This video, via sonicstate, captures Dave Spiers of GForce Software checking out the new Korg ARP Odyssey and sharing his impressions.
Spiers brings a deep understanding of the original ARP Odyssey, from GForce’s work on Oddity – their virtual version of Odyssey.
In the video, Spiers discusses the new Korg ARP Odyssey, discusses the Odyssey’s synth architecture, demos a variety of patches and compares the new version to a vintage original.
Spiers notes the slim keyboard and Proportional Pitch Control as two downsides to the Korg ARP Odyssey. Nevertheless, he sums up his impressions like this: “I want one!”
You can find out more about the Odyssey at the ARP Synth site.
If Dave says it’s “close enough” this should be the end of the debate. Unless you really like huffing cork particles out of YouTube compressed audio, the results are in. It’s an Odyssey.
It’s now between you and your synth god to decide if the brand-new warranty, lower price, MIDI/USB, drive and filter revision switch is a fair trade for a more compact format. Take a few days to think it over. Maybe head up to the cabin for some solitude.
Let’s be honest: Were you right about to fork over a few thousand for a scratched-up vintage model when this was announced? All the people who were genuinely conflicted could probably fit in a phone booth.
It sounds amazing but I never understood why Korg would gimp it by not giving it full size keys. It’s a instrument designed to be played.
May become an optional system like the ms20 has
and there may have been some research on what people wanted and a whole bunch probably said mini keys, then again surveys aren’t always right
plus with midi you plug in favorite keyboard to play
It’s pretty funny in a sad way that the original vintage Odyssey is made to look like a giant compared to the Korg Odyssey.
Certain angles and backgrounds can make something look bigger (similar to how car commercials have people with a small stature standing next to the car to make the car look bigger). Korg is certainly using these techniques in their advertising for their Odyssey (and the MS-20 mini).
Until you actually see and play one, you may not realize how ridiculously small these Korg mini version synths are. The first time I saw an MS-20 mini at a music store, I literally chuckled when I saw how small it is.
Even if you use a different keyboard via MIDI, there is no way of getting around that these mini synths look like toys. Professional instruments should not have mini keys.
Maybe you can buy a full size original then with all your music professional royalties.
There has never been a standard keyboard size, it’s alway been changing, so stop moaning.
To quote wiki….
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_keyboard
Over the last three hundred years, the octave span distance found on historical keyboard instruments (organs, virginals, clavichords, harpsichords, and pianos) has ranged from as little as 125 mm to as much as 170 mm. Modern piano keyboards ordinarily have an octave span of 164–165 mm; resulting in the width of black keys averaging 13.7 mm and white keys about 23.5 mm wide at the base, disregarding space between keys. Several reduced-size standards have been proposed and marketed. A 15/16 size (152 mm octave span) and the 7/8 DS Standard (140 mm octave span) keyboard developed by Christopher Donison in the 1970s and developed and marketed by Steinbuhler & Company. U.S. pianist Hannah Reimann has promoted piano keyboards with narrower octave spans and has a U.S. patent on the apparatus and methods for modifying existing pianos to provide interchangeable keyboards of different sizes.
Its got full size keys. Full size keys that are marginally narrower than full size. They are definitely NOT mini keys.
“Unless you really like huffing cork particles out of YouTube compressed audio”… That inspires an interesting mental picture! 🙂
Having once owned the original white Odyssey back in the day, I applaud Korg’s revival of this synth. From the looks of things, it appears to be true to the original concept, but with modern electronics and better build quality.
These are salad days for hardware synths, almost like 1975 on steroids!
i have rev3 #0450//
it sounds amazing en is super flexible soundwisee. i lf*** ove it. the keys play nice, a bit too light, but getting used to it. the 3 filtermodes, give acces to total different kind of sounds, the 2nd filter rev. being the warmest, the 3rd being the most squeaky. the 1st sounding more like a 1 pole moog phatty style filter.
