Hammond's new B3

[bg]

Excerpts about the new B3 from the Hammond website: http://users.belgacombusiness.net/hammond/new-b3.htm

 

Sound generator system

The unique B3 sound is reproduced by a revolutionary newly designed sound generator system (96DigitalToneWheels™), which recreates all of those wonderful idiosyncrasies of the Tone wheel generator which have eluded all previous digital systems.

 

Mechanical multi-contact system

It is by utilising several tone varying features that the B3 performs so uniquely. Upper and lower pitch foldback subtly effects the overall sound, while, probably, the most important and interesting feature is the nine key contact system operating on each key. These contacts connect from each of the nine drawbar pitches and by pressing a key slowly each pitch level can be determined, high to low. This system created the earliest form of touch response for tone variance as well as expression. This mechanical contact system is also responsible for Hammond´s famous key click noise, an unintended feature that became an essential component of the B3 character. The new B3 incorporates a complete mechanical contact system, totally unique in a modern instrument.

 

B3 expression curve

Sound dynamics are controlled by an exact copy of the original B3 expression curve incorporated in the new instruments foot volume controller.

 

[end excerpt]

 

Has anyone heard this thing? It strikes me that Hammond (along with Korg, NI, Voce, etc.) has been trying to digitally recreate the B3 for some years now. What makes this new one "revolutionary"?

 

Regarding the multi-contact system: Am I reading this right? The new one has a nine key contact system, like the old? If so, that's pretty amazing. This would be too much for MIDI, I'm sure.

 

Regarding "B3 expression curve": I'm glad this is finally being addressed. I wish Korg, NI, Voce would consider it. I'm sure they could nail it.

[Slowly]

IMHO, you can`t get the Hammond sound without 'tubes'. Gotta have tubes gurgling and burgling. Kcbass

[Blues Disciple]

Does it have a Leslie emulation built in?

 

It looks great, but Hammond will go and ruin it all by charging like 20 grand for it, and make it out of the price range for 99% of us. Now if they can sell it for 5K or less, then it would be comparable with purchasing an authentic B3/Leslie combo, and at least in the neighborhood of a Korg/Roland copy.

 

Organ companies like Hammond just do not get it. The real market for organs are gigging musicians who need the B-3 sound. The new B3 would be great for that market. People buying home organs don't want the straight B3 sound/organ--they want the colored buttons, instrument sounds, autoaccompainment, etc.

 

My prediction--Hammond will price it and market it to the home organ buyer market, sales will fail and there goes the new B3(just like the B3000 and their other attempts at a new B3). Whereas is they priced and marketed it to financially challenged gigging musicians, sales would go through the roof, it would blow away the CX-3, Vk-8 and Electro copies and Hammond would rule again

 

But nobody takes my suggestions.

 

BD

[Wewus432]

I'm sure it sounds good, but why don't they just build a real B3 with the tubes and everything like it was originally? Maybe that's not possible today, but the minute I saw DigitalToneWheel I dismissed the whole thing. There's plenty of B3 simulations and soft synths available, musicians want the real thing.

[bg]

To me, the price of the new B3 is irrelevant. I don't believe Hammond plans on selling many of them anyway. It's more like a Detroit concept car. I'm simply curious how it sounds, and I'd be very surprised if it sounds as good as a Korg BX3.

 

When it comes to digital emulation, it seems like the playing field is very level. I could be wrong, but I don't think Hammond has any secret technology.

[burningbusch]

When I spoke with the Hammond rep about Leslie emulation, he said it would not have it. The new B3 will only be sold with a real Leslie speaker (half moon toggle switch mounted where it should be).

 

I doubt that the new B3 is meant to be a high volume mover, but that's fine. Given its price tag it will still likely be profitable for them to manufacture even at relatively low volumes. Plus, because the original B3 is so highly desireable, they don't have to worry about coming out with new versions of it every few years to keep up with the competition. It has a long shelf life. I think the problem with the keyboard industry is that the target for the last 10-15 years has been the sales volume success of the DX-7 and M1.

