Dave Bryce Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Trouble for Young Chang/Kurzweil? I hope not - I'm a big fan of Kurzweil synths... dB ==> David Bryce Music • Funky Young Monks <== Professional Affiliations: Royer Labs • Music Player Network Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeebus Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Hang on to that K2600 tight and never let go... One thing seemed strange to me... "On Sept. 9, the Fair Trade Commission announced its decision to halt Samick's attempt to take over Young Chang, reasoning that the buyout would lead Samick to monopolize the domestic piano market. " How does the absorption of Kurzweil by Y.C. change their position in the domestic piano market? Kurz doesn't make pianos. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Bryce Posted September 22, 2004 Author Share Posted September 22, 2004 Originally posted by Sir Jeebus: One thing seemed strange to me... "On Sept. 9, the Fair Trade Commission announced its decision to halt Samick's attempt to take over Young Chang, reasoning that the buyout would lead Samick to monopolize the domestic piano market. " How does the absorption of Kurzweil by Y.C. change their position in the domestic piano market? Kurz doesn't make pianos.Kurzweil was bought by Young Chang about 15 years ago. Samick has been trying to buy Young Chang - Kurzweil is just a part of that package. ...and BTW - I believe that Kurzweil does manufacture digital pianos. dB ==> David Bryce Music • Funky Young Monks <== Professional Affiliations: Royer Labs • Music Player Network Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soundscape Studios. Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 I don't know - Kurzweil stuff never did it for me. They do stand out in one respect though - you can tell Roland, Korg stock sounds from a mile a way . Kurzweil stuff is definetely not identifiably Kurzweil - which is a good thing. Maybe it's the mechanics of the VAST architechture which lends to Kurzweil sounds being "different". I just always have that feeling when using any K2x board. I also LOVED the Sweetwater library of pianos Dan Fisher made for the 2500 a few years back - the RSI series. Absolutely stunning... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
g. Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 The VAST engine when it came out was at least an interesting and powerful metaphor to program to. At that time quite a few years had already passed where static wavetable synthesis with a few measly envelope and modifiers had dominated. Really kinda pathetic how the bent for imitative synthesis just seemed to knock creative approaches right out of the water. The sad ironic thing was that wavetable synthesis became a parody of chiffs attached to just about every type of sustaining loop, and the imitative aspects devalued immensely too. . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben One Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Having purchased a PC2R in the last month, I can tell you that Kurzweil USA offices moved in the last few weeks from Washington State to City of Industry, CA. I don't know if this was part of a plan under new Samick management, or if they are being managed by some other company. Amazingly, Kurzweil USA just has one person in operational tech support right now. To his infinite credit, he sent me a thorough, conscientious answer to several tech questions that I had within a week of contacting him. Ben Eddie Jobson Tribute Projects Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
platypus Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Is it just coincidence that Jordan Rudess switched to Triton X just about a month ago after his long love afair with Kurz? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Zeger Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 It just so happens that Kurzweil here is only MOSTLY dead. There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive. With all dead, well, with all dead there's usually only one thing you can do...Go through the clothes and look for loose change. If Gibson buys Kurzweil, then it will be all dead. Originally posted by GregMinton: Is it just coincidence that Jordan Rudess switched to Triton X just about a month ago after his long love afair with Kurz?Phil Mickelson just switched to Callaway golf equipment from his long relationship with Titleist. Both are business decisions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ELP71 Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Wow. Guess I need to pick up the PC2-O for my PC2R card here soon. I really hate to hear this. Looks like the whispers going around for a while have had some weight. Weasels ripped my flesh. Rzzzzzzz. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marzzz Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Sounds strange to me....a company as big as YC going into default over a $400,000 loan? That would be like a bank taking your house because you missed a $40 credit card payment!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hermanjoe Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 How does the absorption of Kurzweil by Y.C. change their position in the domestic piano market? Kurz doesn't make pianos. You know young-chang. They make those pianos that sound like tin cans when you play em'. I'd rather play a samick. But f*$@ them all. Yami or Steinway for me. "Learn the changes, then forget them." -Charlie Parker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ITGITC Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Originally posted by Mark Zeger: It just so happens that Kurzweil here is only MOSTLY dead. There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive. With all dead, well, with all dead there's usually only one thing you can do...Go through the clothes and look for loose change. If Gibson buys Kurzweil, then it will be all dead. Mark, do you know something we don't know? Is Gibson considering the purchase of Kurzweil? I wonder who the other prospective buyers might be. Seems to me that Sweetwater Sound is probably keeping close tabs on this. Or maybe some of the folks in the original Kurzweil R&D department could get together, buy it, and move forward with VAST and the other excellent Kurz technology. I agree. Kurzweil isn't dead yet. Tom "Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent." - Victor Hugo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Zeger Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Originally