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CS80 in NHK TV program

Daniel Forró
 

To all group members living in Japan:

Japanese main TV channel NHK found me enough attractive from all 128
millions of inhabitants here and selected me and my CS80 for their
well-liked series Yomigaeri Maisuta (Master of Renovation).

It's half documentary and educational, half entertaining program,
which introduces somebody who has something rare, old, special - it
can be anything. That thing is repaired, restored, renovated, and the
story about the owner, the thing and its renovation is recorded, and
these sequences are then commented by the guests invited to TV studio.
Then owner and renovation specialist enter, renovated thing is
brought, owner can try it, comment, and express his thanks for the
renovation.

So this time it's about my life story, work, coming to Japan in 2003,
and mainly about a rare analog polyphonic synthesizer from my
collection - Yamaha CS-80 from 1979. As an expert in the field of
electronic musical instruments and long-year collector I have
established in my native country - Czech Republic - the only "Museum
of Electro-acoustic Musical Instruments" (between 1989-2003), and had
a good luck to buy this instrument in 90ies from one Christian radio
in Slovakian capitol Bratislava, as partly non working. Before my
moving to Japan I have closed the Museum and sold about half of
instruments (the most rare were bought by Technical museum in Vienna,
were restored and became the part of permanent exhibition there). But CS-80 travelled with me to Japan together with many other machines of
my recording studio and the collection. In fact it did a world tour -
from Japan to USA, then to Slovakia, and then it returned to Japan. As
I understand electronics and do all repairs and maintenance of my
gear, I was going to restore also CS-80 but then an offer from NHK
came which I accepted.

Program is moderated by Nachiko Shudoh and comedian duo Taka & Toshi. Besides three decorative TV celebrities for making various sounds the
production has invited as the special guest an excellent and famous
Japanese keyboards performer Minoru Mukaiya, a member of my favorite
Japanese jazz fusion formation Casiopea so finally I could enjoy
meeting him. He explained basic info about analog and digital
synthesizers in simple and entertaining way and showed a little bit
Minimoog, Roland vocoder and Yamaha Motif. We became quickly good
friends as well as with Mr. Kawazoe who did repair of my instrument.
BTW, that evening after the TV studio recording Mr. Kawazoe showed me
his huge collection of synthesizers - he owns over 400 pieces!

I'd like to invite you to watch this 60 minutes program, broadcasted
on BS Premier on:

July 2nd, 9 pm
July 6th, 12 pm (midday)

There's some archive of whole this series to found on the internet but
it looks like some Chinese pirate server :-)

I wish you good entertainment and all the best.

Daniel Forró
Kakamigahara
Japan
 

Wonderful story and opportunity, I'd be delighted to see the whole of it later! :-)

/mr
Daniel Forró
 

Dear friends,

if you are interested in program Yomigaeri maisutá about me and the repair of my Yamaha CS-80, recorded by the main Japanese TV (broadcasted this week - second time on Sunday at noon - 12 pm - on BS Premium), you have a chance to watch it anytime on these internet pages:


or here:


I'm sorry, it's only in Japanese language, but anyway... Enjoy! I'll be happy if you send this info to the circle of your friends.

Best regards

Daniel Forró


On 27 Jun, 2014, at 5:32 PM, mr@... [yamahacs80] wrote:



Wonderful story and opportunity, I'd be delighted to see the whole of it later! :-)

/mr
 

Very funny program thanks !
I wish my tech would do me the 49th minute moment every time he repairs a synth of mine :)
Maybe I should show him that they do it better in Japan :)

And I quite enjoyed your final demo. Excellent sounds and performance there. Not only all the voices work but the calibration seems to be very accurate. That's one of the main recurrent issues on the CSs...
Now you realise you fooled them all by playing each voices with 1 finger only right ? Playing like that the CS never allows you to play all voices. There is always one that is not playing. To ear them all you need to keep keys pressed...

Phil


On Fri, Jul 4, 2014 at 3:50 PM, Daniel Forró danforcz@... [yamahacs80] <yamahacs80@...> wrote:
?

Dear friends,

if you are interested in program Yomigaeri maisutá about me and the repair of my Yamaha CS-80, recorded by the main Japanese TV (broadcasted this week - second time on Sunday at noon - 12 pm - on BS Premium), you have a chance to watch it anytime on these internet pages:


or here:


I'm sorry, it's only in Japanese language, but anyway... Enjoy! I'll be happy if you send this info to the circle of your friends.

