Stereo Graphic EQ for live keyboard?

[scottasin]

I've always wanted a graphic eq guitar pedal for my Rhodes to really get the tone where I'd like it, and as I'm starting to look into it I notice that none of them have stereo I/O on them. I figure if I'm gonna get one I oughtta get something I can use for my piano sound even if I'm not bringing the Rhodes along, I know with a good EQ available I can really make myself sit in a mix better, as we're often running our own sound right now and the board has very minimal controls. Do you all know of anything I could use both between my Privia and a soundboard or my Rhodes and a guitar amp, or are those too different of applications? I really don't like the piano sound I have mixed to mono, I've listened to room recordings of it both ways and vastly prefer stereo, so I don't want to give that up.

 

I imagine I might have to go the rackmount route, which seems like a pricey step into a new world of music gear that I'm not sure I should take.

[AnotherScott]

Rhodes is typically a mono instrument, albeit often with stereo effects. So maybe a mono EQ can sit between your Rhodes and your other fx?

[Reezekeys]

Rhodes is typically a mono instrument, albeit often with stereo effects. So maybe a mono EQ can sit between your Rhodes and your other fx?

I figure if I'm gonna get one I oughtta get something I can use for my piano sound even if I'm not bringing the Rhodes along

[AnotherScott]

Rhodes is typically a mono instrument, albeit often with stereo effects. So maybe a mono EQ can sit between your Rhodes and your other fx?

I figure if I'm gonna get one I oughtta get something I can use for my piano sound even if I'm not bringing the Rhodes along

Sorry, I left out the rest... The Privia has pretty flexible EQ in it for that alternate scenario, have you had a chance to play with that? (It has 3-band parametric as a DSP effect plus 4 band master EQ where the two mids are also parametric.)

 

Back to the other, I have no experience with EQ pedals, but if the entire issue is that they are only mono, then I suppose you could also just buy a pair of them...?

[Reezekeys]

Yea I don't think a stereo EQ pedal exists. Googling brings up a few other attempts at finding one.

[AnotherScott]

p.s. -- for some reason, I assumed the Privia was a PX5S, which has that EQ. If it's some other model, the EQ options there may be more limited (or non-existent)

[WesG]

Get a 1U 2x15ch GEQ and a 4U Levy Rack bag.

 

You can fill the other 3Us with other handy goodies...like a Furmann power bar, 1U mixer, and Lexicon MX400.

[Doerfler]

Do you all know of anything I could use both between my Privia and a soundboard or my Rhodes and a guitar amp, or are those too different of applications?

 

to me, those are very different applications. I run my Rhodes into a Fender Twin Reverb, use the EQ on the amp only.

DP into anything else is completely different. As always, Scott, YMMV, but I've been playing a Rhodes since 1977 so I feel I have a good handle on this.

 

Damn, just realized that it's been 40 years.

[I-missRichardTee]

Do you all know of anything I could use both between my Privia and a soundboard or my Rhodes and a guitar amp, or are those too different of applications?

 

to me, those are very different applications. I run my Rhodes into a Fender Twin Reverb, use the EQ on the amp only.

DP into anything else is completely different. As always, Scott, YMMV, but I've been playing a Rhodes since 1977 so I feel I have a good handle on this.

 

Damn, just realized that it's been 40 years.

 

That was my gut feeling too... but you are way ahead of me.

 

But the Twin Reverb you use...how much does it weigh? My old bandmate used one with replacement speakers that made it ungodly heavy.

[WesG]

They are pretty heavy without any speakers at all!

 

Sort of on topic - I don't have any time in on the real deal, but I'm pretty fond of the Fender Twin amp model in the CP4, and use it for both Wurli and Rhodes sounds a lot. Have you guys tried it?

 

Another CP4 feature I've grown to find indispensable is the graphic equalizer, so I understand the desire to have a standalone unit! Just the other night, I set up in a mid-sized room in a country club with high-ish ceilings and wood-covered walls. It was really boomy, so I EQd the piano to pull some of the boominess out. Then the patrons filled up the room and acted as bass traps, ruining my bottom end; I was able to re-EQ mid-song to compensate. Strange room, never heard anything that dramatic before.

[The Real MC]

Do you all know of anything I could use both between my Privia and a soundboard or my Rhodes and a guitar amp, or are those too different of applications?

 

to me, those are very different applications. I run my Rhodes into a Fender Twin Reverb, use the EQ on the amp only.

DP into anything else is completely different. As always, Scott, YMMV, but I've been playing a Rhodes since 1977 so I feel I have a good handle on this.

 

Damn, just realized that it's been 40 years.

 

That was my gut feeling too... but you are way ahead of me.

 

But the Twin Reverb you use...how much does it weigh? My old bandmate used one with replacement speakers that made it ungodly heavy.

 

Twin Reverb can be a heavy amp but the Dual Showman Reverb (not the Showman or Dual Showman) is the head version, exact same amp and cheaper. Separate head and cabinet can lighten the weight.

 

I monkey with a lot of amps and outboard EQ/processing on my Rhodes, but when you don't need stereo a plain old Fender Twin Reverb amp with a phaser just seems to work. Make sure you use "Input 1" jack as the other jack will suck tone. The pickups in the Rhodes are very sensitive to input impedance which will impact their tone, even different DIs will change the tone.