Hp works amazing except for the actual hp only really working the last 20 procent of the slider
the things that are not so great:
– the is no centre dent for osc 1or2 course tune, so u always have to use a tuner if u wanna have the a440. it does however tune very well if u use ur ears
– the sliders have kind of a strange curve, i have never played the original arp so i dont know if this is the idea. The respond quite steep in the beginning and nto so much at the end (except for the HP and LP)
– NO CC”s – seriously i get the whole hands on thing, but there is a freakin usb port there. so lets make use of it. since there are a few midi functions (controlled with the keys) this might be updatable, lets tell them to do so:)
– there is an amazing looking case with it, it is unfort. not waterproof 🙁 so for giigs always need to pack it is someting else
!!!!! There is one major (let me call it bug) is when i try playing two note chords; Let me 1st say the 2note chords (duophonic) sounds amaazing. very intense & deep
BUT Every time i let go ( at the same time, and i play quite well ) the two notes to go to trigger the next two, one note retriggers (it has by default a last note priority). the only solution for this is turning the sustain of the adsr (if it is assigned to vca) to zero. This way u can let go when the whole envelope is finished.
I read the last ntoe priority is an arp original thing, but still this really could use an improvement.
Playing duophonic is on of the specs of the korg arp that makes it standout towards other similar or cheaper prized analog monos
I would really like to see a chord mode implementation, where there is no last note priority,but an two notes of kind of setting.. i the the midi implementation 1.0 i see there is a syssex code for duophonic on and off. so it must be implementable
my impressison so far
“NO CC”s – seriously i get the whole hands on thing, but there is a freakin usb port there. so lets make use of it. since there are a few midi functions (controlled with the keys) this might be updatable, lets tell them to do so:)”
With all due respect, you didn’t get it. This is a pure analog machine, period. It just have a USB-MIDI-CV interface built-in for convenience purposes, once the MIDI digital signal is converted into analog CV, that’s it. Maybe you are confusing this synth with a digital controlled analog synth like Moog’s Phattys or DSI’s Prophets, but it was never Korg’s intention to build one of those.
or could get an after market one which gives you a bunch of CCs and try to make the connections yourself
or buy an analog that has those
Sure i dont get it , because of the 1978 original usb connection u mean
Dont ever tell anyone u dont know he doesnt get it..
The problem is that people see an electronic instrument with a USB port, and assume that all functions should be controllable from their computer. I’ll reiterate what I’ve posted before, which is that I’m thankful Korg didn’t try to make the instrument programmable or externally controllable.
Here’s why: to achieve MIDI control, every slider would need to be disconnected from the analog circuits they are part of and replaced with internal VCAs connected to a multiplexed D/A stream fed by a processor of some sort. The controls themselves would need to be read by an A/D converter. Yes, this would give you external control and programmability without much extra effort, but there are tradeoffs:
– each parameter would become “steppy”. Those smooth filter sweeps by moving the slider over a small range would sound mechanical … digital. When trying to adjust something like the pitches of individual oscillators feeding a ring modulator, it can make it impossible to find the sound you want because it literally lies between two steps on your control.
– with this type of system there is, however negligible, a delay between the movement of a slider and the actual reaction of the analog circuits. The delay is minor, but it is there, and it can contribute to one’s mental and emotional disconnection with a synthesizer.
I’m not even thinking about costs. In fact, I must say that in terms of monosynths, I shy away from the latest Moog and DSI offerings in favour of the new Korg, Oberheim, Arturia products for that precise reason: I want to feel close to my synthesizer.
I had a Mk III. Not being a “real” keyboard player, I would get a sequence or arpeggio going (sometimes on my computer or sometimes on one of my other synths sequencer or arp) and then have two hands free to “play” the Odyssey controls. I feel I got more out of that than if I was playing the keyboard anyway. Never had an issue with the PPC. I liked it. The Korg Odyssey is very attractive to me.