Best regards

Daniel Forró


On 27 Jun, 2014, at 5:32 PM, mr@... [yamahacs80] wrote:



Wonderful story and opportunity, I'd be delighted to see the whole of it later! :-)

/mr
Daniel Forró
 

I'm glad you liked it.

There was no time in the studio to set the instrument better, I had to play something just after they brought it, and before the recording there was no rehearsal, that recording was done live. And I forgot to show ribbon in that studio recording hectic... Now, when I have instrument back in my studio, I could get much better sound from it. It only needs a little bit of tuning, I'll do it later.

Concerning voices - I don't think I fooled them, if I understand that instrument well, voices rotate and each new key press goes to the next voice card. (It is obvious because before calibration each new key press of the same key started the sound with other pitch, timbre, even envelope...) That was the reason why each eighth voice in lower synth didn't worked before the repair - one voice card was out of function. Regardless if I played one voice successively, or pressed 8 keys - always one voice was missing.

So I don't understand well what you mean - why there should be always one voice which doesn't play? All eight voice cards must work always, be it in monophonic or polyphonic play. Or am I totally wrong?

Of course there's also Sustain I and II modes, in one of them probably voices don't rotate when played monophonically, and only the last note gets sustain.

Daniel


On 5 Jul, 2014, at 1:14 AM, Phil a nuipb1@... [yamahacs80] wrote:



Very funny program thanks !
I wish my tech would do me the 49th minute moment every time he repairs a synth of mine :)
Maybe I should show him that they do it better in Japan :)

And I quite enjoyed your final demo. Excellent sounds and performance there. Not only all the voices work but the calibration seems to be very accurate. That's one of the main recurrent issues on the CSs...
Now you realise you fooled them all by playing each voices with 1 finger only right ? Playing like that the CS never allows you to play all voices. There is always one that is not playing. To ear them all you need to keep keys pressed...

Phil
 

开云体育

Voice 8 on both panels will not sound in rotation on any working CS80?unles you hold a finger down before?you? press another key which will be 8 ....

you will get 1234567 1234567
but if you go 12(3-hold) next one is 8? ?4567

the 123 order only works on start up....
as soon as you play a chord the order changes....

voices do?rotate in both sustain modes...

?

---- On Fri, 04 Jul 2014 11:37:21 -0500 Daniel Forró danforcz@... [yamahacs80] wrote ----

?

I'm glad you liked it.

There was no time in the studio to set the instrument better, I had to play something just after they brought it, and before the recording there was no rehearsal, that recording was done live. And I forgot to show ribbon in that studio recording hectic... Now, when I have instrument back in my studio, I could get much better sound from it. It only needs a little bit of tuning, I'll do it later.

Concerning voices - I don't think I fooled them, if I understand that instrument well, voices rotate and each new key press goes to the next voice card. (It is obvious because before calibration each new key press of the same key started the sound with other pitch, timbre, even envelope...) That was the reason why each eighth voice in lower synth didn't worked before the repair - one voice card was out of function. Regardless if I played one voice successively, or pressed 8 keys - always one voice was missing.

So I don't understand well what you mean - why there should be always one voice which doesn't play? All eight voice cards must work always, be it in monophonic or polyphonic play. Or am I totally wrong?

Of course there's also Sustain I and II modes, in one of them probably voices don't rotate when played monophonically, and only the last note gets sustain.

Daniel


On 5 Jul, 2014, at 1:14 AM, Phil a nuipb1@... [yamahacs80] wrote:



Very funny program thanks !
I wish my tech would do me the 49th minute moment every time he repairs a synth of mine :)
Maybe I should show him that they do it better in Japan :)

And I quite enjoyed your final demo. Excellent sounds and performance there. Not only all the voices work but the calibration seems to be very accurate. That's one of the main recurrent issues on the CSs...
Now you realise you fooled them all by playing each voices with 1 finger only right ? Playing like that the CS never allows you to play all voices. There is always one that is not playing. To ear them all you need to keep keys pressed...

Phil
 

Thanks Laurie, this is what I meant. If you always heard 1 voice was silent simply means it was one of the first 7 voices.

Phil


On Fri, Jul 4, 2014 at 7:14 PM, laurie laurie@... [yamahacs80] <yamahacs80@...> wrote:
?

