an entire company (Yamaha) with a brush based on one person's statement...

 

So? Fess up. 500? 1000?

 

Something tells me I already know the answer.

 

Also, quoting someone, without proper context (ie. the post he was actually replying to, not just your paraphrasing of it, or at least linking to the discssion on whichever forum it occurred) is in very poor form.

[CEB]

I've created 1 arp in the last 12 months to build a mover bass line in Born This Way. I just wanted to play with Karma.

 

There is just better ways for me to do the things I could use Arps for. Usually loops I bring over from my PC to my hardware.

[EscapeRocks]

 

--------So let's just cut to the chase, shall we? ---------

 

 

 

This is exactly what I like about Bad Mister, and Sven!

 

No beating around the bush to answer a question.

 

Maybe it's me, but I've never had my feelings hurt reading direct or indirect answers to questions I, or others, have asked here or on any other internet site.

 

I read the information for what it is: INFORMATION.

 

I can then take the parts I like and cast aside the parts not useful to me, to come up with a more informed knowledge base for myself.

 

Often, when reading things from Phil(bad Mister) or Sven, I have learned new ways of thinking about things, and have never been made to feel belittled or dumb.

 

Hell, I've had Sven, who's helped me a lot over the years, call me out on something very basic that I asked about. Unlike some, I didn't go apoplectic. I realized, "duh, oh yeah..." and let him know I appreciated the slap upside the head to get my brain back on track.

 

Now, if I were to keep asking the same thing over, and over again, I'd expect the snarkiness to appear in future replies.

 

 

Back to Yamaha: Even thought the Montage is probably not for me at this time, I fully got what Phil was explaining, and didn't feel Yamaha, thru Phil was being arrogant.

[pjd]

Hi --

 

Back in the day, I did forum support for our product along with software development. I tried to be respectful and focus on the technical issue when replying. And still things would go awry. So many things go wrong when people try to communicate especially when two or more people don't share the same native language! Tone is easily misinterpreted.

 

Yeah, Phil is a good guy. His reply is consistent with pre-Montage comments when someone would ask about making user arpeggios.

 

After one such occasion, I decided to make a few arpeggios using a group of MIDI phrases that worked together musically. Yep, it was a fair bit of monkee work with a lot of button pushing. I wasn't a MOX-noob at that point either.

 

That experience raises a meta-question -- is this a chicken and egg situation? Do few people create user arpeggios because the Motif/MOX UI is clumsy to begin with?

 

All the best, pj

 

P.S. Hard coding the (number of) storage locations seems to be the Yamaha-way. malloc()? free()? Put it in the heap, man. Product-specific proprietary data formats is another annoyance. XML?

 

[steadyb]

Truth - and honesty in opinion - is sometimes a bitter pill to swallow.

 

...or a bitter herb.

 

Honest and popular don't go hand in hand.

 

For example, if you admit that you play the accordion, no one will hire you in a rock 'n' roll band.

[RABid]

I always thought arpeggios were just a tool to help one-note-wonders sell you a keyboard.

[Synthoid]

For example, if you admit that you play the accordion or a banjo, no one will hire you in a rock 'n' roll band.

 

Fixed that for ya.

[WesG]

Wait, so The Lumineers are not a rock band?

[MurMan]

That experience raises a meta-question -- is this a chicken and egg situation? Do few people create user arpeggios because the Motif/MOX UI is clumsy to begin with?

Yes, definitely.

 

I tried to create a few arps on the Kronos but the learning curve was tough. Keeping on the meta theme, I had bad karma Karma.

 

When I found out how easy arps are in Omnisphere, I started making them regularly. It's not that I create 1000's of them, it's just that when I need one, it's not a barrier. I just want to have tools that I can use. If I needed to create 1000's, I would invest more time with Karma and maybe find that it's a better tool.

[Synthoid]

I tried to create a few arps on the Kronos but the learning curve was tough.

 

If I needed to create 1000's, I would invest more time with Karma and maybe find that it's a better tool.

 

Please share any KARMA tips and tricks with the forum.

 

 

[MurMan]

I tried to create a few arps on the Kronos but the learning curve was tough.

 

If I needed to create 1000's, I would invest more time with Karma and maybe find that it's a better tool.

Please share any KARMA tips and tricks with the forum.

Purely hypothetical. I thought that the 'would' and 'maybe' was enough CYA language. Maybe I should have added "... in the unlikely event that I understand it."

[David Emm]

I always thought arpeggios were just a tool to help one-note-wonders sell you a keyboard.

 

They can drive you batsh*t-crazy, can't they? However, the bad rep arps have is based on the overuse of their most mechanical aspects. E-mu's old modules offered several ways to humanize them, such as a knob that would play the basic rhythm at the 8 o'clock position, but at 4 or 5, it could sound like Tito Puentes being pushed off a cliff rig-first. It was PLAYABLE. You can use a slow arp to drive white noise for natural-sounding waves and wind, as well as all sorts of abstract madness from LFO-enhanced 'event' sounds. I once labored over a tabla loop by hand, with busy and minimalist sections. Once I got it running, gently sweeping the filter and reverb made it an organic keeper. Its not all about 8-bar patterns. You can create the Lockstepped Chords of Doom, apply a pipe organ-ish sound to them and do all of your other wailing over that. Its prog-y fun. Its easy to lose track of their merits when 95% of the time, they're percolating away behind a Daft Punk cover. Also, running one at a high speed can turn it into the sound of a recital at a high school on a planet based on silicon rather than carbon. I have to imagine that part, as I am only based on carbon and bagels.

