External multi-voice hardware Tone Generators for MIDI Guitarists

Started by sixeight, July 06, 2008, 06:03:15 AM

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sixeight



Does any one have any experience with the use of external synth modules with the VG-99?

I am thinking about maybe getting something nice second-hand, for live use, as it is more reliable than a laptop. Also a laptop can be a little slow in patch changes.

vauge99

Hi 68,

I´m currently using an old yamaha TG100. It serves my purpose, as long as you don´t expect to find good guitar sounds  ;D Nevertheless it has a very good upright bass in it. Just started with this midi thing (some years ago I owned an axon) and up to this point I have to say, that the tracking is not as bad as I supposed. If I would relay on it live? Hmm... have several gigs in sept. maybe I´ll try it for some songs.

vauge99

rdownings

I am using a Roland Sonic Cell which is basically a Fantom X with some G sounds in it. Really nice box. I work solo and have my whole show on a USB drive that I plug into the Sonic Cell and that is the band. The laptop stays home now.

I also have a GR-20 that is fine too.
Funny thing is, the GR-20 has a greater lag time on the lower E and A string than running a midi cable out of the VG-99 to the Sonic Cell.

Anyway, I posted in the General section wanting to know how to control the volume of the Sonic Cell from either the FC-300 or from the GK-3. Hope someone has an answer and instructions how to set it up.  Roland-US does not know yet to explain it to me.  I called them 4 times in a week to get the answer.

germanicus

I use a roland gr33. I dont use a split box (us20). Instead I use the midi out on the vg99 to the midi in on the gr33. The tracking isnt quite as good as it would be if I used a splitter, however, I very much like the convenience of how all the midi out on the vg99 is automatically shifted to match your alternate tuning settings.

I also use a laptop to run m-tron and some other soft synths.

I have set up the first expression pedal on my FC300 to control the volume of my gr33.
My albums done with modeling/guitar synth at http://music.steamtheory.com

JTV69/59P/Godin LGXT/Multiac ACS/Variax 700 AC
Helix/FTP/GP10/VG99/SY1000
Traynor k4

Macciza

Hi All
I am running the midi out into a Yamaha VL 70m Physicak Lmodelling Synth ( read- Wind sounds tie for).
Using my foot to blow until I get a Breath Controller - tweaking sounds I can get asxs to growl and sqeal,
trumpets to blow overtone series, etc also got a lovely cello and realistic violin.
Have previously run gr1 and other rigs live quite a bit - when mixed with mags you get away with it
VG seems to track quite well hthough I have not done any time tests yet

Cheers
Macciza
'70s Strat, Brian Moore iM, VG-8, VG-99, FC-300, VL-70m, StringPort, SoftStep, Sentient6, iMac QC i7 27".

Ludek

I also decided to trigger Roland Sonic Cell through my VG-99 and the result is astonishing. I used to have GR-9, 33, 20 and none of those responds so perfectly. Triggering is accurate, no glitch even when using short (mallets for instance) sound and the latency is also absolutely acceptable. Give it a try, you´ll be surprised how good it responds!
Ludek

Ludek

Hi, I used to have Roland GR-09,33,20 and sold all of them after some time. Reason why? tracking speed and collection of sounds (GR-33 was the best among them thanks to arpeggiator and two-sound editing). Now I sing praises on Roland Sonic Cell which I have equipped with two expansion cards (the World collection and the Complete guitar patchorchestra), also expanded with some downloadable collections of patterns - more than 2500 sounds available. Tracking - excellent! I have chosen the nylon guitar patch I made on VG-99 (Villa-Lobos,  in acoustic section) for controlling the Sonic Cell,  made some midi communication adjustment (nothing important, just significantly reduced the GK-3 values on each string - about 12 (e,b,g) to 27 (D,A,E). Now I can play classical pieces with many kinds of string, wind, etc. orchestras -all the musical world is within reach of hand. And I must point out that there are no sound glitches or others mistakes in communication of these two wondeful devices even when playing mallet, bells, simply short sounds samples. You cannot think of running extremely fast solos on the fretboard but playing in the speed of Oldfield´s Tubular bells intro is a breeze. Give it a try and you´ll like it.
Ludek   

acousticglue

If you like that buy Wusikstation for your PC and use this softsynth! Many sounds available and much cheaper.

bbliss

Brand new to the VG99 and absolutely loving it.  I am using a VG99 and Carvin Frank Gambale FG1-S combination.  I was curious if there were recommendations on additional sound modules like the Yamaha Motif Rack ES for additional keyboard / string / pad sounds to add via midi. I am trying to find a rack mount unit specifically to use (instead of a full keyboard).

