Hammond M-Solo

[AnotherScott]

 

[niacin]

He says from time to time that he's sure you can plug it into a computer and change various settings - organ model, keyclick level etc. - which you can't.  Would have taken no more than a few minutes to read the manual.

[AnotherScott]

Yeah, some wishful thinking there. Especially since, to my knowledge, Hammond has never made a model that had any outboard editor. But I thought the video was useful for its audio demonstrations.

[Baldwin Funster]

UK  Nick Foleys videos are similar to Jack Duxbury in that they are only meant to be quick first impressions like what it would be like if you unboxed a keyboard and just got 10 minutes to get a couple of sounds before it was time to go. Like if you walked into Andertons and saw it on the wall. Which is what it's like in most music shoppes. If you want depth go to Sonicstate.

[Adan]

I'm done with "first impression" videos.  Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me a 50th time . . .

[Delaware Dave]

I generally find his reviews lacking, also i find him difficult to understand as to what he is saying, he has this weird combination of mumbling and fast talking that frustrates me.

[AnotherScott]

There was a lot of talk here about its lack of support for double manual and how you might work around it... One more way could be to buy a pair of them... you'd practically have a 16 pound double manual clonewheel! I'd use a stand that would allow me to stack one over the other, with the front of the top one's keys aligned with the rear or the bottom one's keys, with some inches of vertical spacing between, basically just enough for me to reach in-and-under the top manual to grab its drawbars. Use a pair of flat sustain pedals mounted to a a small piece of wood so you can easily operate them both simultaneously, so the rotary changes for the two would happen together. I don't need this, but part of me is tempted just because I think it would be cool!  Hmmm... which color? Or one of each? 😉

[stoken6]

5 hours ago, AnotherScott said:

buy a pair of them... you'd practically have a 16 pound double manual clonewheel! I'd use a stand that would allow me to stack one over the other

Presumably you'd offset the two boards by an octave, in honour of the M3?

5 hours ago, AnotherScott said:

Use a pair of flat sustain pedals mounted to a a small piece of wood so you can easily operate them both simultaneously

Or, if you're brave/handy with a soldering iron, wire a dual-throw switch to a pair of TS cables?

 

Cheers, Mike.

[JoJoB3]

5 hours ago, AnotherScott said:

There was a lot of talk here about its lack of support for double manual and how you might work around it... 

It doesn't have basic MIDI functionality?

Yeah, again this should be their 3-figure product. Feels like a missed opportunity.

[Delaware Dave]

I think the intention of the product is for people who want a good hammond emulation but only use the sound occassionally and dont want to add a larger, heavier additional keyboard to achieve it. Also for people who use public transportation and need something lightweight. I actually think that it is a smart offering; they missed the price point as they always do. Hammond seems to think that they can command a premium price on everything they sell, the Cadillac brand if you will.  Pedals, benches, lower manuals, leslies, everything is priced at a premium.  The problem is that their line of products are not head and shoulders above the rest of the market.  This keyboard should have been priced at $600-700  It is currently listed at sweetwater for $1295. The Crumar Mojo is currently listed at Thomanns for $1185. A full manual of keys (61 vs. 49), splittable, lower manual available, highly adjustable,  new Yamaha CFX piano, rhodes, wurli and clav. 25 pounds isnt a back breaker. The advantage of the M Solo is the size and weight.  Pricepoint makes little sense to me.

[AnotherScott]

4 hours ago, stoken6 said:

Presumably you'd offset the two boards by an octave, in honour of the M3?

Although I definitely appreciate that nod toward authenticity, I think I'd keep it compact and pretend I'm just playing the top 4 octaves of a B3.  Really, when I played a double-manual in a band context, I'm not sure how much I used the bottom octaves anyway, outside of the occasional windmill and similar dramatic effects. 😉

 

5 hours ago, JoJoB3 said:

It doesn't have basic MIDI functionality?

