PedalBoards

[Human Machine]

Does anyone out there use a pedal board or have any experience using one. I remember years ago we had an old organ and I thought it was great to not only have 10 fingers working but also moving my feet around and getting bass sounds. I was thinking that on slower parts if I can figure out how to deal with damping issues, you could actually trigger chords with stringed instruments with your feet, while playing a complicated piano part. I wasn't sure if you could do something like this.

Thanks
Brian

[Shreddy]

I dont own a set I wanted to get some but they're too expensive. My old guitarist has the Moog Taurus Pedals which are higher than the controllers.

For MIDI pedal controllers you can get the Roland PK 5, 7, 25 midi controller pedals or the StudioLogic MP 113, 117. The base models are still expensive but I'd opt for the Roland pedals over teh StudioLogic they just look better and have additional pedals on the top of the unit.


PK-5
http://www.musiciansbuy.com/mmMBCOM/Images/ROLAND_PK5.jpg

MP 117
http://www.musiciansbuy.com/mmMBCOM/Images/studiologic_mp117_dw.jpg

[Spacehog]

I may well have a set later this evening... ;-)

Martin

[Tigerfolly]

I dont own a set I wanted to get some but they're too expensive. My old guitarist has the Moog Taurus Pedals which are higher than the controllers.

For MIDI pedal controllers you can get the Roland PK 5, 7, 25 midi controller pedals or the StudioLogic MP 113, 117. The base models are still expensive but I'd opt for the Roland pedals over teh StudioLogic they just look better and have additional pedals on the top of the unit.


We had a guy bring a PK5 into the Guitar Center I worked at who wanted to sell them so he could buy some new gear. We both ended up with a pretty good deal, and we had the PK5 sold by that evening, because as soon as everyone saw them, they hit their phone lists and had dozens of people who wanted them.

Talk to a GC department or assistant manager and tell them you're interested in finding a set of these. You'll usually find them MUCH cheaper than they normally go for (sometimes even less than a thousand), just because a lot of people don't know how much they're worth.

[Karmafied]

Hi friend, the PK5 it´s a great deal,i use two of them for live gigs and i really love this board.
With this gear you can make some really cool things like play complex orquestal parts,some really complete chords or play some nice multi-intrumental parts. You can have a hands free option to make some multiple plays with the two hands and mantain the armonic base with the board.
It´s not really dificult to program and have nice options like Hold ON-OFF, program chances, control changes,3 velocity curves and multipercusion and FX sets for example, you dont have many banks and only the 2 first are avalaible for a complete programation, but this not a problem cause it`s a secondary controller and not the master control of your gear.

I recomend you go for the PK5 ´cause the PK7 it´s not programable and the Studiologic doesnt comewith the same general options that the PK5 offers.

If you have any trouble about the programation or any other question about this boards can you send me a Email to :

cyakeyboard@hotmail.com

Good luck with your purchase :D

[Human Machine]

Thanks for the feedback guys. I guess my other question would be how useful would it be for me. I have a K2600X and can keymap the entire keyboard to do almost anything I want; however I want to put say strings playing chord progressions under a bright 2 hand paino part. I'm really not sure if the K2600X is suitable to do this. I was listening to Images and Words and in Wait for Sleep, there is a piano with strings under it. Now I know that the piano part isn't that complex and the strings are really simple chords, so I guess he could trigger this from one synth, but I started to think about complex piano parts and putting chord progressions that don't necessarily follow the piano. I suppose the pedal would be far less complex than trying to program all that into the K2600X if it's even possible. And of course using it as a midi controller/pedals would be useful, just not sure if the $300-$400 investment is worth the money. It's bad enough I currently don't have the time to even program the K2600X. all that power and no time to actually use it :( Then there is the issue of trying to play it while standing...I was thinking maybe a bike seat type pearch, so I'm still sort of standing but I don't need to balance on one foot....hmmm....lots to think about.

[Karmafied]

Ok, with the PK5 you can make this set for trigger a chord progression (strings) and at the same time you can mantain playing the piano parts with the left hand or with the 2 hands...but unfortunately this type of sets dont come as a preset programs, you need to make a program that contain in one of the midi channels the chord`s root and intervals in one note, or even make a multisetup for diferent chords in any pedal/note then you can play the progression as you want.
If you want to trigger a little type of secuence with the chords or anyother similar way this pedalboard it`s a bad deal, ´cause the money dont justify the use as a start-stop trigger.
This board it`s mainly for playing propouses and need some programation the dificult of this action depends on you own needs, obviously you can use in any way that you like but i think if you want a trigger start/stop type of gear you can obtain other machine for less money.

:D

[Omega Monkey]

I have the PK-5, and i believe they are more bad-ass than I could probably ever use. Mostly I just run them through one of my synths (usually the alpha juno or jx3p, as those have the nicest bass sounds for the most part) and use them like Taurus pedals. I can change the octave they play in, or I can change whether they "hold" or not (one note, the hold function is a bit awkward and you have to stop playing to engage or disengage it, ie it cuts out all note on messages). I have also run it through the alpha juno, and using the chord memory function and a string patch, done a pretty cool rendition of the groove part of Heart Of The Sunrise (ie with me playing bass, and playing the "mellotron" chords on the pedals). That was just me triggering the actual notes. But with a sampler, you can just map all kinds of crazy chords to whatever notes you want. Theoretically, you could have 13 chords for the verse, 13 more for the chorus, etc... until you run out of notes to map them to. Then you could just step through them sequentially (rather than chromatically, ie having each chord play from its "root", you might for instance start the song on an em7 chord mapped to C1). I have the PK-5, and i believe they are more bad-ass than I could probably ever use. Mostly I just run them through one of my synths (usually the alpha juno or jx3p, as those have the nicest bass sounds for the most part) and use them like Taurus pedals. I can change the octave they play in, or I can change whether they "hold" or not (one note, the hold function is a bit awkward and you have to stop playing to engage or disengage it, ie it cuts out all note on messages). I have also run it through the alpha juno, and using the chord memory function and a string patch, done a pretty cool rendition of the groove part of Heart Of The Sunrise (ie with me playing bass, and playing the "mellotron" chords on the pedals). That was just me triggering the actual notes. But with a sampler, you can just map all kinds of crazy chords to whatever notes you want. Theoretically, you could have 13 chords for the verse, 13 more for the chorus, etc... until you run out of notes to map them to. Then you could just step through them sequentially (rather than chromatically, ie having each chord play from its "root", you might for instance start the song on an em7 chord mapped to C1). Know what I mean? Then you can step through the octaves on the PK-5 (you press the right control button and then press a pedal to select whichever octave you want out of 9). With resampling, this really shouldnt be that difficult.

You also have bass and poly sections, which you can "save" various settings of (ie the settings dont change until you change them, even after turning the unit off). So you can have the poly section n channel 12 in octave 5 while the bass section is in octave 3, channel 9 with the hold function on. Thats not even getting into the drums and sfx sections, which personally I havent really delved into yet (but maybe i should now that i have a sampler, albeit a very limited one).

Really, the only thing you are missing with the PK-5 that you would get from the Taurus, is the SOUND. But the Taurus sound is not really something very animated, or something that there is usually much realtime control going on, so its very sampleable, and Im POSITIVE there are some good samples of it out there. At any rate, its fairly easy to approximate with any analog or VA synth.