Thanks.

arkieboy

Hi bbliss

I've been kicking around pitch-to-midi from the release of the GR700 so I've tried and evaluated a lot of the synths you might consider, particularly if you like eBay!

Generally, when choosing modules for guitar-midi convertors (this includes almost all of the Roland GR, Axon or Yamaha units) you are looking for either (at least) 6 part multitimbral or midi mono mode (mode 4) capabilities - from here I'll refer to both as 'mono mode' as this is what the VG99 manual uses.  However, while mono mode is great for synth leads and 'featured' parts where the natural pitch variations of the guitar greatly add to the playability of the sound, for almost all other purposes it is simpler and easier to use a simple poly-mode setup, broadcasting a single stream of midi signals on only one channel.  In particular, editing the midi output of a multi-timbral stream from a midi guitar is a right royal PITA so when you're sequencing you'll want to send on a single channel.

You can also find quite a lot of useful information on the 'other gear' section of the axon forum http://www.axon-technologies.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=8.  Note that Axon users talk about common (poly) and separate (mono) modes.

If you stumble upon a synth and want to know what it sounds like, of course there's bound to be something on youtube, but you should also check out 'synthmania' too as this will usually be a preset-by-preset rundown of the sounds http://www.synthmania.com/

...

Anyway, enough with the meta points - you want to know about synths!!  I replied to a similar question on the Axon forum a little while ago, I've updated my response below...

The Yamaha Motif range works well, but be careful of the laggy midi response on the early units - there is a sound-on-sound review that describes the problem with the first Motif rack http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jun03/articles/yamahamotifrack.asp.  I'm not a fan of the 'Yamaha sound' which seems (IMHO - feel free to differ) to take a very piano-oriented approach to synth sounds.  I like synths to sound like synths!!

Roland Fantom XR: multitimbral.  Basically an updated JV5080.  With the user sampling upgrade (FANUP1) + extra RAM + third party editor this is probably the best module you could get.  Medium-to-deep setup but you of course are familiar with Roland product manuals!!  The Yamaha racks don't have user sampling capabilities unlike the keyboards...

Proteus 2000/2500: multitimbral, flexible, easy but a little cheesy. You might want to check out the other P2K derived units such as the 'Orbit' and the later 'Vintage Keys' too... some of the sounds are re-released as soundfonts so you can demo the sounds without buying a unit.

Oberheim Matrix 1000 (my favourite!): Supports midi mono mode. Dead easy to set up. Sounds fantastic. Needs an external effects unit, and a computer to program.

EMu Ultra series samplers (I like these a lot too...): multi timbral, easy initial setup, lots of cheap sample libraries available and sounds fantastic. A bit big to carry around, probably need to learn a bit of SCSI. Deep but never unintuitive. FX passable. Essentially a Proteus 2K that you can fill with your own sounds.

The thing to remember about samplers is that you can sample poly mode only synths and then play them multitimbrally.  There - now you have an excuse to buy a Moog Voyager!

Supernova/Supernova II/Nova: multitimbral, relatively easy to setup and sounds great, and all those knobs! A bit big. Stunning effects. Tons of real time control options occasionally lead to unpredictable effects.  I have a SN2 in my synth rack at the moment.  Love it to bits!

Yamaha A series sampler: multitimbral, initial setup easy but becomes frustrating and ultimately limiting (esp A3000). Excellent effects. Slow patch changing. Sample library is more difficult to find and a little more limited than EMu. A3000 is as cheap as chips but make sure you get a mark II. A4000/5000 are about as expensive and not as good as an EMu Ultra series sampler.

Akai S5000/S6000/Z series samplers: multitimbral, easy to medium setup. If you are good with your samplers, a fully loaded Z8m with 512Mb RAM and a hard drive is probably all you need for a gig.

Korg Wavestation AD/SR: multitimbral, setup for guitar synth described in manual. Stunning synth, compact but a pig to program. Possibly not your first synth.

Roland D550: like many Roland synths of the time has midi mono mode. Dead easy to set up, loads of sounds available, still found in a lot of serious rigs today.

Roland JV/XV series: multitimbral. Fairly easy to setup. Very expandable. Later models still sound excellent but the JV1080/880 are a bit long in the tooth.

MOTU 828 MkII + 3 year old MacBook Pro + Logic 8/9 Mainstage: multitimbral/multisynth, medium difficulty to set up.  Mainstage (OS X only of course) is a £20 download from the app store and as such is fantastic value for money, even if you're not a Logic user.

