WORLD OF MUSIC ; PORTABLE KEYBOARD » Roland JUNO-Gi Mobile Synthesizer with Digital Recorder

Roland’s new addition to Juno line, the Roland JUNO-Gi Mobile Synthesizer with Digital Recorder Keyboard. The Juno-Gi brings the synthesizer into another level of realism. This highly portable power-synth keyboard’s super-charged features include 61-keys with velocity, more than 1,300 high quality fresh sounds; instrument sounds and musical styles, maximum 128 voices Polyphony, Tone Category buttons, enlarge LCD display, Live Sets; four-way splits and layers, eight-track digital recorder with 64 virtual tracks; enable multi-track digital recording, BOSS GT-Series professional guitar effects, USB audio/MIDI interface, Controllers; powerful mod, pitch bend, and D BEAM, Cakewalk Sonar LE 8.5 software.

The Juno-Gi comes with a whopping 1,379 high quality brand new sounds derived from 128 MB ROM and the sounds are organized into Live Sets. Live Sets are made up of 788 custom tones, 256 General MIDI-compatible tones and 256 user-created Live Sets . A Live Set or a multi-patch sound preset, can have up to four tones, and tones can be layered. And the keyboard can be split into four zones, each playing from one to four tones with ease. With 1,379 presets sounds, selecting the sounds you want is also a breeze. User can search sounds according to individual’s criteria by filtering base on type of sound; Rhythm, Piano, Electric Piano, Keyboard/Organ, Bass, Guitar/Plucked, Strings/Orchestra, Brass/Wind, Vocal/Choir, Synth/Pad, and FX/Others. Additionally, user can also filter and organize presets by Favorites.

Roland Juno-Gi’s new and unique 8 track digital recorder is my favorite among all. The digital recorder brings the Juno-Gi beyond merely a performance keyboard into a viable and powerful compositional tool. The 8 track digital recorder can store a maximum of 99 songs. User can record any one song directly to a single SDHC card for up to 192 hours of possible recording time with a single 32 GB card. A special ninth track is reserved for built-in rhythm patterns. User can select from hundreds of drum and percussion grooves built into the Juno-Gi, or creates own patterns and styles on the pattern-edit screen. When you lay out the structure of your piece within the arrange window by selecting and repeating rhythm patterns, this quickly and easily creates a bed to record your tracks over. Roland Juno-Gi‘s sound quality is excellent and can simply be recorded with a mic or guitar, or enhance with insert effects or pro guitar effects. Simply plug into the line and record, and up to two tracks can be recorded simultaneously, then master and export your mix to the Juno-Gi’s SDHC card and transfer it to your computer by using an SD card reader.

We never know when inspiration will strike, and having a simple and effective device to harness ones musical ideas is a wonderful thing. The Mobile Synthesizer is a powerful composition tool that is handy, easy to use, with abundance and high quality sounds and quite reasonably priced. The portable keyboard is ideal for professional singer songwriter on the go, live performance and keyboardist. The lightweight Roland Juno-Gi Synthesizer can be battery-powered and weigh merely 5.7 kg.

Cons: Limited tone editing capabilities. No editor software.