Jim Aikin - Shame on you.

[mildbill]

july 2005, tori amos issue - page 52 - "what's this for" column.

 

 

quote: "But note-off velocity is not very important musically: Most instruments just ignore it."

 

 

this issue is sort of a personal crusade with me, so i felt i had to post.

i normally look forward to Jim's reviews and comments. up till now, his ideas about synthesis and keyboards in general were similar to mine.

 

this is a column for beginners who are looking to understand something new.

to tell a beginner that release velocity isn't 'important musically' is to do them a great disservice.

i think that release velocity is every bit as important as any other performance control/technique and that you can do just as much (if not more), with RV as you can do with velocity.

 

i'm still a bit shocked that Jim apparently has never explored RV (even more shocked if he's done so and hasn't found it 'important musically'.) if this is true, i highly recommend spending some time working with just RV to see what it can do for expressive playing.

 

to use RV to attain note specific amplitude release times is the least and most common function. this is useful even for someone who just plays 'piano' type sounds.

 

it really comes into its own when you have a piece of gear that allows you to use it as a modulation source to control most other parameters. a simple example is to have RV control the amplitude and speed of an lfo which is set to control frequency, but at a nominal level of 0 until it receives the RV signal.

a good synth will allow you to control all parameters with RV (even ones that don't make a lot of sense.)

 

it is most definitely 'important musically', and few too manufacturers take advantage of its benefits.

i will only buy boards now that use RV as a complete mod source and they are getting scarcer.

at least they're not as scarce as boards that implement polypressure.

people sometimes complain that synths aren't as expressive as acoustic instruments because you don't have the same level of control.

i've found release velocity to go a long ways towards giving some of that level of control.

 

i don't expect replies to this post because most people seem to have little interest in it. i'm only posting to blow off steam that a respected journalist may have misled some novices. (maybe inadvertently, but the damage is done).

 

'blowing off steam session' over.

 

BTW Jim, if you happen to read this, i do still look forward to most of your reviews/comments, etc. and am curious to see what your new novel will be like.

[Finale]

It's a fact that few people use release velocity as a control source.

 

I have a lot of experience programming complex patches and I have to admit this is not the most common source of control. But for certain types of sounds or effects, it can be as useful as anything else, supposing you have a good keyboard controller. So I agree that saying it's not musical is going a little bit far, indeed.

 

An example I'm thinking of is a harpsichord sound. When you play a real harpsichord, you can understand the true meaning of releasing a note and what very special sound it can create. So for someone to achieve a true "harpsichord touch" emulation on a digital keyboard, you have no choice but to find the right release velocity setting.

[M Peasley]

a simple example is to have RV control the amplitude and speed of an lfo which is set to control frequency, but at a nominal level of 0 until it recieves the RV signal.

I'm not arguing with your case that RV is useful. I'm just trying to imagine what the control setup described above would be used for. So you would scale the intensity of a vibrato that kicks in only on the release? So a slow release would result in a slow vibrato for the length of the release, and a fast release would speed up the vibrato for the length of the release? IMHO, I would think aftertouch would be better for that, if you're going for the "vibrato on decay" kind of thing the night-club singers always used to do (of course, you'd have to use an envelope that decayed to silence with the keys down, so it actually wouldn't go to vibrato on release, but during the decay). You'd get tactile control with aftertouch that I would think would be pretty dicey with RV.

 

I mean I can imagine goofing around with using RV that way for odd techno effects, but my brain isn't coming up with any emulations of real instruments that would behave that way.

 

I can see a slow release effecting a filter or a PWM parameter to emulate the sort of slow choke that piano strings can make with a slow release.

 

I wouldn't be surprised if Jim Aikin responds to your post. I've emailed him before and even 'tho I'm a total stranger, he sent me a gracious and lengthy reply.

 

Dang I wish he still did album reviews for Keyboard!

 

M Peasley

[TrancedelicBlues]

I wish he still did synth reviews... I miss Dave Stewart too... I even miss Freff...

[alfonso]

I agree with mildbill. Saying that note off is not very important musically is a bit too superficial, something that should be avoided i.m.o.

 

The main reason is because nobody is entitled to say if my choice to control an envelope release stage duration or to have sounds crossing thanks to inverted envelopes or whatever thing I can assign to note off is musical or not. Even Beethoven wouldn't be entitled on saying this.

