Motif XS Demo Contest

So you’ve had your Motif XS for a few months now and got every thing dialed in. So now it’s put time to put the Green Monster to the test. We’re putting together new Motif XS demos for the website and for store displays here in the US. So we created a special opportunity for you to show off your skills and style. Post your song to the new MoRadio channel called Motif XS Demo and at the end of September we will select three winners. There are the only two rules:

1. The Song or Pattern must be either original or public domain (copyright free). You of course keep all the right to your song and, if selected as a winner, we will send you a simple form that gives Yamaha permission to use the song for promotional purposes.
   
2. The Song or Pattern must be done completely on the Motif XS. It’s perfectly fine to get a buddy over to play guitar or sax as longs as it’s sampled into the Motif XS. Why? Because if selected as a winner we will ask you to send in the original Motif XS file and we may well use it in stores and clinics around the US.

So take the challenge! See if you’ll be one of the few, one of the proud selected to represent your keyboard for Yamaha.

1st prize – $300 in Motif Mart downloads
2nd prize – $200 in Motif Mart downloads
3rd prize - $100 in Motif Mart downloads

Motif the platform for epic DVD on analog-style synthesis and digital effects

Everyone needs to be a synth programmer or engineer nowadays. And not just keyboard players, either. Guitarists and songwriters using the free copies of Cubase LE that tumble out of the box along with a computer interface, drummers with a new DTX e-kit, remix artists running Reason, live DJ/musicians running Live!, videographers running Final Cut Pro or even iMovie. Garage Bandits… the list goes on and on.

Almost every music-involving program now offers filters, envelope generators, and LFOs for tweaking your music, along with reverbs, EQs, delays, and compression modules or plug-ins that are essential in order to raise your audio to the ‘professional’ standards that modern music and video software enticingly now permits.

But actually using these new-found tools takes a far wider level of understanding than any host program or general tutorial or DVD is going to spend time on.

For Motif owners, the new Sound Advice DVD offering almost 9 hours of ‘no parameter left behind’ information and expertise on analog-style synth programming and digital effects is particularly sweet because the Motif ES was used as the platform and interface to shoot the video.

Under the guidance of top sound designer Dave Polich, who has crafted waveROM and presets and for some of the world’s most successful music hardware and software products of the past ten years (not only all the Motif models, but Korg and Roland hardware, plus softsynths from NI and others), Sound Advice’s 3 DVDs encompass:

• Synth programming techniques,
• An exhaustive parameter-by-parameter guide, and
• Everything you could possibly wish to know about digital effects.

The DVD’s navigation system allows you to use Sound Advice in many different ways: As a complete master class tutorial, as a work of reference (you can search individual sound parameters), or as an encyclopedia of techniques and sound types (creating pads, modifying sound FX etc).

Legendary producer and 2007 GRAMMY nominee Alan Parsons describes the DVD as offering: "All you need to know about oscillators, filters, envelopes, dynamics and effects that will enable you to produce the sound that you are looking for on your synth - totally from scratch."

DVD Contents

Disc 1 starts with how to create simple sounds; breaking down examples into three main categories: decaying sounds, sustaining sounds, and non-pitched sounds. The next section shows you how to tweak a series of classic sound types: brightening up a piano, changing the tone of an electric guitar, modifying the envelope of a brass patch, and many others.

Disc 2 comprises an exhaustive look at all the major analog-style synth parameters from Amplitude Scaling to Velocity Curves. Perfectly watchable from start to finish, with diagrams, text boxes, and plenty of real-world musical examples, Disc 2 is primarily designed as a reference guide.

Disc 3 is entirely devoted to digital effects - now an integral part of the sound design landscape, especially on the Motif platform. All major DSP effects - from reverbs and delays, to chorus, flanger, and phaser, to EQ and compression - are examined in minute, parameter-by-parameter detail.

Who Needs It

Produced by KEYFAX NewMedia, who has been making instructional videos and DVDs on music technology for more than 15 years, Sound Advice is filmed in a clean and uncluttered style, with supporting text boxes and simple diagrammatic material.

