On Bass Chords???

[vbdx66]

Hi everyone,

I have begun trying out some features of the PSR E463 and, damn it, apparently it hasn't the On Bass chord recognition mode.

Of course the E series never had proper On Bass chord recognition, but there was a workaround in that if you played a C chord with four notes with the bass repeated at the octave, for example G C E G, you would then get a C/G chord instead of a regukar C chord in root position.

Apparently the E463 doesn't have this feature so now I am wondering whether the older models had it or not?

I think that I was able to play C/G chords on my old E433, but now I am starting to have doubts... Could anybody with a PSR E433 check this, please?

If the older E 4xx models could understand chords spelled G C E G but the E463 can't, now this is a serious flaw... 

Regards,

Vinciane

[SeaGtGruff]

I'm not aware of anything like that on the PSR-E models.

[vbdx66]

Indeed probably not. I think I am confusing with the DGX series, for which you can use this neat trick. Too bad for « Whiter Shade of Pale »...

Regards,

Vinciane

[AnupamEnosh]

If I am getting it, you are talking about Chords getting detected and displayed on screen, without the styles being played in background.

[vbdx66]

Hello Anupam,

Not quite. I am speaking about the way a keyboard tracks the chord played with your left hand to generate the auto-accompaniment.

On higher-end keyboards such as the Genos, Tyros or PSR S, you can choose a chord detection mode where the keyboard recognises in which inversion you are playing a chord. If you select this mode, the keyboard will then be able to make a difference between a C chord spelled C E G, a C/E chord spelled E G C and a C/G chord spelled G C E.

Lower-end keyboards can't make a difference between these chords and will always play them C E G, thus with C on the bass, even when you play them in various inversions.

On some keyboards, there was a way to "cheat" to play these chords in the correct inversion: if you played the chord with a note repeated at the octave, this repeated note would then be used as the bass note of the chord.
For instance, if you wanted to have a C/G chord, you could play your chord spelled G C E G, thus with the G repeated at the octave, and the keyboard would correctly use G as the bass note instead of the root note C. This was very handy to play songs such as a Whiter Shade of Pale by Procol Harum, where the chords in the introduction have other notes than the root note as the bass note.

Unfortunately the PSR E463 doesn't have this "cheat mode" to play inverted chords. My DGX650 can do that, and I thought that the PSR E433 could do it as well, but I am probably mistaken...

Regards,

Vinciane

[vbdx66]

Hi Roy,

Thanks for this clarification. This means that the first Yamaha arranger keyboard which detects on-bass chord is the PSR S670. This is a thing to be aware of.

Regards,

Vinciane.

[andyg]

I've not tried a 463 but, FWIW my E443 and even my old E403 could play a limited number of inverted chords with just two keys, just as AI Fingered Mode does on the larger keyboards.

To get C/G, you simply play a C over a G - or G and C from left to right if you prefer thinking of it that way. Similarly, C/E is a C over an E - or E C from left to right. No need to play four notes. I get my students using this early on - before they tackle Grade 1.

It can't of course play things like G/F as that will trigger 'single finger' chords and give you G7, and neither can it do minors or any more complex chords.

I'd be surprised if the 463 didn't do the same, but like I said, I haven't tried it.

[vbdx66]

Hi Andy,

Thank you very much for what looks like a very nice workaround. I will try it on the PSR E463.

Best Regards,

Vinciane.

[SeaGtGruff]

I'm not sure-- since I don't actually use styles very much-- but I should think that this behavior might also depend on the style itself, since the various settings in the CASM chunk, not to mention the notes which are defined for the various style parts in the MTrk chunk, are what control the specifics of each style.

But to repeat what I said before, I'm not aware of any particular "trick" or playing method for triggering an On Bass Chord, and if Andy's method does work then I'd hope it works regardless of whether you're fingering an abbreviated chord or full chord.

Unfortunately, the PSR-E Owner's Manuals are a bit skimpy when it comes to certain technical instructions and details-- e.g., the Owner's Manual for the PSR-E403/YPT-400 has a page which lists all chord types that can be detected, with both the required and optional notes for each type of chord; but that page was dropped from the Owner's Manuals of later PSR-E4xx models.

[AnupamEnosh]

On higher-end keyboards such as the Genos, Tyros or PSR S, you can choose a chord detection mode where the keyboard recognises in which inversion you are playing a chord. If you select this mode, the keyboard will then be able to make a difference between a C chord spelled C E G, a C/E chord spelled E G C and a C/G chord spelled G C E.

Lower-end keyboards can't make a difference between these chords and will always play them C E G, thus with C on the bass, even when you play them in various inversions.