 

Busch.

[Dan O]

OK .....I was right next to the HAmmond booth at the summer NAMM show . The "new" B3 will be sold with a leslie tone cabinet 122 . So the selling price of the B3 will include the 122 .

 

The B3 tone is very , very objective . Just like a rhodes sound is objective . My friend is a B3 player . He sat down and played the new B3 .

He said it's really , really close . 25% of the cost is in the solid wood cabinet ! I am certain that a a church looking for a B3 would be interested in this NEW B3 . I personally couldn't hear a difference between new and old !

 

dano

[Gus Lozada]

If it's NOT real tonewheels... it's yet another B3 Wanna be...

 

Yes, it may sound "real" but the tag price is not for "realistic" enthusiast. I guess if anyone is willing to pay the price, will ask for real tonewheels.

 

But as usual, I'll expect for the real experts on the B3 to try it and let us know...

[steadyb]

Originally posted by GusTraX:

If it's NOT real tonewheels... it's yet another B3 Wanna be...

 

Yes, it may sound "real" but the tag price is not for "realistic" enthusiast. I guess if anyone is willing to pay the price, will ask for real tonewheels.

 

But as usual, I'll expect for the real experts on the B3 to try it and let us know...

I agree. If it's not built to the ORIGINAL specs...what's the point. There are places out there that you can still get the real thing in flawless mint condition...for a price.

[steadyb]

On a side note... I've been playing with the latest beta of the EVB3 and I must say (as a Keyboard Cornerite, not an Emagic employee) Wow!!! This thing is on the money. I can't stop playing it.

 

Sorry for the interruption, back to your originally scheduled programming...

[Blues Disciple]

Although I would probably look into a new B3 if it was reasonably priced, I, like others on here, am a purist at heart. If I ever had $10,000-20,000 to spend on a B and had the choice of a new versus old---I too would go with the old.(especially if it played like the one I played in a music store down here last month--man that was a screamer!)

 

The thing with the comment about Hammond not worrying about making the selling price liveable because there are still so many other Hammonds out there for musicians to buy is that Hammond ain't making money off of those! They are either being sold through want ads, yard or church sales, e-bay and at worst, private piano and organ stores who take the profit all to themselves. So I do think a reasonably priced new Hammond B3 aimed at the gigging musician market would be a wise decision for Hammond. Down here in NC, I rarely see an organ in a church and when I do it ain't a Hammond---and most small churches wouldn't (or couldn't) even turn their head to look at a $ 20,000 new Hammond either. Not when the old ones are out there, or cheaper Baldwins, Lowry's, etc are out there too.

 

If I was buying a new B3 copy, I would definitely look into it. But a $ 2,500 CX-3 versus a

$ 20,000 new B3 wouldn't be a tough decision for me.

 

Of course for me--I would rather drop 1-2K on a Hammond A100 or M3 with a Leslie than the Korg anyway. Of course that would be if I had the 1-2K to drop anyway.

 

BD

[bg]

Originally posted by steadyb:

I agree. If it's not built to the ORIGINAL specs...what's the point. There are places out there that you can still get the real thing in flawless mint condition...for a price.

I have a different view. The Hammond B3 will never be remanufactured to the original specs. The sound we like comes from 40-year old electronic and electro-mechanical parts which don't exist anymore. The last tone wheel B3's were made in the 70's, and they don't sound as good as the older ones. I don't know why, but probably because the newer electronic parts were more accurate.

 

Aside from the imperfections of the old parts, recreating the original machinery of the organ (i.e. moving parts) would be *extremely* expensive.

 

And about being able to get the real thing in flawless mint condition: Yes, they're still out there, some still waiting to be found! But they're getting rarer and more expensive every year. And look what it takes to get an old B3 back in shape:

http://www.b3sforsale.com/Inside_the_Hammond_organ.html

 

Digital emulation is our best hope.