Talking ‘in plain English,’ Sound Advice is aimed at the novice to intermediate user who has a keen potential interest in sound, but who doesn’t exactly want to study the subject at college. Aside from clearly being a must-have for Motif owners (the pure programming and effects parameters are 90% compatible from the original Motif right through to the Motif XS), applications include computer-using musicians of all persuasions, technology-enabled DJs, to students and teachers in music education.

“There’s so much scope for creating new sounds today between powerful workstations like Motif, software applications, and plug-ins,” says KEYFAX founder Julian Colbeck. “But programming has become a dark - or at least lost - art for most people. We hope that Sound Advice will inspire a whole new generation to experiment with sound and unleash the full creative potential of the tools now at their disposal.”

2007 Motif Loyalty Program

The new 2007 Motif Loyalty Program is available to US customers who are purchasing a new Motif XS from an authorized US Yamaha Dealer.

There are two parts to the Loyalty program. One part provides an extra incentive to potential Motif XS customers to upgrade or cross-grade from your current workstation whether it is a Motif ES or a product from a competitor. The other portion provides incentives to customers who purchase a pre-owned Yamaha product from someone who is upgrading to the XS. Hopefully this increases the value of that pre-owned Yamaha instrument so people upgrading to the XS can sell them for as much money as they possibly can.

Who qualifies for the program?
Anyone who currently owns one of the following products and purchases a Motif XS qualifies.

Qualifying Yamaha Products:
Motif, Motif ES, Motif Rack, Motif Rack ES, MO6, MO8, S90, S90ES

Qualifying Competitive Workstation Cross Grades:
Korg Oasys, Korg Triton (any model Studio, Extreme, etc.), Korg TR Series, Roland Fantom (any model), Kurzweil 2600 and 2661, Alesis Fusion, and Akai MPC (any model).

For the new Motif XS owner the 2007 Motif Loyalty Program provides 64 New Voices taken from four of the most popular DCP Voice libraries available on Motifator.com, a new bank of 128 XS voices and extra Performances created by the Yamaha voicing team, a 40% discount coupon on Arturia Virtual Instrument software, and perhaps most important of all the S700 piano sample set taken from the Yamaha S90ES.

For people who purchase a pre-owned Motif ES we are also offering the 40% discount coupon on any Arturia Virtual instrument software, the S90ES piano sample in ES format, plus a healthy discount on the new 9 hour Sound Advice DVD on Motif ES voice programming.

Motif Loyalty content comes on a custom Content CD and contains data with a retail value of $499.

How do I sign up for the loyalty program?
You go to www.motifloyalty.com and register the product that you currently own. When you purchase your new XS, you register that serial number as well. That’s all you need to do.

When will the Motif Loyalty program start ?
www.motifloyalty.com will open for registration on May 15, 2007. Of course, it is retroactive for all those people who have already purchased an XS.

When will the actual Loyalty content be available?
The Loyalty Content CD will be available no later than May 30th, 2007 and probably well before that.

Do I have to sell my Motif ES or Triton to qualify for the Yamaha Motif Loyalty program?
No, if you wish to keep your current product and add the Motif XS to your system, that’s fine. Just register the serial numbers for your two products as usual.

DCP Motif XS format Voice Libraries

DCP’s Dave Polich is one of the leading Motif sound designers, who has worked on the WaveROM and on the preset Voices and Performances for all Motif series instruments up to an including the Motif XS.

DCP has also produced some of the most popular third-party voice and sample libraries including B’s Knees, Vintage Keys, and Motronix available for purchase in the MotifMart.

The Motif XS is physically capable of loading Voices and Samples created for the Motif ES. If you own any of the DCP or other third party libraries you can then load the ‘ES’ version into an XS without additional expense. Some re-programming may be either necessary or desirable in order that sound assignments line up or make the most sense, and this is something that, technically, can certainly be done yourself.