Voice 8 on both panels will not sound in rotation on any working CS80?unles you hold a finger down before?you? press another key which will be 8 ....

you will get 1234567 1234567
but if you go 12(3-hold) next one is 8? ?4567

the 123 order only works on start up....
as soon as you play a chord the order changes....

voices do?rotate in both sustain modes...

?

---- On Fri, 04 Jul 2014 11:37:21 -0500 Daniel Forró danforcz@... [yamahacs80] <yamahacs80@...> wrote ----

?

I'm glad you liked it.

There was no time in the studio to set the instrument better, I had to play something just after they brought it, and before the recording there was no rehearsal, that recording was done live. And I forgot to show ribbon in that studio recording hectic... Now, when I have instrument back in my studio, I could get much better sound from it. It only needs a little bit of tuning, I'll do it later.

Concerning voices - I don't think I fooled them, if I understand that instrument well, voices rotate and each new key press goes to the next voice card. (It is obvious because before calibration each new key press of the same key started the sound with other pitch, timbre, even envelope...) That was the reason why each eighth voice in lower synth didn't worked before the repair - one voice card was out of function. Regardless if I played one voice successively, or pressed 8 keys - always one voice was missing.

So I don't understand well what you mean - why there should be always one voice which doesn't play? All eight voice cards must work always, be it in monophonic or polyphonic play. Or am I totally wrong?

Of course there's also Sustain I and II modes, in one of them probably voices don't rotate when played monophonically, and only the last note gets sustain.

Daniel


On 5 Jul, 2014, at 1:14 AM, Phil a nuipb1@... [yamahacs80] wrote:



Very funny program thanks !
I wish my tech would do me the 49th minute moment every time he repairs a synth of mine :)
Maybe I should show him that they do it better in Japan :)

And I quite enjoyed your final demo. Excellent sounds and performance there. Not only all the voices work but the calibration seems to be very accurate. That's one of the main recurrent issues on the CSs...
Now you realise you fooled them all by playing each voices with 1 finger only right ? Playing like that the CS never allows you to play all voices. There is always one that is not playing. To ear them all you need to keep keys pressed...

Phil
Daniel Forró
 

Thanks for info, I didn't know. Who knows why key assign algorithm is like this, maybe some kind of technical limitation? I don't see any logical reason why on 8 voice instrument one voice shouldn't play except when 8 keys are pressed.

But anyway it's strange, because if there's only 7 voices playing, and one voice card doesn't work, then each 7th press of the key will not sound, I suppose. On my CS each 8th didn't sound.

Daniel Forro


On 5 Jul, 2014, at 3:48 AM, Phil a nuipb1@... [yamahacs80] wrote:



Thanks Laurie, this is what I meant. If you always heard 1 voice was silent simply means it was one of the first 7 voices.

Phil


On Fri, Jul 4, 2014 at 7:14 PM, laurie?laurie@...?[yamahacs80]?<yamahacs80@...>?wrote:
?

Voice 8 on both panels will not sound in rotation on any working CS80?unles you hold a finger down before?you? press another key which will be 8 ....

you will get 1234567 1234567
but if you go 12(3-hold) next one is 8? ?4567

the 123 order only works on start up....
as soon as you play a chord the order changes....

voices do?rotate in both sustain modes...

?

---- On Fri, 04 Jul 2014 11:37:21 -0500?Daniel Forró?danforcz@...?[yamahacs80] <yamahacs80@...>?wrote ----?

?

I'm glad you liked it.

There was no time in the studio to set the instrument better, I had to play something just after they brought it, and before the recording there was no rehearsal, that recording was done live. And I forgot to show ribbon in that studio recording hectic... Now, when I have instrument back in my studio, I could get much better sound from it. It only needs a little bit of tuning, I'll do it later.

Concerning voices - I don't think I fooled them, if I understand that instrument well, voices rotate and each new key press goes to the next voice card. (It is obvious because before calibration each new key press of the same key started the sound with other pitch, timbre, even envelope...) That was the reason why each eighth voice in lower synth didn't worked before the repair - one voice card was out of function. Regardless if I played one voice successively, or pressed 8 keys - always one voice was missing.

So I don't understand well what you mean - why there should be always one voice which doesn't play? All eight voice cards must work always, be it in monophonic or polyphonic play. Or am I totally wrong?

