Playing With Accompaniment (Arranger); What Is An Arranger - Roland KR-11 Owner's Manual

KR-11 Owner's Manual—Playing with accompaniment (Arranger)

7. Playing with accompaniment (Arranger)

7.1 What is an Arranger?

Think of the Arranger's Music Styles as your backup
band. Your KR-11 is capable of playing several "varia-
tions" (called divisions) of a given accompaniment.
All you have to do is decide what kind of music you
want to play: salsa, rhumba, pop-rock or big band?
You are the band leader, which means that you have to
tell the members of your band what to play, including
how many bars there are to each song part and how
the melody and/or solo should be accompanied.
There are two main levels: Basic and Advanced, each
consisting of two divisions called Original and
Variation.
As the name implies, Basic is the "normal" accompa-
niment level, with the basic ingredients of a profes-
sional sounding accompaniment. The Advanced level
may contain another version of the selected Music
Style or a more elaborate one. On either level (Basic
and Advanced) you can choose between the Original
accompaniment or an alternative (called Variation).
The latter usually adds one or two parts to the current
accompaniment.
If you want the accompaniment to become more com-
plex as the song evolves, here is a useful sequence:
Typical song structure
1st Verse 2nd Verse 1st Chorus
Basic Basic/ Advanced/
Original Variation Original
Other elements help you refine the accompaniment.
Instead of abruptly changing to Advanced/Original,
you may want to play a short transition to announce a
new part of the song. That is what Fill In [TO VARIA-
TION] and [TO ORIGINAL] are for.
See "Switching Style arrangements (divisions)" on
page 28 for other Music Style divisions and functions
you can use to create a professional sounding accom-
paniment.
Each accompaniment (or Music Style) consists of up
to five parts:
Rhythm— This part takes care of the drums and
percussion.
Bass— This part plays the bass line of the selected
Music Style.
Accomp. 1~3— These are the melodic accompani-
ment parts. Certain Music Styles use this feature, play-
ing anything from a piano line to a guitar line, an
organ line to a synth pad line.
24
Settings
• The Sync Start function is turned on. This means that
• The Intro function is activated so that Style playback
• The keyboard is split at F#3. Use your left hand to
3rd Verse 2nd Chorus
Basic/ Advanced/
Variation Variation
• It selects a suitable (preset) tempo as well as an Upper
• To change the split point, see "Lower Tone on/off and
• As in Split mode, the KR-11 automatically selects the
• See "Auto: changing the Arranger defaults" on page 44
The bass and accompaniment parts rely on the chord
or note information you play in the chord recognition
area, i.e. the keyboard zone you have assigned to the
Arranger (originally the left half of the keyboard).
Also note that you can use the drum patterns of a
Music Style in other One Touch Program modes
(Piano and Organ). These patterns can be started in
the same way as entire Music Styles (with bass and
melodic accompaniments). See "Starting and Stop-
ping Styles" on page 26.
Press the One Touch Program [ARRANGER] button.
The KR-11 now automatically makes the following
settings:
the Arranger will start as soon as you begin playing
with your left hand.
will start with a musical introduction.
"transpose" the accompaniment pattern(s), and play
the melody with your right hand.
Tone for the selected Music Style.
Additional notes
split point" on page 44.
most appropriate pitch for the Tone assigned to the
Upper part. If you want to shift the pitch of the Upper
Tone in octave steps, see "Octave Shift: changing the
pitch by octaves" on page 21.
if you don't want the KR-11 to change the tempo and
select another Upper Tone every time you choose a
Music Style.
Piano Style Arranger — chord recognition on the
entire keyboard
If you press the [WHOLE] button after pressing the
One Touch Program [ARRANGER] button, the entire
keyboard will be scanned for chord information for
the Arranger. Let's call this mode Piano Style Arranger
mode.
The Arranger decodes every chord you play – no mat-
ter where you play it. Causing the Arranger to play
another chord requires that you play at least a triad