Yamaha RM50 Owner's Manual page 19

Playing the RM50
The RMS50 contains a great deal of sound variety: 500 preset voices, 500 partially-editable preset voice
variations, and 128 user voices, as well as 64 preset and 64 user rhythm kits. The first thing you'll want to
know to put all this variety to work is how you can get at the sounds.
Before we can explain the procedures used to select and play the RM50's sounds, however, you will
need to understand the difference between the two methods the RM50 uses to assign voices to a MIDI
channel. The two methods, or channel modes, are referred to using descriptive names: "rhythm kit' and
"pitched voice".
What Is a Rhythm Kit?
What Is a Pitched Voice?
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You will normally play the RM50's voices by selecting groups of different
sounds known as rhythm kits. The rhythm kit collects rhythm-related voices in
the manner of many recent synthesizers: different voices are assigned to each
MIDI note number, allowing you to play a broad range of rhythm sounds within a
single keyboard range.
In addition to voice assignments, a rhythm kit lets you specify, for each note,
the volume at which it plays the assigned voice, whether it will accept or ignore
key off messages, how it will respond to pitch bend messages, and which other
control change messages it will acknowledge. This entire assembly of voice
assignments and settings can be given a name and stored in an internal rhythm
kit memory bank (or in a card memory bank, if you insert a data card in the
DATA slot).
The rhythm kit is thus equivalent in many ways to the "drum voices" of the
SY77, the SY99, and related tone generators. (We have used term "rhythm kit"
for the RM50 to underscore the fact that this rhythm sound module does more
than just drums!) One advantage of the RMSO's rhythm kits is the fact that
notes BO through A#l have two voice slots which allow you to assign two
voices, rather than just one, to each of the note numbers in this range.
In addition to rhythm kits, the RMSO gives you another way to select and play
its voices. You can assign a single voice to play all notes, through the entire
range from C-2 to C8, received on a specified channel. Voices selected for play-
ing in this manner are known as pitched voices. The pitched voice setup, which
corresponds roughly to the normal voices of most synthesizers, is handy for
playing bass voices, orchestra hits, and other melodic sound effects.
A pitched voice consists of a voice selection plus a handful of other param-
eters, corresponding to those made for the individual notes of a rhythm kit, which
specify how the RMSO will respond to key off, pitch bend, and control change
messages received on the channel in question. Unlike the rhythm kit settings,
however, the channel settings are not permanently saved in memory banks,
since a pitched voice requires only one setting of each type.
The important point to understand here is that the word "voice" indicates
two different things at different levels. At the most basic level, a voice is a dis-
crete sound unit produced by one or two waveform elements. Voices can be
assigned to either a single note number (as part of a rhythm kit), or across a
channel's entire note number range. A pitched voice is what you get when you
use a voice in the latter manner.