Question: What is a MIDI guitar system?

Answer:  This is any instrument that lets a guitarist send out
real-time MIDI messages from a guitar or guitar-like controller. The
guitar can be a specially made instrument (as in the case of the
Zeta below) or it can be a "normal" guitar fitted with a special
pickup.

Question: What MIDI guitar systems are available?

Answer:

_Roland GR1_. This is the popular footpedal guitar synthesizer (you put it
on the floor and select sounds and do other things to it with your feet). It's
supposed to track your playing very well if you play the interal sounds (which
are based on the Roland Sound Canvas module). The GR1 comes with the built-in 
synth, effects, a mixer that takes in a stereo signal from the guitar (if you 
want to process your guitar through an external effects unit and then mix it 
with the synth; the GR1's effects can only be used with the GR1 synth, not 
the guitar), jacks for plugging in expression pedals, and a 4-track sequencer.

_Roland GR09_. Here is a review courtesy of Philip Nelson:

As I hoped to do I made it to the GR-09 demo by Scott Summers
from Roland last night.  In spite of the fact most of the the demo
actually was of the DR-5 drum machine and their new multi-effects 
box, it still was useful.  The GR-09 will certainly not make me want 
to abandon the GR-50 and is really a baby brother of the GR-1 with 
the exception of the number of sounds which is double (in a non 
expanded GR-1).  The lack of controls make the GR-09 much less 
desirable than the GR-1 which adds a mini sequencer and
patch editing, has 4 timbres for external use to the GR-09's 1.  The
tracking inplementation is the same among the GR-50, GR-1 and GR-09
internally but the GR-09 does not have the MIDI options for setting
up external program changes, bender range, channel etc. making it less
desirable for that as well.  I didn't catch if the GR-1 has has
external settings like the GR-50's but I suspect it does.
   The GR-1/09 has better samples than the GR-50 as they are 16 bit
vs 12 bit PCM on the GR-50 and many sounded very good.  As I indicated
earlier the GR-1/09 has no synthesis engine so the sounds you get from the
built in samples or from the the expansion card is all you are going to get.
This is not incredibly limiting if your main use is imitating "natural"
sounds.  The GR-50 has samples and the LA synthesis engine but is challenging
to program so it is geared more to someone inclined to smear synth guts
on their face once in a while and hopefully the rewards of the effort
can be your own unique sounds.
    The question that came up in this list about tracking has been
answered for me.  These units all track with the same technology and nothing
new is coming down the pike.  Some people will feel that *some* of the 16
bit samples feel better because of the attack transients and rich sounds
that make you feel good about your playing.  My solution will be to keep
the GR-50 and possibly get a good external box that will fit in my rack,
maybe the Sound Canvas.  But the GR-50 with it's synth engine and lack of
floor real estate is still my choice though I'd be quite happy with the
GR-1 as well.  The money saved on the GR-09 while not insignificant is
probably better spent than saved.  Hopefully the GR-1 will start showing up
on the used market soon (I paid $500.00 for my GR-50 *and* GK-2 pickup).

_Roland GR700_. Roland's first MIDI guitar system. The internal
synth can be best classified as "classic analog". I like my GR700
for the internal sounds, especially the "Psycho Synth" patch;
originally invented by Gayle Ellett of Djam Karet and contributed by
Gayle to _MIDI Guitarist_. This patch behaves in the following
manner: when a note is plucked, the synth "swoops down" to that note
and when that note is released, the synth spirals up in an orgy of
self-modulation. Gayle can be heard using this patch on his GR700 in
"A City of Two Tales" on Djam Karet's _Suspension and Displacement_.
It's a great sound for dramatic moments. The tracking is pretty
decent if one picks every note cleanly and responds to hammer-ons ok
too if they are done cleanly. 
	The GR700 is woefully crippled, however, as a MIDI
controller. It only transmits on MIDI channel 1 and is not capable
of transmitting MIDI pitch bend information. All it can transmit is
MIDI note-on, MIDI velocity, and MIDI program change; *that's it*.
Still I find it useful as an input device for sequencing.
	What some would consider the GR700's other weakness; the
ability to glitch ;-); I consider to be an asset. By playing
harmonics and doing other weird things, I can coax various wild
sonic events out of the GR700 that would not be possible to produce
with a keyboard (unless that keyboard has a powerful synth engine
and hours are spent programming an equivalent sound).

