Roland and Yamaha are on notice!!! after Namm 2013

[chilly7]

Did Yamaha even bother to turn up at MusikMesse?

What saddens me most about the demise of Yamaha as a synthesizer innovator is not that they no longer innovate in any way or in the ways that only they uniquely can; nor is it that they do not give a damn about that loss or a damn about their own legacy - what saddens me the most is that you just know there's nobody there that is even aware of their lousy situation or that there is a user base of Yamaha synthesizer players/users who do care. They actually think they are doing quite well in that regard. They think that the odd little 'sweet voice', the occasional 5th rate 'workstation' or vocal harmony package is innovation. It's like the company has Alzheimer disease.

i think they relised another watereddown Motif...
nothing interesting! keep going!!!

[robinkle]

Yamaha just did release a new Workstation. The Motif XF with this amaizing motif engine - state of the art Element stuff. Well it's still considered new to Yamaha.

[LivePsy]

Yama-who? Nothing at NAMM. No longer in the synthesizer business anymore. Rompler workstations with 10 year old design but no synth innovation. The heady days of the AN200 or FS1R are over.

B

[billysynth]

And to think once upon a time they owned Korg.

Korg should lend them a helping hand

Billy

[chilly7]

Yamaha just did release a new Workstation. The Motif XF with this amaizing motif engine - state of the art Element stuff. Well it's still considered new to Yamaha.

lol.
Yamaha Motif Xf is not state of the art and also it was not state of the art when they introduced it, in fact there is nothing in Motif Xf which is state of the art.

[chilly7]

And to think once upon a time they owned Korg.

Korg should lend them a helping hand

Billy

i do not think somebody should help yamaha.
It is the same as to help a greedy businessman in building homes for homeless people.
yamaha has all the money in the world. They do not make something great because they care only about money

[BasariStudios]

Yamaha just did release a new Workstation. The Motif XF with this amaizing motif engine - state of the art Element stuff. Well it's still considered new to Yamaha.

,,Just released'' Well my Grandma is still considered new too.

[Saxifraga]

It´s a little bit silly to be that haughty about Yamaha. The Korg Kronos is also not state of the art. Just look how modern UIs work and compare it to this 1995 style Atari ST Interface in color. Just look how easy the iMS20 APP is in comparison to the Kronos MS20 interface. It does not help to have a competitor that is even more old school. And calling it a steep learning curve is a cheap excuse for a crappy workflow.
Just adding big RAM and SDD is not enough, but Korg has something to build on.

[jimknopf]

The overall Kronos concept is significantly more advanced than the Yamaha's from my view, in more than one way.

And the slightly outdated graphical UI of the K (only compared to actual computers) is at least a well working link between functionality and graphical overview, which can neither be said for Nords or Kurzweils, nor for the Sesame Street colours of Roland covering halfbaked or in part completely silly OS structures.

So yes, essintially it is completely ok to mock the missing innovative overall concept of other workstations and synths, and to wonder why The Kronos still is so far ahead of the competition.

[Kevin Nolan]

This NAMM show suggests (tentatively) that the traditional workstation is "on notice".

There seems to be new and developing approaches (and markets): iPad apps, kits, monophonic synths, polyphony synths, and digital pianos.


The Workstation was originally developed to provide all of those under one hood, of which the Kronos is surely the pinnacle?

But when you see Korg selling 15 synth engines in an iPad for $28 - compared to $8000 for 7 synth engines (and top class controller) with the OASYS; surely there is no viable future for the Kronos/Fantom/Motif type workstation any more?

In once sense I lament the loss of the yearly delivery of a Flagship synth (and we may see them again, but less frequently) - but in another sense there is a sense of liberation - look at the Moog Sub37 - that is an extraordinary instrument, and one you could not have envisioned happening 10 years ago. There seems to be a liberation of technology approaches, devices, formats, ... , though a lot of it feels experimental and uncertain too.

