The Yamaha YC61 may be your perfect stage keyboard!
The new Yamaha YC61 drawbar organ has great features for a digital organ, but it looks like it has plenty to offer to any gigging keyboardist. Though organ tones are its speciality, but there are plenty of other sounds packed in the instrument as well.
The Yamaha YC61 features 61-key waterfall keyboard and is the first Yamaha stage keyboard to include real drawbars, while the organ sound comes courtesy of a new engine that is powered by Yamaha’s Virtual Circuit Modeling technology (VCM). This is designed to recreate the behaviour of all the transistors and resistors of real tonewheel and drawbar circuits, and you get detailed control over your organ’s parameters.
Inside, there is a rotary speaker emulation in the YC61, along with effects. As Yamaha mentioned earlier that it has not scrimped on the non-organ elements of the YC61, meaning either there are two concert grands – S700 and CFX, electric pianos – FM models and synths.
The Yamaha YC61 definitely has the look and everything you need in one keyboard. A portable and lightweight gigging instrument with real drawbars.
The new Roland RD-88 Stage Piano is lighter, compact and more affordable Digital Stage Piano than some of the competitors. It takes the RD 30 years history and puts it in a gig and home-friendly compact package.
The Roland RD-88 features a 88-note PHA-4 keyboard with a hammer action and Ivory Feel keys, and there are built-in speakers as well, which are useful for practice and monitoring. Inside the RD-88 there are assortment of new SuperNATURAL Piano and SuperNATURAL E.Piano sounds powered by Roland ZEN-Core. The digital stage piano comes with more than 3,000 tones and 400 scenes that make use of the 3-part split and layering. Each part gets its own effects system with 90 effect types, EQ and Tone Colour plus multi-effects for the scenes. It has Sympathetic Resonance, 8 types of Chorus/Delay, 6 types of Reverb, a Master compressor and EQ and reverb and EQ on the mic/line input.
In addition, the interface is designed to offer quick, easy access to the essential controls, so you should not have any problem selecting sound categories, creating splits/layers and adding in effects. Favourite sounds can be stored for quick recall, and the one-touch piano button takes you straight back to the core piano sound any time you want.
As mentioned earlier by Roland, the RD-88 offers easy computer integration so is also possible to play your software sounds through the instrument via USB.
Originally released in the late ’70s, the original MS-20 is a classic semi-modular monosynth, prized for its distinctive, aggressive-sounding filters and external audio processing capabilities. The MS-20 was originally revived by Korg in 2013, in the form of the three quarter-sized MS-20 mini, and while two full-sized versions did follow – in full and desktop module forms – both were released as DIY kits produced in limited numbers.
Korg has announced another production run of the full-sized MS-20, and this time in pre-built, rather than kit format. And what is more there are four limited-edition color variations to choose from. These include the standard black design along with new green, white and blue versions, each of which Korg says will be produced in limited numbers.
The full-sized 37-note keyboard’s design remains the same as the original including two filter types, Except for the addition of MIDI and USB MIDI control – just pitch and note on/off. The two filter allow users to switch between earlier and later designs of the original filter.
The Korg MS-20 FS Monophonic Synthesizer is expected to be available in April 2021.
