Dig My Rig--Let's see your setup!

[CEB]

Boring but it works.

 

[Doerfler]

Boring but it works.

 

lots of guys/ gals would kill for that rig, Ed.

[Morrissey]

Boring but it works.

 

lots of guys/ gals would kill for that rig, Ed.

 

+1. That rig doesn't bore me in the slightest. Gives me GAS.

[wineandkeyz]

Boring but it works.

 

lots of guys/ gals would kill for that rig, Ed.

 

+1. That rig doesn't bore me in the slightest. Gives me GAS.

 

Boring?

 

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-hOrHY7ZYxrQ/UOr98Mbs5wI/AAAAAAAAAXM/HXKS50rnOAk/s1600/You+keep+using+that+word....jpg

[SamuelBLupowitz]

Boring but it works.

 

lots of guys/ gals would kill for that rig, Ed.

Yeah that is a SOLID setup. Digital convenience and portability, with the impressive size and scope of an old-school "different toy for everything" rig. Great way to split the difference onstage.

[confidence]

Pardon my ignorance but what's the 88-note under the Roland?

[Charleston]

Something over the screen on the SKx?

[CEB]

Something over the screen on the SKx?

Yes. It"s the protective plastic that it shipped with. I haven"t pulled it off yet. ð

 

Pardon my ignorance but what's the 88-note under the Roland?

No problem. It"s a Korg Kronos 2-88.

 

 

Boring but it works.

 

lots of guys/ gals would kill for that rig, Ed.

Thanks, funny thing the rig is sort of like the Bears offensive line. It has problems but I don"t know how to make it better without making the good things worse.

 

The Roland FA-06 has a terrible action but I like the Studio Set architecture and I really really like the built in keypad sampler. I use one shot samples a lot. I could use a cool poly synth but I would need a Roland or Akai sampler and I hate loose pieces of gear. This rig is quick to setup. 3 board plug into a racked line mixer. Then you hookup the pedal boards. A new Fantom or FA-07 is a lot of money just because I"m a whiner about the action. When I preordered the FA there wasn"t anything else available that fit the bill.

 

The Kronos is heavy. The action is heavy in the bass and a little sluggish but Korg Setlist is the coolest thing about the rig. It runs everything. My biggest suggestion to improve the Kronos and make it a even better controller is more pedal I/O. It should have two assignable foot switches so one can be set to decrement in setlist in case you accidentally double tap when going to the next combi. It should have 2 expression pedal inputs so one can be full time volume and the other be set to whatever you need like a filter. If it had been available I would have gotten the Kronos LS for the weight and I don"t hardly play any piano in the Pop gig. Mostly synthy things.

 

The Hammond is great. My only disappointment is it won"t take the old EXP-100F. I really miss the kickswitch to change Leslie speeds. First time out I"m playing left hand organ and right hand on the Kronos and I hit a chorus and want to go to fast gear and I"m out of hands. I might disconnect the half moon and plug in a foot switch to change speeds on the vent. I hate to do that. Hammond charges an arm and leg for that half moon. I could bring the XK3C back out but it"s heavy and the SKs sounds way better.

 

It works well live

[MikeT156]

Partial quote be CEB

 

"First time out I"m playing left hand organ and right hand on the Kronos and I hit a chorus and want to go to fast gear and I"m out of hands".

 

I remember that problem WELL. Back in the Seventies, no one had thought of a "workstation" KB yet. I had an extensive LIVE rig that was a problem controlling volume, sustain on the piano, playing bass pedals, singing lead vocals, and remembering the Lyrics for what came up to over 100 songs. I made at least as many mechanical mistakes as musical mistakes. That was the easiest way to ruin my night.

 

Nice looking rig. I bet it sounds great!

 

 

Cheers!

 

 

Mike T.

[Charleston]

Here is my current little affordable living room setup with P-125, MX61 (just got this recently), Behringer PA, TC Helicon, Samsung tablet, old as the hills laptop, etc.. Yeah, got some crazy lights going on!