 

Saying that some instruments can't use note off velocity should be the only thing to say in a review, and present it as a limitation, as it is.

For me it would make a hell of a difference.

[RABid]

RV is very useful with string patches or pads where you need to alter the rate of release decay. (Note to long timers - yes, you are about to hear the C word from me again.) I first encounted RV 25 years ago on the Rhodes Chroma and it was very handy. To not have it on modern keyboards seems like a step backward.

 

Robert

[mate stubb]

Yes, well, the Chroma still rocks in ways that many (most?) modern synths do not.

 

-outstanding weighted wooden action

-programmable patch architecture

-polyphonic filter fm

-release velocity

-velocity switched envelopes

-polyphonic amplitude and ring modulation

-footswitch controlled patch chains

 

As you can see by my avatar, I'm still a fan!

[Anderton]

Bring back polyphonic aftertouch!

[Dave Bryce]

Originally posted by Anderton:

Bring back polyphonic aftertouch!

Talk to the people who manufacture the keybeds...

 

Poly AT rulez...

 

dB

[Gruv]

Originally posted by Dave Bryce:

Originally posted by Anderton:

Bring back polyphonic aftertouch!

Talk to the people who manufacture the keybeds...

 

Poly AT rulez...

 

dB

What's the word on that? Are the patents under lock and key in a vault somewhere or are poly AT keybeds so not fetch these days? I've never played one and I'm most curious about them.

 

V.

[Finale]

Originally posted by Anderton:

Bring back polyphonic aftertouch!

I love my Kurzweil Midiboard.

[Dave Bryce]

Originally posted by Gruv:

What's the word on that? Are the patents under lock and key in a vault somewhere or are poly AT keybeds so not fetch these days?

The latter. They cost more, and the perception is that most manufacturers and end-users don't wanna pay for them, so the people who make keybeds don't offer them.

 

The Poly Evolver KB would probably have had poly AT if it had been available...

 

dB

[bg]

Originally posted by Anderton:

Bring back polyphonic aftertouch!

Mr. A., I've been meaning to publicly commend you for prominently noting lack of P-AT as a "Con" in your recent CME controller review.

 

Sorry to change the subject, mildbill.

[Dave Horne]

Originally posted by Cydonia:

Originally posted by Anderton:

Bring back polyphonic aftertouch!

I love my Kurzweil Midiboard.

The Roland A80 had it and you could apply it as you wished to 1 - 4 zones.

[bg]

Originally posted by Dave Bryce:

The Poly Evolver KB would probably have had poly AT if it had been available...

 

dB

Considering my MIDIboard is twenty years old, the prospect of a modern P-AT controller, with built-in sounds no less, would be a strong selling point for me.

[Stephen Fortner]

Hopping on Dave's coattails, I'll add that Poly-AT is a hardware-level feature. The aftertouch sensor on today's keybeds is a pressure-sensitive strip that runs under the whole length of the keybed. (I've killed several of them on K2000s) Poly AT requires some kind of separate physical sensor under each key.

 

Alternatively, I suppose a manufacturer could explore "zone based" aftertouch, with say, two or three strips of fixed length under the keyboard, but the zones would not be user-changeable. You'd have to settle for a common denominator like bottom 2 / top 3 octaves.

 

I'd love to have Poly-AT today, and would pay for it. For that matter, I'd love it if Dave Smith started making MIDI controllers based on the Prophet T8 action (ever try one? It's heavenly), but I bet it would be cost-prohibitive.

[marino]

I have just one little thing to say: Release velocity, like poly aftertouch or breath control, is rarely used because few instruments implement it. Manufacturers like to believe that it's useless, and if they'd put it in their synth, just a small minority of players will use it. If more manufacturers don't implement it, just a few players will learn the technique, and there will always be limited demand. So how to break this vicious circle? Well, *magazines* are one of the main links between users and manufacturers. If they start writing that these controllers are useless, we're lost.

[mildbill]

yes, magazines are where a lot of people look to for this kind of info.

they can also influence people's idea of what's valuable and what's not so valuable.

people are entitled to their own opinions, but the written word carries power, especially when it comes from someone established in the area.