 

Fender changed pickups multiple times over the production era of Rhodes. I've owned four of them and the mid-late 70s ones sound dull and muddy, while my favorites are the earlier ones. No experience with 80s Rhodes.

[scottasin]

just getting back to this, we did a quick demo recording session today (really really rough, 4 hours, no perfect takes, real imperfect recording gear, but we just need something to share) and haven't had a chance to look back all day.

 

I've got an older Privia model, no EQ to speak of, but I do really like the piano and wurli sounds, action is great, and the onboard speakers are a huge plus since I'm in a relatively quiet band these days.

 

As for my amp, I've got a Fender Super Champ X2 head running into a 10 inch Kustom PA speaker with a tweeter. Considering thats far from a guitar cab, I'm really happy with how it sounds and that I can use something I already own. On the amp face, its only a 2 band EQ, and it works fairly well, but my Rhodes has a pretty all over the place signal, and some finer control could really help. Also, the signal out of my Rhodes is REALLY hot and has been known to overdrive preamps in the past, and having a separate gain control on an EQ would help bring my level down. I hate playing with the Rhodes dial set a 2.

 

In all reality I need to pop it open and readjust all my tines/pickups, but this also seems like a feasible solution, the addition of tube amp has improved my sound drastically already. That said, I think I could get it right where I want it if I had acces to a good EQ before the amp. I've messed around with modelers in DSPs, and EQing the dry signal to be as close to what I want before I send it into an amp modeler is what gives my my most dynamic tone.

 

The reason I'd like it for my is that, although the Privia's piano is top notch, sometimes it fills in too much low end, and the EQ on our mixer does a poor job of doing the job I'm imagining. I'm also riding my volume knob a lot for switching between backing and solos, and if I had some sort of different tonal option, I could use a pedal to switch between the two tones. I don't think a pedal exists for EQing the piano in stereo though.

Get a 1U 2x15ch GEQ and a 4U Levy Rack bag.

 

You can fill the other 3Us with other handy goodies...like a Furmann power bar, 1U mixer, and Lexicon MX400.

googled that EQ and didn't turn anything up, got a link?

Do you all know of anything I could use both between my Privia and a soundboard or my Rhodes and a guitar amp, or are those too different of applications?

 

to me, those are very different applications. I run my Rhodes into a Fender Twin Reverb, use the EQ on the amp only.

DP into anything else is completely different. As always, Scott, YMMV, but I've been playing a Rhodes since 1977 so I feel I have a good handle on this.

 

Damn, just realized that it's been 40 years.

 

That was my gut feeling too... but you are way ahead of me.

 

But the Twin Reverb you use...how much does it weigh? My old bandmate used one with replacement speakers that made it ungodly heavy.

 

Twin Reverb can be a heavy amp but the Dual Showman Reverb (not the Showman or Dual Showman) is the head version, exact same amp and cheaper. Separate head and cabinet can lighten the weight.

 

I monkey with a lot of amps and outboard EQ/processing on my Rhodes, but when you don't need stereo a plain old Fender Twin Reverb amp with a phaser just seems to work. Make sure you use "Input 1" jack as the other jack will suck tone. The pickups in the Rhodes are very sensitive to input impedance which will impact their tone, even different DIs will change the tone.

 

Fender changed pickups multiple times over the production era of Rhodes. I've owned four of them and the mid-late 70s ones sound dull and muddy, while my favorites are the earlier ones. No experience with 80s Rhodes.

My amp is a little 25 watter, with my band it could maybe work unmiced on a stage without getting too crunchy, but with most I'd have to mic it. I wonder about the input impedance, I've got a 1980 MKII Suitecase converted to a standalone with a Vintage Vibe cheekblock iirc. Active pre-amp, although I could also go straight out of the harp and not plug it in, but its so goddamn bassy it would sound horrible. I generally have the EQ set with bass down 80%-90% and treble boosted 60-70 (it gets hissy after that). Even after that, I pull down the lows and boost the highs on the amp.

[The Real MC]

I wonder about the input impedance, I've got a 1980 MKII Suitecase converted to a standalone with a Vintage Vibe cheekblock iirc. Active pre-amp, although I could also go straight out of the harp and not plug it in, but its so goddamn bassy it would sound horrible. I generally have the EQ set with bass down 80%-90% and treble boosted 60-70 (it gets hissy after that). Even after that, I pull down the lows and boost the highs on the amp.

 

Yup, that's input impedance sucking highs and mids. The song impedance can also make the pickups noisy.

 

Input impedance spec on an amp can be sneaky - what they don't tell you is that the impedance varies with frequency and they don't map it on a graph. It may be 1M impedance at 400z but 10K impedance at 4K, which is where the highs disappear.

 

The counteraction between the input impedance of the amp and the pickup coils on the rhodes has a big factor in the sound too.

 

My rhodes is an old sparkletop that is missing the preamp electronics so I have to go straight off the harp. I have a lot of gear - amps, mixers, DIs, outboard - and my rhodes is PICKY about what it is connected to. It doesn't even like my Mackie mixer. But it likes my Countryman Type 10 DI (10M input impedance), Fender DSR, and an old Selmer british guitar amp.

[WesG]

re. foot pedal EQ - use an A/B switch or something to switch paths

 

re. input impedance - it might be worthwhile adding something like an Art Tube Pre as a buffer between your Rhodes and whatever EQ/effects/etc you are running if you really want to run them before your amp. (Any chance your amp has an effects insert? That would probably be a better solution)