[Tedly Nightshade]

I agree, no tone wheels, no tubes, it ain't a B3.

 

Why no tubes? Come on!

 

The word on the new 122's: not recommended for recording, the motor noise is significantly more than the old 122's.

 

I'm doing well with a digital Hammond played through an old 122 or two.

I wish they had at least managed getting the new 122 right- I realized for the price of one of those, I could have four reconditioned 122's- so now I have four old 122's.

[Stephen Fortner]

I'll take tubes and tone wheels whenever I can get 'em, that's for sure. That said, I got an extended listen to the new B3 at January NAMM, and also got to play it a little. A lot of attendees probably got to hear Joey DeFrancesco rip on it on the third floor balcony, and I also went to the show he did Saturday night at this jazz club in Fullerton called Steamers.

 

I didn't get to play it enough myself to make a serious evaluation, but I liked what I heard, a lot. A 90-year-old Don Leslie showed up with his family, and he was pretty impressed by the sound, as I recall. From the subjective judgment I did get to make, I'd say that the discrepancies between this and a vintage B3 are not significantly larger than those that have always existed between vintage Hammonds.

[SurrealMcCoyJazz]

Originally posted by SteveFortner:

I'll take tubes and tone wheels whenever I can get 'em, that's for sure. That said, I got an extended listen to the new B3 at January NAMM, and also got to play it a little. A lot of attendees probably got to hear Joey DeFrancesco rip on it on the third floor balcony, and I also went to the show he did Saturday night at this jazz club in Fullerton called Steamers.

 

I didn't get to play it enough myself to make a serious evaluation, but I liked what I heard, a lot. A 90-year-old Don Leslie showed up with his family, and he was pretty impressed by the sound, as I recall. From the subjective judgment I did get to make, I'd say that the discrepancies between this and a vintage B3 are not significantly larger than those that have always existed between vintage Hammonds.

I too had the pleasure of viewing and listening to the "new" B3 at the January Anaheim show + the Saturday night 2nd show at Steamers in Fullerton.

Although I didn't have the opportunity to have a "hands-on", I most certainly couldn't distinguish any aural "digital" flaws. Unlike a few NAMM shows ago when Joey Defrancesco displayed his amazing Jimmy Smith/Larry Young "chops" with the Roland VK-77......the digital discrepancy was rather apparent.

 

Surreal

[Tedly Nightshade]

I've done tests powering 122's with solid state preamps before the stock 122 amp, tube preamps and poweramps, and purely solid state.

There is something about going with tubes all the way through that is conspicuously lacking when you go solid state- it's so thin, and no amount of EQ helps. Leslies just benefit so tremendously from tube preamps and poweramps.

The preamp is the part of the organ that would simply have to be tube, with a tube leslie.

I find it easier, less expensive, and sounds even better (than chasing around the original Hammond preamps and Leslie amps) to just send line level into the power amp in of an old Ampeg.

The Hammond pre amps puts out a strange level in between line and speaker level that you don't see elsewhere. That's why a specialized preamp is necessary before the 122 amp, which wants this odd level.

Better in my experience just to run a standard tube power amp directly into the crossover on the 122.

[Gus Lozada]

Originally posted by SteveFortner:

... A lot of attendees probably got to hear Joey DeFrancesco rip on it on the third floor balcony

Was THAT a "new" B3 ??

 

If so, Ok yes, it sounded "the real" thing for me. It was Joey DeFrancesco, after all...

 

But that was mixed with all the other band's instruments. I guess a CX-3 with a real leslie or my own B4 by itself could sound like that in a mix.

 

So, how does it sound for the solo performers?

[Stephen Fortner]

Yep, that's what he was playing. Hung with Joey D, Papa John, and Dennis Fioramonti (exec VP Hammond USA) at the Hammond booth a bit, and it sounded good solo too. Ronnie Foster came in and played it for awhile too, and he seemed to dig it. One thing about it is that it uses an actual bus bar system with separate key contacts for each drawbar, which is essential to how a real B responds to you: there are subtle variations in the time when each frequency attacks. Not nearly as noticable as, say, Pro Tools MIDI timing, but very subtle and musically pleasing.