 

anyways;

kurzweil, alesis, access and emu use RV in some of their boards. waldorf also used to use it. maybe some others i'm not aware of - info is hard to come by about it.

 

i think roland has some boards that currently use it in an extremely limited fashion. (my XV-5080 module can respond to it to control amp release time).

 

the T8 and kurzweil's midiboard are the only 2 i know of who use both polyAT and release velocity.

 

i'm so used to playing with RV that i have a hard time imagining doing without. sounds seem lifeless and dead without it, and playing is much less fun.

 

people who have never used it probably think it's strange to be concerned, and it may feel odd at first trying to use it, but it's worth the minimal effort it takes to get the benefits of it.

[Finale]

Originally posted by mildbill:

the T8 and kurzweil's midiboard are the only 2 i know of who use both polyAT and release velocity.

Another problem is when those two manufacturers decided to create keyboard controllers with poly AT, nobody seemed interested. The demand didn't show as expected, mainly because few people understood the benefits of polyphonic AT.

 

So nobody makes them anymore. Either like me you bought one new back then, either you got lucky on E-Bay with one still in good shape.

 

In my opinion, a Midiboard is more reliable than a T-8, because the latter used a strange resistive pressure pad, compared to the Midiboard action which is solid as concrete. I bought mine new in 1990 and I never had one problem with it. It still works perfectly and I would never sell it, even if someone offers me twice the price I paid back then.

[Finale]

Whoops... My retrigger threshold was set too high.

[Kayvon]

It's funny (more like tragic) how in the world of electronic music instruments, for every step we take forward we seem to take a good few steps backwards aswell.

 

Is release velocity hard to implement? I've wanted to experiment with it in the past but I've never had a board that supports it. I suppose it's a tough one because you are limited by how quick the key springs back plus the resolution would have to be alot greater for slower key releases.

 

My real bug bear is with the lack of user-definable scaling. From things like expression pedals to control signals sent. I reckon alot of these expression controllers would benefit if we had more control over how they are scaled. For instance I've never had much luck with things like velocity to attack time because they seem to be linearly scaled when it may be alot more useful if they were, for instance, exponential scaled. It's just the same with my expression pedal, I can't control the section I would like, it just seems to be the whole pedal range.

[Marzzz]

Originally posted by Dave Horne:

Originally posted by Cydonia:

Originally posted by Anderton:

Bring back polyphonic aftertouch!

I love my Kurzweil Midiboard.

The Roland A80 had it and you could apply it as you wished to 1 - 4 zones.

Poly AT is the greatest thing that ever happened to synthesizers. I searched for a year for a mint Kurzweil MIDIBoard, and NOTHING will make me part with it! Luckily, it is built like a tank (and weighs almost as much). The Real MC gigged with one for years without problems.

 

Dave: I owned an A-80 for about ten years prior to the MIDIBoard (with a GEM S3 in between), and you must have hands of steel if you can play the A-80's PolyAT (and yeah, I know about the Roland mod).

 

I'll say this again- playing the DSI PolyEvolver with PolyAT absolutely RULES! And once again, the biggest disappointment I ever experienced was discovering that the otherwise totally excellent Alesis Andromeda DOES NOT respond to external PolyAT, despite it being part of its original published MIDI spec. It's probably one line of code away from a fix, but Numark has no intention of any further work on the OS (EF THEM!). I would pay fairly serious $$$ just for this one lousy bugfix.

 

WHY WHY WHY can't someone manufacture a Poly AT keyboard? The last production was back in '92, I can't imagine there are still patents in effect.

 

:::::::

[Moon Zero Two]

My two cents:

 

anything that makes a keyboard more expressive is laudable. I have never had the chance to play a board with Poly-AT - I think some Ensonic things had it - as we move towards a laptop based paradigm midicontroller manufacturers will have to differentiate themselves and hopefully that will include polyaftertouch and release velocity.

[synthetic]

A note to those reading this thread: You (and I) are the 1% who would pay more for poly aftertouch, release velocity, breath control, etc. The rest of the world looks at keyboard B, which is $75 more with its poly AT, and buys keyboard A to plunk out their piano, organ, bass and string sounds. I have several keyboards with release velocity, and I've never found a usable sound with that feature. And I think I know a little about programming, my sounds have made it as factory presets on a few synths, but it's just not my thing. But you have to realize that it's a real niche. Hopefully a few more more boutique companies like Moog and DSI will come along and push the envelope for all of us.