Might also want to keep an eye open for a Yamaha TX802 (easy setup, loads of sounds, pig to program a bit 80s if that's all you have - watch out for the sounds programmed especially for the G10 midi-guitar), Yamaha TX81z (easy setup, inflated price as it has that 'lately bass' sound). Roland U110/U220 (multitimbral, easy and cheap ROMpler but nothing special). Korg 01/w and triton series - not played but spec looks fine.

Hope this helps!!

Steve

Main rig: Barden Hexacaster and Brian Moore i2.13 controllers
Boss SY1000/Boss GKC-AD/Boss GM-800/Laney LFR112

Other relevant gear: Line 6 Helix LT, Roland GR-33, Axon AX100 MkII
Oberheim Matrix 6R, Supernova IIR, EMu E5000, Apple Mainstage, Apple Logic, MOTU M4

bbliss

Steve,
Thanks for such a thorough response!  I will check out the various options you list out below. I have a chance to pick up a Motif Rack ES for $450....seems like a good deal. I appreciate the SOS article on that specifically. Apparently they fixed the latency problem with the ES versus previous model.

Thanks again for the great input.

Brian

Elantric

#11
With the pending release of the Fishman Tripleplay, and VG-99 , GR-55 owners who want to broaden their sonic palette of tones. its proper that we have a referennce thread to discuss the Synth Engine options for those who do not want to use a softsynth or a laptop

External Multi-voice hardware Tone Generators for MIDI Guitarists

As a refresher - this link sheds light on whats possible
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIDI

While any old keyboard with a MIDI input jack may be used for MIDI guitar, the ideal candidate for External Multi-voice Tone Generators must support "MIDI Mono Mode", where each guitar string may be assigned a separate MIDi channel.  This allows each string to have separate bending expression ( Country riffs, Steel Guitar) . In the world of MIDI, if you bend 6 guitar strings in different directions, or apply  hand vibrato to only certain strings and not others, you will need a synth that can map each guitar string to a unique MIDI channel. This is also required to accomplish string range  / Fretboard range tone splits   

Remember there are many options for external PCM synth sounds

Roland Sound Canvas

http://analog-relics.com/2012/06/19/roland-sc-55-sound-canvas-part-1/

Details on the full range of Sound Canvas
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roland_Sound_Canvas

Roland SD-50 Mobile Canvas ( same synth engine as GR-55)
http://www.rolandus.com/products/productdetails.php?ProductId=1090


Roland Sonic Cell
http://www.rolandus.com/products/productdetails.php?ProductId=897


ROLAND  JV2080, JV1010, JP8000, XP80


Overview of old Yamaha MU modules ( these are like Roland Sound Canvas on steroids, use the Yamaha XG format and popular XG Edit)

http://www.yamahamusicsoft.com/en/product/1017294

More details

http://tastenpaar.de/motif/YamahaSeminars/www.cyber-bp.or.jp/yamaha/devzone/english/library/sw/sw03.html


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamaha_MU-series

Yamaha VL-70M
http://usa.yamaha.com/products/music-production/tone-generators/vl70-m/?mode=model
http://www.yamahamusicsoft.com/en/product/1017294

Yamaha Motif Rack XS
http://usa.yamaha.com/products/music-production/tone-generators/motif-rack_xs/?mode=model


Roland Juno-G ( a real sleeper synth, not to be confused with any other Juno!)

The Juno-G  is a poor mans Fantom X that can take a Roland SRX module (SRX "Ultimate Keys"  is my fave and installed in my Juno G) and can do most Everything a Sonic Cell does and More.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roland_Juno-G
http://tweakheadz.com
http://www.zzounds.com/item--ROLSRX09

http://tweakheadz.com/reviews.htm

Juno G Review
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/nov06/articles/junog.htm

teleholic

great list Elantric..Thanks! i was just wondering about this the other day..one question though, how would it all be connected? doesn't the tripleplay require the usb receiver in order to transmit midi info? Also, i've noticed this and can't help asking, why do you spell it Trippleplay? hahaha..

Elantric

See this thread for details how the TriplePlay may be used without a Laptop

https://www.vguitarforums.com/smf/index.php?topic=5188.msg46425#msg46425

Re spelling -that may be my own error !

Il try to fix the spelling error!

THANKS!

montyrivers

Yamaha Motif-Rack is awesome.  If anybody finds that at a bargain they should grab it.  Other than that I only wish Korg had more table top type synth boxes.  They blow Yamaha and Roland sounds away in my opinion.  I mean there's the microKorg...  But even that has key's on it.  I had considered getting the electribe but I'm not sure if that would work so well with a midi controller?

musicman65

I've been using Emu Proteus 2000 for several years. It's a single rack space synth and sounds great. It can be had for 100 bucks on eBay...a real steal. One feature I value is the 4 analog inputs on the back which I use to mix the VG99 and Smyth to a single signal.

