Rhodes MK8
rhodesmusic.com
rhodesmusic.com
Yeah I agree, sometimes I like putting Jamiroquai's Matt Johnson's channel where he jams with different keyboards: https://youtu.be/0JNvCTW0cwo
I listened first on my MacBook Pro laptop speakers then pulled out my trusty Grado SR-80 headphones to confirm before commenting. It sounded great on both.
Looks like the people behind this are LoopMasters, who are well known for making sample packs from recorded instruments.
I wonder how this model compares to the Vintage Vibe pianos (https://www.vintagevibe.com/pages/vintage-vibe-piano )
I guess you are in North America, which is probably the only region in the world where this is the case. Here in Australia you can get a Hammond from the US but you have to pay close to 5 grands just for shipping. Back when I was in Europe it was similarly hard to get one.
The thing about the Hammond is that there are no dynamics. It was designed by a clockmaker as a very precise piece of machinery. It’s all switches and gears.
The problem comes when you actually start designing a new hardware product for the market: do you have cost constraints? What corners are you going to cut? If you aren't cutting corners, how much is the product going to cost? How large is your potential market then? If you are targeting a pro segment, among other things you would need to equip your organ with good quality DSPs and in case you go for physically based sound synthesis (which IMHO you should) I would imagine you need a good CPU + an OS with realtime kernel. For a Hammond you also have additional hardware requirements compared to a piano, e.g. good quality waterfall keyboard (not many producers out there, unlike weighted piano keyboards that are much more mainstream) and bass pedalboard (much more expensive than a keyboard for obvious structural reasons).
> It was designed by a clockmaker as a very precise piece of machinery.
Hammonds have all types of quirks, for example folding of the higher harmonics in the higher octaves or key click, not to mention Leslie emulation where all sorts of variables are in play such as mic positioning, speed, acceleration and deceleration of the cones... those are not unlike some piano quirks such as sympathetic resonance, which are not straight forward to emulate in a credible way.
In the end, instead of doing all of the above, you could just reissue the real thing, a tonewheel organ.
The Hammond simulation is just way easier. As a player, you're manipulating a bunch of key switches. The circuitry inside may have a lot of quirks, but those quirks are just a lot simpler to model than a Rhodes. Leslie simulation is something else... IMO, buying a real Leslie or DIYing something similar is far more convenient than buying a B3, and far less expensive than buying a Rhodes. Part of the price here is that a B3 is almost 200 kg.
Maybe Rhodes simulations have gotten better since the last time I used them. I have an old keyboard from circa 2010, it's not designed specifically for organ players but even so the Hammond patches are pretty damn good... but the Rhodes patches leave a lot to be desired. Getting a good Hammond sound out of some kind of simulation is just so much easier than getting a good Rhodes sound.
> DIYing something similar is far more convenient than buying a B3
I wonder if they will start doing something like Hauptwerk organs[1] but for Hammond emulation. Currently I even struggle to find dual keyboard waterfall midi controller[2]. If it was easier I would install something like the software version of the Crumar (Gsi) and I would build my own. But I don't have time to do things like buying a Fatar waterfall and do the low level work.
[1] https://www.hauptwerk.com/hardware/
[2] This is one of only 2 controllers I am aware of, that are specifically for Hammond emulation https://www.genuinesoundware.com/?a=showproduct&b=42
IMO, if you care about your controller to that extent, it’s going to be a bit of a pain even for normal synth action. The only way I end up happy with a keyboard controller is when I go into a store and abuse a really abuse display model for a few minutes. I currently use reasonably high-end synthesizers as master controllers just for the better keybed they come with.