Sorry I'm too late, just got to login to the forum.
Well now I got it. That four note inversion of Chord makes no difference at all, in styles played in auto accomp.

that fourth note DOES make a difference, much like making chords on the lower manual of an organ, but when a rhythm IS running, that fourth note makes absolutely NO difference in the sound of the chord.  That is to say, when a rhythm is running, adding the fourth note does NOT force an on-bass chord on the PSR-E433, and I assume that this probably applies to the entire PSR-E4XX line, and most likely to the entire PSR-E series.

Yes Roy, that does not make a difference, it just triggers the regular Chord on styles, but the bass Accomp (without style) does pick up some bass lining with it (I would check it myself). Now that I am not much familiar with the S-series keyboards, I don't know how its styles work, actually I have learnt playing these keyboards like solo instrument synth, and not arranger. Playing melody with styles (auto accomp) is something I have not mastered myself with yet.

[2112]

Unfortunately, the PSR-E Owner's Manuals are a bit skimpy when it comes to certain technical instructions and details-- e.g., the Owner's Manual for the PSR-E403/YPT-400 has a page which lists all chord types that can be detected, with both the required and optional notes for each type of chord; but that page was dropped from the Owner's Manuals of later PSR-E4xx models.

I wanted to thank you for pointing me to the older manuals.

The information about recognized chords was never "dropped" by Yamaha. It was "moved" it to the Songbooks.

Here's the link to the all currently available songbooks:

https://usa.yamaha.com/support/docs_data/index.html?l=en&c=keyboards&k=song

even if the particular songbook was not directly linked from the downloads for the particular keyboard model.

What was indeed "dropped" was all kinds of information about the auto-accompaniment that is mostly usable to the beginners or those that are less interested about making music but more into ear training and listening with understanding.

I downloaded whole bunch of older manuals and I'm right now going through them fishing for all kinds of nuggets that are useful to the students of music and are considered too obvious for experienced performers. I'll post my finding in a week or two.

[SeaGtGruff]

I wanted to thank you for pointing me to the older manuals.

The information about recognized chords was never "dropped" by Yamaha. It was "moved" it to the Songbooks.

You're welcome.

And thank you for pointing me to the songbooks, because even though I downloaded them I hadn't actually given them more than an initial cursory glance afterward, and missed the information about the chords!

It seems like an odd place to put the chord information, since (in my opinion) it's much more relevant to using the styles than to playing back the songs. And I might have missed it, but I don't think the Owner's Manual directs the reader to that page of the songbook, which would have been helpful.

Anyway, I like the graphic format, although the tabular format of the older manuals was also useful.

It looks like the information about how to trigger "No Chord" or "NC"-- which produces "tacit" or silent accompaniment-- might be missing, unless I just didn't look carefully enough. I'm on my iPad right now, so I had to view the zipped file in iZip, which made it harder to get a good look. I'll have to take a closer look later on my computer.

[2112]

It looks like the information about how to trigger "No Chord" or "NC"-- which produces "tacit" or silent accompaniment-- might be missing, unless I just didn't look carefully enough.

Well, I happen to have PSR-E363 and this feature doesn't work like described by you and some other Yamaha manuals.

Four fingering the non-chord (four consecutive notes) indeed quietens most of the melodic accompaniment, namely MIDI channels 11 and 12. But leaves single notes being played in the MIDI channel 10.  I have to press ACMP OFF to get back to the pure rhytmic accompaniment that flows through channels 8 and 9. And then again press ACMP ON to rearm the accompaniment.

This is most obvious in pure pianist styles "PnoWaltz" or "Stride", which have nothing except piano sound that goes through channels 10 and 11. After the four-finger-salute my keyboard goes into mode where it keeps playing single root notes through the channel 10.

Can you actually verify that the four-fingers-non-chord does completely silence channel 10 on your E-series keyboards?

I'm currently quite far away both from the store where I bought it and from friends which own various Yamaha products with the compatible auto-accompaniment feature. Therefore I cannot compare my instrument with others that should have compatible behaviors.

If you confirm that I'm going to open the trouble ticket with Yamaha.

[2112]

On the other hand two of the following features do work on my current keyboard, although they aren't documented in any of the current manuals (PSR-Ex63), but were documented in the earlier ones.

• Playing two same root keys
in the adjacent octaves pro-
duces accompaniment
based only on the root.
• A perfect fifth (1+5) pro-
duces accompaniment
based only on the root and
fifth which can be used with
both major and minor
chords.

I understand that they are not of much use for the experienced players. But as a student striving to train my ears I like those very much. They give me the Mike-Oldfield-ey-Tubular-o-Bells-ey sense of assembling the music from the individual pieces. I think it is very helpful for other beginners to hear the two intermediate steps that are available between the purely rhythmic accompaniment and the default one that uses triads.