It does. But it doesn't have the ability to play one sound from the internal keys and another sound (e.g. different drawbar settings) from external keys.

 

10 minutes ago, Delaware Dave said:

I think the intention of the product is for people who want a good hammond emulation but only use the sound occassionally and dont want to add a larger, heavier additional keyboard to achieve it. Also for people who use public transportation and need something lightweight. I actually think that it is a smart offering; they missed the price point as they always do. Hammond seems to think that they can command a premium price on everything they sell, the Cadillac brand if you will.  Pedals, benches, lower manuals, leslies, everything is priced at a premium.  The problem is that their line of products are not head and shoulders above the rest of the market.  This keyboard should have been priced at $600-700  It is currently listed at sweetwater for $1295. The Crumar Mojo is currently listed at Thomanns for $1185. A full manual of keys (61 vs. 49), splittable, lower manual available, highly adjustable,  new Yamaha CFX piano, rhodes, wurli and clav. 25 pounds isnt a back breaker. The advantage of the M Solo is the size and weight.  Pricepoint makes little sense to me.

About a $100 difference at Thomann, closer to a $300 difference here in the states (sweetwater). But yeah, either way. Crumar has always tended to be a good value (unlike Hammond, as you point out). I wonder if part of it could be that their cost of Fatar actions is lower than for companies located elsewhere (both companies being in Italy). And Hammond's sales presumably have to support more people/overhead than Crumar's sales do.

 

Regardless, yeah, it's a bit pricey, but then again, nothing else quite fills its niche. Even the VR09 and CK61 are more than 50% heavier (topping 12 lbs instead of under 8 ) and probably don't sound as good, if all you're looking for out of them is organ (sound always being somewhat subjective). They also don't have the same operational ergonomics (i.e. drawbars that are sized, shaped, and spaced as an organ player expects... plus the VR's are too stiff). And one thing the Hammond has over any of them (including the Mojo) is the multi-contact emulation, which will appeal to some.

 

But ultimately, whether Hammond sells them in the numbers they projected will determine whether or not they priced it correctly, from their perspective at least. It's always easier to lower prices than raise them. Maybe Hammond just felt it was unique enough that they could sell enough at this price... and if they find that sales aren't meeting expectations, they always have the option of lowering the price, within whatever latitude they do have.

 

On 10/1/2023 at 3:40 PM, stoken6 said:

Would pair nicely with something like a Casio CT-S500 or Roland DS61 - if the price is right. 

Price aside... I like the CT-S500 pairing idea. A super light and compact duo that could cover most stuff pretty decently, considering that of the main b&b sounds, I consider organ to be the CT-S500's weakness. 

 

As much as I like the DS61, I just can't happily play piano on it, so it wouldn't work for me in this case.

[Adan]

Crumar arguably does offer some of the best value available. I'm a huge Crumar fan, having owned 3 of the keyboards (still have 2 of them). I think Crumar cuts corners on quality of materials, and I've had issues with mine. Hasn't stopped me from getting tons of great use out of them, but I can see in part how they're achieving lower prices.

 

Comparing a US price on one product to a Thomanns price on a different product isn't super helpful. The Crumar Desktop sells for $949, the Mojo 61 for $1579. If we accept, for purposes of conversation, that Crumar is a price leader, how can we hypothesize a 4-octave clone for $700? At the very least, you're adding a keyboard onto the Desktop.  Maybe Crumar could piece one together for $1150? But that's just an attempt at objective triangulation. In the end, the only thing that matters is what it's worth to you. I think Hammond rolled the dice with the M-Solo. As Scott said, they can always drop the price if units are just sitting on shelves.

[Baldwin Funster]

If I didn't have the organ thing already covered many times over, mostly in software but not totally,

I would be tempted more. But I just don't need to bring in another keyboard in the house on a GAS impulse.  The synth keys probably are the the tipping point against. 