 

 

 

[burningbusch]

Seeing as we've digressed...

 

Yamaha's use of the term arpeggio to mean things far beyond the common definition has long bugged me. In Yamaha's world, drum patterns are arps, as are bass lines and even controller movements. If someone asked me to, I wouldn't begin to know how to program a drum arpeggio. What's that, a flam? A better term would have been patterns: drum patterns, bass patterns, note patterns (arps), controller patterns. I do understand they use pattern to mean something else, but that's a pretty easy fix. You might say this is just semantics, but when people are trying to learn these very deep keyboards confusing terminology doesn't help. In the KARMA world, everything is a Generate Effect (GE) with categories of arps, seqs, drum patterns, controller, etc.

 

When you actually get down to programming, both Yamaha arps and KARMA GEs use pretty much a one-size-fits-all approach, which if you spend a lot of time working with either has its advantages I suppose. I do think most people would prefer and more readily use an interface more appropriate to the task. For example, if you're programming drum patterns, the x0x matrix is well understood, that's all you need and anything more just gets in the way. Similarly, arps/seqs tend to follow the TB303 interface. As mentioned above, Omnisphere is especially powerful yet easy to use for this. I've always like the one in FM8 (screenshot below). Parameters like note order and transpose turn an arpeggiator into something like a quasi-sequencer. Also note the Random option for each parameter!

 

http://www.fm8tutorials.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/arpy.png

 

In making the Famous Synth sounds for the Kronos I think I created three new KARMA GEs. I used the KARMA software to do this. Mostly I used the step sequencers of which there are three in an AL-1 program.

 

Rather than a global space for X number of user arps, my preference would be to store (true) arps/seqs and drum patterns on the program/patch level. You can always copy from one program to the next.

 

Busch.

 

[DanL]

I did use 1 arp on my S70XS, it took me a long time of scrolling thru them to find one that works, for the acoustic guitar part on "Torn" by Natalie Imbruglia. I had it trigger every time I pressed the keys so we didn't need a click track for the drummer. It was very effective and was almost an exact copy of what was playing on the recording.

 

I haven't found that in my FA08, nothing came close. For that matter, I couldn't even find a straight 8th not triplet one to do a synth arp in Uprising by Muse. Every one has some kind of swing to it or little varation that makes it useless. It took me 2 seconds to do it on my Nord, but unfortunately, I don't use that in this band's rig.

[WesG]

Can Motif "arpeggios" be used to fake the intro chromatic in "Turn Me Loose"? Does Montage have stepped portamento?

[Mogut]

Let me just say this, Badmister is the only person on the planet that knows exactly what motif users are doing and struggling with. This guy has tirelessly and relentlessly answered questions about the motif every friggin day for 15 years. The same questions over and over and over again. He has answered and dealt with every single possible issue that a consumer could think of..... thousands of times over

 

So yeah.... if badmister says users didnt use this feature, the SOB is right!!

 

When badmister writes a blog or answers a question.... you listen and learn. End of disscussion

[MotiDave]

Let me just say this, Badmister is the only person on the planet that knows exactly what motif users are doing and struggling with. This guy has tirelessly and relentlessly answered questions about the motif every friggin day for 15 years. The same questions over and over and over again. He has answered and dealt with every single possible issue that a consumer could think of..... thousands of times over

 

So yeah.... if badmister says users didnt use this feature, the SOB is right!!

 

When badmister writes a blog or answers a question.... you listen and learn. End of disscussion

 

agree.

[Danny Linguini]

Lots of good and helpful info over there, but damm that forum engine is a major piece of crap. Slow, cumbersome, and navigation is nonexistent. And I have to log in on every visit. You'd think they could come up with something a little more up to date and user-friendly.

[synthizen2]

... if you admit that you play the accordion, no one will hire you in a rock 'n' roll band.

 

Hey, I resemble that remark!

 

Yup, I started out as an 8-year-old "Weird Al" and then evolved to "normal" keyboard instruments from there. I just didn't have Al's knack for preposterous snarky humor.

[Danny Linguini]

... if you admit that you play the accordion, no one will hire you in a rock 'n' roll band.

 

Hey, I resemble that remark!

 

Yup, I started out as an 8-year-old "Weird Al" and then evolved to "normal" keyboard instruments from there. I just didn't have Al's knack for preposterous snarky humor.

I did, too, except I was 9. After 10 years of it I grew to hate the instrument. Started banging on the piano at home, at school, and anywhere else I could find one that wasn't anywhere near tomoatoes and quickly left that childhood trauma far behind. I did have a good teacher, though, who gave me a good foundation in theory as well as a broad variety of classical and 'gig' music, all of which has been greatly helpful over the years.