_Starr Switch Company_. This San Diego based company makes what amounts to
keyboard controllers for guitarists. The model that Living Colour's Vernon
Reid uses is shaped like a guitar, but has no strings. Instead, it replaces
the fretboard with a keypad with one key for each fret and six rows of keys.
Your left hand (assuming you're a right handed guitarist) would play it like a
normal guitar by tapping the appropriate keys on the neck keypad. Since this
keypad is arranged just like a guitar fretboard, you should be able to adjust
fairly quickly. Your right hand would either manipulate the various controls
(like the pitch bending joystick) or assist the left hand (as in two-handed
tapping, Stanley Jordan style). This would be the ideal controller for
guitarist who needs an instrument to play his MIDI setup but feels frustrated
with traditional organ-type keyboard controllers. This is *not* a replacement
for real guitar; it's intended to be a composing tool. The tracking ability of
this instrument would rival that of a regular keyboard controller since it is
really a keyboard for guitarists; it doesn't suffer from the occasional 
glitching of other MIDI guitar controllers since it doesn't deal with strings at
all. Starr actually makes two models, the Datapump (described above)
and a tabletop model with the arrangement of keys more like that of
a Stick fretboard. Allan Holdsworth reportedly uses the tabletop
model as a replacement for the SynthAxe. The MIDI control capabilities
are supposedly very comprehensive; comparable to that of a good MIDI
master keyboard.

The address:

Starr Instrument
1717 5th Ave.
San Diego, CA 92104
USA
 
_Zeta_. Here is some info courtesy of David Campbell:

Well, yesterday when I posted the information about the Zeta MIDI guitar
controller, I managed to bungle a great deal of it.  So I've reviewed the
literature that I had on it.  Here's the real poop:


   * Guitar MIDI controller.  Comes with a guitar (standard tuned, regular
     strings so its playable as a regular guitar as well) and a 1-unit rack
     "brain".  It only outputs MIDI -- it doesn't have a built-in synth
     engine.

   * Made around 1989 and at that time cost $3000 - $3800 depending on
     the options and the guitar that came with it.  It may or may not still
     be made (does anyone know?).

   * It used a wired fretboard to sense which notes were being played.
     Obviously, this makes for *fast* tracking -- in fact pretty much as
     fast as you're going to get, considering that's basically what a
     keyboard controller does.  (It does not use an optical system as I
     had previously reported -- got my controllers mixed up.)

   * Its also obvious that wired fretboards aren't going to track bends
     worth a damn.  So it also has a pitch conversion system that is
     used to track bends -- the wired frets are used to initially trigger
     notes, and pitch conversion is used for bends only.

   * It has a huge set of parameters to adjust the thing to your playing
     style.  It takes quite a bit of tweaking to get it just right.

   * There is a mode which will detect note muting with your picking hand
     and will send out a quick note-on/note-off series for the open string
     note.  If you use this with a synth patch that has a very quick attack
     and decay, you can emulate that muted "chunka" sound.

   * It knows how to handle MIDI legato mode to deal with hammer-ons and
     pull-offs.  ("Legato mode" is a mode that somes synths can be put in
     where two separate note-on events without an intervening note-off will
     cause the synth *not* to retrigger a new note, with its accompanying
     ADSR envelope, but rather just change the pitch of the first note.
     The result is a sound that is, well, legato.)

   * There's a hardware option that allows you to route the outputs from
     your synthesizer (not your guitar as I reported earlier) back into
     the Zeta brain.  There, the Zeta applies a VCA to the synth signal
     that dynamically adjusts the synth's volumes to track the natural
     decay of the guitar strings.  The result is even more guitar-like
     response.

   * It has something called "Neck Mode" where merely fretting a note
     causes it to trigger.  This is to accommodate two-handed tapping.


IMHO, what makes this unit so much better than the GR1, other than the
performance, is that all the cost is put into the technology of making a
superior controller, not into providing a synth engine.  While the Sound
Canvas engine that the GR1 contains has some really nice samples, it
doesn't have nearly the programmability that I want in a synth (I want
something more like a Korg Wavestation AD, or a Kurzwiel K2000).  Now of
course the GR1 can output MIDI to drive the synth of your choice, but
when you do that, the tracking performance is seriously degraded.

The most obvious disadvantages of the Zeta are its price, its complexity,
and the fact that it comes from a small company (by which I mean that
the company could go belly-up more easily and you could be left with a
very expensive, unsupported piece of technology).

So there you go, the Zeta MIDI controller in a nutshell.  If you're a
techno-dweeby, I'm sure you're lusting like me....


