Using the microARRANGER in church.

[ddmetzger]

I just received my microARRANGER this week and I am awash in the Reference Manual.

I have been playing a Technics KN7000 for church services for about 10 years. It has (as do most Yamaha keyboards) a "stop accompaniment" function which will play the left hand accompaniment and root base voices with no rhythm or percussion. It is simply set by choosing "auto accompaniment" and NOT pressing the "start" button. It is also possible to edit or change the chord and bass voices and voice parameters. I am not an accomplished musician and use LH "one finger" chords and "harmony come ensemble" for RH solo.

I was unable to find a microArranger locally and so I ordered one from the local Guitar Center sight unseen (I really need the light weight). I did ask Korg Support a question about the "ensemble" feature and the answer I got led me to believe that the functionality I described above could be achieved on the "micro". The respondent did not offer any advice about "how to". I am now on the front end of the 30 day satisfaction guarantee from Guitar Center but they have nobody who knows anything about either the "micro" or the PA50.

I have read and re-read the Owners Guide and the Reference Guide and have played around with the instrument for several hours with no luck. I can get it to play styles just fine but I am in the dark about how to make it work in "stop accompaniment mode". I believe I need to somehow edit an existing style and then save it as a "user style" or to an SD card but the terms and operations in the manual don't say how to do this.

I need help. The sounds, styles, programs and physical attributes of the "micro" are just fine for me but it is not useful unless I can get it to do what I need for church service congregational singing accompaniment. Any hints, tips, manual references, etc. would be gratefully appreciated.

[Deane]

DD,
I always use the percussion and rhythm parts when I play but today I'll try to turn off the rhythm part and see what happens. I'll post my findings later today - I have a gig to run off to now. By the way, I just love my little KMA and often use it for gigs instead of my Tyros 4.

Deane

[ddmetzger]

Thank you Deane. I will look forward to the results.

Cheers !!

[Deane]

DD,
I think I found how to do what you need. Pick the style you need for your music. Then Press the exit button and a screen appears from where you can turn off various parts of the style. I turned off the rhythm and percussion part and it played left hand chord changes, bass line - but no drums or percussion parts.

I imagine to get what you need you would have to do this for each song you will play and save that setup as a performance.

Hope this helps.

deane

[michelkeijzers]

Why are you writing in bold?

[Deane]

Some of us here are old folks whose vision is not what it once was.

Deane

[ddmetzger]

Hello Deane

I tried what you suggested and it seemed to add the bass line as long as the "play" led was "ON". Even Though I set the tempo as low as possible, the string bass voice results in a glitch at the beginning of each new accompaniment measure (besides trailing off to nothing as the note decays). I think I can get around this by switching the bass voice to one which is a continuous non-decaying tone. This presents my next challenge. I have spent about two hours trying to figure out how to change the bass voice in a style but I have yet to succeed.

This keyboard has some very nice features but ease of use and a clear manual are not on the list.

Will let you know if I succeed.

Thanks !

[michelkeijzers]

Some of us here are old folks whose vision is not what it once was.

Deane

If you use Internet Explorer, you can use Ctrl - Shift - + (on the same as the = key) to increase the font size for the current screen.

With Ctrl + 0 you go back to normal. This way you can zoom in/out as much as you want without using bold fonts which can be considered rude (like writing in capitals for example). No offense personally. But the keys above probably help you with any site, not just KorgForums. Probably on other browsers there is a similar functionality.

[Thoraldus]

Hello Deane

I tried what you suggested and it seemed to add the bass line as long as the "play" led was "ON". Even Though I set the tempo as low as possible, the string bass voice results in a glitch at the beginning of each new accompaniment measure (besides trailing off to nothing as the note decays). I think I can get around this by switching the bass voice to one which is a continuous non-decaying tone. This presents my next challenge. I have spent about two hours trying to figure out how to change the bass voice in a style but I have yet to succeed.

This keyboard has some very nice features but ease of use and a clear manual are not on the list.

Will let you know if I succeed.

Thanks !

I have done this on the PA500 for playing organ hymns with the pedalboard bass played by the auto-accomp. It works well. Haven't yet tried to set it up on the microArranger. Perhaps I'll get some time to experiment this weekend.

[ddmetzger]

I have solved the problem but not exactly to my liking. I have gotten lazy over the years with the "stop accompaniment" function in Yamaha and Technics triggering the root bass note from the recognized chord. I talked with the Korg Customer Assistance line and the representative told me that the PA50SD/microARRANGER was not designed to do this. I just happened to have a MIDI bass pedalboard and after a few settings, it works just fine along with the LH chord as recognized and harmony (ensemble) (without having to have the rhythm running in the background).

This yields a relatively glitch-free performance and ALL of the voices (programs) can be selected to suit. I will have to re-learn using the pedalboard for church hymns but I can live with that because the sound is OK.

I still believe the automatic root bass note could be triggered by the recognized chord but it would probably involve an upgrade to the OS. Maybe if Korg sells enough microARRANGERS there will be a clamor for this function.

Thanks for your interest and help. I have decided to keep the micro.

[Thoraldus]

(snip) I talked with the Korg Customer Assistance line and the representative told me that the PA50SD/microARRANGER was not designed to do this. (snip)

Perhaps not automatically, but I'm sure you could create a user style that will do just what you want. You could even get a little fancy and have your user style play different pedal bass patterns based on the current chord variation being played. With a user style you could leave out the drum track altogether.

[ddmetzger]

I agree that it should be/may be possible but I am still on the very steep part of the learning curve and creating custom styles seems to be way down the road for me. Reading about it in the (pardon the expression) user manual is quite intimidating.

Thanks for the encouragement though !!

[Thoraldus]

I agree that it should be/may be possible but I am still on the very steep part of the learning curve and creating custom styles seems to be way down the road for me. Reading about it in the (pardon the expression) user manual is quite intimidating.

Thanks for the encouragement though !!

Yesterday I printed out the Style Edit part of the manual and had a working style with organ pedal bass and optional left hand organ accompaniment in just a few minutes. Most of that time I was reading the manual pages. I took an existing ballad style and modified it. Piece of cake! This weekend I'm going to modify the style with some arppegiated bass lines. Using the CV (chord variation) you can create multiple different ( I think up to 6) bass lines depending on the chord variation used.

[Chuck]

I own the Korg PA2/3X. After reading all of these posts, I'm interested in purchasing the micro arranger, but have a few questions first:

1. The Bigger arrangers allow you to edit the styles, can you do that with the micro arranger?
2. The bigger arrangers have a songbook that you can save your arrangements in, does the micro arranger have a similar function?
3. When looking at the pictures of the micro arranger, it appears there are weighted keys. Yes or no?
4. Are there any country styles in the micro arranger?
5. Can I copy some of the styles from the PA3X and load them in the micro arranger?

Thanks. Chuck

[Thoraldus]

I own the Korg PA2/3X. After reading all of these posts, I'm interested in purchasing the micro arranger, but have a few questions first:

1. The Bigger arrangers allow you to edit the styles, can you do that with the micro arranger?
2. The bigger arrangers have a songbook that you can save your arrangements in, does the micro arranger have a similar function?
3. When looking at the pictures of the micro arranger, it appears there are weighted keys. Yes or no?
4. Are there any country styles in the micro arranger?
5. Can I copy some of the styles from the PA3X and load them in the micro arranger?

Thanks. Chuck

1. Yes
2. No ***
3. No
4. Yes
5. No - Not directly

*** Although the microArranger does not sport a Songbook, you can save Performances with automatic links to specific styles.