posted by Is There Gas in the Car?: Originally posted by Mark Zeger: It just so happens that Kurzweil here is only MOSTLY dead. There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive. With all dead, well, with all dead there's usually only one thing you can do...Go through the clothes and look for loose change. If Gibson buys Kurzweil, then it will be all dead. Mark, do you know something we don't know? Is Gibson considering the purchase of Kurzweil? The first part was just a (paraphrased) quote from "The Princess Bride". The Gibson comment was in reference to all the brands they've killed: Opcode (all dead), Oberheim (all dead), Baldwin (mostly dead), etc. If Gibson would happen to buy Kurzweil, well, draw your own conclusion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reverend Rhythm Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 The Princess Bride is one of my all-time favorite movies (shows my strangeness I guess). Gibson is not my all-time software company. I used Opcode's Vision. David Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zeronyne Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 To be absolutely fair to Gibson (and, by the way, my "Gibson, please leave Opcode alone" rant was actually published in Keyboard Mag a million years ago), there's always two sides to every story. Opcode was in the final throes of financial death and rock-bottom morale, as was Baldwin, and Oberheim essentially was dead, just like Kramer. So it's not like Henry was buying viable, vibrant, vivacious companies and gutting them. The problem I had with Gibson is their lack of anything resembling corporate/social integrity. It wasn't intellectual property that they were buying up. They were using respected brand names to hawk lesser products from other manufacturers. Even though our friend Cikira loves her Viscount OB-12, in my opinion, it doesn't even stack up to a Matrix 6/1000 which was arguably Obie's "weakest" MIDI synth. So I don't think that Gibson is guilty of killing off good companies. I think they are guilty of much worse: picking up cadavers, filling them with live roaches, and pretending that because it's moving, it's been resurrected. And now they want all Gibson guitars off the internet to "protect the brand". Henry, with all due respect, you are simply a corporate ghoul. ______________________Back on topic, though, it's a shame how the Young Chang story is playing out, but keep in mind that Korean companies operate with a different set of rules...bribery and corruption are a matter of course. They may have been in deep financial trouble for decades without anyone "noticing". "For instance" is not proof. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
r33k Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Originally posted by zeronyne: So I don't think that Gibson is guilty of killing off good companies. I think they are guilty of much worse: picking up cadavers, filling them with live roaches, and pretending that because it's moving, it's been resurrected. F'ing brilliant, 0-9. That was as fine a piece of prose as I've read in a long while. Thanks. r33k Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ITGITC Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Originally posted by Michael Erwin: Originally posted by zeronyne: So I don't think that Gibson is guilty of killing off good companies. I think they are guilty of much worse: picking up cadavers, filling them with live roaches, and pretending that because it's moving, it's been resurrected. F'ing brilliant, 0-9. That was as fine a piece of prose as I've read in a long while. Thanks. Good work 0/9. Lemme buy you and Michael Erwin a brewski! When's it gonna be? Tom "Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent." - Victor Hugo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tusker Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 My understanding is that the design department of the Kurzweil remained a US operation. In bankruptcy, YC would want to sell what assets it can. Anybody who wants to play in the synth market has got to prick up their ears at this buying opportunity. I would think. Jerry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burningbusch Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Originally posted by Marzzz: Sounds strange to me....a company as big as YC going into default over a $400,000 loan? That would be like a bank taking your house because you missed a $40 credit card payment!!!!But they are ~$60 million in debt and no one will provide additional credit. When you're out of money, you're out of money. Without Samick buying them out, it looks dismal for YC. When you buy a company you buy the assets AND debts. It's possible that they can sell off the Kurzweil name and what remains of the products. Hey, maybe Ray will buy back Kurzweil on the cheap. Busch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
burningbusch Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Originally posted by BenOne: Having purchased a PC2R in the last month, I can tell you that Kurzweil USA offices moved in the last few weeks from Washington State to City of Industry, CA. I don't know if this was part of a plan under new Samick management, or if they are being managed by some other company. BenI sat at a breakfast table with some Kurzweil people at NAMM a few years ago. They said they had been moved from CA to WA because YC was buying a lot of lumber for its pianos out of the pacific northwest. Soon after they moved, YC ended up not getting as much of the wood out of this area, so the move back to CA is probably related to that. Busch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marino Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Originally posted by burningbusch: Hey, maybe Ray will buy back Kurzweil on the cheap. Right - I hope so!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben One Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Originally posted by marino: Originally posted by burningbusch: Hey, maybe Ray will buy back Kurzweil on the cheap. Right - I hope so!!Do you think Ray is aware of the current situation at Kurzweil Musical Systems? I realize he has many, many other interests to keep him occupied. But (if only as a pipe dream), selling the company back to him would be like bringing Steve Jobs back to Apple! Ben Eddie Jobson Tribute Projects Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ITGITC Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 No. I think that Ray Kurzweil is too wrapped up in the other companies he is involved in to entertain the idea of playing in this space again. Check out Kurzweil Technologies. I'm sure things are in the works. Keep your fingers crossed that the outcome will be good. In this business it's hard to be innovative, profitable, and to have the ability to compete with the likes of Roland, Korg, and Yamaha. It would definitely take someone with deep pockets, business savy, good connections, and knowledge of off-shore (Korean or Chinese) manufacturing to take what's left of Kurzweil and turn it around. Who in their right mind would want to take the risk? Tom "Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent." - Victor Hugo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
g. Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Remember what happened to the best of Sequential Circuits when they were on the chopping block. Yamaha/Korg got the tech and Dave Smith and a couple other of the best and brightest ... I'm not sure that the companies who COULD pull anything off today would even care that much for the intellectual property VAST represents however. Back in the SCI days, Vector Synthesis (among other things) looked like a way to get out of the static wavetable playback doldrums. . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soundscape Studios. Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 Wow - I guess the shit is really hitting the fan now. This is all due to the softsynth market killing hardware off. I mean, most of us have a controller or two for the studio, and a Rompler or two for live - right? Contrast this to 10 years ago when most of us probably had 5-10 at least! These are truly sad times. In a few years, it'll just be the big 3, I bet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zeronyne Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 Originally posted by Soundscape Studios.: These are truly sad times. In a few years, it'll just be the big 3, I bet.You know what, though? Despite what I wrote above about Gibson, Synth MI is the one place where I think pure corporate Darwinism is in place and is appropriate. You can be one of the big boys, or you can find a boutique niche, but you better choose, and you better be good at what you choose. Want to be a boutique? Then you have to keep your overhead WAY low, keep your product line lean and clearly differentiated from inside and out, and have a clear strategy to be small and exclusive. Who broke those rules? A certain German company with some excellent synths (I'll really miss you guys...I wanted to buy a Wave within the next few years...). Want to run with the big dogs? It's all about diversification and constant incremental innovation. Create a certain useful technology and tier it all the way up and down the affordability/performance scale. Have a budget, regular, pro, and bells and whistles version to microcategorize your consumers. Deep pockets for the inevitable dogs are mandatory...no one is batting 1.000 in this game. Kurzweil priced like a boutique, produced like a Big 3, and sort of was in the middle in terms of diversifying their product line and doing incremental innovation. You can't have it both ways and be a global player. Just ask E-mu, Ensoniq, Sequential, Arp, Moog, Crumar, etc etc. "For instance" is not proof. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
g. Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 Just as long as there's some innovation going on and some variety of approaches I could care less. The Biggies actually can afford to do R&D and promo and support, and that's just the way it is. There have been some rather dry periods for cool synthesis even when a lot of companies were in the field, and that's been just as much a fault of the customers as the suppliers. Too many people wanted too little and that's just the way it went. Those who wanted more scrounged around for older stuff - the back to analog backlash most obvious - or brought it out of storage, or sidestepped back to non-synth technology. . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marzzz Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 Originally posted by burningbusch: Originally posted by Marzzz: Sounds strange to me....a company as big as YC going into default over a $400,000 loan? That would be like a bank taking your house because you missed a $40 credit card payment!!!!But they are ~$60 million in debt and no one will provide additional credit.OK, that explains it, thanks!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Prague Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 Hardware is also disappearing because keyboardists don't play live very much anymore. Those that do seem to be satisfied with the typical. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ITGITC Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 Originally posted by Prague: Hardware is also disappearing because keyboardists don't play live very much anymore. Damn Prague! How did you come to THAT conclusion? You insinuate that either there are a bunch of DEAD GUYS out there playing the gigs, or all the keyboard players pawned their hardware and are now holed up in their bedroom studios messing with plug-ins. Why do you think that there are fewer keyboardists playing out anymore? And to what timeframes are you using when you make these comparisons? Just what is the basis of your study - Census data, Musicians' Union data, a poll of the watering holes in your neighborhood, or just a gut reaction? You may be right, perhaps us keyboard players are buying and using more plug-ins. However, most of the times that I go out to hear a live band, the keyboard player has hardware. Very rarely, if ever, do I see guys with a controller connected to a PC or Mac running a plug-in. There may be differences by region, but I wouldn't post a broad statement such as that stating that sales of hardware are down because keyboardists don't play live anymore. That's just silly. Perhaps you're talking about how DJs are getting lots of gigs that bands used to get. Or maybe you're thinking that there are a lot of guys who, instead of playing out, are composing music for games, or ring-tones for cell phones, or orchestration for movies. I don't know. 'splain yourself, Prague! Ummmm, no offense intended, Prague. Here, I'll prove it... pull my finger! Take care, Tom "Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent." - Victor Hugo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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