Due to the fact that Motif XS offers substantial enhancements in terms of sound, FX, and functionality over the Motif ES, Dave Polich has decided to re-program the DCP libraries specifically for Motif XS in order to take advantage of these new features.

These ‘XS’ version Voice libraries are brand new, and will be made available for separate purchase with their own individual price points.

However, as the libraries on the XS platform are released we will offer discounts on multiple purchases. Please call 1-800-752-2780 for details and to verify ownership.

Release Schedule:

West LA Music hosts Motif XS clinic featuring Alan Parsons and Ellis Hall

West LA Music in Los Angeles is hosting a Motif XS Clinic featuring legendary producer and artist Alan Parsons, and gospel great Ellis Hall 7-9 PM on April 26 th

Alan Parsons has been a Motif user live and in the studio ever since the original Motif came out in 2001. Alan not only utilizes a wide range of internal synth sounds, he also uses his Motifs for custom samples and the co-ordination of click tracks being fed to the rest of the band on stage.

Ellis Hall’s unique, dynamic style of playing - showcased on video from the NAMM Show in January 2007 on the XS – has been tailor-made for Motif acoustic and electric pianos since day one.

The clinic not only puts Motif XS through its paces, it will also offer a fascinating insight into how Motif is used by some of the world’s top professional producers and players in real life.

West LA Music is at 11345 Santa Monica Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90025

Phone: (310) 477-1945 for more details. Click here to register.

ArpManager software released!

ArpManager is a PC application (a Mac version is currently being worked on but we have no release schedule as yet) that lets you, literally, manage your User Arpeggios. By manage, we mean compile your own collections from several different sources, re-arrange them in the order you want them, and even edit them.

Keane 2007 interview

Keane back on the road again in US. "Piano-based (Motif, S90, CP70...) British trio Keane return to the US after a brief hiatus at the end of 2006. Read the new interview with keyboardist Tim Rice-Oxley."

Yamaha shows Motif XS at Winter NAMM

January 18 th 2007 , Anaheim , California : Yamaha is showing the forthcoming Motif XS at the 2007 Winter NAMM Show at the Anaheim Convention Center .

The Motif XS features brand new Expanded Articulation Voices developed not only to enhance the performance of the XS's acoustic instrument library, but also to generate new, radical behaviors for synthesizer sounds.

Thanks to the large format, full color display, the Motif XS offers studio-style routing and mixing on its sample-capable sequencer. Both eye and ear catching are the new Virtual Circuit Modeling effects, and with Cubase AI (Steinberg's up-coming OEM version of Cubase 4) in the box and Studio Connections available, projects can be worked on in both hardware and software environments simultaneously.

Yamaha is situated at the Marriott where the XS will be put through its paces by top product specialist Phil Clendeninn, aka BadMister.

Yamaha shows MM6 at Winter NAMM

January 18 th 2007 , Anaheim , California : Yamaha is showing the new MM6 at the 2007 Winter NAMM Show at the Anaheim Convention Center.

The MM6 marks a new direction for the Motif range, as an instrument you can literally plug in and play, with no mode setting and editing required.

The MM6 provides classic Motif sounds in a performance setting where you can layer, split, and tweak sounds on the fly, assign and switch arpeggios and drum loop backings without breaking the creative flow, and still record and store up to 5 user songs internally.

USB To Device and To Host are both included, allowing you to store unlimited songs off-line (and even play SMFs direct from a USB storage device) and also interface with the included Cubase LE on your computer.

Yamaha is situated at the Marriott where the MM6 will be put through its paces by top product specialist Phil Clendeninn, aka BadMister.

MoBros & Mo'Sis's welcome at Winter NAMM!

January 18 th 2007, Anaheim, California: YamahaUS, MrMotif, BadMister, DavePolich and other regulars of the Motiforum will all be in attendance at the NAMM Show. YamahaUS has issued an open invitation to MoBros and Mo'Sis's visiting the show to meet at the Yamaha booth at the Marriott Hotel.

Interested parties should post in this thread to decide on a meeting time.

Fun – and goodies courtesy of Yamaha – are promised to all who show up.