 

Interestingly, they had this new Leslie which is black, compact, and seems to build on the Motion Sound model. It can go solo or sit on top of a stationary cabinet which also has non-rotary channels.

 

The new B is very expensive.... I was told somewhere between $20 and $30 K. But perhaps it will come down as they recoup the R&D costs... at that price, even institutions are gonna have a hard time affording it, especially in these times.

[steadyb]

Originally posted by SteveFortner:

The new B is very expensive.... I was told somewhere between $20 and $30 K.

Why would you spend that much when for 10-12 grand you can get a flawless 50's or 60's vintage Hammond with the lid, seat, pedals, and Leslie. I'm talking not a scratch to be found flawless, ...TIME MACHINE flawless.

 

Ain't nothin' like the real thing, baby.

[b_3guy]

Originally posted by SteveFortner:

The new B is very expensive.... I was told somewhere between $20 and $30 K.

The first B I bought was in 1974, brand new. It cost $4,200Can. At the same time the first van I bought was a bare bones 1973 Ford Econoline. It cost $3,800Can. If the new B is $20,000-$30,000, it falls in line with a what a new cargo van would cost. It has stayed in line with inflation.

[coyote]

BLAGGGHHHHH

 

There are still hundreds of thousands of B3s, C3s, A100s, RT3s, and other genuine tonewheel consoles which exist out in the world. If you need the tonewheels & tubes (the REAL THING) AND are willing to lug one of these around, you won't have difficulty finding one. If it's in decent shape you can probably expect a decade or more from it if you bother to maintain it. Asking HammSuz or anyone else to remanufacture these borders on insanity.

 

$20K for a Hammond emulator w/ the HamSuz sticker is silly.

[Tedly Nightshade]

A lot of research and development Hammond Suzuki has gone to in order to demonstrate what a killer deal a vintage Hammond really is!

[B3Nut]

They seem to have done as well as can be practically done. Making an actual tone-wheel generator would entail making all-new tooling, which would cost an astronimical sum today. That idea was considered, but scrapped. They at least have the key-switching right, for authentic key-click.

 

As far as the preamp goes, IIRC it indeed has at least one tube in the preamplifier. Not that it's really necessary, the growl we all love comes from the Leslie's power amplifier which is still a tube affair. Trek II makes a solid-state replacement preamp for B-3/C-3/A-100 that emulates the performance of the original AO-28 preamp when it was new. It can be added to earlier consoles as well, to replace an aging or unsafe original preamp and add percussion at the same time. Comes with reverb, too. Had I the $$, I'd get an SSP-3 for my old B-2. I'd even consider one for my '63 B-3 if the original preamplifier ever became damaged.

 

A clean original tonewheel box is still a vastly better buy for the enthusiast, but the New B-3 is a better investment for its target institutional/church market as it is a new instrument with full factory warranty. In that application its performance should be more than satisfactory. I haven't had occasion to play one yet, but other Hammondites who have speak very highly of the instrument.

 

TP

[Blues Disciple]

"The first B I bought was in 1974, brand new. It cost $4,200Can. At the same time the first van I bought was a bare bones 1973 Ford Econoline. It cost $3,800Can. If the new B is $20,000-$30,000, it falls in line with a what a new cargo van would cost. It has stayed in line with inflation"

 

If only Ford, Chevy, or Dodge could make a van that would last forty or so years like an original Hammond! Then they too might be worth the price tag!

 

BD

[Jeep]

http://hammondb3organ.com/new.php

[coyote]

I ***loooove*** that type of flawed reasoning lol I guess I can expect to pay $158,000 or so for my next desktop PC then.

