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Author Topic: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group  (Read 213117 times)

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Dick

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #80 on: October 02, 2011, 08:57:10 PM »

Olympic digital accordion playing< we must be in with chance!
                                                                                     Dick.
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Huw

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #81 on: October 02, 2011, 09:12:03 PM »

Make that list 10 at least.I know of a very very well known person on this forum who has one as well but has not come out of the closet melodeonly speaking as yet , confess sir before you are outed !!
The first amp I tried mine through was a Peavey backstage but have just bought a Roland KC 350 and the sound is incredible a keyboard amp makes a huge difference if you intend to play out.
The orchestral sounds do have their uses and are great fun but it's worth spending  a bit of time with the melodeon sounds in different keys some really great warm tones can be found. There's a lot more to the Roland than appears at first I wouldn't be without one now.
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Ray Langton

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #82 on: October 02, 2011, 09:21:24 PM »

Played mine out in public for the first time this weekend at a local community festival-4 spots two inside on stages and two outside. Using a Roland BA 330amp that can work off mains or batteries and rechargeables in the FR 18. It worked brilliantly and attracted a lot of positive attention. Could walk up plug in switch on and go in minutes-plenty of volume available. Also used a small headset mike through the same amp to sing whilst accompanying on the FR 18- very impressed all round.

I use the ADG set up and have decreased the musette tuning-(I'm not a Shand Morino fan!)-also found that the lightest setting on the bellows curve (not any of the fixed ones) worked really well for me with plenty of expression available and no need for muscles like a blacksmith!

Am currently re configuring tablature on the computer to produce a series of ADG layouts available on all sets each with a different set of experimental basses -particularly working on layouts of basses with no chords based around anglo concertina pattern. I do rather like the Tuba on the bass end!
 (:) :||:
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rees

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #83 on: October 03, 2011, 10:18:54 AM »

Make that list 10 at least.I know of a very very well known person on this forum who has one as well but has not come out of the closet melodeonly speaking as yet , confess sir before you are outed !!

Alright already. I've got one but it is in very small pieces on my workbench.
I'm rebuilding the air-button mechanism as the original Roland effort is a complete waste of time.
I'm not exactly sure how the rest of you are managing as it doesn't work for me. I play a lot on the pull and need the bellows to close at lightning speed not the 3 or 4 seconds that it currently takes!
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Rees Wesson (accordion builder and mechanic)
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summerstars

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #84 on: October 03, 2011, 10:59:44 AM »

I'm rebuilding the air-button mechanism as the original Roland effort is a complete waste of time.

Rees,  When you have worked out a way to increase the air flow through the air button mechanism, please please let us all know how you did it.
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Ray Langton

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #85 on: October 03, 2011, 11:12:47 AM »

Yes the air button is a real pain! I've got a bruise on my thumb from trying to get it to work and even when it does open the bellows move at snail's pace -so let us know how you get on Rees. hotos would be good !!!!!
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Ray Langton

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #86 on: October 03, 2011, 11:14:12 AM »

Whooops should have been photos
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rees

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #87 on: October 03, 2011, 12:11:03 PM »

I may be some time  (:)
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Rees Wesson (accordion builder and mechanic)
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DaveW

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #88 on: October 03, 2011, 01:32:39 PM »

found that the lightest setting on the bellows curve (not any of the fixed ones) worked really well for me with plenty of expression available and no need for muscles like a blacksmith!
Am currently re configuring tablature on the computer to produce a series of ADG layouts available on all sets each with a different set of experimental basses -particularly working on layouts of basses with no chords based around anglo concertina pattern. I do rather like the Tuba on the bass end!
 (:) :||:
Those of us that use the heavy bellow setting, which doesn't use much in and out movement, maybe do so to overcome the slow bellows recovery? I too would be very interested in Rees work on the air valve. Also Ray's bass experiments.
Using the heavy setting also seems to stop the banjo and percussive instruments working
DaveW
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DaveW

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Ray Langton

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #89 on: October 03, 2011, 02:02:11 PM »

Strangely enough I found completely the opposite happened. The light setting meant I hardly had to move the bellows at all while the heavier settings meant I had to heave the bellows around like a blacksmith-also on some of the heavier settings the volume almost disappeared unless you did heave around like billy-o.

One thing I do find irritating and will try asking Roland about is you can't trill between two notes that are the same on different rows. On my 'real' melodeon I often trill say from D on the push on the G row to D on the push on the D row using third finger and little finger. On the Roland it recognises that a D has been selected already and therefore won't recognise the other D unless you take your finger off completely in between, which on fast trills isn't going to happen.

As to tablature changes-the first I have started on is to move everything up a button on the treble end and fill the 'spare' buttons at the bottom with potentially useful accidentals and additional duplicates. Then on the bass end I have selected the two bottom buttons on each of the bass row to give the relative minor chord in both directions to give the option of a drone-could be useful for say E minor tunes wnd not available on normal boxes. Then working up from there to put on a scale on each row for example D/E F*/G A/B C/D  Though haven't looked really closely to see whether there are bass notes available in 2 ocatves. Or I might reverse it so that the double pull is at the top end.
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Huw

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #90 on: October 03, 2011, 02:42:05 PM »

Well done Rees for admitting it ! I knew the disguise wouldn't work, saw Alain Pennec playing one on youtube this week, Marc Perrone next ? a step too far for Tony Hall me thinks.
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Graham Collicutt

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #91 on: October 03, 2011, 03:03:51 PM »


One thing I do find irritating and will try asking Roland about is you can't trill between two notes that are the same on different rows. On my 'real' melodeon I often trill say from D on the push on the G row to D on the push on the D row using third finger and little finger. On the Roland it recognises that a D has been selected already and therefore won't recognise the other D unless you take your finger off completely in between, which on fast trills isn't going to happen.