[Delaware Dave]

2 hours ago, AnotherScott said:

I wonder if part of it could be that their cost of Fatar actions is lower than for companies located elsewhere (both companies being in Italy). And Hammond's sales presumably have to support more people/overhead than Crumar's sales do. 

 

1 hour ago, Adan said:

Crumar arguably does offer some of the best value available. I'm a huge Crumar fan, having owned 3 of the keyboards (still have 2 of them). I think Crumar cuts corners on quality of materials, and I've had issues with mine. Hasn't stopped me from getting tons of great use out of them, but I can see in part how they're achieving lower prices.

 

 

Here's my theory on this: Crumar offers basic features where others offer more. I believe this allows them to then keep the price down. A couple examples:  No dedicated organ out of the Gemini module nor the Mojo; no 11 pin for an external leslie.  They offer an 11 pin accessory sold separately; mojo is mono timbral so although they offer non organ sounds they cant be played simultaneously; one set of drawbars rather than two, you can purchase a 2nd set of drawbars as an accessory if you really need them.  This makes sense to me, why pay a markup on a keyboard for features you may not ever use.  So if you later want to use an 11 pin leslie then buy the accessory but why pay for an accessory that you don't need?  This has been my unsubstantiated theory on their lower than typical price points. 

 

As far as quality I believe they have switched parts suppliers and since doing that their 'complaints' have substantially decreased. I had big issues with the gemini module, when the new internal boards were received they had to be retrofitted into the unit. The new boards came from a new supplier and .... not one single problem since the new parts were installed a few years ago.

 

[AnotherScott]

On 4/16/2024 at 9:25 AM, Delaware Dave said:

{Mojo has} A full manual of keys (61 vs. 49), splittable, lower manual available, highly adjustable,  new Yamaha CFX piano, rhodes, wurli and clav. 25 pounds isnt a back breaker. The advantage of the M Solo is the size and weight. 

Funny, while 25 lbs doesn't sound like a lot, I'm reminded from another thread about how I picked up a 13 lb Liano because I didn't always want to deal with my usual 25 lb 88-key hammer action piano options if I could find something suitable at that much less weight... and I suspect it will probably be the piano I most often gig with now.

 

Obviously, the M-Solo is targeted at people who would prioritize size/weight over the ability to play two organ registrations at the same time (whether via a split or a lower manual)... I think that might be the clearest distinction between the Mojo vs the MSolo. That, and the fact that the Mojo can possibly be your only board (with its pianos/EPs), whereas MSolo really wants to be a second board... though if you intend to use the Mojo over a piano board anyway, that distinction isn't so important. But to the main point here,  I don't know what percentage of potential single-manual organ customers would pick the ability to play 2 drawbar registrations at once over super light weight.

 

ETA: I can see there being both markets, and Hammond has the lightest entry. For the other category of customer, Hammond's answer to the Mojo61 is the XK-1c. Mojo has its advantages over the XK1c as well, but also the reverse... the XK-1c is also a 3-zone MIDI controller, has more preset recall buttons, and weighs just 16.5 lbs. 

 

ETA: For the player who wants lightest possible weight and still the ability to play two registrations (split or dual manual), that option is the Roland VR-09, which is actually cheaper than the M-Solo, and far more versatile than either the M-Solo or the Mojo61. But it's still over 50% heavier than the M-Solo and quite a bit larger, has lesser organ/rotary emulation, no multi-contact emulation, compromised drawbar and front panel control design, and my personal pet peeve, no way to instantly get to the sound represented by the current position of the drawbars. But it's a high value board for other reasons.

 

If you want both lower-than-Mojo weight and the ability to play two organ registrations at the same time, for another option, we can also go back to my earlier post about using a pair of M-Solos. The two together still weigh quite a bit less than a Mojo (and even a bit less than the XK-1C!), and gives you two 49-key manuals, pretty much negating the "splittable, lower manual available" Mojo advantages you list. Plus you can bring just one on the gigs that don't really need the second. Kinda cool. But yeah, it's pricey, no doubt, comparing a pair of M-Solo to a single Mojo61 (or XK-1C) where you either split the board or use your existing piano board (or whatever) as your second manual.