Motifator.com 2.0 launched

January 18 th 2007, Santa Cruz, California: Motifator.com 2.0 Phase One launches, offering an array of new interactive features and expanded search facilities, blogging, a brand new ‘mixing and production' contest, and much more.

“It's been three years since we had a major re-design” says Keyfax CEO Julian Colbeck. “So much has changed since then, and we've concentrated on keeping the site bang up-to-date with content, not so much the style and features. But the technology is now very much part of the content so we've taken a completely new look at what we can offer the Motif community.”

New areas and features include:

• MoRadio
• Clinicians Blog
• MoTV
• MoPedia
• RSS News feeds
• Full site and forum search engine
• New Motifated People
• Motif XS pages
• MM6 pages

Motifator.com is owned and operated by KEYFAX NewMedia Inc of Santa Cruz .

New music contest announced

January 18 th 2007, Santa Cruz, California : "Mix It & Motifate It," a brand new mixing and production contest, is being launched to coincide with the opening of the new Motifator.com 2.0 website.

Based around KEYFAX NewMedia's Twiddly.Bits library Modular Madness , a construction set of MIDI loops that recreate parts and effects used by classic analog modular synths, entrants can download the raw material of 5 Motif/Motif ES format files free of charge.

The challenge is to voice the files, plus write at least one new Pattern Section to go with it then Chain the Sections into a finished Song.

Considerable kudos plus a modicum of cold hard cash will go the winning entry. See here for Full Details.

Hot Salsa beats in Motif format

October 20 th 2006 , Santa Cruz , California : The infectious world of Salsa comes alive in native Motif, Motif ES, and MO Pattern format with the release of Hot Salsa! – the 25 th MIDI Sample library from Twiddly.Bits producers KEYFAX NewMedia.

This live-played collection of Salsa parts comprises almost 500 instrumental motifs and rhythms from the essential piano montunos and Latin percussion to a wonderful collection of jazz-tinged guitar lines, punctuating brass, and more, underpinned by lilting, beat-crossing bass lines that give Salsa its unmistakable float and swing.

Great care has been taken during the recording and editing of these loops to preserve the authentic feel of Salsa. The power of MIDI and the quality of the Motif soundset gives you unfettered freedom to experiment with tempo, instrumentation, part, and arrangement.

Not only are parts available in Motif Pattern formats, individual .MID files can also be dragged and dropped into Cubase, Sonar, Logic, GarageBand 2, Acid etc.

For dedicated Salsa composers, or for those who simply want to add a Latin dimension to their dance, jazz, or rock tracks, Hot Salsa provides uniquely creative access to the instrumentation of this enticing style of music.

New sounds for stage and studio

December 20 th 2006, Santa Cruz, California: Hot from Germany comes a new collection of the most crucial instrument sounds you need for both stage and studio work - both regular instruments and classic synth sounds.

Stage & Studio , produced by one of Motif's star programmers Peter Krischker, offers a level of depth and complexity in voices such as the string ensembles, brass sections, and string/bell/synth combos that have only hitherto been available in Performance mode. This makes it very easy to create your own Performances by using this new and interesting voice material, which will be particularly helpful for live performances when speed and flexibility is so important.

While most voices are brand new and custom-created, some of the standard instruments have been re-examined and optimized from existing preset material.

To ensure all-round playability and suitability, these voices have been tested by musicians live, and in a range of studio applications.

All voices use internal WAVE ROM and so no additional samples nor DIMM memory need to be installed.

Stage & Studio can be purchased by download from the MotifMart price $35.00.

Renaissance & Folk Instrument library from DCP

October 15 th 2006, Santa Cruz, California: Renaissance Folk Instruments is the latest collection stunning sample voices from star Motif series sound designer Dave Polich/DCP.

Featured are 64 voices for Celtic, Baroque, Folk, American Appalachian, Bluegrass, and Old World ethnic music, including shimmering hammered dulcimers, mountain dulcimers, stringed harps, two beautiful Italian harpsichords (with keyoff effects) a new full-bodied stereo nylon guitar, and a new multilayered stereo banjo.