Of course there's also Sustain I and II modes, in one of them probably voices don't rotate when played monophonically, and only the last note gets sustain.

Daniel


On 5 Jul, 2014, at 1:14 AM, Phil a?nuipb1@...?[yamahacs80] wrote:



Very funny program thanks !
I wish my tech would do me the 49th minute moment every time he repairs a synth of mine :)
Maybe I should show him that they do it better in Japan :)

And I quite enjoyed your final demo. Excellent sounds and performance there. Not only all the voices work but the calibration seems to be very accurate. That's one of the main recurrent issues on the CSs...
Now you realise you fooled them all by playing each voices with 1 finger only right ? Playing like that the CS never allows you to play all voices. There is always one that is not playing. To ear them all you need to keep keys pressed...

Phil
 

Thanks for info, I didn't know. Who knows why key assign
algorithm is like this, maybe some kind of technical
limitation? I don't see any logical reason why on 8 voice
instrument one voice shouldn't play except when 8 keys are pressed.
The 7 voice rotation appeared on the GX1 poly ranks.
The GX has a switch mounted inside to disable the use of the 8th voice, even
if multiple voices are in use.
The aim of that was to allow you to continue using the synth even if a voice
card failed - you could just swap the bad card into the voice 8 position and
set the switch to 7 voices.
I don't know if the CS has the same option, it may be they just used the
logic straight from the GX KAS chips.
Another benefit of the 7 voice rotation is that minor differences between
the sounds of each voice card don't tend to cycle so obviously.

Cheers,
Colin
Daniel Forró
 

Thanks for the explanation, it's interesting. I have to study more about CS internals...

Daniel Forro

On 5 Jul, 2014, at 10:32 PM, 'Colin f' colin@... [yamahacs80] wrote:


Thanks for info, I didn't know. Who knows why key assign
algorithm is like this, maybe some kind of technical
limitation? I don't see any logical reason why on 8 voice
instrument one voice shouldn't play except when 8 keys are pressed.
The 7 voice rotation appeared on the GX1 poly ranks.
The GX has a switch mounted inside to disable the use of the 8th voice, even
if multiple voices are in use.
The aim of that was to allow you to continue using the synth even if a voice
card failed - you could just swap the bad card into the voice 8 position and
set the switch to 7 voices.
I don't know if the CS has the same option, it may be they just used the
logic straight from the GX KAS chips.
Another benefit of the 7 voice rotation is that minor differences between
the sounds of each voice card don't tend to cycle so obviously.

Cheers,
Colin
 

No, the reason was because the chip was designed from organ tech. The 8th channel was assigned to the pedal board.

On 5 Jul 2014, at 14:33, "'Colin f' colin@... [yamahacs80]" <yamahacs80@...> wrote:


Thanks for info, I didn't know. Who knows why key assign
algorithm is like this, maybe some kind of technical
limitation? I don't see any logical reason why on 8 voice
instrument one voice shouldn't play except when 8 keys are pressed.
The 7 voice rotation appeared on the GX1 poly ranks.
The GX has a switch mounted inside to disable the use of the 8th voice, even
if multiple voices are in use.
The aim of that was to allow you to continue using the synth even if a voice
card failed - you could just swap the bad card into the voice 8 position and
set the switch to 7 voices.
I don't know if the CS has the same option, it may be they just used the
logic straight from the GX KAS chips.
Another benefit of the 7 voice rotation is that minor differences between
the sounds of each voice card don't tend to cycle so obviously.

Cheers,
Colin




------------------------------------
Posted by: "Colin f" <colin@...>
------------------------------------


------------------------------------

Yahoo Groups Links
 

No, the reason was because the chip was designed from organ
tech. The 8th channel was assigned to the pedal board.
An organ pre-dating 1974 with dynamic allocation of voices ?
Are you sure ?
The GX service manual clearly shows the purpose of the SW 7or8 Tone input is
to disable allocation of voice 8 on the YM22401 KAS IC.

Cheers,
Colin
 

On Jul 5, 2014, at 8:58 AM, Kent spong kent_spong@... [yamahacs80] <yamahacs80@...> wrote:

No, the reason was because the chip was designed from organ tech. The 8th channel was assigned to the pedal board.
I’ve heard that explanation before but I don’t understand how that would work given the KAS logic.

David
 

No, the reason was because the chip was designed from organ
tech. The 8th channel was assigned to the pedal board.