I'm using a SonicCell for my next gen rig. So far so good with it.

bd

jburns

#16


http://www.rolandus.com/products/productdetails.php?ProductId=712
or
http://kurzweil.com/product/k2600r/specs/

best mods I've ever used. sadly both are hard to find at a decent price.
yet if one is not afraid of bulk, a $500-$1000 keyboard is a great idea. beats lugging around an expensive computer anyway.

arkieboy

A good place to find more stuff about external midi guitar modules is the 'other equipment' of the Axon Forum http://www.axon-technologies.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=8.  This deals pretty much with synth modules and foot controllers.  There are quite a few posts about external synths there - note that Axon users talk about common (poly) and separate (mono) modes.


I summarised my distilled trial-and-error wisdom of 25 years of pitch to midi here here https://www.vguitarforums.com/smf/index.php?topic=5035.msg34404#msg34404


Roland have a definite 'house sound' so I would avoid another modern Roland synthesiser - particularly a S+S module such as the Fantoms, JV/XV because while they are better synthesisers, Roland has been recycling its sample library since it released its first sampler in the 80's and you might find it doesn't expand your sound pallet much. 


Motifs have a reputation for taking a while to change patches which might be a limitation so check carefully.  In particular avoid the very first motif module because it was bugged and had problems with its midi timing.


Given that the internal GR55 already has loads of bread-and-butter samples inside it, and that you will likely still use it for lead patches, I would be tempted to look for a no-compromise synthesiser.  Why not head down to http://www.synthmania.com and listen to a few things to see what tickles your fancy?


Steve
Main rig: Barden Hexacaster and Brian Moore i2.13 controllers
Boss SY1000/Boss GKC-AD/Boss GM-800/Laney LFR112

Other relevant gear: Line 6 Helix LT, Roland GR-33, Axon AX100 MkII
Oberheim Matrix 6R, Supernova IIR, EMu E5000, Apple Mainstage, Apple Logic, MOTU M4

cell7

Dont discount the idea of using an ipad or an iphone as your synth module - i have switched to this from a studio full of toys and the portability and flexibility is astounding :)

An ipad loaded with animoog and sampletank [for example] will give some serious options, and you arent locked into any particular 'sound' as you are with a traditional S+S module. Call it futureproofing if you will...

arkieboy

... just to note that my 'buy something else other than Roland' advice was directed at GR55 owners.  If you have a VG99, or any other pitch to midi device, then a Fantom XR with Fanup1 upgrade would be a superb choice of hardware synthesiser.

Oh and if you have a mac running snow leopard or later, then Mainstage II is going for silly money in app store


Steve
Main rig: Barden Hexacaster and Brian Moore i2.13 controllers
Boss SY1000/Boss GKC-AD/Boss GM-800/Laney LFR112

Other relevant gear: Line 6 Helix LT, Roland GR-33, Axon AX100 MkII
Oberheim Matrix 6R, Supernova IIR, EMu E5000, Apple Mainstage, Apple Logic, MOTU M4

OldShepster

Funny, I was looking for this sort of information last week...As usual, my timing was off, but this is sure good information.  I have a used Motif XS Rack coming sometime this week, so hopefully it isn't an early version with the glitch.  I so grateful that all of this information is available in one place.

Shep

arkieboy

Hi Shep


If it has XS in the name you should be fine.  It was the old 'motif rack' with no extra letters or flashing lights that was the problem.


I noticed that the forum editor included the full stop in the URL for the SOS review of the motif rack.  Here it is again - hopefully - working


http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jun03/articles/yamahamotifrack.asp


Steve
Main rig: Barden Hexacaster and Brian Moore i2.13 controllers
Boss SY1000/Boss GKC-AD/Boss GM-800/Laney LFR112

Other relevant gear: Line 6 Helix LT, Roland GR-33, Axon AX100 MkII
Oberheim Matrix 6R, Supernova IIR, EMu E5000, Apple Mainstage, Apple Logic, MOTU M4

OldShepster

Dang, just popped back here.  Thanks again for being so helpful!!!  Still digging into the Motif, but it has been fun.

Shep

Yug

The VsynthXT accompanies the VG99 very well although it does have some limitations, mainly with the arpeggiator restrictions when using more than one midi channel. Apart from that, I have few complaints  :)  For vocal synthesis, it does a good job and it's formant correction is excellent.

erikbojerik

I have tried 2 methods for triggering soft synths on my MacBook Pro - 5-pin MIDI and direct USB.  The latency was notably higher with the 5-pin connection.

I am interested to know if this would also be true for a hardware synth module like one of the ones discussed above.