[Tusker]

Every piano sound should have release velocity modulating the decay envelope. Just as a real piano's dampers are user controllable. Yes, the effect should be subtle. But it should be there. IMO.

 

Poly AT I dunno. Send me your Midiboard. I'll let you know.

 

Jerry

[Prague]

Use poly AT (adding intensity to vibrato) with a string pad and you'll never be satisfied again.

 

Do bends like a pedal steel with one hand.

 

Big, phat synth chords with the filters just slightly varying with poly AT.

 

There are a million uses. I leave it on all the time. It may be possible to clog up MIDI data, but find a workaround for that rather than not using poly AT.

 

Question: If a keyboard can trigger a different sound when the key is lifted, does that mean it has an AT of some sort?

[RABid]

I think the trick is not just adding poly touch for $75 more than other cheap keyboards. What I want is a really GOOD keyboard controller with all the features, even if it is $400 more. Give me the same keyboard that you get on a Fantom X or Motif ES. Give me poly after touch, breath controller input, a few high quality knobs and sliders that do not feel like they have sand inside, release velocity, both a stick and wheels. Give me quick selection keys for patches and multiple MIDI outputs to control a rack of synths and a screen that will let me name those setups.

 

I would rather pay $1500 for a true quality, professional controller than $500 for a cheap 88 key with uneven response and more knobs than I will ever use.

 

Robert

[Marzzz]

PolyAT fell out of favor partly because the dense MIDI stream was choking the computers and sequencers of 1988-92. Now that MIDI is an afterthought (bandwidth-wise) vs audio data, the only things holding it back are 1) expense, 2) patents (?), and 3) manufacturer inertia. If keyboard players are being relegated to playing pads, there is nothing like PolyAT to make them more interesting. Just the motion of holding an octave in the lefthand bass is infinitely more satisfying (think the first few seconds of UK's 'Alaska").

 

Keyboards with Poly AT include the Kurzweil MIDIBoard, Roland A-80, GeneralMusic GEM S2/S3, and various Ensoniq boards. Best bet is eBay, and even the MIDIBoards come in around $350-700.

 

I admit I haven't played around with release velocity as much, but it is kinda fun to have Release Time modulated. Significant changes in sounds when you play stacatto vs legato.

 

Unfortunately, Synthetic is probably right, the vast majority of buyers out there probably aren't interested....

[Jim Aikin]

Good discussion. First, I should apologize to the release velocity fans. This data type is great conceptually, but there are two or three problems. First, many keyboards don't sense it. Second, learning to lift your fingers in a speed-controlled manner is more difficult to learn than dropping them in a speed-controlled manner, for reasons having to do with physiology and evolution (it's not a very useful skill). Third, the number of things you can do musically with release velocity is limited, because all the action takes place while the note is decaying to silence.

 

That being the case, since "What's This For?" is a column with very limited space that is addressed specifically to the needs of newbies, I blew off release velocity.

 

This fall I'll probably blow off non-resonant filters in a sentence, and get flamed by 01/W owners. That's the way it goes.

 

--JA

[mildbill]

hi Jim: i'm not sure an apology is necessary if that's how you truly feel, but it's good to know there are still civil people around.

 

no one bats 1000%, but i've enjoyed 99% of everything i've read that's been written by you.

 

first - those keyboards are no longer on my priority list.

 

second - evolutionary/physiologically speaking, maybe learning to lift your fingers came first - got to keep those digits out of the fire and away from the fangs. maybe speed control relieved boredom.

 

the keyboard i learned on made fantastic use of release velocity, so i can't say how difficult it would be to pick up for someone who already plays, but i think it's worth a little effort.

 

third: i respectfully have to disagree with you here - like i stated, it's at least as useful as velocity control is, and maybe more so for some.

 

there is a larger issue here, as Marino caught on to: if some of these features are routinely blown off by people in the know, the user base interested in performance control features will gradually atrophy, and there will be no incentive for manufacturers to implement truely important features.

 

WOW! i got a response from Jim Aikin!

 

 

Rabid - those are my thoughts exactly.