 

But here's another wrinkle, for someone who really likes the idea of the part-time double manual. Yes, a pair of MSolo at $2600 is a lot more expensive than a Mojo, but less than $300 more than a Mojo with its optional lower manual, Sure, the Mojo gives you a pair of 61s instead of 49s. But the Hammond pair is under 16 lbs total, and the Crumar pair is almost 43 lbs total. And the Hammond pair gives you two sets of drawbars and multi-contact simulation. Not an unreasonable alternative, I think. But the Mojo does give you the pianos, whereas with the pair of MSolo, you're more likely to need another board, and a triple stack (even a small and light one) can get a bit more complicated in setup/ergonomics.

 

ETA: The pair of M-Solo is a bit pricier than Mojo Classic Double Manual, which should give you the best double-manual experience of the bunch... but it's a single piece that weighs almost 40 lbs.

 

Still, this is all just some idle fun brainstorming. I won't know how I actually feel about playing an M-Solo (much less a pair) until I get my hands on it. 🙂

 

 

[AnotherScott]

Some more video...

 

Bonner's... the first minute alone is a nice organ demo; and then some nice demo of non-organ functionality starting at 5:40.

 

 

 

And, okay, this is totally unfair, but here's the M-Solo through a Leslie 122 compared to a C3 through the same Leslie. I think the similarity is impressive, to the point that, sonically, this is probably in the range of about as good anything (at least in terms of sounding like this particular C3), up to the point of the Leslie sim, anyway. (Note that when he runs through the CV settings, the high drawbars on the two on not set exactly the same, so you just want to compare the effect and factor out that slight difference in tone.) If you just want to hear the comparisons without all the setup and commentary, you want 2:35 to 4:50, 7:00 to 9:15, 10:00 to 11:35, and 12:15 to 16:25. The biggest difference I heard was at 10:25 where the real thing is spittier (though other sections of that percussion comparison are virtually indistinguishable). I guess I'd also say the real one sometimes exhibits a bit more midrange beefiness. But really, I think this is darn good. Next I'd like to hear a comparison of the M-Solo's internal sim vs. a Vent...

 

 

[stoken6]

I didn't realise the M-solo didn't have waterfall keys. Does it have high trigger?

 

The synth is more powerful than I expected, but it desperately needs real pitch/mod wheels. The topic of a "organ+VA" board has come up before here, and this is the closest I've seen.

 

Cheers, Mike.

[AnotherScott]

24 minutes ago, stoken6 said:

Does it have high trigger?

 

Yes (though not over MIDI).

[stoken6]

1 hour ago, stoken6 said:

Does it have high trigger?

 

1 hour ago, AnotherScott said:

Yes (though not over MIDI).

And is it velocity-sensitive over MIDI? (I know I could RTFM...)

 

Cheers, Mike.

[AnotherScott]

it appears to send velocity over MIDI only when you have its tonewheel organ mode engaged (in that mode, the organ engine itself uses velocity to alter the performance of the virtual multi-contact feature).

[AnotherScott]

Here's someone playing my double-manual idea, but not on a very good stand for it! But wow, watch this 11 year old play...

 

 

 

I also like this one, just some casual thing in what looks like a showroom, no fancy setup...

 

 

[AnotherScott]

On 4/17/2024 at 12:41 AM, AnotherScott said:

ETA: For the player who wants lightest possible weight and still the ability to play two registrations (split or dual manual), that option is the Roland VR-09

 

I forgot, the CK61 does this too, they're about the same weight (12.25 lbs, 12.5 lbs). Pretty much the same trade-offs (compared to the M-Solo) that I listed for the VR.