David.
--
+-----==== opinions expressed do not represent those of my employer ====-----+
| David L. Campbell, IBM Austin, TX         | "... and you eat your own soul |
|   Inet:  dcampbel@austin.ibm.com          |        until the only thing    |
|   VM:    dcampbel at austin               |          left is appetite..."  |


From: cbradley@bozell.com (Chris Bradley)
Subject: Re: Any experience with casio midi pg380?

> In article <2sueu0$8af@hpscit.sc.hp.com> davidm@hparc7.aus.hp.com (Dave  
Mitchell) writes:
> >
> >Additionally, the guitar itself sounds better than my Strats (US and Jap),
> >so I figure I got two instruments in one.  Other people have commented that
> >the Casio MIDI guitars are excellent guitars in their own right - your
> >mileage may vary.  I think it's actually an Ibanez guitar that's been
> >heavily altered by Casio.
> 
> "Heavily" is the key word here. The thing weighs a ton.


Hey, I gotta speak up here.  I've been using a PG-380 as my main axe for four  
years.  It just works, for me.  The guitar sounds are versatile -- humbucker  
with single-coil tap switch in the bridge (lead) position, and two single-coil  
pickups in the neck and middle positions, similar to a Strat.  Maple neck,  
rosewood fingerboard, jumbo frets, Strat-style body (mine's black), Strat-style  
headstock, Gotoh keys, Floyd Rose-style floating bridge and locking nut,  
5-position Strat-style pickup-selector switch, three knobs (guitar volume,  
synth volume, tone).  It's not any heavier than my second guitar (Gibson  
"Howard Roberts Fusion"), which is a semi-hollow electric guitar with a small  
body -- think of a Les Paul with F-holes.

The MIDI section is pretty good.  Not as good as a Beetle, or a Voyetra, but  
hey, you can find a PG-380 for around $500-600 these days.  A hexaphonic pickup  
between the bridge and the humbucking lead pickup drives the onboard  
pitch-to-MIDI conversion circuitry.  Lots of MIDI parameters are provided:   
note on/off, pitch, velocity, bend, octave transposition, and a switchable  
pitch-quantization feature that forces semitones to the nearest chromatic  
pitch.  This last feature is useful when I want to sound like a keyboard  
instrument (no semitones), instead of like a stringed instrument.  There is an  
eight-button keypad, located just behind the tone knob that you can use to  
select the patch you want, and there is a bright, red, 2-character LED display  
to show you what patch is currently selected.  Standard MIDI out port (5-pin  
DIN connector).

There is an on-board tone-generator, too, but I don't like many of the sounds  
it has.  It is based on Casio's "VX" (phase distortion) synthesis method --  
same TG unit as the Casio VX-101 keyboard of a few years back.  There are a  
couple of cool patches in there, but most of the time I'll drive an M1R with  
the MIDI out instead.  If you do use the onboard tone generator, there are  
separate volume knobs for the guitar sound and the synth sound.  The guitar  
volume knob is located right under your pinky finger as you play, just like a  
Strat.  The synth volume knob is the middle knob, and the guitar "tone" control  
is the bottom knob.  There are also separate output jacks for guitar and synth  
sounds, one of which is is a stereo jack to carry guitar and synth sounds on  
separate leads, the other jack is a mono jack that has guitar and synth sounds  
mixed.  You control the relative volume of the guitar and synth sounds with the  
two volume knobs on the top of the guitar.

The synth section requires 9VDC, 300ma to work.  There is a built-in battery  
holder that takes six AA cells; these last about 5-6 hours of continous use.   
You can also use a standard 9V cell but it will get drained in about 2 hours.   
Most of the time, I'll use a wall-wart power adapter, which plugs into an  
external power jack between the MIDI out and the guitar out jack.  I made a  
special cable that has DC power, MIDI, and guitar signal, and I run that back  
to the guitar rack at the back of the stage.

All told, I'm damm glad that I bought this thing, even if it did cost me $1500  
new.  I've played the hell out of it for four years and never had any trouble  
with it ('cept for a fret job!).  It's a steal at $500.  Go for it.
--
Chris Bradley                           |  cbradley@bozell.com
Techno-Slave, with Many Masters         |  +1 214 830 2273 vox
Bozell, Jacobs, Kenyon & Eckhardt, Inc. |  +1 214 830 2687 fax
Advertising and Public Relations        |  "Born ready"