 

I play keyboards, sing, and a little guitar. Sometimes I run through sets for vocal practice/training (using the laptop for backing tracks) and running through pa give the feel of performing. Sometimes I jam on keys and sing, and the MX61 is good for pulling up a quick drum beat and setting tempo. I can also work on stuff from not only books, but from YouTube lessons and such on the tablet. The MX61 is surprisingly nice sounding in many ways.

 

It is also a decent setup for a friend or 2 to jam.

 

I had a nice Yamaha grand, but it took up almost the whole space. I hope to get a nice digital piano when I can afford it. I really miss playing a real acoustic though, but it is one or the other, since I have limited space.

 

[EscapeRocks]

Here's a pic of the rig with the Gibraltar stand I created:

 

Yamaha YC61 over Yamaha MODX8

 

This was its maiden voyage on a live stage/gig a couple weeks ago.

I'm still working on the cable snake. I was able to avoid cable spaghetti by using points on the stand connectors to hook the cables

 

[The Real MC]

Here is my current little affordable living room setup with P-125, MX61 (just got this recently), Behringer PA, TC Helicon, Samsung tablet, old as the hills laptop, etc.. Yeah, got some crazy lights going on!

 

I play keyboards, sing, and a little guitar. Sometimes I run through sets for vocal practice/training (using the laptop for backing tracks) and running through pa give the feel of performing. Sometimes I jam on keys and sing, and the MX61 is good for pulling up a quick drum beat and setting tempo. I can also work on stuff from not only books, but from YouTube lessons and such on the tablet. The MX61 is surprisingly nice sounding in many ways.

 

It is also a decent setup for a friend or 2 to jam.

 

I had a nice Yamaha grand, but it took up almost the whole space. I hope to get a nice digital piano when I can afford it. I really miss playing a real acoustic though, but it is one or the other, since I have limited space.

 

 

This is a good example of a creative environment. Sometimes a good atmosphere is more important than piles of keyboards.

[Charleston]

Thanks! That is a good way to put it.

 

This is a good example of a creative environment. Sometimes a good atmosphere is more important than piles of keyboards.

[NewImprov]

Here's a pic of the rig with the Gibraltar stand I created:

 

Yamaha YC61 over Yamaha MODX8

 

This was its maiden voyage on a live stage/gig a couple weeks ago.

I'm still working on the cable snake. I was able to avoid cable spaghetti by using points on the stand connectors to hook the cables

 

 

That Gibraltar stand just screams stability! Nice!

[Morizzle]

 

Today I had most of the babies set up for a little video recording

[Michael Wright]

Getting really bored. Thought I might as well get this out of the case, and set up the never used rig!

[vonnor]

Boring but it works.

 

Ed, how sturdy is that Monolith stand? Any wobble side-to-side?

 

~ vonnor

[Rally]

CEB, great rig. I am curious about your iPad, what tasks are you using it for? Thanks.

[Al Coda]

CEB, great rig. I am curious about your iPad, what tasks are you using it for? Thanks.

 

Read music !?

 

A.C.

[CEB]

Boring but it works.

 

Ed, how sturdy is that Monolith stand? Any wobble side-to-side?

 

~ vonnor

 

I like them. I have three of them. I had a weld break on one after 12 years of hard use. It had been rode hard. Dave Bryce got one and he didn"t get along with the tiers. He couldn"t get them to tighten down enough. Zero setup time. The legs just swing out. One of the coolest things is if your bottom board is heavy and you are cramped for space. You can walk straight through the stand if there is no board on the top tier. That is handy. The Monolith is heavy. Also standing I use it on the highest setting. It works for me. I"m 5"11' with 28' inseams and 33' sleeves. The stand may not fit everyone. You need to check the measurements of the stand or have a good return policy.

[CEB]

CEB, great rig. I am curious about your iPad, what tasks are you using it for? Thanks.

