Yamaha Genos, first look

Yamaha Genos

76 note flagship arranger workstation

I was one of the few dealers invited to a pre-showing of the new Yamaha Genos arranger keyboard. I will do my best to explain what I saw and what my opinion on this is.

Looks

I have to say, Yamaha has finally made an arranger keyboard that does not embarrass me. I would always get comments on the Tyros look, “ Is that the StarShip control panel? “ “ Can blue buttons be any bigger or brighter?” , etc. It is a beautiful flat black color, with an off white bottom. It has a slight curve look to it, almost like the latest sneaker fad. I would have to say an almost “sexy” look to it. The display is a 9” color touch screen, very fast and responsive, also with a changed layout, less cluttered but still informative. The LED buttons are smaller and now the brightness is controllable.

Controls

They have also changed their sliders from the Tyros design, which was of a smaller throw, and just under the screen, now they are to the left side of the screen and has a full travel, just like faders on a mixer, so you really can get some fine adjustments in. Also on top of the faders are custom assignable knobs, from Cut-off freq to reverb. Great for quick adjustments of sound or to get more into that EDM/Dance mode.

Sound

Yamaha has redesigned they outputs for the Genos, Words like 32bit D/A was thrown around, and mentioned was it was on par with the Montage’s output stage. Listening at the demo I was able to tell it was a definite step up from my Tyros 5. Also a comment was made, “ when you play a Tyros 5 next to the Genos, you will think your Tyros was broken”. They had also changed the whole DSP system to a much higher level, especially the reverb, which in the past was based off the Rev X, but as we know is getting up there in age. The new reverb is airy and compliments every sound. Never sounds too much, and sits in the mix, just right. The last upgrade was the Compressor, which I felt was very mediocre on the Tyros 5, but the Genos was very musical sounding, gave it a almost in your face feeling if wanted. All the old Tyros 5 sounds are in the legacy folder, so if you have a favorite it will be there, but the Genos has new sounds that I don’t think you will ever go back, for example, Guitar strum, jazz sax, and the new C7 piano. just to name a few. The drums are newly sampled and have wave-cycling technology, which in short give realism to the drums by having different samples of a snare drum for example, with ambience, constantly cycle through, just like a live drummer would, giving you a big realistic sound.

Styles

550 styles included, there are completely new and some re-voiced and re-worked. Yamaha said they are taking advantage of the new sounds and output, and taking advantage of the bigness in the sound, and making the styles less busy, so there is more sound but less bells and whistles going on. I’m sure my description can not express what it actually sounds like, but I was very impressed.

Over all it was an amazing demonstration from Martin Harris, if you have any questions you can email me frank@audioworksCT.com, or call (203) 876-1133

http://audioworksct.com/yamaha-genos-76-key-flagship-arranger-workstation-keyboard/