I have a Hyde/Whiteley midi melodeon where this happened. It is now fixed by having the middle row on a seperate channel to the outer rows, it is more bother setting up. It is also a nuisance on midi anglos. Was it on the Streb?


Graham
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Clive Williams

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #92 on: October 03, 2011, 03:26:38 PM »


One thing I do find irritating and will try asking Roland about is you can't trill between two notes that are the same on different rows. On my 'real' melodeon I often trill say from D on the push on the G row to D on the push on the D row using third finger and little finger. On the Roland it recognises that a D has been selected already and therefore won't recognise the other D unless you take your finger off completely in between, which on fast trills isn't going to happen.


I have a Hyde/Whiteley midi melodeon where this happened. It is now fixed by having the middle row on a seperate channel to the outer rows, it is more bother setting up. It is also a nuisance on midi anglos. Was it on the Streb?


Graham

Don't believe I've ever noticed this happening on my Streb's treble - I think it works fine. It sometimes happens on the basses though, where one 'reed' is shared between more than one chord - this can cause some odd effects if you release the first chord after you press the second chord.

Bill Young

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #93 on: October 04, 2011, 05:24:54 PM »

I had a good afternoon in Edinburgh with Dick and his FR-18. He now has several BCC# keyboard layouts to experiment with. (Glad the programming worked OK). All have the same treble layout - same as a 37 key Paolo Soprani - with different bass layouts. None of the bass layouts is optimal yet, but there's at least as much functionality as a 12-bass Trichord, which is enough to be getting on with. Thanks to Dick for letting me spend so much time playing his instrument. The treble keyboard is delightfully light in action, and I didn't notice the stepped keyboard at all. What a wonderful instrument this would be with a 72 Stradella bass!

(I think you should shun Roland's misuse of the word "tablature" for "keyboard layout" and call them keyboard layouts).

It was a bit disconcerting for a while to find that the treble register settings for selecting reed footages did not accord with the table on p25. I thought I had broken it (didn't see the small print). We then discovered the lists on pp60-64, which show that the treble register settings are all over the place arranged differently for all the different accordion sets. Phew! Therein is the basis for days of experimenting with different sounds. The FR-18 manual seems to be poorly laid out, even by Roland standards; you need to jump about all over the place to find key information.

I agree with Rees. The FR-18 definitely requires a larger, or additional, air hole. It will be interesting to see what modification he comes up with.
 
Black is definitely the better of the two colour options.
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rees

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #94 on: October 05, 2011, 10:49:07 AM »

I agree. The manual was written by chimpanzees!
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Rees Wesson (accordion builder and mechanic)
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DaveW

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #95 on: October 05, 2011, 11:14:35 AM »

I agree. The manual was written by chimpanzees!
It's like the holy books - you should read them every night just before bedtime. That's what I do, am I alone out there? And before you ask, Graham, my mother was not a chimpanzee
DaveW
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DaveW

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xgx

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #96 on: October 05, 2011, 12:01:54 PM »

Presumably those books would be DaveTtownsend's 1, 2 and 3 and for the newly converted
Diatonic liaisons  ;D

Check with Darwin re antecedents :-X
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Graham

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summerstars

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #97 on: October 05, 2011, 12:15:35 PM »


It's like the holy books - you should read them every night just before bedtime. That's what I do, am I alone out there?

I am so glad to have found a kindred spirit.  I have always read "Manuals" as bedtime reading - this new attitude of providing software manuals on disc really isn't the same thing - a favourite book of mine from the past (completely off-topic) was the early microsft WORD manuals - my current regular readings are the Roland manual, three Cubase 6 textbooks and a Microsoft "Access 2010" textbook., and the manuals for the variety of plug-in devices i use with the Roland
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DaveW

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #98 on: October 05, 2011, 12:50:43 PM »

Presumably those books would be DaveTtownsend's 1, 2 and 3 and for the newly converted
Diatonic liaisons  ;D Check with Darwin re antecedents :-X

Graham you old anthropologist you:

I suppose what I was trying to say, in a lighthearted way, was that after one intensive reading of the manual, it is expecting too much to have absorbed everything. The FR18 manual as a work of reference seems to me to work reasonable well. Frequent returns to the index are necessary and fiddly. The authors seem to be encouraging an intuitive type of approach - necessary when so many variables involved?

Can anyone tell me what saving a 'User set' is about. I asked before but didn't understand the answer.

DaveW
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DaveW

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howard mitchell

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Re: Roland fr18 diatonic accordion - user group
« Reply #99 on: October 05, 2011, 01:45:51 PM »


Can anyone tell me what saving a 'User set' is about. I asked before but didn't understand the answer.

DaveW


User Sets are for loading voices into the USER set family ( as opposed to FOLK,  ETHNIC and WORLD).  You can only load files provided by Roland.

Do you mean User Program Sets? 
You can save 4 User Programs (see section 10 of the manual) which are accessed by pressing the User Program Button followed by one of the 4 main selectors.  You can then save 4 of these User Program Sets on a USB memory (Section 11) for recall later.

H
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