 

It is a really cheap Android tablet. Too cheap, I need to upgrade it to something more robust. I just run a single piece of software called MobileSheetsPro. It manages charts and sends MIDI changes to the rig. I use the Kronos though to control patches. I just use it for charts and notes like 'bridge turn off zone 5" etc ... I suffer from CRS Syndrome.

[CEB]

CEB, great rig. I am curious about your iPad, what tasks are you using it for? Thanks.

 

Read music !?

 

A.C.

Yes especially on fill in gigs. Even on my regular gigs charts are in show order and there as a security blanket with notes on zone management. I keep the Kronos in Setlist mode and forget what sounds on on what zone some times. The joys of playing modern Pop with early onset dementia.

[Tonysounds]

You probably dont want to go there, but the action on the FA07 is back in the ballpark. The FA06 was pretty bad keybed wise, and the FA-08 made my wrists hurt. But the 07 came out a year or 2 later, and they actually put a decent synth action on it.

[CEB]

I"ve thought about getting the 07. I use the SP404 sampler a lot. My biggest issue with the rig is the the nerve issues in my legs. I"m not man enough to handle the Kronos in the case. I want a lighter 88. Looking at the PC4. I can use a tablet for patch control if I have to. If it had been available the Kronos LS would have been perfect for this gig.

[Josh Paxton]

Here"s a little story of incorporating the Valente into my primary stage rig in place of the DP I had been usingâ¦

 

For a while in The Before Time I was using a two-board rig for most band situations: a Mojo 61 over top of a Korg Grandstage. I was using the Korg mainly for EP sounds, with a little acoustic piano here and there as well as the occasional lead synth, strings or polysynth. Of course the Valente can"t do any of that except EP. I was happy to convert all the previously-AP tunes into EP tunes, simply on the grounds that I"d rather play a real electric piano than a fake acoustic one. But that still left a fair amount of synth ground to cover, and I"d need some additional gear to do it. The Mojo wouldn't cut it as a controller for, say, an iPad, so I'd need a whole other board. My goal was to add as little weight, footprint, extra hardware and complication as possible. If only I had a board that had a strong palette of the types of sounds I needed, that was small and light enough to just sit directly on top of the Mojoâ¦

 

Enter the Korg MicroStation. It"s been sitting around my house unused for years, and truth be told I don"t even remember why I bought it. I do remember that I came close to putting it up for sale more than once, but I always talked myself out of it on the grounds that its weird little combination of strengths just might come in handy someday.

 

Friends, today is that day.

 

Sonically and ergonomically it"s the perfect solution for this situation. While most of its bread and butter sounds were never quite up to par, even by today's standards it scores high marks for analog synth sounds and string and brass samples. Its small size means it can sit directly on top of the Mojo. Yes, it"s got mini keys, but for the kinds of parts I"m playing on it, that"s fine. And it"s got enough keys that I can set up splits comfortably. In other words, it gives me everything I need and nothing I don"t, with no extra stage space, and with less than 6 pounds of extra weight. Major win.

 

But of course, nothing is ever really that simple, and there were some ergonomic kinks to work out. The first was getting the Mojo and the Valente set up the way I wanted. My goal there was to have the two keyboards as close together as possible. The front edge of the Mojo can sit comfortably on top of the Valente if it"s supported in the back, and I happened to have an old x-stand (Booo! Hiss!) that was the perfect height for that. The problem was, when set up that way it stuck out way further in the back than I could live with. So I took a hacksaw and a file to it, and got it down the exact depth I need:

 

 

Next challenge: getting the Microstation on top of the Mojo was a good deal tricker than I expected. At first I thought I could just velcro it in place, but the way it"s weighted made that impractical unless I could live with it bouncing around every time I hit a key, which I couldn"t. I needed something to lift the back end, so I thought a couple door stops added to the velcro would do the trick. They came close. Adding additional support with some bits of corrugated board made it workable, but by that point I decided that rather than having this half-assed piece of kit made of cardboard and door stops and velcro, it would be worth my while to just take a tip from the folks as 3DWaves: design a pair of brackets with the exact dimensions I needed, and have them 3D printed.