 

Originally posted by Blues Disciple:

"The first B I bought was in 1974, brand new. It cost $4,200Can. At the same time the first van I bought was a bare bones 1973 Ford Econoline. It cost $3,800Can. If the new B is $20,000-$30,000, it falls in line with a what a new cargo van would cost. It has stayed in line with inflation"

 

If only Ford, Chevy, or Dodge could make a van that would last forty or so years like an original Hammond! Then they too might be worth the price tag!

 

BD

[Blues Disciple]

Coyote,

 

I can only take credit for the paragraph about Ford, Chevy and Dodge vans and their value.

 

The first paragraph about keeping with inflation rates came from b3_guy.

 

But IMHO, $ 30,000 for a new B3 is outrageous and unecessary....especially when the originals are better and can be had for up to $ 25,000 less. And a $ 30,000 B3 won't go 150,000 miles and take you everywhere you wanta go.

 

BD

[Tedly Nightshade]

" posted 07-29-2002 08:49 PM                         

------------------------------------------------------------------------

"They seem to have done as well as can be practically done. Making an actual tone-wheel generator would entail making all-new tooling, which would cost an astronimical sum today. That idea was considered, but scrapped."

 

No credit for considering it! How could they not? But the original is such an amazing blend of electronic and mechanical, nobody does such a thing today except the auto folks. The sad thing is, it's a lost art. Nowadays a synth maker can't even manage to put a damned transformer on the output, they're all "electronically balanced" (The founder of Equi=Tech balanced power units told me a better term was "cosmetically balanced") so you need to go get a nice transformer DI to kill the hum. Actually that's probably just as well considering the shitty transformers that would be included. Hand winding is out of the question I'm sure.

So Hammond Suzuki had a chance to preserve the part of Hammond worth preserving, and bailed out because they couldn't figure out the tone wheel to save their pitiful lives!

 

"As far as the preamp goes, IIRC it indeed has at least one tube in the preamplifier."

 

From what Hutch and EveAnna at Manley tell me, they either have two tubes or it's one of those hokey marketing tubes that are so common these days. To even do any part of the circuit halfway right would require two. Nothing to do with stereo, just for a mono circuit.

 

"Not that it's really necessary, the growl we all love comes from the Leslie's power amplifier which is still a tube affair."

 

Is the new 122 really tube? That's not what my Hammond dealer told me.

 

As I mentioned earlier I've run experiments that indicate that of the sound we're after comes from the original 122 amp, which needs a preamp to bring the signal up to the level the 122 amp needs. If this preamp is solid state, things sound not nearly like the combination of a tube preamp and the 122 amp.

Using a tube preamp with a standard (expecting line level) tube power amp works very well, and you can get away with using only a standard tube power amp (direct to the crossover in the 122) and it will sound much more like what we're after than using a solid state preamp with the 122 amp.

[b_3guy]

Originally posted by coyote:

[QB]I ***loooove*** that type of flawed reasoning lol I guess I can expect to pay $158,000 or so for my next desktop PC then.

 

Why was it so deep you couldn't understand it? Do need some sort of picture? Things do go up in price, even with technological advancements. It's called inflation. With your flawed reasoning, you would expect to pay $2,000 for your next brand new car.

[coyote]

When you consider that their (sometimes excellent) competition sells between $1400 - $4000, how can a twenty thousand dollar emulator be justified by keeping up with inflation? Oh that's right, I forgot the "genuine Hammond" sticker on it. Uh huh, that Suzuki label is worth thousands....

 

PS the vast majority of electronic circuits go down in price relative both to performance and inflation

 

Originally posted by b_3guy:

Originally posted by coyote:

[QB]I ***loooove*** that type of flawed reasoning lol I guess I can expect to pay $158,000 or so for my next desktop PC then.

 

Why was it so deep you couldn't understand it? Do need some sort of picture? Things do go up in price, even with technological advancements. It's called inflation. With your flawed reasoning, you would expect to pay $2,000 for your next brand new car.