I've heard that explanation before but I don't understand how
that would work given the KAS logic.
Indeed.
The information I have is that Yamaha designed the GX key assigner
independently but at the same time as E-Mu, who got a patent on theirs in
1974.
It is clear the intended purpose of the GX KAS chipset was purely to drive a
fixed number of linear VCOs.
You can see the annotated service manual page here:


Cheers,
Colin
 

开云体育

I am not sure of the entire?reason.... CS was the Combo Synth line from Yamaha and possibly for future expansion on some of their later Combo Synth endevors, used "Keycode" over a Blue rectangle connector called a "24 pin Sumicon 1600 series connector" to hook up to their SK line which?had a 7 note polysynth? and ensemble instruments?? SK500D a 2 manual with a bottom octave that could be played from foot pedales when detected...that being an eigth ...

once they created the flagship CS80, it is quite possible they had planned on?something grander and this was part?of a design which they had expansion in mind with... maybe with the Keycode which predated midi...
?

---- On Fri, 04 Jul 2014 19:34:38 -0500 Daniel Forró danforcz@... [yamahacs80] wrote ----

?

Thanks for info, I didn't know. Who knows why key assign algorithm is like this, maybe some kind of technical limitation? I don't see any logical reason why on 8 voice instrument one voice shouldn't play except when 8 keys are pressed.

But anyway it's strange, because if there's only 7 voices playing, and one voice card doesn't work, then each 7th press of the key will not sound, I suppose. On my CS each 8th didn't sound.

Daniel Forro

On 5 Jul, 2014, at 3:48 AM, Phil a nuipb1@... [yamahacs80] wrote:



Thanks Laurie, this is what I meant. If you always heard 1 voice was silent simply means it was one of the first 7 voices.

Phil


On Fri, Jul 4, 2014 at 7:14 PM, laurie?laurie@...?[yamahacs80]?<yamahacs80@...>?wrote:
?

Voice 8 on both panels will not sound in rotation on any working CS80?unles you hold a finger down before?you? press another key which will be 8 ....

you will get 1234567 1234567
but if you go 12(3-hold) next one is 8? ?4567

the 123 order only works on start up....
as soon as you play a chord the order changes....

voices do?rotate in both sustain modes...

?

---- On Fri, 04 Jul 2014 11:37:21 -0500?Daniel Forró?danforcz@...?[yamahacs80] <yamahacs80@...>?wrote ----?

?

I'm glad you liked it.

There was no time in the studio to set the instrument better, I had to play something just after they brought it, and before the recording there was no rehearsal, that recording was done live. And I forgot to show ribbon in that studio recording hectic... Now, when I have instrument back in my studio, I could get much better sound from it. It only needs a little bit of tuning, I'll do it later.

Concerning voices - I don't think I fooled them, if I understand that instrument well, voices rotate and each new key press goes to the next voice card. (It is obvious because before calibration each new key press of the same key started the sound with other pitch, timbre, even envelope...) That was the reason why each eighth voice in lower synth didn't worked before the repair - one voice card was out of function. Regardless if I played one voice successively, or pressed 8 keys - always one voice was missing.

So I don't understand well what you mean - why there should be always one voice which doesn't play? All eight voice cards must work always, be it in monophonic or polyphonic play. Or am I totally wrong?

Of course there's also Sustain I and II modes, in one of them probably voices don't rotate when played monophonically, and only the last note gets sustain.

Daniel


On 5 Jul, 2014, at 1:14 AM, Phil a?nuipb1@...?[yamahacs80] wrote:



Very funny program thanks !
I wish my tech would do me the 49th minute moment every time he repairs a synth of mine :)
Maybe I should show him that they do it better in Japan :)

And I quite enjoyed your final demo. Excellent sounds and performance there. Not only all the voices work but the calibration seems to be very accurate. That's one of the main recurrent issues on the CSs...
Now you realise you fooled them all by playing each voices with 1 finger only right ? Playing like that the CS never allows you to play all voices. There is always one that is not playing. To ear them all you need to keep keys pressed...

Phil
 

Great story. The CS60 has the same voice allocation where you have to press 2 keys to get the 8th voice. Were the techs not familiar with that??

At the end of the program the tech shows you a voice card that they got from an "American auction site". I think this is a card that came from me on ebay. :)

Doug?
synthparts.com

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