One thing I sense from Korg is that they are extremely forward thinking right now - but - not quite sure where that future lies. On one hand it seems to me that there may be dwindling sales in their traditional markets and hence there may be a possibility of a recoil from that market a la Yamaha 10 years ago (speculating here) but on the other hand it looks like Korg are trying to create new markets by bringing all synthesis to the masses (mono tribe, volca, kits, iPad Apps). My beef with it is that there seems to be little context set for any of it. there's no underlying sense of 'value' to a software based synthesiser any more; while those of us lucky enough to own hardware have developed a keen 'sense' of value in a myriad of ways.

for example, there isn't even a user manual for the iMS20 (I know there' interactive docs - but they're not used). Indeed, overall - does ANYONE know how to use an MS20 (including its patch panel). Where's the value-add, the support: the patches, tutorials, helpful guidance ...( and as an aside, I feel Korg need to give the MS20 a rest and develop a new monophonic (if not polyphonic) analogue synth. The MS20 has been 'done to death' in about every conceivable format).

There are excellent signs for the current / future development in music technology; but to me, signs of knee-jerk reaction or perhaps a lack of depth to attributing valuable context and direction too.

Times are a changin'...


Kevin

[MrDuke]

Did Yamaha even bother to turn up at MusikMesse?

What saddens me most about the demise of Yamaha as a synthesizer innovator is not that they no longer innovate in any way or in the ways that only they uniquely can; nor is it that they do not give a damn about that loss or a damn about their own legacy.

This is an old post, but I couldn't agree more, and I'm saddened about it as well.

At one point, I was actually anticipating them to release a multi-engine touch screen beast, to follow the Motif line and to compete with Kronos. Perhaps with all their PLG boards integrated, emulations of a legendary synth like a CS series, etc.

I don't think they've HONESTLY brought out anything "new" to the synth market since Motif XS, and that's a product from 2007, which seems like an eternity. All the variations and "new" workstations that have followed, have been derived from that...or from other derivations.

[MrDuke]

...surely there is no viable future for the Kronos/Fantom/Motif type workstation any more?

You're forgetting the live players. They (we, me) are probably the primary uses of "workstations" as purely live instruments in various genres. Turn on a TV, watch a talk show, and there's a guy with the same black / silver keyboards as there ever was.

I still crack up when I think of the first Kronos teaser videos, with Adam Blackstone playing an 808 kit and getting all excited "whoooop, I'm gonna take this to the studio!".

PS - I feel Korg need to give the MS20 a rest and develop a new monophonic (if not polyphonic) analogue synth. The MS20 has been 'done to death' in about every conceivable format.

I agree.

[Bachus]

Seems Both yamaha and Roland missed this call....

- But then Roland pulled out of the main market workstation race long time ago.. And its a pity they even left the great concept of the V-synth behind.
- Yamaha is still sleeping, because they make loads and loads of money with yesterdays technollogy ... Sad thing is their customers are still sleeping too, calling the Kronos old fashioned as it does not have flash memmory.. well, lets wake them up and tell them that their flash memmory works at 0.8 MB/s and that Kronos direct from disk samples have a bandwith of 80 MB/s ... but then i wonder if they would even grasp the meaning of that..

And the others?

Nord keeps doing which its good in..
Kurzweil is prommising the next big thing like they allways do
Casio try and stay as far away from professional worlstations as possible

[BasariStudios]

You're forgetting the live players. They (we, me) are probably the primary uses of "workstations" as purely live instruments in various genres. Turn on a TV, watch a talk show, and there's a guy with the same black / silver keyboards as there ever was.

But you are also forgetting that a LOT of these Live Players already taking
Laptops and MIDI controllers on stage now.

[Jan1]

On the positive side, I have to say that I immensely like the sound of the pianos in Yamaha's CP4, where you can sound both majestic and full as well as subtle and intimate.
The pianos sound just the way I want them to sound, and I think Yamaha did a really great job there.