 

And now back to our regularly scheduled thread topic ...

[Synthoid]

I tried to create a few arps on the Kronos but the learning curve was tough.

 

If I needed to create 1000's, I would invest more time with Karma and maybe find that it's a better tool.

Please share any KARMA tips and tricks with the forum.

Purely hypothetical. I thought that the 'would' and 'maybe' was enough CYA language. Maybe I should have added "... in the unlikely event that I understand it."

 

Every little bit helps.

 

KARMA is about as fun as the convoluted Yamaha OS.

 

 

[I-missRichardTee]

Have not read this thread, but decided to pile on the Yamaha thread since i am quite annoyed with my experience with there $5000 Tyros 4

 

I switched from the mid range Psr 900 to the $5000 model tyros 4

one of the reasons was the tyros 4 has dedicated volume sliders for each part that the per 900 lacks. The 900 only has buttons to raise and lower volume of each part.

 

But dig this, in the year 2013 when I bought it, this piece of shite has th worst volume sliders in memory.

The volume sliders on my Roland JV1000 had perfect volume sliders over 20 years ago

The T4 has wildly erratic responses to movement of the sliders

It takes great calmness and patience, sort of like trying to catch a house fly, to successfully effect a decrescendo or crescendo with this piece of crap t4.

 

[Threadslayer]

 

KARMA is about as fun as the convoluted Yamaha OS.

 

Going to the dentist is MORE fun than the convoluted Yamaha OS.

[Danny Linguini]

Have not read this thread, but decided to pile on the Yamaha thread since i am quite annoyed with my experience with there $5000 Tyros 4

 

I switched from the mid range Psr 900 to the $5000 model tyros 4

one of the reasons was the tyros 4 has dedicated volume sliders for each part that the per 900 lacks. The 900 only has buttons to raise and lower volume of each part.

 

But dig this, in the year 2013 when I bought it, this piece of shite has th worst volume sliders in memory.

The volume sliders on my Roland JV1000 had perfect volume sliders over 20 years ago

The T4 has wildly erratic responses to movement of the sliders

It takes great calmness and patience, sort of like trying to catch a house fly, to successfully effect a decrescendo or crescendo with this piece of crap t4.

 

I wonder if what you're sensing with the sliders is what I've experienced on the CP4. What I've found is that the slider value is fixed depending on the slider position, and not the current value of the parameter you're editing. The result is that the slider will either feel incredibly jumpy or slow to respond, depending on whether it's initial position is higher or lower than the parameter value.

 

Example 1: parameter has possible values from 0-127, currently set to 120, slider is at the mid point when you go into the parameter. You want to raise it to 127, so you start raising the slider forward, but nothing happens until the slider reaches the position around where 120 is before the value moves, until which time it feels like it's not responding.

 

Example 2: same parameter, but it's currently set to 50. slider is already about 80% up. You want to raise the value to 80, but because the slider is already so far up, the value 'jumps' to 100', making it feel like it's really twitchy.

 

Just throwing it out there -- it may not be what you're experiencing. But it's still an example of where perpetual knobs would make better controllers for some parameters than sliders. I've kinda gotten used to it on the CP4 and at this point I wouldn't want to change it, but it can still catch me off guard when I'm tweaking something live like a layer level.

[I-missRichardTee]

Thank you for that. All I know is even after you "reset" the faders by moving them

they still remain erratic , hard to gently control no matter how many times you have moved it.

[Reezekeys]

Example 1: parameter has possible values from 0-127, currently set to 120, slider is at the mid point when you go into the parameter. You want to raise it to 127, so you start raising the slider forward, but nothing happens until the slider reaches the position around where 120 is before the value moves, until which time it feels like it's not responding.

 

Example 2: same parameter, but it's currently set to 50. slider is already about 80% up. You want to raise the value to 80, but because the slider is already so far up, the value 'jumps' to 100', making it feel like it's really twitchy.

What you're describing are two different way of editing parameters, "soft takeover" vs "absolute." It's hard to imagine that Yamaha would implement both in the same instrument. Is that what you're saying? Here is a good definition of soft takeover.

[MotiDave]

Yamaha design is so that when you switch from Voice 1 to Voice 2, the new voice isn't affected by wherever the sliders are currently, randomly sitting at. I don't move the sliders when I switch from one program to another, except in a few rare cases, I pre-program the sliders to where I want them so I get the same exact sound every time I call it up. trying to set the sliders exactly at a specific exact value is pretty hard to do while playing live.

 

While having to pass the current set point for the slider to become actively controlling that parameter may seem a bother, the alternative of not knowing what your Voice, Performance, etc will even sound like when you punch it up would be far worse imo.

 

i get why they do that, i concur with that design decision. ymmv

[MurMan]

i get why they do that, i concur with that design decision. ymmv

Me too.

 

I used to play a Motif XS and had the pleasure of explaining this concept several times to non-pro Motif owners. It was fun watching the light go on in their heads when I pointed out the little red triangles (which show the preset setting) on the slider display graphics.