4/24/2021 0 Comments Kawai K4 Patch Editor
The majority of these are glitch-free looped sounds, although several one shot attack samples are included - some of the loops are really very good, particularly the strings and voices, and I suspect that some are samples of a complete K1 Multi patch The remaining 23 PCM waveforms contain Reverse and Loop samples which are useful for effects.Synthesizer technology has progressed in leaps and bounds over the past few years, with the price-to-capability ratio changing very much in favour of the buyer.
Kawai K4 Patch Editor Free Looped SoundsDuring this last year the prime example of offering more than you thought possible for less than you dared hope has been the Kawai K1, and it is not surprising that the instrument won various awards - including Sound On Sound s prestigious Synth Of The Year. The technology that makes the K1 sound so good basically involves the use of stored waveforms in ROM which can be combinedmanipulated in various ways to produce complex original sounds, and now that technology has been upgraded to produce Kawais new flagship synth, the K4. However, despite some quite major improvements, notably the addition of a filter and onboard effects, and the consequently higher price than the K1, at 895 the K4 still represents good value for money. The sounds that the K4 can produce vary from lush pads to combination and layered sounds, harsh leads to analogue-style swept filter brass, timpani to electro-toms. K4 offers a good range of sounds that should keep most users happy for quite sometime. DESIGNER LOOKS In keeping with Kawais, and indeed several other manufacturers, designer styling, the K4 comes in a two-tone finish - black all over with the odd bit of white for keys and lettering. The two performance wheels are conventionally located to the left of the keyboard, not above as on the K1. The keyboard itself is a five octave C-C weighted type, sensitive to Attack and Release Velocity and monophonic Aftertouch. It has quite a nice feel, although inevitably some will find it either too firm or too soft, depending on whether theyve been raised on plastic or ivory. By chance, or maybe because of my heavy-handed playing, I found out what Kawai mean by weighted when one of the weights in question basically a flat lump of metal glued to the underside of each key - ended up on my lap I soon replaced the weight using some Araldite, but I did wonder whether Kawai should be using a better glue, as Im sure no-one is going to be impressed if, as well as spending several months savings on a K4, they have to buy a tube of Araldite to keep re-fixing said weights. However, since this particular K4 had been used and abused by a couple of other magazines reviewers before I got hold of it, I dont think that this is likely to be a problem for anyone. The K4 is powered via a separate AC mains adaptor, which presumably saves a good deal on cost and reduces the possibility of mains interference in the audio signal, but which leaves a lot to be desired in terms of security of connection and durability. In fact, the mains adaptor with my review model didnt work at all, no doubt because somebody had dropped it, which for a moment had me on the verge of developing a distinct prejudice against the K4. ![]() The sounds that emanated from the K4 can best be described as clean and stunning, ranging from a realistic piano to a superb airy voice sound, with an amazing analogue synth (complete with swept filter) somewhere in between. The range of sounds available is quite wide though, as I will discuss later, Kawai have missed a golden opportunity to produce an even more powerful machine for the sake of a few integrated circuit sockets. WAVES The K4 contains 256 high quality waveforms consisting of 96 DC (Digital Cyclic) waveforms and 160 PCM (Pulse Code Modulation) waveforms. As on the K1, these waveforms are referred to by number rather than name in the LCD window, so you may need to look at a separate printed Wave List Table to help make a selection. The DC waveforms include Sine, Sawtooth, Pulse, Square, Triangle, Rectangle, and numerous other tones representing the main harmonic content of various sampled instruments. Kawai actually say that these DC waveforms consist of cyclical PCM sounds which have been analysed and recombined, so that they are easier to process. The 160 PCM waveforms (you could almost call them samples) are split into four groups: Drum and Percussive; Multi; Block; Reverse Loop. The sound quality of these PCM samples is excellent, due to the K4s internal 16-bit storage (the K1 was 12-bit) - Kawai claim that this gives the K4 CD quality sound. Having listened carefully, I would tend to agree with them - unlike the K1, the K4 sounds crystal clear, with no trace of digital noise. This digital noise (sometimes referred to as quantisation noise) is normally most prominent when sounds are played lower down the keyboard, and is often heard as a hiss or buzz which can be very annoying on subtle tones. The first 43 PCM waveforms are basically drum samples, which apart from the usual single shot sounds include several loops that allow much more realistic cymbals, tambourines, etc to be created. The next 94 waveforms are sampled instrument sounds, including strings, piano, voices, woodwind, guitars and basses.
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