 

Enter the forum"s own MathOfInsects, who saw my Facebook post seeking 3D printing help and generously stepped up to the plate. Thanks to him and his teenage offspring/3D printing genius, I now have this sweet setup for holding the Microstation atop the Mojo simply and securely. (The fact that it actually worked exactly the way I hoped it would, on the first try, brought me more joy than I can adequately express.)

 

 

 

 

The final problem was an aesthetic one. There was a time when I would have let such considerations slide, but one lesson I"ve had repeatedly drilled home in the livestreaming era is that people truly do listen with their eyes first. The Valente and the Mojo both have a classic look, with natural wood endcaps and as simple a design as they can get away with. Then there"s the Microstation, which looks busy and digital and modern, but out-of-date modern. It looked like I had put these two beautiful vintage boards together, and then topped them with something I got at an Office Depot clearance sale in 2010. And so for the first time I tried my hand at serious keyboard modding. I made full use of my Cricut cutting machine, learned to stain wood, and came up with something that I"m pretty proud of. Before and after:

 

 

And so all together, this is the rig that I"ll be taking out to shows once there are shows again. And even before then my band has a video recording coming up that this will be perfect for.

 

 

 

Thank you for coming to my Ted talk.

[dongna]

With all due respect to paint-master Escape Rocks-- whose work I respect and admire greatly-- that is one of the most beautiful cosmetic mods I've seen. Kudos!

[Al Quinn]

Wow, great work Josh!

[Noah DC]

Man, this is such a killer setup! Never thought I'd be searching around for Korg Microstation listings, but here you've got me doing just that...,

 

I don't want to be presumptuous - already super generous of you to share all the info that you have - but is there any level of detail about those Mojo 61 risers that you could send around to help others get something like that made? If I had the specs, I'd likely dig around the internet to see if I could get identical risers printed somewhere. I've worked a bit on how best to rest a third keyboard on top of the Mojo 61, but encountered some of the same balance issues you were describing (the IK iRig Pro 2 Keys fits on its own, but just barely).

[Modler]

The Roland FA-06 has a terrible action but I like the Studio Set architecture and I really really like the built in keypad sampler. I use one shot samples a lot. I could use a cool poly synth but I would need a Roland or Akai sampler and I hate loose pieces of gear. This rig is quick to setup. 3 board plug into a racked line mixer. Then you hookup the pedal boards. A new Fantom or FA-07 is a lot of money just because I"m a whiner about the action. When I preordered the FA there wasn"t anything else available that fit the bill.

 

 

I"ve thought about getting the 07. I use the SP404 sampler a lot. My biggest issue with the rig is the the nerve issues in my legs. I"m not man enough to handle the Kronos in the case. I want a lighter 88. Looking at the PC4. I can use a tablet for patch control if I have to. If it had been available the Kronos LS would have been perfect for this gig.

 

 

I also bought my FA-06 before the FA-07 was a thing.

It is a rather uninspiring keyboard in many ways and with a pretty bad action, but few other keyboards boats the same level of all-round practicality with the studio sets, keyboard switch groups, MIDI-control features, vocoder, sampler, USB/audio-interface and ultra light weight construction. It can't easily be replaced by something different and an 07 is indeed a lot of money just to get a better keybed.

 

I use mine together with a Kurzweil PC4, and before that with my old PC3X. The light weight of the PC4 has been a huge blessing, but it has yet to see a live show though.

Recently I've also introduced a laptop running SampleTank 4 to the rig, with both the PC4 and the FA sending MIDI to the laptop.

I use the PC4 to send all program changes to the FA as well as SampleTank, while the FA takes care of the USB audio I/O for the laptop. Works fine so far.

[RichieP_MechE]

That's a great looking rig, Josh! Excellent work.

 

Also, to any forumites needing help with 3d modeling, design, and fabrication (3D printing included!) feel free to reach out via PM - I do this stuff for a living (and for fun) and am happy to share some of my skills and knowledge.