Also present are solo stringed instruments (violin, viola, cello), zithers, mandolins (plucked and double-picked), sitars, dobro, oud, bouzouki, kanoun, flutes and pipes, and an assortment of rhythm section instruments such as guitarron (large nylon bass guitar), washtub bass, jug, washboard, castanets, stomps and claps – even a joos harp!

Multiple configurations for many instruments are provided, including tunable drone strings for the sitars and oud, as well as instructions for converting certain instruments to alternate tunings.

As a sample bank, Renaissance Folk Instruments requires the installation of DIMM memory in the Motif. Both the library itself and guaranteed memory can be purchased direct at the MotifMart.

New gig bags and road cases available in the MotifMart

December 15 th 2006, Santa Cruz, California: A new range of gig bags and road cases for your Motif plus protective materials for laptops, mixers, and more, is now available at the MotifMart.

As part of an on-going drive to offer every imaginable form of protection for the Motif range MotifMart buyer Nia Christy has brought in a brand new series of custom-fit cases from industry leader Gator Cases.

“We are still carrying the official Yamaha hard cases and the excellent new Yamaha spandex dust covers” says Nia. “But we felt it was important for us to offer items at all prices and weights, and Gator offers many different alternatives.”

The MotifMart is aiming to add a range of customizable, top-of-the-line flight cases in 2007 to complete the range.

Best Of Motif ES DVD ROM

December 1st 2006 , Buena Park , California : A choice selection of some of the best sounds, samples, patterns, arpeggios, and support material ever made for the Motif ES (retail value $149) has been assembled by Motifator.com and is being made available to purchasers of Motif ES units at the end of 2006.

Content includes Voice & Sample libraries from DCP and Sonic Reality, Patterns Drum Loops from the Keyfax Twiddly.Bits MIDI Sample libraries ( Drums Around the World , 100 BreakBeats from the best-selling MIDI BreakBeats collection. A sampler from FutureBeats, 5 construction sets from the Motif Jazz Construction Set, and Mo'Gates, the groundbreaking MIDI Gates complete, in native Motif ES format.), arpeggio banks, a huge range of Videos, Power User Guides, Instrument Defintions, Editors, and Discount Coupons.

Yamaha announces takeover of mLAN driver development for Mac

January 12 th 2007 , Hammamatsu , Japan : Responding to continued speculation about the future of mLAN driver development for the Mac platform Yamaha Corporation has released the following statement on 01xRay.com:

Dear valued customers,

With regard to mLAN, which YAMAHA Corporation has proposed to the industry and promoted, we appreciate that many customers are enjoying its convenience under the Windows environment.

As many of you have acknowledged and those who run Intel-based Macs can experience for yourself, on the Windows OS, mLAN is very stable and a vast majority of end users are satisfied with its performance.

As for mLAN on the Mac OS X environment, however, we recognize that some of the performance does not satisfy specific use-cases. In the future, in order to assume more responsibility for the driver's performance and release timetables, the mLAN driver development for the 01X, i88x, mLAN16e and MY16 mLAN will be handled by YAMAHA's own software engineering team and some mLAN driver releases will be done by YAMAHA.

At this time, we are not able to give a definite timetable for release of a new mLAN driver for MAC OS X as we are currently conducting detailed technical investigations to determine the requirements of the new work we must do.

Our current target is for YAMAHA to release its own mLAN driver update for Mac OS X in the summer of 2007 with a major improvement. However, this release will probably not include all the improvements we would like to achieve so it will be followed by a series of driver updates as YAMAHA continues it's on going effort to provide the best possible end user experience for our customers.

We have been as open and honest with you in informing you of our current situation. We feel that this open and honest communication is the first step in the process of convincing you that YAMAHA is committed to supporting our customers in an ethical and positive manner. We sincerely appreciate your kind understanding and patience in this matter.

Mac OS is a registered trademark of Apple Inc. Intel is a registered trademark of Intel Corporation in the United States and other countries.

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