Strictly speaking from opinion, I’m a bit baffled by the smaller keys and those wretched PPC pads. Both go against the grain of such a legendary mono-synth being solidly hot-solo-capable. Its less of an issue if you are applying it as a module, but hands-on playability makes or breaks an instrument for me. Nostalgia isn’t a motivator when I have a bushel of filters and effects readily available elsewhere, too. I can program very ARP or Obie tones easily. I don’t fault you if you like the form, which is not BAD and your call to make anyway. I just think the hardware should have been beefier so it hit the synth’s basic mark better. If you really do crave its sound, go for the GMedia version, which is one hell of an update, including solid polyphony. It does for the Odyssey what MiniMonsta does for the MiniMoog.
Almost all of the classic Ody albums used Odys with PPC pads.
Would you prefer the old knob?
Maybe a super innovative pitch wheel.
Oh, I know, A 6 inch dia pitch wheel with 9 D-Beams set into it.
call me a philistine but it doesn’t float my boat, one for the puritans am afraid.
very nice sound though, but the packaging and the practical applications of the all analogue design is a liberty for a lazy **** like me.
one feature i hope was duplicated a was I call a design flaw in one the original design in that there was a auxiliary board mounted on straight soldered pins in center of the front and if you tapped on it the soldered would break, it wasn’t mine but a friends and i had to fix several times
I have an old Mk 1 Odyssey that is either resting or “pining for the fjords.” I must have stunned it as it was waking up. Anyway, If I were in the market for an Odyssey today, and I wanted it for the sound and not the collecting value, I would go with the Korg Model in a heartbeat. I understand how some people don’t like the mini-keys, but it has midi in. Play it with your favorite midi controller. Korg was able to make it for less than it would have cost to make it full-sized, and it looks like they passed the savings onto you, so you can use the savings to buy a midi controller. The original Odyssey’s keyboard was nothing special. I never tried the PPC pads, but they had to be better than the pitch-bend knob that came on the Mk1 and some Mk2 Odysseys. I didn’t realize this in the initial previews, but it apparently has USB midi in and out vs DIN midi in only. This means that you can park this little beauty right next to your computer. I never travelled with my Odyssey. In the 20+ years that I had it that it worked, I never did find a really great place to put it. Smaller could only help in that department. That’s a pretty nifty carrying case on the new one too, by the way.
Korg could have made it even smaller and more portable if they’d left off the mini keyboard though the PPC Proportional Pitch Control is extremely expressive.
It would have been a no brainer if it didn’t have those pathetic potato chips sized keys. A desktop kit version like the MS20m would be Perfect.
For the life of me, I can’t imagine potato chip keys. What does this mean?
@an3– Apparently the last note priority retrigger upon release “bug” is how the original Odyssey works. I’ve never played an Odyssey, but I found this out when I bought GForce’s Oddity plug-in a few years back and noticed the retriggering in Duo mode. I emailed Dave Spiers about it and he said they programmed the plug-in that way to preserve the behavior of the original instrument.
The original Odyssey is 14% better than the Korg Odyssey.
Only if Slightly Bigger and Less Features = Better.
One way the original exceeds the new one is price. They’re 250% more expensive!
The mini keys make this thing look like a toy. It’s the same with the MS-20 mini. What a joke Korg.
I have ordered one. I am a little mystified why Korg didn’t call it Arp Odyssey Mini, as it follows the exact same concept as the MS-20 -> MS-20 Mini.
2 points; I wonder if there is an Arp Odyssey M (for Module) on the way? And I wonder what the likelihood of a revived 2600 is?
Does anyone have an opinion on the Creamware Prodyssey? It’s discontinued but sells around this price 2nd hand. Polyphony, patch memories and rack mount format all appeal to me. Personally I’m not too fussed about how it does in A/B tests with an original so you may think that makes me a bad person;o) To me, THAT sound is the one I stumble across and think “wow I like that!” regardless of authenticity. Has anyone here ever used one?
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jan07/articles/creamwareasb.htm
They should make a full size version for those of us who hate these @$!% mini varieties.
Prodyssey is closer to the original than the original except for the p